-Walter Benjamin from "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction."
With this same attitude -that our offices, our means of daily transportation and current fiscal responsibilities, have locked us up, hopelessly, there are degrees of self understanding that a person may need to travel through (pardon the pun) in order to perceive their self in relation to those creations around them. In the age of mechanical reproduction, we have rapidly become the age of digital reproduction. And in that age, the work of art has lost nearly all of its value as reproduction has even itself become a thing of the past. This new age lays out paths to imagery in abundance, paintings as obtrusive and permeating throughout computer screens, television sets, and banners that plague the highways. Commodified, art's history of exploitation does not peak at any particular point. Accessibility does. And accessibility may or may not be peaking at this very moment. For what is not accessible, really? Does it truly matter that my neighbor have the original Robert Frank photographic print, framed on his wall, and I the copy? Who will care? And at what point does value trump aura, atmosphere, initial response, or reaction? As long as we are liars, we will print and pretend that copies are in fact the original piece, and as long as we lie to ourselves, authenticity will not matter, though some would like to believe otherwise. Authenticity is what, anyways, besides vomit in the gutter at 3am in the morning. Talk about abstract.
