by Jon Lackman | 25 June 2010 | Theory
A propos of our recent discussion of Ruskin, I recently discovered a new article on Ruskin’s views of art and morality in the Jan 2010 Modern Language Review (105:1) by Jeremy Tambling. He contrasts Ruskin with Nietzsche:
Ruskin wishes to believe that art reveals morality, or that morality shows itself in art; in other words, he accepts that art in some way can be predicated on the moral sense, and that a morality can be derived from good art. Nietzsche, however, has no such sense of a basis for art. No morality generates art; rather, because there is no morality, no justice at work in life, art becomes the more necessary. Nietzsche is postmodern in not believing in any basis which makes art possible; Ruskin, despite his unconversion of 1858, and consequent refusal of a formal religious basis to life, cannot think of art as being baseless, or rather, he does not wish to think it.
