Art and Left Politics

[Carrol Cox <cbcox@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I want to raise as a hypothesis at least worth exploring that the
political effect of a movie, a poem, a painting, a commerical, a musical
performance depends *not* on the content or style of the work but on the
political context in which it is received. That in periods of great
leftist political activity even the most reactionary art will be
interpreted by large sectors of the audience in progressive terms and
have a progressive impact, while in periods of relative quiescence of
the working class and progressive political activity even the most
progressive/revolutionary art will be perceived as conservative and will
tend to have a conservative influence. Within what sort of a framework
did the bulk of the audience that saw The Matrix perceive that film?

Just a thought.

Carrol