JaHecht

Art doesn't die if it doesn't innovate. That's technology. Art is expression. It won't die man. Innovation is arts appendix. It's not really needed for to reach the ultimate goal of feelings, thought, and dancing. In fact, some of the things you fear most you might actually find beneficial. Poetry experienced what you would call a "death" as post-modernism began, Ginsberg being the last classic perhaps? Well Dylan, who doesn't constitute much of a singer has shouted his poetry into ears and has changed more lives than most pen-and-paper guys. If you want to do something new, consider opera. Not opera as in the genre that was popular in the previous centuries, but opera as it would be now! Aesthetics will constantly shift unnoticed, so your "new" is now. Example, the peak of this culture of revivalism you speak about is probably something like the Strokes. They're often compared to Television and the Velvet Underground. Listen to VU&Nico, Marquee Moon, and Is This It back to back to back. You'll notice how different they are when you stop focusing on how similar they are. Cheer up my Ferky, music is ALIVE. I know plenty of people who really can't sit through a movie, but everyone with hearing has a favorite band when they're young.

You misunderstand Ferkun, it is not that the depth of the human experience is mapped, it is that it will no longer continue to expand in a way comparable to the way it has expanded. EDIT: And art will live as long as emotion. Plus it seems to me that you think of the periods as the articulation and mapping of the human experience, when it is merely border-making. A dozen periods, a BILLION works of art. It is not romanticism that moves you I say, it is the Third!

This question is known as the "Post-Modern Conundrum" and it applies to all of the arts, architecture, and ideologies of today. It argues itself: meaning most of the posts and views expressed in this thread are actually a part of the question. The clearest way for this question to be presented is often thought to be its political manifestation. IF a governments role is to serve and represent the needs and views of its people, then there is simply no better form of government than a social democracy. The conundrum is that this must be an endpoint in political ideology, since a social democracy has the capacity (barring external forces i.e. war, incurable illness, etc.) to both serve and represent its people fully. This idea of government cannot be improved upon or put through a "revolution" that wouldn't change the concept so much that it could still be called "government." So, to the people in this thread who are begging for a revolution: the ages of art never really existed, they are a system of classifications we've used to study scientifically and philosophically the nature of human expression. Monet wished to paint light. Debussy, like all composers, wanted a mood out of his compositions. They did not set out to create impressionism. The main philosophic virtue of romanticism existed in many baroque pieces. Modernism recognizes this and thusly makes the first active decision to "innovate" in the arts and here is where Pollack, Burroughs, and Cage have left the world their ultimate gift: We now live in an age of pure aesthetics. There is even an aethetic of experimentation as evidenced by the growing number of "noise" fans in a demographic typical of underground ROCK fans. They enjoy the cacophony for the cacophony. But as I said, this number is growing which leads to my last point... Music will sound so different by the time we die. It will change, however, in a way that is unclassifiable following the line of thinking that classifies impressionism as being distinct from romanticism. "Revolutions" are dead, yet "new" is all around you... as 4'33'' made clear, music is anything and everything.