From the protest songs of the 1960s, to political murals, to Ayn Rand novels or Brecht plays, art has a long history of being used in the service of politics. After all, couching one’s message in the form of a beautiful melody or breathtaking prose can help it to reach people who would be turned off by a straightforward speech. Yet, the message can also be diluted by the artistry — and vice versa. What is a “serious artist” who also cares about politics to do? Certainly, we are more than entitled to our opinions on political issues, but is our art the proper place to express them? As a composer and writer, it is a question I often ask myself, and I doubt I’m alone.
In his March opinion piece for the New York Times (which you should read), composer David T. Little examines these issues and more that trouble the “political artist.” Historically, he points out, art in the form of propaganda posters and anthems was used by totalitarian regimes to spread their hateful ideas and practices — and therefore, it was the “pre-emptive duty” of artists opposed to such regimes to engage in their own political posturing. “[P]olitical composers believed that since politics was going to concern itself with art — (as Hitler and Stalin proved) — art had better concern itself with politics.” Yet, not all political art need be message-oriented. Little feels that merely observing and commenting on politics, rather than explicit advocacy, is actually the preferable approach for modern artists:
[M]y reasons, approach, and techniques are different, because this historical moment is different. We are no longer amidst a social(ist) revolution in the United States (despite what the Tea Party says) and as such music with a strong ideological or revolutionary message can often feel out of place or out of touch. As a result, political composers are no longer the revolutionaries we once were. Instead, we function as critics.
While I think Little is on-target when it comes to the issues he mentions — we don’t need a modern “Internationale” — the fact that is that we do have other revolutions occurring at this particular historical moment. Mainly, the revolution in the political rights of and cultural attitudes toward LGBT people. Studies have shown that “knowing” gay fictional characters is similar to knowing a gay person when it comes to affecting attitudes toward LGBT people and issues. Artists with a wide audience, such as the people behind popular TV shows, movies and books, have a unique opportunity to reach people who would not otherwise seek out LGBT perspectives. A lot of people would never watch explicitly-gay shows like Queer As Folk or The L Word — but as we make more and more inroads to otherwise-straight shows, like Pretty Little Liars or Glee, it becomes harder and harder for homophobes to avoid queer people on TV. And harder and harder for them to avoid empathizing with us.
via afterellen.com
Even reality shows, despite their often stereotypical nature, can have an impact. Carson Kressley, once the co-host of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, mentions that as a result of the show: “I had so many young people come up to me and say, ‘You know, because of your show I was able to have a dialogue with my family about me being gay or a friend being gay.'” Now Kressley has a new show on OWN called Carson Nation, where he plans to hit the road to small-town America, increasing visibility even more.
So for me, the question isn’t whether I should take a stance on these issues with my music, the question is how effective it is. With the obvious exception of opera, classical music isn’t always the best medium for transmitting a “message”; even with lyrical songs, there’s a very thin line with “message music” between the inspirational and the pedantic. The other dilemma is how many people I will actually reach, now that classical music has become a niche genre — and modern classical music a niche within that niche. At the same time, though, because classical music is still seen as more “serious” than other forms of art, even controversial and racy works are granted “educational value” that popular media is often denied.
And those in the so-called “high arts” are taking their places on the barricades as well. We previously reported on the controversy surrounding Beached, an opera with a gay protagonist that was due for a premiere from Leeds’s Opera North, before the Bay Primary School objected and pulled their students. The school has since re-joined the production after the line “Of course I’m queer / That’s why I left here” was changed to “Of course I’m gay / That’s why I went away.” It turns out that the school didn’t object to the gay themes so much as the use of the word “queer,” with its history as an epithet. So now the kids of Bay Primary will get the chance to not only experience an amazing yet oft-misunderstood art form (in the opinion of this opera buff), but also learn a little about the lives of gay people — at an age when many of us didn’t even know what the word “gay” meant. And at an age when these kids probably wouldn’t be allowed to watch Glee or similar TV shows.
via Ann Johansson - NY Times
Theater, both musical and otherwise, has also been great to LGBT people. In fact, plays like The Children’s Hour (1934, film 1961) and The Boys in the Band (1968, film 1970) were on the cutting-edge in terms of media portrayals of homosexuality, addressing it when it was still very taboo. Yet, in recent decades, plays about gay people have taken an explicitly activist turn, discussing subjects such as AIDS (Rent, Angels in America) and anti-gay violence (The Laramie Project). The latest to enter the throng comes from Milk screenwriter Dustin Lance Black, who is working on a play about Proposition 8, titled “8,” to be premiered Sept. 9th at Broadway’s Eugene O’Neill Theater. It will go on tour to various colleges, including Carnegie Mellon, Northwestern and the University of Michigan; the cast of the Broadway revival of Hair also plans to include it as part of their upcoming national tour. Black was inspired to write 8 when he found out the Prop 8 trial would not be broadcast over the Internet:
“One of my hopes about the trial was to get the opposition in court, hands raised swearing to tell the truth, and have the world see the opposition called to account for going on TV saying gay people harm children, harm families,” Mr. Black said. “Since the trial itself wasn’t heard or seen, I wanted to get the story out another way.”
The script is largely taken directly from the several-thousand-page-long trial transcript, and Black worked for half a year “min[ing] the best arguments on both sides” to turn it into a 90-minute play. As 8 makes its way across Broadway and the country, it hopefully will turn even more hearts and minds toward the cause of equal marriage rights.
Because art imitates life, the increased pressure on artists to do battle in the struggle for equality can extend to their personal lives. The personal is political, after all. This has led to intense finger-wagging toward ambiguously-gay media personalities who have yet to make any official declarations. Yet, coming out is never easy, even for people in relatively liberal environments. We’re still unequal in the eyes of the law, regardless of what our friends and families think. Plus, there is the fact that sexuality often doesn’t fit into the neat labels society provides us, so the issue is less whether we will be accepted, but if we qualify in the first place. As Ricky Martin mentions in a recent interview: “Since I came out, a lot of people have said: ‘Were you living a lie?’ I don’t think I was. Was I feeling things with women? I was. And I was fully functional.”
via Rodney Smith - OUT
The other thing people tend to forget is that just because one has been able to move to a liberal, accepting place, it doesn’t mean they started out there — and it doesn’t mean the people back home stop mattering. As one would expect from a performing arts school in a blue state, the music conservatory I attend is bursting with gay men. It’s a running joke that half the guys in each freshman class will come out by the end of the year. Yet, some remain in the transparent closet, with everyone wondering why they have to hide who they are at such an ultra-gay school. It’s because they can’t stay behind come the holidays or summer. They have to go home, and back into the closet. And in the era of Facebook and, now, Google +, it’s becoming harder and harder for students to hide their college life from their parents and high school friends — whether that “double life” means partying their faces off or it means being gay. If it’s that hard for ordinary college students to be “selectively out,” imagine what it is like for celebrities!
Also, when Queen Latifah says that her personal life shouldn’t be an issue, I can’t help but think that is how it should be. Sexuality shouldn’t be a huge issue! Unfortunately, we are not there yet. While everyone is free to choose how/if they come out, including celebrities, I can’t help but feel like it compromises the “it gets better” message that even beloved celebrities are choosing to remain closeted. How, then, can we expect ordinary kids to take that step?
The role of the artist in political discourse is a complicated one, no matter the issue. But especially when it comes to the fight for queer equality, as sexuality is a much more personal topic than most others. What is more important: the “pre-emptive duty” artists have to help make things better, or an artist’s right to a private life? Or just to dictate the terms of their art? Little further explains why his music doesn’t take stances: “While I want my work to engage in the political, I have no interest in creating work that serves only as a vessel for delivering a political message. The world has enough pundits.” That makes perfect sense to me.
Not every artist should have to be an activist. Heck, not every artist can be. But for those who do use their talents for advocacy, it can make all the difference.
Thumbnail image via NY Gallery Tours
Wow. Being an engineering student, I had never even considered many of these themes or understood how they affect me. Thanks for the insight into the artist’s mind.
Coming out isn’t even an option for a lot of people – particularly if you are a minority in other ways. The queer/LGBT communities aren’t always open and accepting of minorities, and then there’s the cultural fallback. So basing art’s worth on whether celebrities are out as queer or not may not be very useful.
(Not to mention there are artists out there who are openly queer, like I am, but getting *recognised* as such is hard because we don’t fit queer-normative molds – trendy hipster clothing & hair, alt folk music, gangly lanky looks, whatever. It’s not a thing people consider about us.)
For me it’s about expressing my truth, my stories, my experiences. Being queer is part of my experience and I do want to express it, I do want to be recognised and acknowledged as queer damnit. So some of my work is about that – about how my skin colour is not code for my sexuality, that I am more complex than my looks and background may let on, that what “queer” means for me can be very different than what one expects.
In no way am I trying to say that the quality of one’s art depends on being out, so I apologize if I gave that impression. I simply think that when it comes to the “It Gets Better” message, that is compromised by the fact that so many well-known, beloved celebrities remain in the closet, especially when they’re in comparatively more welcoming environments than the average queer teen.
In the section about “being out” I’m speaking fairly specifically about celebrities and other artists who would count as “public figures”; it’s not intended to apply to queer people as a whole.
Their *audiences* may be, but their managers and handlers and la de da would freak the hell out. It’s still conservative in places, don’t want to be *too* edgy, you want to make the most money, etc.
And then there’s the Darren Hayes tactic: for years whenever people asked him about his love life he’d say “My partner’s name is Robert.” But no one actually paid attention or decided to print that because he never actually said “I am gay” until around 2006. Also, he keeps his private life private; his family and loved ones didn’t sign up to be famous, and I’d imagine that to extend to his partner(s) too.
Oh wait, the partner’s name is Richard. Not Robert. Robert’s a musical partner but not a lover. ahahahahhaha
That’s true about managers. Still, it puzzles me why managers would still have those attitudes; lately it’s seemed like “coming out” is a great way for one to INCREASE their profile and their no. of fans. Even in areas where the audience is less accepting. Look at Chely Wright and Jennifer Knapp.
And ftr by their environments being more accepting I was talking more about their physical environments rather than their audiences. Someone living in Hollywood or New York, where most “celebrities” are, is typically dealing with a much more diverse, accepting social group than someone living in, say, the rural or suburban Midwest. (And I can say that about the Midwest ’cause I’m from there, lol.)
I mention being queer in some of my writing, but I don’t make a big deal out of it. I treat it like it’s normal, because it is. I think sometimes it takes people off guard because they read my stuff and don’t think of me as a queer writer and then suddenly, BOOM! I’m talking about kissing girls.
I’m not famous, so I have no illusions of being a great political artist, but I think I representing my life openly and honestly in my writing makes a difference–even if it is a little difference.
I’ve been told that I “write like a straight person”. -_-
Are you kidding me? I would like to tell that person they give opinions like an idiot :)
That’s ignorance on the reader’s part; what does a ‘straight person’ write like as opposed to a ‘queer person’?
Don’t let it get you down.
Oops, that’s a response to Creatrix Tiara.
I have this same conflict of interest when writing. Because I run a blog and am still in the coming out process, im still apprehensible when it comes to blogging about queer issues. I want my blog to appeal to girls, yes, and I also want the blog to appeal to gay readers. Does one posit themselves as a queer writer or a writer who just happens to be queer? I guess the same can be said of all artists and activists.
i really like how you wove all those stories together
Wonderful article.
This is so smart. Everything about this is very smart. I really like this a lot.
Thanks everyone!
I was all about David T. Little’s article last year and I had no idea someone at Autostraddle had written a response! I need to check this site more often…
I like what you’re saying about how the conundrum of wanting to tackle queer issues as an artist has a lot to do with the intersection of public and private space. It’s interesting that the “gayest” composer I know is a white man (like most composers), David del Tredici. I think he does a fantastic job of bringing his radical queerness into the space of contemporary classical music, largely by, as you wisely intuit, bringing his private life into the public (because who doesn’t love a song cycle called “My Favorite Penis Poems”?). But I feel like that space could benefit from some more point of views, such lesbians or POCs or genderqueers, or really anyone else. He’s sort of a lone wolf on that front. Nico Muhly (another white male) also sort of inhabits that space but I think it’s more of a sideline issue for him rather than a major part of his work.
I also agree with another point you make, which is that it’s difficult to find a successful compositional medium for conveying politics. I, too, find that abstract orchestral or chamber works surrounding a topic are pretty insufficient. It takes something big and theatrical, with words and even multimedia, like an opera, to bring issues to life. But the problem with opera is that it’s outdated: the big opera halls and stuffy conventions surrounding the through-composed style is alienating to modern audiences. Perhaps the most successful artistic work of political commentary I’ve seen recently was Ted Hearne’s Katrina Ballads, which was a sort of oratorio about Hurricane Katrina, using public domain texts such as news interviews and commentary, combined with multimedia elements like video collages of the wreckage, he really brought the point home. I’d love to see something big, modern, and successful like that responding to some of the big political issues the queer community faces.
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I have so, so much to say about this article and little time to do so, so I’m going to begin by saying that as a teenage queer female violist, composer, musicologist, history nerd, social activist, 20th century classical music aficionado, and inhabitant of the Internet, thank you so very much. I particularly appreciate your writing on this subject in reference to art and especially the intersection of politics and music: I study Soviet music, and it irritates me infinitely that the Western public abuses Shostakovich and Prokofiev and their music for the furthering of our own political and historical agendas. When art is inundated by politics, it can kind of cease to be art, especially when the politics are potentially supplied by the interpreters rather than the creators.
Additionally, as you so well explain, the reality is that self-preservation sometimes has to take priority over both politics and art. I have had my cake and been able eat it too in terms of art, politics and personal health and safety, but I know that there are tons of music students (and students of all disciplines) whose educations, careers, and relationships depend upon staying inside the closet. It’s even more disheartening for me to know that the reason I have the liberty to be talking about classical music is that I’m a very privileged person even taking my marginalized identities into account. It’s an awful lot easier to be a queer artist and involved in politics when you’re white, cisgender, and can afford a decent instrument and private lessons.