Botticelli’s Birth of Venus and Kate Moss modelling for Topshop were cited as contrasting ideals of beauty in a debate on whether or Britain has become indifferent to beauty. Photograph: Corbis/AFP
Beauty. A topic that never goes away. I’ve written about it many times on this blog, quoting from some of my favorite books in the subject. Like the other big tent concepts of Truth, Reality and God, it just keeps roping us in, generation after generation.
The latest riff on this tune is a witty piece by British art/cultural critic Stephen Bayley. I’ve posted it on Slow Painting but I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to rant a bit here. While Bayley’s piece is full of that famous British irony and playful cynicism, he does touch on how the shift to a more values-based approach to life is in keeping with the turbulent “revolution” (my word–is it too soon to apply that term to what is happening right now?) we are witnessing. I’m watching and you’re watching as cultural preconceptions and attitudes fractalize and morph into completely unexpected forms. As the title to the aptly-named book Uncontrollable Beauty implies, the Big B will not be held hostage and will not go away, hard as many have tried to shut it out. Its tenacity is, well, downright inspiring.