Kitsch or Art? Guessing Game

>>>>

A series of questions designed to gauge your aesthetic sensibility. Structure is dualistic\either/or, usually.

>>>> question one

Which magazine would you prefer to read/look at with interest?

The New Yorker

-or-

jodi.org

>>>>>question two

Which mode of highly-organized Western music appeals to you?

Mozart, symphony no. 40 in g minor, 1st movement

-or-

Tchaikovsky, Serenade for Strings in C Major, Op. 48

>>>>>question three

What film is more enjoyable?

The Royal Tenenbaums 

-or-

Rear Window

>>>>>question four

do you wear thick-framed glasses because your eyesight is so very poor it necessitates a heavy frame to support the weight of your lenses, or do you wear them because it is fashionable?

>>>>>question five

Which graph makes more sense?

-or-

>>>>>question six

Which painting seems "familiar?"

American Gothic / Grant Wood

-or-

Angelus Novus / Paul Klee

mua Ha Ha HA.

Kraftwerk vs. Coldplay

Last in a series with potential for indefinite continuation.

Preliminary Definition of Horror

composed for my Religion and Film class


In a culture that esteems binaries so highly, defining an abstract word by simply assigning it a series of synonyms or associated terms fails to encompass the totality of the word. We gain understanding of a concept not only by declaring what it is, but also through discerning what it is not. Oppositional concepts in particular reassure the universe’s innate orderliness: male and female, figure and ground, good and evil. Dualism permeates our lives to the point of intuition. Without a match, a balance, or an equalizer, a concept threatens stability, offsets the poise of the world.

Defining “horror” automatically invokes the usual slew of synonyms. Some perfect combination of loathing, repulsion, and terror might suffice. We could add a negative embellishment to this definition and say horror is not fondness, not tranquility, and perhaps achieve a further understanding this way. Yet none of these concepts capture the true essence of horror.

This is because horror is far beyond our system of binaries and the aforementioned concepts are not. The experience of horror occurs when a person cannot readily place an experience, an event, a sight or sense into a pre-defined organizational grid. The things we find horrific disrupt the continuity of our mental framework. Stated bluntly, horror constitutes that which is beyond our realm of understanding; it falls between binaries or is way outside of them. The best opposites of horror, “awe” or “wonder,” offer no orientating cues either for precisely the same reason: they are outside our realm of understanding. Thus, we can situate horror neither through affirmation nor apotheosis. Horror is perfectly incomprehensible.