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This Twitter thread is just really really bad. The argument it attributes to Benjamin is just not what his essay says at all. In fact, Benjamin was a pioneer in

This Twitter thread is just really really bad. The argument it attributes to Benjamin is just not what his essay says at all. In fact, Benjamin was a pioneer in what we'd call "media studies," and he wrote about popular entertainment long before the rest of academia took that sort of thing seriously. And if that were all that were wrong with it, it'd be a petty criticism, but this attitude--of assuming every critic is an elitist snob--just pervades the whole thing. Critics don't hate Thomas Kinkade (dude gets his name wrong, also, twice) "because he mass produced his art"--so did Warhol, so do most modern artists on some level. They hate him because his work is kitschy and boring. It's the elevator music of painting. Contra the author, comics are taught in higher education. There was a whole furor roughly a year ago because religious students at Duke were angry about being assigned Fun Home. There are academics who specialize in science fiction, who write about comic books. This entire long thread is against an enemy that doesn't exist anymore.

sp332 9y ago
Asking for game(r)s to be taken seriously is specifically asking the elitists to legitimize the medium. Non-elitist critics might take games seriously but they don't count because culturally they aren't the gatekeepers to legitimacy. I think the Kinkade point wasn't about mechanical mass production but mass appeal. Critics might not like the work but he sold zillions of prints. There's clearly a disconnect between what people think is good and what gets praised as good.
- maldusiecle 9y ago
  That's the thing, though--who are these gatekeepers he's imagining? Game studies are growing rapidly in academia. So-called "elite" media (which is, let's face it, much cheaper to consume than the games themselves) don't necessarily exclude games anymore. The New Yorker runs articles about games, for instance. But it's silly to act as if dislike of games never has anything to do with quality. A lot of games, even now, have stilted dialogue, poorly-considered plots, inept voice acting. They're bad _as games_, and this applies even to many of the widely-praised ones. It's counterproductive to act as if lack of coverage for games has nothing to do with this. Many people like Thomas Kinkade. Many people like hundred-hour long video games with badly-dubbed dialogue, repetitive battles, and lots of bugs. People should be allowed to like what they like, but that road goes both ways. Critics aren't obligated to pretend they enjoy things that actually make them miserable, just because that's what people are buying.
dabber 9y ago
>>he mass produced his art"--so did Warhol, so do most modern artists on some level Not sure how far back "modern" goes but Florence was full of workshops[0] during the renaissance. A lot of the good stuff (David IIRC) was produced by teams of professional artists to some degree. [0] http://matthewgream.net/Professional/HistoryOfArt/workshops_1.pdf http://matthewgream.net/Professional/HistoryOfArt/workshops_...

sp332 9y ago

Asking for game(r)s to be taken seriously is specifically asking the elitists to legitimize the medium. Non-elitist critics might take games seriously but they don't count because culturally they aren't the gatekeepers to legitimacy. I think the Kinkade point wasn't about mechanical mass production but mass appeal. Critics might not like the work but he sold zillions of prints. There's clearly a disconnect between what people think is good and what gets praised as good.

maldusiecle 9y ago
That's the thing, though--who are these gatekeepers he's imagining? Game studies are growing rapidly in academia. So-called "elite" media (which is, let's face it, much cheaper to consume than the games themselves) don't necessarily exclude games anymore. The New Yorker runs articles about games, for instance. But it's silly to act as if dislike of games never has anything to do with quality. A lot of games, even now, have stilted dialogue, poorly-considered plots, inept voice acting. They're bad _as games_, and this applies even to many of the widely-praised ones. It's counterproductive to act as if lack of coverage for games has nothing to do with this. Many people like Thomas Kinkade. Many people like hundred-hour long video games with badly-dubbed dialogue, repetitive battles, and lots of bugs. People should be allowed to like what they like, but that road goes both ways. Critics aren't obligated to pretend they enjoy things that actually make them miserable, just because that's what people are buying.

dabber 9y ago

>>he mass produced his art"--so did Warhol, so do most modern artists on some level Not sure how far back "modern" goes but Florence was full of workshops[0] during the renaissance. A lot of the good stuff (David IIRC) was produced by teams of professional artists to some degree. [0] http://matthewgream.net/Professional/HistoryOfArt/workshops_1.pdf http://matthewgream.net/Professional/HistoryOfArt/workshops_...