'Man as an artist is at home only in Paris' (Frederick Nietzsche).
The city is the mass collection of individuals from different ethnic backgrounds, with different tastes and different beliefs. It is the center of culture. There are many sub-cultures and niche groups and this facilitates much artistic potential. In this essay I will discus why some artists are attracted to working and living in cities. I will argue that the four main benefits of urban living for artists are: it is a place of many encounters and hence inspiration; it is a place where often avant-garde art is produced; it offers anonymity and the possibility for recreation; and it is the place of modern life and modern culture.
I will examine artists and art in the urban environment focusing primarily on literary writers and musicians. The city is an attraction for artists from both high and experimental art to low brow and popular art. The city not only provides a place for artists to work but it is most often the focus of much of their artistic expression.
In the nineteenth century Baudelaire wrote poems about the urban experience in Paris, and Charles Dickens wrote realist novels depicting life in London; whilst only a decade ago rappers from Los Angeles and New York expressed life in a big city through hip hop. Ultimately the city provides a wealth of inspiration, it is where the majority of people live and it is were human nature and human emotion is most frequently encountered and best expressed.
Baudelaire, a French poet, wrote pioneering poetry about the city and the experiences of city living and modern life. Gilloch (1996: 133) suggests that Baudelaire, "presents the finest articulation of the experience of the modern individual in the urban setting." For Baudelaire the role of the artist was to express modern life and human emotion and the only way to do this was to engage with the outside world. Schwarzbach (1979: 1) suggests that, "modern life is city life", hence, the city is a playground of inspiration and the perfect setting for the artistic expression of modern life. Gilloch (1996:138) suggests that Baudelaire had an ambivalent relationship with the city.
The city was both heaven and hell; both bestial and beautiful. Benjamin (Quoted in Gilloch 1996: 138) argued that, "No one felt less at home in Paris than Baudelaire." This love hate relationship with - and response to - the city was the perfect inspiration for Baudelaire.
Although the city was the location of ruination and intoxication it was also compelling. "For Baudelaire, as for Benjamin, the color and noise of the street and the hustle and bustle of the modern metropolitan crowd were not only vital components of the text, but were the necessary conditions surrounding its genesis" (Gilloch 1996: 138). The crowds and the movement; the flows of people and the busyness of the city were the necessary environment for the creation of art expressing modern life. Baudelaire had an ambivalent approach to the city. A love hate relationship that inspired him to write.
He acted as a flaneur - a walker - drifting with the crowd. Benjamin (1983: 55) suggests that, "The flaneur is someone abandoned in the crowd." In the crowd but outside the crowd the flaneur receives fleeting impressions of modern life.The artist in Benjamin's view is a spectator of the urban who is distinctly separate from the crowd in order to observe. The view of artists as flaneur's, strolling through the city streets, inhaling their surroundings, demonstrates the possibilities for inspiration in the city.
The industrial revolution from 1750 to 1850 produced massive population growth in London. Charles Dickens who wrote and lived in London through these times was largely inspired by London and the possibilities for interaction the large city enabled.strong Dickens, like Baudelaire, had an ambivalent approach to the city.
Schwarzbach (1979: 23) suggests that Dickens had an "attraction of repulsion" towards the city. This repulsion is seen in his novels.strong "Places and people, in the city of London are used in Oliver Twist to evoke a nightmare vision of a bestial city of death" (Schwarzbach 1979: 47). The city is portrayed as dark and evil. It generates fear and suspense for both the characters and the readers.
Also like Baudelaire, Dickens played the role of a flaneur. He was inspired by walking through the city and absorbing his surroundings. "Over the course of his writing career, he began to sense the connection between inspiration and walking the streets" (Schwarzbach 1979: 26).
Dickens' daughter Kate recalls that her dad "would walk through busy, noisy streets, which would act like a tonic and enable him to take up with new vigour the flagging interest of his story and breathe new life into its pages”" (Schwarzbach 1979: 27).
