In 476AD, the world saw the end of the Western Roman Empire. Nearly a thousand years later, its successor, the Byzantine Empire, likewise collapsed. Other noteworthy empires–the British and the Ottoman, for example–fell prey to economic outmaneuvering and the ravages of world wars. Yet what caused the fall of Rome? In comparing the flourishing peace of Pax Romana to the inwards crumble of Rome or the violent collapse of the Byzantines, one clear factor in common was the overexpansion of the empire. That which too readily ate up its neighbors was in turn too readily robbed of the same assets. The British Empire had learned this lesson; when the time came in the early twentieth century to de-colonize, they grudgingly yielded to the necessity of downsizing their reach, and thusly preserved what properties they could safely retain.
What does this have to do with anything? Well, I posit the idea that Art is an empire. Likewise, one can label Science to be the same; however, Art is unique in its freedom to expand as it wishes. Aesthetics are highly subjective, and if one person creates something that they believe to be artistic, there is little room for others to disagree–at least, there will be no changing the opinion of the artist. Such was seen in the last lecture on the subject of the GFP Bunny; despite many protests to the contrary, Mr. Shanken (sorry if I got the name wrong) was steadfast in his definition of the subject as art. If we were to go back to the Roman model one might connect this phenomenon to the peripheral communities who did not identify themselves as Roman, but were subsumed in the name of the Empire despite this minor detail. This may be taking the analogy a bit too far, but it brings up the point originally intended: Art may be expanding its borders at too fast a rate.
Fortunately there is no true counter-Empire to that of the Arts; were Art to theoretically fall, the void of Aesthetics could only be filled by the very same Art; one might say its immortality is by virtue of its definition. However, the other ailments of imperial collapse are not so easily avoided. That is, were there a point at which Art had expanded its boundaries to include too vast a reach of subjects, it could fall victim to (1) lack of governmental support, i.e. a decrease in recognition from the people (which we can already see in a variety of the more obscure or less accessible forms of art); (2) attack from external forces, i.e. a rejection of the Arts by a casual observer, particularly as a result of inaccessible artwork; (3) underpopulation, i.e. a lack of artists, too thinly distributed over so many sects; (4) civil rebellion, i.e. protest within the artistic community; and many more. To be sure, all of these problems occur not only in overgrown empires, but in any State; however, expansionism past maintainable capacity is a catalyst for their geometric growth.
Thus I protest not the liberty of artists to constantly push the boundaries of Art, but instead the propriety of doing so. Although Art clearly thrives on the advantageous aspects of innovative growth, it is not impervious to the less advantageous side effects of doing so. My concern is simply that, while Art has not befallen any great calamity due to its expansionism, it might be on the brink of doing so; or, if there is no sudden cliff to fall off of, we may be on the top of a very long downwards slope, a gradual degradation that accelerates as time goes by. The empirical evidence goes against me; Art has been expanding since it was first conceived. However, its growth is exponential, and with every step made in other fields of innovation, such as science, multiple new venues of artistic expression open. I cannot help but worry that we are inevitably heading towards an Artistic carrying capacity–if not an imperial collapse, a Malthusian one.
Since I would be far too long-winded if I were to discuss Malthus, I’ll put up links about him instead.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malthus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malthusian_catastrophe
http://www.gutenberg.org/catalog/world/readfile?fk_files=6366&pageno=8
