Topic: Newsmax
Last year, we caught Newsmax columnist Alexandra York insisting that any art that is not directly representational of something is somehow bad. She began her Sept. 5 column by praising all things classical:
We start by identifying that the English term "classical" finds its etymological roots in the Latin adjective classicus which referred to the highest class of Ancient Roman citizens. “Classic” also denoted the Romans’ adoration of all things considered timeless by the Greeks like philosophy, architecture, drama, mythology, and the visual arts.
Later, these terms referred to distinguished literary figures as well. So, we see that from inception the word described the best, most excellent, most revered, and most refined.
As century after century ensued and Europe developed its cultural achievements in arts and letters, usage of the word expanded along with the progress, but it never deviated from its original reference to the most excellent and refined.
In today’s world, too, it retains that essence of meaning and has come to describe everything from formalized “classical” Western orchestral and operatic music to stylishly “classic” clothing that are appreciated by sophisticated and knowledgeable people as superbly accomplished, timeless, and harmonious expressions of beauty and elegance.
She went on to praise classical music and art -- read: white and European -- before we got to her complaint that anything that doesnt follow her ideals is inherently bad:
As in 20th-century atonal music’s abandonment of traditional “classical” form, however, much 20th-century painting and sculpture dismissed the central tenets of “classic” and focused on non-realist and abstract art that denied and, in many cases, brutally bastardized the ideas of excellence, proportion, and ennobling beauty initiated by the Greeks.
Of course. She concluded by gushing over all things classical again:
Thus, in everyday life the “classic” still denotes excellence, refinement, timelessness, and beauty just like the highest of arts.
Ergo: Classic always means refined in technical creation-execution and harmonious in presentation: hence, the term “classy” in its most serious sense.
No room for any deviation from the norm here.
