Swing Between The "aura" And "shock" Art Geek

Among all the important aestheticians in the 20th century, only a few people showed their affirmatives and praises to the modern technique and its form of art. Walter Benjamin who was a special representative of Germany Frankfurt School belonged to them. With the context of situation at that time, he declared the coming of the age of "Mechanical duplication", which made the traditional "Aura" art died out. Instead he developed his idea of modern "Shock" art, considering that the modern "Shock" art, which was characteristic of Mechanical duplication, had some revolutionary potential, that is, politicization of the art, democratization of the art, etc. He had an optimistic and admiring attitude of this "Shock" art;therefore, he was misunderstood as a "technicalist". Actually, retrospecting the whole process of his aesthetics development, we will find that he always swung between the "Aura" art and the "Shock" art. And his value is indeed in this ambivalence.This paper endeavors to discuss Benjamin's abundant aesthetics thought, with the methods of perusing the materials and comparing China and the Western country. It started with his theory of "art production", and then led to his main opinion that "technique is the productivity of art development", in order to discuss with the concept of "Aura", "Shock", and "Mechanical duplication". The innovation of this paper is to analyze his explanation of the aesthetics characteristic of "Aura" art and "Shock" art and his ambivalence, which swung between them and its reasons. With this conclusion so that it could develop the significant guidance in theory for the cultural construction in China, and to expound my own attitude towards the popular culture and literary heritage with the own cultural circumstance in China.