The Authority of the Object

It seemed like we were having some difficulty unpacking just what Benjamin was talking about in his essay "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" in class. I'd like to bring in another complicating factor that we might not really have discussed much: the "authority of the object." Benjamin states that, "what is really jeopardized when the historical testimony is affected is the authority of the object" (1235). And "historical testimony rests on the authenticity," the particular quality of a work of art as a unique original that exists in times and places unique to itself.

So, if a work is reproduced, then it does not have a link to the unique history of the original, and therefore dilutes the "authority" that that object has in its particular time and place? It seems that reproductions, by putting images of the original in different contexts, would undermine the strength of the original context of a work. Although we were discussing the ways in which reproduced objects can have auras of their own, can exist to broaden the affect of a certain artwork, it seems as though Benjamin is almost speaking against reproductions as legitimate artworks, because they are separate from/dilute original historical context.

So time and place are clearly essential for a work of art to be original, and an artwork has more "authority," more clout as an original, if it is not reproduced. Benjamin goes on to discuss how this originality is linked to tradition: "The uniqueness of a work of art is inseparable from its being imbedded in the fabric of tradition" (1236). Here it seems that Benjamin is implying that history is essential along with usefulness. An artwork needs to have a function within history to motivate its existence, and reproductions do not fulfill this same function. In fact, perhaps they undermine not only the historical specificity of a piece, but its usefulness as an object of ritual as well.

Although it seems to me that there is a sort of negative tone to much of what Benjamin says about reproductions, and their part in the decay of the aura, the spreading and diluting of the "authority of the object" is not necessarily all bad. While it may make the original artwork less original, in a way, it does allow for multiple historical interpretations for a piece, that would not necessarily be possible otherwise. It seems that reproduction creates something similar to the "death of the Author" that Barthes discussed, carrying this idea further to the "death of the Original..."