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6 - Nature, culture, chance

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 October 2009

Boris Wiseman
Affiliation:
University of Durham
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Summary

In this chapter, I would like to continue to explore some of the untapped potentialities of Lévi-Strauss's thought for an understanding of art, and more specifically certain forms of avant-garde art. The question at the core of this chapter may be summed up as follows: to what extent may avant-garde art be seen to function mytho-poetically? The precise meaning of this question will become apparent in what follows. In very broad terms, what I designate here by ‘mytho-poetic function’, following a view that is implicit in Lévi-Strauss's works but not theorised as such, is a boundary-marking function, one that is at the very core of the way in which we create an order of the world around us.

To explore this mytho-poetic function of art, I would like to turn to a series of three key essays that I have so far only touched upon: ‘Indian Cosmetics’ (1942), ‘Split Representation in the Art of Asia and America’ (1963a: 245–68; 1958: 269–94) and ‘A Native Society and Its Style’ (chapter xx of Tristes Tropiques). These essays, written in the 1940s, deal with a topic seemingly far from that of mythical thought, a form of body painting practised by the Caduveo, a population from the Matto Grosso region of Brazil. As we shall see, however, they are crucial for an understanding of the mytho-poetic function and indeed of Lévi-Strauss's aesthetic thought in general.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2007

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  • Nature, culture, chance
  • Boris Wiseman, University of Durham
  • Book: Levi-Strauss, Anthropology, and Aesthetics
  • Online publication: 27 October 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511585883.007
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  • Nature, culture, chance
  • Boris Wiseman, University of Durham
  • Book: Levi-Strauss, Anthropology, and Aesthetics
  • Online publication: 27 October 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511585883.007
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Nature, culture, chance
  • Boris Wiseman, University of Durham
  • Book: Levi-Strauss, Anthropology, and Aesthetics
  • Online publication: 27 October 2009
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511585883.007
Available formats
×