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Salient. An organ of student opinion at Victoria University, Wellington. Vol. 23, No. 8. Monday, September 12, 1960
"Salient" At Tournament: Obscurity and Subtlety Synonyms at Arts Festival
"Salient" At Tournament: Obscurity and Subtlety Synonyms at Arts Festival
A great deal of work went into the organisation of the second students' Arts' Festival in New Zealand. The programme, subsidised by Shell, was magnificent. The opening statement by Don Locke, the Arts Festival controller, is well worth reprinting in full:
"It is exceedingly difficult to speak of art and/or culture without appearing to ride the intellectual hobby horse of the great gods Art and Culture, two beings who are at least as obnoxious as the much despised Mammon, yet we do feel inclined to lament the fact that New Zealand lies materially happy if spiritually enervated in a cultural backwater.
"Many regard the lack of an authentic New Zealand culture as our greatest omission, but the desperate attempt to produce an art of our own usually degenerates into good-cobber Kiwism, with the peculiar point of view that we remain uncultured until we can develop an art circumscribed by our accidental boundaries in space and time. What we do lack in this country is rather a sense of the value of art, and the chance for it to be presented and appreciated. It is the national drama, ballet and opera organisations which are building, however slowly, an art in New Zealand.
Spirit Of Adventure
"It seems to me that the important function of a Festival of the Arts lies primarily in the awakening of an awareness among those who observe what we have to offer. The University is traditionally a place where the spirit of adventure never dies, and certainly the products of art find an audience here, even if that audience is often more impressed by its own awareness than by what it is aware of. ... I would like to present it simply as a step towards that enjoyment and understanding of things artistic which we find so sorely lacking in New Zealand."
Coffee And Crumpets
The Canterbury Literary Society organised three "coffee and crumpets" sessions (4.30 to 6.0) for the Arts Festival. These were held in the upstairs Common Room and were very well attended. The atmosphere was one of cheerful pessimism. To Salient's reporter (who admittedly has no literary background) the poetry and prose read at these sessions seemed obscure. It is Impossible to go Into a detailed analysis of the contributions to the "Literary Yearbook" and the other manuscripts read, but they were all similar in style to our own "Experiment." No purpose and no polish. Rarely clever. The prose seemed to be flaccid and uninspiring.
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Judy Garland, sensational nude-in-a-mink coat, in Victoria's "Keep it in the Family."
The predominant type at coffee and crumpets (it was coffee and sausage-roles actually) was the Professional student: beard, corduroys, dark glasses, and duffle coat, with a sheaf of sonnets "I just happen to have with me" in the pocket. The president of Auckland's Art School cut a dashing figure in long hair, duffle coat, Roman sandals, and toga! The pious exclamation of one of may not have been too far off the mark.
The Inscrutable
The approach to Art of New Zealand's youth is reflected in these ways of dress. Their aim is to play the eccentric, to strike a pose, to be Inscrutable. But this is surely not the attitude of a genuine artist? Jimmy Baxter, for example, is sincere and conscientious in his approach to life; he is keen to engage; to understand the other man's feelings; he his art.
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But the attitude at the Arts Festival is exactly the opposite. Write down the words first and wonder what it means afterwards. Obsecurity and subtlety are synonyms. The triumph or communication is non-communication. Words, words, words written by superficial pseudo-poets in love with the image of their own personalities, and pretentious prose-writers having the intellectual stature of an amoeba and the verbal ability of a horse!
Professor Rhodes, in his address, emphasised this point—the artist must cease to be introspective for its own sake, he must establish contact with the community. Communication is just as important as self-expression.
Perhaps we can develop his remarks by saying that there is a "complementarity principle" between these two terms. Complete self - expression communicates nothing (e.g. Surrealism, or prose in nonsense language), and complete communication means that the message is trivial. N.Z. art, particularly in the literary field tends toward the former extreme.
Good and Bad Drama
This really was the bright side of the festival. The plays presented were:
The Desperate People—Booth (A.U.)
Keep It In The Family—Prevert (V.U.W.)
Sordid Story—Coppard (M.A.C.)
Two Gentlemen of Verona—Shakespeare (C.U.)
The Apollo de Bellac—Giraudoux (O.U.)
The Adelphi—Terence (C.U.)
Le bureau central des idees—Gehri (A.U.)
Le mariage force—Moliere (C.U.)
Interieur—Maeterlinck (V.U.W)
Cecile, ou l'Ecole des peres—Anouilh (O.U.).
Keep it in the Family and Sordid Story were exceptionally good. The latter, judged to be the best
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"Salient" At Tournament— Continued from Page 1.
play, was written by a New Zealander (J. A. S. Coppard) and produced by Massey Agricultural College (that's one in the eye for the "cultural" universities!) The unique setting is a man's mind with memory, operation, hearing, vision, anger, fear, and jealousy acting within it. "Memory" for example is cool and rational. Despite all the emotional crises which evolve in the play he continues to read through his pile of typewritten cards, mentioning particular phrases that someone has used in the past; odd fragments of past impressions. "Jealousy" on the other hand, dressed in green cloak and makeup, is vindictive and terrible.
The effectiveness of the setting can perhaps be traced to the doctrine that nothing is real but the thoughts and impressions in our heads. All we can be sure of is the image on our retina; the rest is inference.
The disturbing effect of this play is that it suggests that none of the elements in our personalities is dominant. It is an unproven assumption in psychology, that our minds are crowned with an "ego" —that we do, in fact, have a true self." But is this true, or is it, as the play suggests that our minds, our "selves" are simply the momentary resultant of our emotions? It's enough to make an existentialist reach for his Bible. We certainly hope that Massey are invited to put this on at Victoria.
Polished Comedy
Victoria's "Keep it in the Family" by Jaques Prevert was an extremely sophisticated and polished comedy. The play itself is a satire on Freud's work: the daughter (Ruth Garland) a sensational nude-in-a-mink-coat, falls in love with the father (Barry Green), and the column-writing mother (Katherine Lennart) with her son (Geoff. Henry) who has become a worker priest, in particular, a worker plumber priest. Anne Able, Peter Dickinson, and John Ross give magnificent performances as the housekeeper, the lawyer, and "mistress to the colonel." "Salient's" reporters can only join with the audience at the Festival in saying that it is the most hilarious thing we have seen. Once again, may we hope that this is repeated at Victoria.
Victoria Dominates
Music at the Christchurch Festival was dominated by the Victoria contingent: Evelyn Killoh, Susan Jones, Penelope Saunders, Robin Maconie, Peter Merz, and Maurice Quinn. In fact, John Ritchie, an important conductor in Christchurch said "Victoria made the Music Festival." We had a complete concert entirely to ourselves and were the only university to present original works; e.g. Gary Mutton's "Adagio"; Robin Maconie's "Trio Sonata"; and Kit Powell's "Allegro Barbarosso!" Mr Mutton's work was impressive; Foster Brown writing in The Press referred to "The beautiful pianissimo playing of Miss Saunders" and "The piece was attractive and deserving of the excellent performance." Mr Mutton in fact, has a most pleasing style. A recent issue of "The Listener" contained the excellent remark that "Nothing is duller than to make the imagination redundant ... and excitement in Art la the provocation of an inner vision." "Adagio" did not make the imagination redundant; all that was presented was the basic idea; the music was Open—the broad view and no tumbling with the details. Because of this, it has been seriously suggested in some quarters that Mr Mutton is the reincarnation of Wagner.
The other pieces were all excellently played and well-received by the audience, with one sad exception, the Haydn wind ensemble (Cant.). Poor intonations and no musicianship. Just sat down and played notes. This is surprising when one remembers that there is far more opportunity for orchestral playing in Christchurch than Wellington, where this field is dominated by Alex Lindsay and the National Orchestra.
Finally and in conclusion might we reiterate that the Arts Festival was a great success (regarding existing conditions as unlikely) and may we hope that they are equally good in the future that lies ahead.
—M.H.H.