GENERAL PAPER - COMPOSITION

'All art is propaganda of some form.' Discuss.

Propaganda is a sort of message that is directed at changing the opinion of people about an issue. The insinuation
is that propaganda is usually filled with untruths and half truths. Art is expression of any form including literature, music
and painting, dancing and lately even the cinema. It seems to be an unusual allegation to say that art is propaganda.
By a little stretch of the meaning, we can take propaganda to mean that art intends to send a message and change
the belief in something probably on what art is.
Art in die form of literature could fall under propaganda. Writers are constantly seeking new ways of expressing
themselves. If we look through the centuries we see that writing has changed a great deal. Word mean ings have
changed; what is not considered poetry in one age is the rage in- the next; what is banned as being offensive in one
generation is hailed as a breakthrough in the next. It is obvious that in this form art may be accepted as propaganda.
Somehow writers, through their writing, are able to persuade their readers to accept their new forms as breakthroughs
and that is propaganda.
Can paintings, sketches and sculptures be propaganda? We could accept that anything with a message can be
propaganda. Paintings, sketches and sculptures do have messages. Every artist has a message in his work, though
many of them are personal and often express the artist's beliefs, experiences and even moods. What often happens is
that an artist creates something according to his mood or feelings and calls it what he pleases and tries to get others
to accept that it is art and often expects to be well paid for it. Often he gets paid but as often gets laughed at. In the
case of the latter instance, it is back to the drawing board. Occasionally his art gets recognized many years later,
perhaps even after he is no more.
Music is certainly a propaganda. If we take a look at the revolutionary expressions that have taken place in the last
three decades or so, we will see that there has been a sudden surge in new forms of expression of music. As in all
other forms of art, there was a lot of opposition from traditionalists. The new music was denounced as being nothing
more than noise. But the artistes became rich through mass support. Then through pressure from the masses the new
forms of music earned recognition as art forms and slowly ousted even the traditional forms from their exalted
positions. Now we even have 'rap' which is little more than poetry and poor poetry at that expressed to the
background of music and gyrations. And this is art.
Dance goes closely with music. With the world coming closer, we see that dances of many cultures are creeping
into each other and this results in new forms of dance. This is certainly propaganda and is accepted with happiness by
the masses. This form of propaganda is a step towards a united world and so is acceptable.
There has long been a desire to make the cinema accepted as an art form. Purists have so far refused to but when
we consider that photography is an art form, then cinema must be too. In fact cinema combines several art forms such
as acting, photography, literature, music and dance. In the case of cinema it is clear that it is propaganda. It is
constantly changing and getting more and more daring.
It is easy to see that indeed, art is propaganda in the sense that it seeks new definitions of what is accepted in
each form as art.
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