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There is evidence of a sea-change in Western consciousness over the last three or four decades of the 20th century, which implies a fundamental rejection of the "arts of humanism"; the tradition of art for the elite, art cut off from society, from nature and from the sacred (added, as Eric Gill once said, "like a sauce to otherwise unpalatable fish"), cannot serve the needs of our future society. John Lane both celebrates the power and challenges the defect of this 500-year-old tradition, invariably claimed to be the finest that has ever existed. He questions whether the institution of the self-directed professional artist was a great step forward in the story of self-realization, or whether it was, on the contrary, a dehumanising aberration in the history of humankind. Challenging and illuminating, this book looks forward to a time of revitalized aesthetic activity when creative expression is not lofty, professionalized and unapproachable but closely interwoven with the activities of daily life.
