Unesco, Malraux och ombildningens museum
Estetik och kosmopolitik i efterkrigstid
UnescoAndré MalrauxColour reproductionImaginary museumAesthetics and politicsUnescoAndré MalrauxFärgreproduktionImaginärt museumEstetik och politik
An inquiry into the post-war European aesthetic and political landscape should take the international organization Unesco?s colour reproductions and travelling exhibitions of paintings into consideration. In these, the organization implements André Malraux? idea of the ?imaginary museum? as a framework for a future cosmopolitical, aesthetic (and utopian) community. During the late 1940?s, the Swedish government also discusses the need for raising an ?aesthetic awareness? amongst their citizens as a consequence to a poor knowledge in the fine arts. In short, there is a poor developed sensibility amongst the Swedish people. An aesthetic (re)shaping has political consequences since it concerns the sensibility of the political subject and his or hers ability to partake in a political order. The issue at hand is how these re-shapings are constituted and further developed, i.e. how these create new ways of sensing and new forms for the political subject. Or, in the stance of Unesco: the cosmopolitical subject.The international organization Unesco has its roots in the early 20th century. The making of the organization ? both its birth and bureaucratic constitution ? coincides with an emergent information society. Radio, colour-photography, television and film all defy boundaries in some way. These media re-organized time, space and perception, changing the awareness of the other. These media linked the world together in the following logic: same time, but different place. The work that Unesco undertook came to revolve around these media and this logic, especially since Unesco furthered Malraux?s imaginary museum. Unesco?s constitution describes the origins of conflict as residing in man?s mind and promotes the free flow of ideas by word and image. New media would act in an enlightening way and play a significant role in making the organizations dream of a global unity come true. This thesis describes art?s function in Unesco?s attempt to bring this utopia to life.