The work of art after the loss of aura

The concept of "aura" is the main concern of two essays of Walter Benjamin, "A Short History Of Photography" (1931) and "The Work Of Art In The Age Of Mechanical Reproduction" (1936). As Benjamin explains, the involvement of the reproduction techniques in art weakened the state of being here-and-now and the cult value of artwork which constitute the aura. While the artwork had been bringing its audience to its own exhibition space before it became mechanically reproducible, with reproduction, the copy of the original artwork started to meet its beholder halfway. Benjamin defines this change as "socialism" whereas Adorno considers it as "mass culture". It is possible to say that accessibility of art to everyone indeed has a socialist side. On the other hand, the artwork becomes a consumable meta in the "culture industry" while affecting its audience greatly. The art galleries where mechanically reproduced works of art are exhibited and the purchases of the artworks as if it is a product were two inevitable consequences of this process. After these changes, Duchamp entered the art scene with his readymades and different techniques of exhibition. Andy Warhol was both criticized and praised for his prints of daily life products and portraits of celebrities. Art was following new and unconventional ways and the art, the product, the work - whatever we may call it became the subject of the discussions about what is art and what is not. In this essay, the process that started with the loss of the cult value, the here-and-nowness and the authenticity of an artwork because of the mechanical reproduction is discussed by using Walter benjamin’ s concept of “aura”.