O potencial emancipatório da obra de arte em Walter Benjamin

Abstract

This article intends to investigate how the work of art, especially the technically produced work, can contribute to social emancipation, in view of Walter Benjamin's conceptions of aesthetics and politics. For this, we intend to analyze how the decline of the aura opens space, at the same time, for an art freed from its ritualistic use and aligned with the interests of the Nazi regime. We will try to understand the author's path and positioning within aesthetics to, finally, understand how the loss of aura opens space for an aestheticization of politics and, at the same time, for a politicized art capable of contributing to social emancipation. For this, the texts “Little History of Photography” (1931) and “The work of art in the era of its technical reproducibility” (1936) by Benjamin will be used as main references, as well as other texts by the same author and by Benjamin. commentators.