Recently, the Germans have developed a tendency to prefer the so-called first (youthful) style of great artists to their mature works. Could it be that they do not realize that their aesthetic criteria, generally speaking, are juvenile?
Out of the past come the standards for judging the present; standards in turn to be shaped by the practice of present-day dramatists into broader standards for the next generation.
Theoretical physicists accept the need for mathematical beauty as an act of faith... For example, the main reason why the theory of relativity is so universally accepted is its mathematical beauty.
In literary and art criticism there are two criteria, the political and the artistic.
If a conclusion is not poetically balanced, it cannot be scientifically true.
A product is bought to be used. It has to satisfy certain criteria, not only functional, but also psychological and aesthetic. Good design emphasizes the usefulness of a product whilst disregarding anything that could possibly detract from it.
I feel sometimes constrained by the expectation that the work should be solely political. I try to create a type of work that is at the service of my own set of criteria, which have to do with beauty and a type of utopia that in some ways speaks to the culture I'm located in.
For all my songs, I keep changing singers till I am not happy.
The perception of beauty is a moral test.
