formalism

formalism. A term used in the discussion of the arts to describe an approach (on behalf of creator or critic) in which the formal qualities of a work—such as line, shape, and colour—are regarded as self-sufficient for its appreciation, and all other considerations—such as representational, ethical, or social aspects—are treated as secondary or redundant. The idea that formal qualities can have meaning or resonance independently of representative function was essential to the development of abstract art, and several notable writers on art in the 20th century were basically formalist in outlook, including Clive Bell, Roger Fry, and Clement Greenberg. Many other writers have been strongly opposed to their ideas, believing that form and ‘content’ are to a large extent interdependent.

Formalism has been particularly opposed in Communist countries, especially Stalinist Russia, where art was supposed to serve a moral purpose in the education and inspiration of the masses (see Socialist Realism), and anything that suggested cultural elitism was condemned. The Soviet authorities regarded formalism as a sign of Western decadence—so much so that the word was used virtually as an all-purpose term of abuse for Western art or its influence. Artists guilty or suspected of formalism were persecuted and encouraged to make public recantations for their offences. This applied to writers and composers as well as painters and sculptors. In 1936, for example, Dmitri Shostakovich was attacked in Pravda for producing ‘leftist confusion instead of music for the people’ in his opera Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District, which ‘tickles the perverted tastes of bourgeois audiences abroad’. In literature, ‘The charge of formalism will commonly mean that a novelist has devoted too much attention to plot, characterization and description, and that his work lacks the requisite inspirational quality’ ( C. Hunt, Guide to Communist Jargon, 1957).