4:33, Tolstoy, and Danto

Above is the performance of 4:33 that I watched and also an interview with Cage.

After watching a video of American composer John Cage’s 4:33, composed in 1952, I decided to try performing this piece of complete silence myself—after all, it isn’t that difficult of a piece. The video I watched took place in an opera house. People were restraining coughs and the tension was thick. 4:33 held the main honor for the night, the conductor sweated from the strain of leading it, and a full orchestra helped perform it. I found the directions for this piece online, printed out the “musical composition,” and chose a guitar, borrowed from a roommate, as my instrument as any instrument is allowed. Sitting in my recently cleaned living room (to create a better atmosphere), I played the three movements of complete silence stupendously! Never have I felt so good about a performance of mine. The first movement lasts 30 seconds, the second 2 minutes 23 seconds, and the last 1 minute 40 seconds. Humming from the household appliances and street did not always capture my fancy as being musical, but I tried to have an open mind. My performance may not have been a fine art performance, but then, it might have been—to me. In this paper, I will critique 4:33 using the philosophies of Leo Tolstoy and Arthur Danto.

For Tolstoy, art transmits the emotional feeling of the artist to others and true art is infectious. The contagiousness rests upon three factors: individuality, clearness, and sincerity of the artist. A sure sign of art is infectiousness, and 4:33 certainly has that. All who are familiar with classical music know of it. Tolstoy’s three factors all are evident in 4:33, though they are weak. Cage’s individuality of feeling, that which he felt when listening in the silence, is seen in others who experience his piece. He is clear in what he wants out of the piece—perception of musical sounds in the atmosphere, but at the same time, John Cage said, “I’m interested in making something I don’t understand” which would be the antithesis of clarity. It is clear in that he understood some things about 4:33. To be sincere, the artist must evoke in oneself a feeling previously experienced and then, by means of movement, transmit that feeling to someone else. So Cage did evoke the same feelings he felt in others—that feeling being one of awe at the sounds around us. Cage met all three requirements for his piece to be contagious, but some of them were met weakly.

When considering Danto’s theory of “artworld,” or world of theory, and criteria for art, the reception and acceptance of 4:33 as art very subjective. What could be seen as a work of art in one context might not be seen as a work of art in another and vice versa. The difference between art and non-art comes from the author’s intent and then the individual needs to make the decision as to whether or not it is truly part of the “artworld” for them.

Two requirements Danto does set in order for something to be seen as art is first an atmosphere of artistic theory and, second, a knowledge of the history of art. Cage has both in his musical composition. He places his work in an atmosphere of high art, an opera house. If it were not for the history of artworld theory, 4:33would not be considered art. Cage builds upon the history that went from Imitation Theory to Real theory. Classical music had abstracted sounds, like a waterfall, and made waterfall music into a new reality. Cage brings us back to real sounds, not just abstractions. At the same time, Cage changes the piece into a sense of is rather than of artistic identification. He restates what reality is.

For both Tolstoy and Danto 4:33 meets the requirements of being dubbed “art,” but there is room for disagreement because both philosophers rely on subjective criteria. The concert hall draws a parallel to the art gallery that Warhol displays his Brillo cartons in Danto’s example. Outside the artworld, the objects are not high, fine art, but inside they are supposed to be artistic. What in the end makes the difference between a concert piece and street noises is the theory of art that the work is placed in. And still, as Danto would agree, we cannot expect all individuals to admit that 4:33 is art merely because it is surrounded by art theory; the individual has to learn to see it as art and make the decision that it is artful.