Ideology and Aesthetics in Contemporary Culture | Dr. Udith Dematagoda

Originally published on Nov 28, 2024.
Can Aesthetics actually help us understand not only political messaging but also the direction of society? Yes, it can. Indeed, the darkest moments of society are often the most Aestheticised or, as Walter Benjamin said: “The logical result of Fascism is the introduction of aesthetics into political life […] All efforts to render politics aesthetic culminate in one thing: war.”

Udith Dematagoda on
Substack: https://udith.substack.com
Youtube: / @empyreanpath

Today I'm talking to Dr. Udith Dematagoda is a Scottish writer and academic studying modernist literature and critical theory. He now works at the University of Stuttgart and recently published an interesting article on “The ideological Aesthetic: The “political” as inevitable and epiphenomenal”. In it, he and his co-author discuss politics, art, and inevitably, facism.