"Beauty is composed of an eternal, invariable element whose quantity is extremely difficult to determine, and a relative element which might be, either by turns or all at once, period, fashion, moral, passion"
About this Quote
Godard frames beauty like a cut in the editing room: part fixed, part contingent, and the real drama is in the splice. The “eternal, invariable element” is his nod to the old promise that art can touch something beyond the moment. But he immediately undercuts any comfort there by admitting its “quantity is extremely difficult to determine.” That hesitation matters. It’s not mysticism; it’s provocation. Godard treats the eternal as a rumor you can’t quite verify, an aura you chase and then distrust the second you think you’ve caught it.
Then he detonates the other half: beauty as “relative,” subject to “period, fashion, moral, passion.” He piles the categories up the way his films pile up references, slogans, and quotations - not to clarify, but to show how many forces compete to define what we’re allowed to desire. “Moral” sits next to “fashion” like an accusation: taste isn’t innocent, and neither is cinema. What looks “beautiful” often arrives pre-approved by power, ideology, and the mood of an era.
The context is Godard’s lifelong war on the polished, supposedly timeless image. Coming out of the French New Wave, he fought studio gloss with jump cuts, visible artifice, and politics that wouldn’t stay politely in the background. The subtext: if beauty has an eternal core, you don’t access it by pretending history doesn’t exist. You get closer by confronting how period and passion distort the frame - and by making that distortion part of the art.
Then he detonates the other half: beauty as “relative,” subject to “period, fashion, moral, passion.” He piles the categories up the way his films pile up references, slogans, and quotations - not to clarify, but to show how many forces compete to define what we’re allowed to desire. “Moral” sits next to “fashion” like an accusation: taste isn’t innocent, and neither is cinema. What looks “beautiful” often arrives pre-approved by power, ideology, and the mood of an era.
The context is Godard’s lifelong war on the polished, supposedly timeless image. Coming out of the French New Wave, he fought studio gloss with jump cuts, visible artifice, and politics that wouldn’t stay politely in the background. The subtext: if beauty has an eternal core, you don’t access it by pretending history doesn’t exist. You get closer by confronting how period and passion distort the frame - and by making that distortion part of the art.
Quote Details
| Topic | Art |
|---|
More Quotes by Jean-Luc
Add to List
