The Picture of Dorian Gray - Morality and the Art

 At first glance, Oscar Wilde’s “The Picture of Dorian Gray” might appear as a novel written to express his aesthetic persuasion that blind pursuit of beauty brings a catastrophic outcome. After all, when the readers finish the book, they notice that Basil Hallward pays for his sin of unconditional seek of aestheticism by losing his life – as he pursues an absolute beauty, he does not consider the morality of the object of his portrait. In this regard, it seems that Wilde argues the absolute necessity of consideration of morality on an art work, through the novel. However, one might find the plot quite nonsensical, since Basil – who onlooked Dorian Gray’s excessive hedonism - does not seem as a sinner who deserve the punishment, but rather seems as merely an innocent victim of Dorian’s brutality. Moreover, according to Wilde’s several writings in his lifetime, he usually kept a perspective insisting that morality is simply among the materials which an artist may use to pursue aestheticism. That is, works of art are legitimate objects of aesthetic judgment, but not of other judgment such as that of moral. In all probability Wilde intentionally formed a paradox between his opinion expressed through the novel and that through other writings. Therefore, it is perhaps more accurate to assume that he made up the unsettled view to persuade his contemporary artists that an artist must realize his full potential by performing art for art’s sake, but not restrict his creativity by pursuing sake of virtues other than beauty. Performing art for specific values, such as moral enlightenment, makes the artist’s freedom of expression get into a rut, thereby distorting the original artistic inspiration. If an artist focuses on chasing aestheticism, adequate consideration of other values including morality would take place subsequently, an order that makes an efficient delivery of what he or she tries to say through the work. Therefore, Wilde says, whatever values the audience would perceive from a work of art, its artist has to eliminate self-censorship by focusing only on developing its aesthetic value for her smooth artistic expression. In this sense, ‘The Picture of Dorian Gray’ is merely a book including Oscar Wilde’s paradoxical argument to reinforce his genuine persuasion about appropriate attitude of an artist when performing art.