Art or Pornography?

Along with Orson Welles and Sergei Eisenstein, Riefenstahl must be recognized as one of the visionaries of her era. And yet it's the breathtaking sense of unstoppable force, the magnificence with which she created this illusion of power for the goose-stepping Nazi stormtroopers marching to demonstrate Hitler's saviorlike power, that ensures Riefenstahl remains blacklisted while other Nazi sympathizers (and Nazis themselves) have quietly returned to business and politics. (Although perhaps we should give the art world credit for holding higher ideals, refusing to forgive and forget . . . )

Riefenstahl's film career was essentially terminated after the end of World War II, when she was briefly incarcerated by the Allies for her support of Hitler's regime. For nearly three decades her career languished until she re-emerged as a photographer with a brilliant photo collection of the Nuba tribespeople of Sudan. This celebration of gleaming, muscled, ebony bodies and natural nudity couldn't seem any further from Hitler's demented racial theories, but Riefenstahl couldn't escape her past. People like Susan Sontag attacked her African photos as "aesthetic fascism," as obsessed with martial strength, physical perfection, and warlike ritual as any of Adolf's Aryan "ubermensch" dreams.


9/10/2003:
	Is it possible to separate aesthetics from life at large? To appreciate images for their beauty alone, removed from any wider social context? This is the unavoidable question one must wrestle with every time the discussion turns to the films of Leni Riefenstahl. Riefenstahl, distinguished by one of the most controversial filmmaking careers for creating powerful Nazi propaganda films, died Monday night (Sept. 8) at the age of 101. Her most notorious film, "Triumph of the Will," about Hitler's 1934 Nuremberg rallies, depicted thousands of soldiers and captivated crowds. Riefenstahl utilized innovative filming techniques for the time, including using a moving camera and telephoto lens. Her film won several German awards and became one of the most famous yet hated propaganda films of all time.