The Cataclysm of the Avant-Garde between the Normativeness of Social Realism and the National Identity of Slovene Music

Abstract

The notion of the avant-garde can now that it has acquired its historical function be seen in its true relation to the varied state of affairs in art in the 1900–1930 period. In the course of getting integrated into tradition, avant-garde, although its surplus power has by now began to fade away, still awaits to be shown its true identity. The musical specificity of the first half of the 20th century is now being proved in the light of the avant-garde theories. An outstanding fact in the survey of the Slovene artistic development of the period is that it was the national character which determined not only the artistic intellectual specificity of the avant-garde clash, but also dulled the break-through force of the musical avant-garde. In the context of the political revival, and in a process of gradual functionalization, Slovene music has been forced to renounce its powers of aesthetic re-evaluation, and, in accordance with the process of forceful ideologization during the period of Social Realism, kept finding its identity in seeking reliance upon the traditional and national idioms.