kitsch

Kitsch is basically the covering up of "shit", the exclusion of anything that isn’t beautiful.. In communism, this meant parades, flags, costumes, anything that made life seem better than it really was. Kitsch is a large part of The Unbearable Lightness of Being. In it, Kundera describes Kitsch as “the absolute denial of shit, in both the literal and the figurative senses of the word; kitsch excludes everything from its purview which is essentially unacceptable in human existence” (248). He says “Kitsch is the aesthetic ideal of all politicians and political parties and movements” (251), but we talked in class about how both sides of the political spectrum use the same kitsch to their advantage. Kundera says that “…the true opponent of totalitarian kitsch is the person who asks questions” (254). Lastly, he says that “…kitsch is an integral part of the human condition” (256).