Abstract

Introduction. Georg Simmel and Walter Benjamin: "The incapability of any actual pause" -- Georg Simmel -- Michelangelo: life and the fate of mankind -- Rembrandt: re-producing the soulful life of the sitter as a portrait -- Auguste Rodin: reexperiencing one's deepest life in the sphere of art -- Walter Benjamin -- Introduction. Walter Benjamin and Georg Simmel: "A duel that is the creative process itself" -- Unscheinbarkeit: "Depersonalization set in an incomparably productive context" -- Charlie Chaplin: "Man would not be the noblest on earth if he were not too noble for it" -- Concluding remarks: "Always lagging half a step behind".