Concerning the arts and cultural works of Cybertronians.

     Culture and the arts have been somewhat neglected amongst the Autobots since the early days of the Third War. The cause of this is twofold.

     Firstly Optimus Prime's naive public statements branding art for art's sake as frivolous and wasteful alienated much of the neutral population's artistic section, many of whom joined the Decepticons in disgust. Whilst Megatron is much recorded as stating that he does not care what his warriors do in their spare time so long as it does not effect their performance, he and his advisors were quick to capitalize on the disaffected artistic population, and the Polyhexian war effort was much aided its sudden new capacity to produce high-quality artwork, not least as propoganda.

     Secondly, whilst the Autobots place great emphasis on camaraderie and cooperation, the Decepticon culture of admiring the achievements of the individual offers an environment more conducive to the artistic temperament.

     Amongst the Decepticons art is tolerated, or possibly just ignored, by the command ranks like so many other things - such as mental illness, sexuality, drug use, religious and political stance - on the simple rule that if an activity does not interfere with a Decepticon's ability to perform his duties then there's no reason why he shouldn't do it.

     The Decepticon ranks contain a large number of amateur and semi-professional artists of various stripes. As a rule only those who can turn their abilities into contributions to the war effort, and who therefor are at liberty to practice their art whilst on duty and even on the battlefield, can be considered professional artists. Examples include the combat artist Slog, the architect Scrapper, the warrior musicians Scowl, Soundwave and Squawkbox and chemical emotive sculptor Alkali. Some artists become so popular that their work is supported by High Councillors or even High Commanders, sometimes out of appreciation, sometimes to support morale, sometimes simply to improve commander's popularity.

     The Decepticons make available to their troops a body of artistic works called the Instructionals.

     Cultural works include:

• Architecture
  • The Dominion Gate
• Cinema
  • Detonator: Impact!
  • The Glass Lava Dance [Autobot]
  • Killbreaker Triad
  • Operation Shatterplanet 
• Multimedia
  • Beyond_Air

• Music
  • What?, the musical adaptation of The Sighing Corner
• Spoken word
  • The Analogue Universe

• Written word
  • The Sighing Corner

     See also Xenos in Culture.