I’ve been assigned some occupational therapy by select concerned Mandarins of the Lichtenbergian Society. It’s also something of a test, I think, to see if I can play along and get along. And be funny. It has to be funny. Even witty.
Something on Art, with the capital A. My first impulse is to send you to an earlier post in which I think I come clean on the issue of Art. But I can go further. Note the shape of the capital letter A. Those of you familiar with Alpine architecture will see the form of a classic high-roofed lodge. Those anthropologists among you will note the Native American “tee-pee.” The capital A is clearly an icon for Shelter. Shelter is a “roof over your head” in this (upper) case. So Art is shelter; and while I seek something “over my head” to protect me from the storm, I know full well that in choosing Art for my protection: I’m in way “over my head.”
In true Lichtenburgian fashion I will let this initial burst of whimsy suffice for the moment and follow it up later with the necessary elaboration (don’t hold your breath). Better yet, let me be true to my belief in collaborative creative processes and open this up to a participatory fantasia. Does this particular conflicted form of Art fetish, this miserable creeping under the eaves of A, resonate for anyone else? Since your response need not be conscientious or earnest or anything in particular (we strive for Art, not accountability), do not waste time complaining you don’t have enough to go on. Consider yourself provoked.
Wasn’t Jeff supposed to provoke us next?
OK, I will provoke.
WARNING: The farther down this list one proceeds, the less it can be validated.
What Is, is.
We are part of What Is. We are (probably) not all of What Is.
To interact with What is, we construct.
Language is a construct. Mathematics is a construct. Art and song are constructs. Metaphors are constructs. Religion is a construct. Rationalization and rational thought are constructs. Scientific and psychoanalytic theories are constructs. Emotions are constructs. Social norms and morals are constructs. “Meanings” are constructs. Even seeing, by the time the image gets decoded in our brains, is a construct — as are all other human experiences.
What we construct is not identical to What Is. They are approximations. But we often forget this.
From the perspective of What Is, all of our constructs are equal, in that they are parts of What Is. Nothing more can be said of them. They exist.
From our perspective, some of our constructs seem more true, more emotionally resonant, or more useful than others.
(Faulty engineering leads to a failed bridge and people die. Two plus two does not equal five. Shakespeare is more eloquent than a news report. A “wrong” note is played by a trumpeter at the symphony. Some people are color-blind. The fossil record bears out Darwin’s Theory of Evolution.)
Individuals often do not agree about which constructs are most true, most emotionally resonant, or most useful. Wars are fought over such things. Waves of successive approximations rise and fall, leaving in their wake maps of What Is. But the maps are not the Territory.
We perceive ourselves to exist simultaneously as a Self (individual), as groups of Selves (communities), and as expressions or parts of What Is. This constructed perception may be illusory (just as all perceptions may be) and may be refined at some later time.
We perceive ourselves as living in a world consisting of three dimensions, plus time, alternatively called Space-Time. This constructed perception, too, is very likely illusory and is in the process of being refined.
The maps we have constructed through waves of successive approximations seem to help us, as individuals and communities, navigate through Space-Time in more meaningful, more practical, or more efficient and comfortable ways. (But we should be careful not to draw too sharp a distinction between us and it, since we ARE it; the center of Space-Time is nowhere if not within ourselves. A close examination of this construct reveals that the distinction that is often drawn between “free will” and determinism is a false dichotomy.)
Of course, being that We Are, we would navigate through Space-Time regardless of whatever constructs we have or have not made for ourselves. But the voyage for us may not be as meaningful, as efficient, as comfortable, or as enjoyable. (Or it may be that the opposite is true, but we would never know it or be able to articulate it, because without constructs we would not be conscious, as the term is commonly defined.)
Constructs enable What Is to become, over time, more and more conscious of itself.
The dreaming dragon awakens.
marc, did you ever get around to writing “Ideology, Theory, and Creative Intuition?” Please share!
And, yes, “this miserable creeping under the eaves of A” does resonate for me, personally. I’d be interested in reading the reactions of others to marc’s well-crafted metaphor. (Or should I say his construction?)
Jeff was, Dale, but you gave me an assignment.
Again, I pet the pets of others. Though to speak of What Is is…well…and so…there we are.
For alternate take on What Is: http://www.lacunagroup.org/marc/?page_id=51
in which said What Is is rendered in materialst rather than transcendentalist fashion. More constructs to be nimbly leaped over in toto, no doubt.
Due to my being Lichtenbergian avant la lettre, my work on “Ideology, Theory, and Creative Intuition” is what it is. Enjoy.
I suppose JB could deal a few cards on Art with an A, but What Is trumps all. Game over.
Platonism? WTF?
With a touch of Hegel, too.
As I walked away from my computer to go and empty the dishwasher and get on with cleaning bathrooms and the like, I saw a dirty towel lying wadded in front of the back door entrance. Why is it there? And why don’t I pick it up? And why is it dirty? Two hints: it rained last night and I have dogs. I placed the towel on the floor in front of the door this morning after I let the dogs out for their morning romp. My hope was that, as they came back in the house, the dogs would walk over the towel and their paws might get somewhat clean. So the wadded dirty towel is a sign of my plan being somewhat successful. How successful? There’s really no way to know. I’m sure their paws were still a little muddy, but the towel was stamped with brown prints, so…somewhat successful.
By placing the towel, things were altered somewhat. I have not been able to grab with both hands a coherent rationale for setting up this Somewhat alongside What Is, but there we are. There’s a dirty towel on the floor and things are somewhat different as a result.
No, I am not denying the reality of the material world. In fact, I am giving it precedence.
Nothing about what I said is intended to be metaphysics.
What if the dog steps over the towel completely and takes a dump on your floor?
Would you grab the feces with both hands, or one?
Or would you just kill the dog?
Besides, I thought we were talking about apes.
What is this Zen shit? Har.
I reject the Somewhat. There is only the Is.
Somewhat so.
But back to Art.
When I think of Art, I tend to ruminate on this idea of framing — so the letter A seems somehow appropriate. (Grew up in an A-frame house, as a matter o’ fact.)
Right now I have a pen sitting on my belly. That’s not art, right? But let’s say I take a picture of it. Put a frame around it. Let’s say that the resulting picture seems to have a visual rhythm — some kind of structure. A theme emerges. Parts of the image relate to other parts in ways that may (or may not) resonate with one who views the photo. There’s the play of light and dark, at least, within the limits of what has been framed by the artist.
It seems that putting a frame around something is a crucial part of crafting Art. Of course the frame need not be literal. Just say that a border is defined. If it’s a play, it’s divided into acts and takes place on a stage, a physical space. In making a sculpture, something is chipped away to reveal what is latent. In music, “notes” are snatched out of a continuum. marc, I think, said somewhere in some post that limitations make invention possible. That’s a profound statement.
(This reminds me. marc, there’s a new TV station that is accepting video submissions. It’s local. You should check it out.)
So the frame, then. Step 1 when creating what might be termed “Art.” What say ye?
But back to Art.
When I think of Art, I tend to ruminate on this idea of framing , so the letter A seems somehow appropriate. (Grew up in an A-frame house, as a matter o’ fact.)
Right now I have a pen sitting on my belly. That’s not art, right? But let’s say I take a picture of it. Put a frame around it. Let’s say that the resulting picture seems to have a visual rhythm , some kind of structure. A theme emerges. Parts of the image relate to other parts in ways that may (or may not) resonate with one who views the photo. There’s the play of light and dark, at least, within the limits of what has been framed by the artist.
It seems that putting a frame around something is a crucial part of crafting Art. Of course the frame need not be literal. Just say that a border is defined. If it’s a play, it’s divided into acts and takes place on a stage, a physical space. In making a sculpture, something is chipped away to reveal what is latent. In music, “notes” are snatched out of a continuum. marc, I think, said somewhere in some post that limitations make invention possible. That’s a profound statement.
(This reminds me. marc, there’s a new TV station that is accepting video submissions. It’s local. You should check it out.)
So the frame, then. Step 1 when creating what might be termed “Art.” What say ye?
And then there’s what Joyce said in Portrait of the Artist … what was it? Going by memory. He spoke of the misuse of art, the co-opting of it for purposes other than the True Purpose … the Didactic, for instance, couldn’t be considered proper art (Brecht, close your ears!) … the Pornographic. (no, not what you’re thinking, you dirty boys). Pornographic would be art in the service of desire, making you desire what is portrayed. TV commercials would be pornography to Joyce. Didactic, that would be art in the service of revulsion. Propoganda. Not true art. Any thoughts or ocmments on this idea?
Also, has anyone watched Hearts of Darkness, the making of Apocalypse Now? What a great portrait of the Artist that is. Wow. Coppola is mesmerizing. I just can’t look away.
re: framing, Dissanayake calls it “making special,” the elevation of whatever-it-is out of the quotidian by all those elements we know as elements: repetition, emphasis, omission, etc. She says that we used to frame the perenially important human concerns (life, death, birth, etc.) with things made special (dance, art, song) in a kind of “This is what we do, “but the West has inverted that so that the making special itself has become the temporarily important, i.e., “look what I did.”
I think she’s right, but I don’t know how we would recapture the old ways, nor do I think it’s necessary.
Back to something Jeff said in his 97 Theses post up top. All is construct, he says, all of human experience. I think the key thing to remember there is not that all our experience is construct, but that it is our Experience.
The more clever among us might seek to enlighten ourselves by looking around to see whether there’s anything else to add to the construct of our Experience, but that’s all we got, baby. Whinging about What Is when we can not, in fact, comprehend it, is the source of our unhappiness, as the Buddha did not say. Oh wait…
So let me be an opportunist and parade my pet for a moment. This is a perfectly fine opportunity for me to talk about collective creative process. I think at present we can see our work on this post, our art, as having two moments (so far). Really, we’ve only engaged in one, but I’d like to entice you into the second.
Moment the first. We respond to a call or provocation or invitation to produce in a communicative flow. We express ourselves, we respond to what has been expressed, we respond to our responses, we introduce new things, we respond, etc. Things flow. So far so good.
Moment the second. I think it would be interesting for us to begin to review this flow of communication we have created. In a sense, we might see it as our putting a new frame around it. I encourage you to read through it and think about how it is “playing.” Re-visiting also allows for new interpretive strategies. It is possible to attend not just to the flow of thought but also to the way we go about communicating that thought. Our own subjectivities can be brought into the mixture. The words we use, the things that trigger our reactions, everything seeming new, maybe strange. I know that whenever I float a notion or idea or observation, some aspect of “myself” is potentially up for question. (Not necessarily where one wants to go, of course; what is your art?) You can even put smaller frames around sentences, phrases, images, and then experience those isolated moments of attention in new ways. All of this leads to…
Possible moment the third. We begin to feed our new responses into our flow; it becomes part of the art. And where might it lead? You can call it recursion. Reflection. Sedimentation. (Yes, psychoanalytic process; but one need not use jargon; these are common processes). And we need not finely articulate new responses, necessarily. Sometimes it’s very interesting just to make the frame:
The more clever among us
kill the dog
Due to my being
Can’t look away
Dump on your floor
Art in the service of desire
elements we know
Seeing things re-framed, taken out of the flow (toweled dry, set by the fire) can produce new subjective turns, even surprises.
My longing, of course, is for the eventual moment the fourth in which we take the material and set it in some form and place a final frame. We create with an eye toward offering an audience an experience. Erstwhile final frame. Subject to revision.
I would say that ALL of our experience is construct. It’s all filtered through the brain, so it’s all second-hand and translated. It’s constructed by our minds, although not consciously. Doesn’t change the fact that it’s a construct. Constructing need not be a conscious enterprise.
And “whinging” about What Is does not make me unhappy. It is, in fact, a source of joy. It doesn’t bother me in the least that there are things which we can never hope to comprehend. Still, how can we not devote at least a portion of our time to thinking about that which is greater? Of course, thinking about it doesn’t get us very far. But that’s what I like about being an Episcopalian. It’s not about the thinking. It’s about the common rituals. We relate to the Mystery in these specific ways (communion, baptism, etc.). Somehow, the rituals speak to me. There is a sense of participation, even though you realize, at some level, it’s all metaphor. Rituals are like art in that they “make special.” But, unlike art, it’s still about the WE and not about the I. Art, I suppose, actually evolved out of these rituals, so I suppose one could say that the rituals are in fact primary and the art secondary.
Comments?
As to marc’s post, it’s difficult for me to step outside of the conversation and participate in the conversation simultaneously, but I enjoy the META so I will try. The most difficult thing for me is emotionally investing in that which will, in short order, be deconstructed. The natural thing to do is adopt a defensive posture, to see everything ironically or post with a smirk. But that seems dishonest. I know one loses points for being too earnest. One gains points for being clever. I enjoy those games, too. But it ultimately becomes all about serving the ego. And if we’re all trying to one-up each other, we’re really not working in the spirit of Lacuna, which is after all supposed to be about creative collaboration.
I forgot what I was trying to say. But I’m sure I’ll be reminded soon.
Re: Dale’s post, I don’t think it’s necessary to renounce that great Western invention, the Individual, and I wouldn’t want to.
Notice I said “I” wouldn’t want to. I can’t speak for We.
And what’s all this I keep hearing about “pets?” Let’s not denigrate or diminish what these really are — IDOLS!
As to “Audience,” about whom are we speaking? We few? We happy few? We band of brothers?
Re: ritual…
It seems to me somehow important that we get the ritual aspect of the Lichtenberg Society RIGHT.
Having said that, I’m not sure what that means.
There is value in re-reading what has been posted. I originally mis-read the following statement of Dale’s:
“I think the key thing to remember there is not that all our experience is construct, but that it is our Experience.”
Re-visiting the statement, I would have to say that I agree with Dale … mostly.
I think it is important to validate our Experience. Art certainly does that. Like Dale says, it’s all we got!
But I think it’s also important to remember that our experience is limited, incomplete. It’s ESPECIALLY crucial for those who claim to speak “The Truth” to remember or realize this. Fundamentalists come to mind.
Jeff, Even Caampbell admitted near the end of his life that we couldn’t have a mythology that met all the criteria a myth needs to today (Mystical, Cosmological, Socialogical, and Pedigogical). The rituals we have are fragmented from older myths. Wouldn’t Art work just a well to replace the Myths. And why would Art have to always be about the “I”. Someone with transcendant experience trying to pass it along is not acting from the I.
“Let’s not denigrate or diminish what these really are , IDOLS!”
(denigrate and diminish)(pets)(kill the dog)(grab the feces)
My first obsessive thought as we began thinking about matters Lichtenbergian was, as always, something like “how could we make this Lichtenbergian meeting into a performance of some kind?” Create a ritual framework within which the piece would develop. I soon was able to stop that kind of reflexive musing. Ego trying to put its stamp. But the idea of a “meeting” as a formal structure is interesting. Theatre and ritual.
“One gains points for being clever.”
(and who’s keeping score, I wonder?)
How is “deconstructed” related to what is “construct?”
“Emotionally investing.”
“Someone with transcendent experience trying to pass it along is not acting from the I.” I wonder. What usually gets attributed to the I is, I think, really kind of murky. What is the impetus for action? What if the I is not a source but a result? And, more than anything else, a result of speech?
How much of our conversation is at some level a struggle over how our I is making it’s way with respect to other I’s?
If you take another look at the Order of Business for the Annual Meeting, you’ll see an explicit ritual deliberately designed.
It’s missing a closure, but that is our special postmodern contribution. Whether it works, we’ll see in about 53 hours.
And within that ritual, I believe we’ll see some art. Perhaps even Art.
“What if the I is not a source, but a result? And, more than anything else, a result of speech?”
Could not agree more. Precisely.
Community——>Ritual—>Myth—->Art and Drama—–>Commentary——–>Deconstruction—–>????
I would like to see the role of the Aphorist expanded in the ritual, as outlined. (The Chair as Apollo, the Aphorist as Dionysus, we Revelers thrown back and forth between the two, but all in good fun.)
It seems that the Aphorist, for example, should tend the fire — maybe even guard it.
It seems that the Aphorist, for example, should tend the fire — maybe even guard it. Dole it out on sticks. Etc.
The Native Americans (ha!) had a fire keeper. It was a solemn duty.
Maybe the creative works of the past year that never quite came to fruition feed the “new fire,” and THEN that new, rejuvenated fire, from the ashes of those aborted works, is distributed to all???
The Aphorist could act as gatekeeper. He could examime said works to determine whether they are “worthy” of being tossed into the fire. Then he could toss them in. Then, when everyone has “contributed,” we all reap the benefits by gaining access to the “new” fire.
Symbolically, we could all take home a coal from the fire and set it on our desks, where we work and create, as inspiration. The next year, we bring that coal, along with what it has helped us produce, and we toss it back in.
What say you?
The “closure” could somehow involve carefully wrapping the coals and distributing them, or some such silly thing. Calling forth names, in all solemnity … Treating the coal as if it were some kind of communion. We could even rub the coal over the back of the hands? The hands create, after all. Dionysus/Aphorist fetches them and hands them to Apollo/Chair, chair calls forth each CM individually, “Do you solemnly pledge to such and such and so and so?” “In the spirit of Georg Christoph Lichtenberg, I say CRAS MELIOR EST!” Apollo rubs said coal over the back of the hands, leaving a mark, puts it in the palm of the hand, closes it. Next person is called. Some such thing.
???
The ashes also speak to me of dragons, of course. You know how I love dragons.
Hm. All kinds of Prometheus, Ash Wednesday, Beast kinds of overtones to all that.
Passing out live coals would be cool, but is it practical? Perhaps we just as symbolically extinguish them first.
As for
you know my preference for cyclical structures:
And your linear structure has illuminated for me my resistance to all the theorizing we do around here: it breaks the circle. Magic dissipates.
Maybe the communicant could kneel down, present the work, and say, “I present my works for examination. Apollo, have mercy.”
I guess Apollo should be the examiner. Maybe he could toss it, tear it, but the Aphorist acts as a kind of goalie? MAybe he, in a ritualistic fashion, tries to prevent the works from going into the flames, but usually fails? We all cheer him on as he tries to rescue the works, but it just never works out? They all wind up engulfed in flames, in the end?
At any rate, Dionysus should tend the fire, guard the fire, and fetch the coals from the fire to be redistributed.
That’s my take, anyhow.
Yes, let’s re-establish the circle. Get the magic back.
Could we have containers to put the coals in? Something that won’t burn?
Obviously we don’t want to burn people’s hands, either. But we can work around all the details so no one gets hurt. I’m sure Apollo can devise something. That’s what he’s good at.
Could we start another post where we talk about “What is Art?”
‘Cuz if we did, I had some questions…
Like, for instance, if one is driving through South Georgia and sees a sign reading “Georgia’s High Tech Corridor”, is that a frame? And if so, is that in fact Art? Or does perhaps the irony of the situation do something different to the scenario?
Also, must art be deliberate, or can it simply spring into being from happy circumstance? I’m not talking about the 1,000 monkeys on 1,000 typewriters kind of coincidence, I’m talking about can a kid playing with paint on canvas accidentally create art? Or does perhaps the fact that we are talking about paint and canvas (rather than, perhaps mud on more mud) give it special consideration as art?