I can't show that quality of an artwork, by which I mean its formal properties, including craft and the correspondence to prevailing taste or style, has any direct bearing on its aesthetic effect. We can try to show some necessary connection but in actuality each of us can be momentarily struck by a random experience of something that prevents or goes beyond rational cognition or explanation. Yet we persist in employing - or engaging -- formal means to reach that unconnected aesthetic end. Maybe we do it out of sincerity, a desire to acquire the aesthetic moment, which is perhaps analogous to the use of prayer as a means to achieve a spiritual awareness.
The formal engagement is at least a mind-set that tries to deny the pure objecthood and utility and commonplace status of something in order to fuse its essential "meaninglessness" to self, making it a projection, as it were, of a primal precognitive "oceanic" oneness in what Winnicott calls "potential space". For Winnicott, the self desires to recapture that moment of infantile fusion of self and object, self and other at the point where a distinction between them begins. Thus, he developed the notion of "Play and Reality" the transition to "play" or "make believe" object, and the beginning of symbolization and metaphor. Right now I'm very keen on Winnicott and the aesthetic ideas that have developed from his psychoanalytic research. It seems that Winnicott has not had much influence in the arts, excepting literary criticism. I wonder why? WC --- On Fri, 1/16/09, Chris Miller <[email protected]> wrote: > From: Chris Miller <[email protected]> > Subject: Re: competent people with discerning taste and knowledge > To: [email protected] > Cc: [email protected] > Date: Friday, January 16, 2009, 9:38 AM > A few things I might note about your response, Boris, to > the question of how > on might identify "competent people with discerning > taste and knowledge" > > First -- it might take a few years to determine whether > "creative dynamics" > have improved, or not --- so it's more of an historical > judgment than a way to > determine who is best qualified to jury a show or be a > minister of art (which > is, BTW, a new position being proposed for the Obama > cabinet) > > Second -- considering the Soviet historical example that I > presented -- I'm > wondering whether "cultural dynamics", as you > conceive it, has any connection > with the quality of art as I experience it -- since > it's been my experience > that a social realist painting or sculpture can be just as > good as a > Constructivist or Modern-Classical one. > > (Although -- if we consider American art history --- the > social/art forces > that have recently been dominant in the American artworld > have resulted in > contemporary museums that have has much aesthetic interest > to me as a stroll > down the aisles of Wal-Mart.) > > Third -- you have queried whether "historical > dialectic and personal could be > separated" -- and wouldn't Saul and Alexei have > agreed with you ? > > We can probably all agree that our personal > lives/feelings/judgments are > affected by the kinds of events and conditions that are > discussed by > historians -- whether Marxist or otherwise -- but whether > that discussion is > truly prioritizing and accounting for all those effects -- > that is a question > that would separate the partisans for an "historical > dialectic" from the rest > of us. > > I consider my aesthetic life to be completely outside that > discussion (so far > as I've heard it) -- and perhaps those who would > identify themselves as > artists on this list would feel the same way. That would > explain, for > example, why some of us can be so strongly > affected/influenced by art that > came from societies that were way-way-way different from > our own. > > > *************** > > Chris, my answer is very simple. You are missing > 'small' details of factual > logic in the essence of my answer. Competency changes > things > for the Good. Commissars were not competent, so they > changed dynamics of > timing, but not creativity, which they could not stop but > only slow down. > Pasternak and alike influenced true creative dynamics of > USSR more then all > drunken commissars. > Boris Shoshensky > > > ____________________________________________________________ > Refine your culinary schools at a top Culinary program near > you. > http://thirdpartyoffers.netzero.net/TGL2231/fc/PnY6rc1mKzKzYhhfdG6mycihEreuiO > ptkzvo1HTTZ2O7FZgVg0BAg/
