Hi John --
So you've set me to thinking. Again.
That can't be all bad ;-).
What is art? We do mean something definite when we achieve
this thing called art; something special and different from our
everyday expressions and output. When it rises to a certain level,
it becomes in our minds and hearts, art. And it is recognizable by
others.
I'm thinking of Leonard Schlain and his explanation of the way
profound art was an intellectual advancement in culture,
a pre-realization of new truth.
I'm thinking of the way engineers and computer programmers feel
when they create structure that transcends the mechanical and pragmatic
needs of the day, and produces in its uniformity, regularity, logic and
simplicity that same artistic feeling.
Good art is rare. I suppose that's part of the definition of the term -
rare excellence. Art, as opposed to mere craftsmanship, possesses
some intellectual tickle to a quality brain.
[Ham, previously]:
To answer Platt's question, "Where does beauty come from?",
it comes from our sensibility to Value. Specifically, it is our
realization
that the substantive essence of our reality is beyond the finite world
of existence. Man's exquisite sense of symmetry, stability, and goodness
is the value of the essential Source from which he is estranged.
The awe and rapture we feel when we are in harmony with this Essence
is imparted to the discrete objects and events which manifest the
uncreated source in our experience.
This, I submit to you, is what we sense as Beauty.
[John]:
I like that Ham; I think I would only dispute one small part.
For myself, anyway, beauty is not for me a realization of a
substantive essence beyond our finite world of existence.
Rather the opposite. It is the realization of an infinite harmony
within my finite world of experience. Right where I live,
in this moment. (Well, not THIS moment, but you know what I mean)
Perhaps "realization" is not the right term for what we sense intuitively
(subconsciously?). But I think this is where experience deceives us. When
we reflect on value, we do it intellectually and conclude (from recalled
experience) that Beauty is in the thing or person experienced. Yet, at the
moment of rapture (which I maintain precedes objectivized experience) we are
feeling (sensing) pure, undifferentiated Value. Because this feeling is
always associated with the thing, person or event observed, we attribute
value or beauty to that object. This selective differentiation is the "act
of experience" whereby we bring value-sensibility into finite beingness.
I know this "subjective" epistemology is strange and illogical as compared
with the common notion of emotional value as reactive rather than
"effective". (This is due to the intellectual precept of cause-and-effect
which we instinctively apply to all experience.) But if you believe, as I
do, that Value (i.e, Quality) is primary to objects, and forget about the
time sequence of human perception, it is clear that Value -- at least our
sense of it -- must actualize (create) our objective reality. Doesn't this
also explain why "the quality of the modern world is no good"?
The first line of John Keats' memorable poem reads, "A thing of beauty is a
joy forever." But midway through it, he departs from daffodils and trees
and seems to be talking about something grander and more transcendent:
"Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour; no, even as the trees
That whisper round a temple become soon
Dear as the temple's self, so does the moon,
The passion poesy, glories infinite,
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls, and bound to us so fast
That, whether there be shine or gloom o'ercast,
They always must be with us, or we die."
Now I ask you, did he really mean "things", or was the message of this poem
"The VALUE of Beauty is a Joy Forever"?
(I hope this inspires you to even more thinking, John.)
Best regards,
Ham
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