What Art Is, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Run-on: A List
“[T]erminologically, there is always a vacillation—I stumble, I err. In any case, there will always be a margin of indecision; the distinction will not be the source of absolute classifications, the paradigm will falter, the meaning will be precarious, revocable, reversible, the discourse incomplete …” —Roland Barthes, The Pleasure of the Text
Art is the highest form of communication (… without communication?). Art defies definition, and can be described only in the grossest generalizations or the minutest specifications, which are rendered useless or meaningless by their respective generality or specificity. Art is creation, reaction, understanding, communion, a progressive bringing together or flinging apart, careful observation and mindless manipulation. Art is beautiful, ugly, shocking, thoughtful, cathartic, shifting, alive. It’s something to believe in, appreciate or ridicule, but never to ignore (or perhaps to ignore? Satie’s “Furniture Music” …). Art is in the psyche of the artist, the reaction to the creation, the transcendent universal language of space and time. (Aside: can we – do we – separate the art from the artist? And what is an artist? Nietzsche says: "Every day I count wasted in which there has been no dancing." He says: “Without music, life would be a mistake.”)
Art is in words and images and sound, hearing and reading and the love of things strange and unconventional and opposite, bound up in limbs and fibers and pulses, the life blood of humanity.
Art is the nameless unknown generated in the person of the individual experience (Apollo); Art is the nameless unknown generated in collective exhilaration (Dionysus): there is no gap between low and high art; there is no low and high art; art is limitless and defiant of categorization. (Roland Barthes: “… such a labor could not be written. I can only circle such a subject.”) The only parameters, the only definitions of structure and space and abstraction are in the minds of artist and audience (can we make this distinction? Perhaps this should read: “in the minds of people”).
There is meaning where meaning can be found. There is meaning where meaning exists: there is meaning in art, and if there is none, well, then, there is meaning in that as well. In absence. There is art in living and seeing and experiencing; there is art in looking at the sky and walking on the grass; there is art in hearing the grinding of this industrialized planet and art in feeling its struggle and feeling our own struggle; there is art in the cast-off middles and grey ash dusting of everyday life discarded or ignored or taken for granted; art is more than visual or aural or tactile; art is more than living; art is more than communicating; art brings together, art isolates; art can never be known; there is no art, there is only creation and destruction and rebuilding anew in another image.
There you have it, out of the mouths of babes and sucklings. From the fingertips of a true child of postmodernism. (Richard Payton)
Art is the highest form of communication (… without communication?). Art defies definition, and can be described only in the grossest generalizations or the minutest specifications, which are rendered useless or meaningless by their respective generality or specificity. Art is creation, reaction, understanding, communion, a progressive bringing together or flinging apart, careful observation and mindless manipulation. Art is beautiful, ugly, shocking, thoughtful, cathartic, shifting, alive. It’s something to believe in, appreciate or ridicule, but never to ignore (or perhaps to ignore? Satie’s “Furniture Music” …). Art is in the psyche of the artist, the reaction to the creation, the transcendent universal language of space and time. (Aside: can we – do we – separate the art from the artist? And what is an artist? Nietzsche says: "Every day I count wasted in which there has been no dancing." He says: “Without music, life would be a mistake.”)
Art is in words and images and sound, hearing and reading and the love of things strange and unconventional and opposite, bound up in limbs and fibers and pulses, the life blood of humanity.
Art is the nameless unknown generated in the person of the individual experience (Apollo); Art is the nameless unknown generated in collective exhilaration (Dionysus): there is no gap between low and high art; there is no low and high art; art is limitless and defiant of categorization. (Roland Barthes: “… such a labor could not be written. I can only circle such a subject.”) The only parameters, the only definitions of structure and space and abstraction are in the minds of artist and audience (can we make this distinction? Perhaps this should read: “in the minds of people”).
There is meaning where meaning can be found. There is meaning where meaning exists: there is meaning in art, and if there is none, well, then, there is meaning in that as well. In absence. There is art in living and seeing and experiencing; there is art in looking at the sky and walking on the grass; there is art in hearing the grinding of this industrialized planet and art in feeling its struggle and feeling our own struggle; there is art in the cast-off middles and grey ash dusting of everyday life discarded or ignored or taken for granted; art is more than visual or aural or tactile; art is more than living; art is more than communicating; art brings together, art isolates; art can never be known; there is no art, there is only creation and destruction and rebuilding anew in another image.
There you have it, out of the mouths of babes and sucklings. From the fingertips of a true child of postmodernism. (Richard Payton)
posted by Prometheus Publications at 11:34 PM
7 Comments:
After reading your article I was torn as to what your argument was. You seem to have a dichotomous account of what Art is. Two sides fighting against a rational explanation and a clear definition of what you believe.
Mostly, I want a clarification. An author's explanation.
Are trying to state that Art is dead in this "Post-Modern" society? There is nothing anymore. The Pre-Raphaelites are no longer. Or, are you saying that we have changed Art into Life as opposed to the traditional mimesis of life? Another big Or, is it a combination of that and we have no need to Art as it once was and we are moving towards the nightmares of Orwell, Wells, Verne, and Huxley?
I think you would have a solid argument if you took a side and stoically defended it. Right how it is awash in ambiguity. It is okay to fight. Push your ideas and let the reader agree or not. It doesn't work to throw out a bunch of tag words and hope that someone can sift through it and make their own understanding.
I like arguments that are strictly defended.
hey richard, i think this an awesome piece!!
I liked this point:
"There is meaning where meaning exists: there is meaning in art, and if there is none, well, then, there is meaning in that as well. In absence."
I find that to be true when I look at some modern art, the kind of art that some people claim isn't art. For example: what does that silver spray painted heap of garbage mean? I'm not sure, but I know it is something, not nothing.
H. Marie
I could've read this entire article without understanding a single word of english and still, somehow find whatever meaning it was that you meant to convey. I saw no words. I saw a picture of a wondering and a wandering mind simply tracing each step of its completely innocent trek.
Furthermore, I feel I must congratulate you on completely understanding my mind and writing this peice just for it. So thank you. That was delicious.
-Benjamina Jawkins
Meaning v. meaninglessness...Hey David, perhaps that is a good topic for a future Prometheus issue.
What this discussion brings to my mind is some of the most hilarious literature I've read: the absurdist plays of Eugene Ionesco. He writes scene upon scene of non sequiturs and gibberish, all to make the point that mankind goes about life involved only in meaningless, emotionless pursuits. Especially check out "The Bald Soprano." Another example: "Him" by e.e cummings which I'm reading now.
When I started reading absurdist stuff, I was just reading it because I thought it was funny, but the more I read, the more I understand the "meaninglessness" undertones.
"Dada or Dadaism [French, from dada, child's word for a horse]: Nihilistic movement in the arts that flourished chiefly in France, Switzerland, and Germany from about 1916 to about 1920 [and later -ed.] and that was based on the principles of deliberate irrationality, anarchy, and cynicism and the rejection of laws of beauty and social organization."
(http://www.peak.org/~dadaist/English/Graphics/)
Yup, had to look that up. Very interesting.
"Him" is a Cummings play. There are definite parallels to his poetry, both in how he writes and in themes. Worth your time, but I like Ionesco more.
Why do existentialist kill themselves?
I love my neighbor.
I rape my neighbor.
Which of these has no meaning?
I don’t expect a response. I expect a reflection of your inability to transcend by descent.
You say the creation has transcended its creator.
I say it never could, it never will.
Words.
Art.
Have the meanings they are assigned. This can be discussed.
But it can never be said, the creation has transcended the creator.
It will get lonely out there by yourself Richard.
You could always come home.
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