So, I think it's relevant to note that although the spiritual is individually, socially, culturally and historically mediated (and mediating) it is not exhaustively determined by (or determinative of), nor constructed by (or constructive of) individuals, society, culture and history. — John
This is honestly a very confusing sentence; I see that it's grammatically correct, but what exactly are you saying? It sounds to me like you're saying "the spiritual is mediated in many ways, but is not exhaustively determined by those many ways". Is that what you mean? Could you elaborate in a different way? — Noble Dust
The spirit of the work, in my estimation, is how the artist's idea for the work gets sorted out by the materials the artist uses in execution of his idea. — Cavacava
Conceptual art (believing it is following Duchamp) wants to say just the opposite. On this 'conceptual' view, in principle at least, everything about individuals, society, culture and history can be analyzed, explicated and commented upon; there is no room for any genuinely intractable mystery. I think this is a huge mistake, with catastrophic potential for the arts, and by extension, for humanity. — John
Conceptual art is more about what is understood to be art than a change in the "mystery" of how anything is art. — TheWillowOfDarkness
Many times an artist will have taken some simple form, a found object, a clear white canvas, given some detailed personal account of their work, only to have half the audience respond with, in all this knowledge, "How can this be art?[/i]..." The "mystery" remains no matter how much is known about an artwork. — TheWillowOfDarkness
The "mystical" quality of art taking the soul to a world more profound then the everyday remains. — TheWillowOfDarkness
One of the striking aspects of response to conceptual art is just how "mysterious" it appears to many. — TheWillowOfDarkness
Interesting. I'm not sure I agree, but I'm also not sure I can argue with that. Again, I think the same spiritual drive exists beneath conceptual art. The impetus hasn't changed. I know you'll disagree because of how you view the development of human thought, but I think there's a necessary quality to each stage of artistic development (and development of thought in general). I think there's a specific spiritual (/esoteric/inner...etc) theme at the core of the development of human thought. It's hard to explain. Every phase seems to follow after the other within the bounds of their own unique logic; Conceptualism had to follow the symbolists and early modernists. It's tied into the human condition. We can look back at eras that we particularly liked, or felt were closer to our own ideal of what art should be, and we can criticize how art evolved, but we need to be realists and look at how art evolves in relation to the state of the human condition. Indeed, the human condition is that inner spiritual drive that directs how thought and art evolve. — Noble Dust
Conceptual art is more about what is understood to be art than a change in the "mystery" of how anything is art. — TheWillowOfDarkness
I don't think it is possible for music (without vocals) to be a conceptual art; — John
There is always a true freedom and spontaneity at work, and the way things will turn out in the future is by no means pre-determined by the past. The element of truth, though, is that things are perhaps determined in their broadest outlines. — John
Also, there is nothing that precludes the possibility that epochs may be more or less spiritually healthy, insofar as they are more or less consciously in touch with the divine. There is nothing to preclude the possibility that the human spirit will find itself in a cul de sac and need to backtrack to regain its compass. — John
I can't see how someone fighting addiction can do it without hearkening back to the time before they were addicted. — John
how else could they know the state of being free from addiction? — John
On the broader scale, going forward would be impossible without drawing on tradition. — John
If the "nature of human thought" was "inexorable" then I can't see how it could be free. — John
I would not classify either Cage's or Ive's music as "conceptual" in the sense I was talking about. Cage, for example I take to have been exploring radical formal possibilities, in a way more analogous to minimalist art than conceptual art. — John
Ok, but at least for 4:33...it's a purely conceptual piece, right? It does explore form as you say, but ultimately the idea is "Listen to what you hear. Is what you hear music?" That's conceptual.
Because overcoming addiction means acknowledging the events that lead up to addiction, and the mental and emotional states that perpetuated and encouraged addiction. — Noble Dust
The state before addiction can manifest itself to the addict as an ideal time, but this is a lie because that state was a state of ignorance. — Noble Dust
I don't mean to move the goalposts, but the problem is that if we take this idea of "freedom" to it's logical extreme, it turns into a nihilistic nothingness. Freedom becomes meaninglessness. Freedom has to exist within Meaning. — Noble Dust
So, for instance, when I say human thought is inexorable, I'm constraining it within it's proper bounds: time and experience. — Noble Dust
Isn't a return to health a return to a pre-addiction state? — John
I don't see it this way at all. I think the idea that when one comes through an addiction one is better for having been addicted than one would have been had one never been addicted is based on false reasoning. Equally one cannot say that one is better for never having been addicted. — John
I think this is the meaning of Christ's: “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven". — John
Perhaps you are thinking of spiritual constraints, ethical constraints? There is no freedom without constraint, I would say, so any kind of a "logical extreme" along these kinds of lines could not be freedom at all. — John
as I said before I don't think it is exhaustively determined by time and experience, which is what I thought you wanted to say by calling it "inexorable". — John
The question is "is it art" or perhaps "how is it art"? Cage was chasing the pure experience of silence, if you remove the aesthetic from a work of art all that remains is the form of the work, the score, the three piece movement here the comprehension of the work is only available through thought. Cage's choice of work was based on his desire to recreate what he heard in the sensory deprivation tank he had tried. — Cavacava
Isn't minimalism a natural consequence of conceptual art,? — Cavacava
I think art tries to be original (even when it cannot be good) its movement seems to be best described as dialectical and perhaps Conceptual Art arose from Art's :P need to be original, and not be associated with the past. — Cavacava
Conceptual Art's reaction is very unemotional, indifferent to emotion. I think that Conceptual Arts ability to disrupt (as when Warhol's Brillo Boxes hit Danto over the head) makes itself art by its ability to disrupt the way it does. Perhaps the dignity in all art lies in its ability to disrupt and change or challenge the way we experience life. — Cavacava
Not mentally or emotionally, or spiritually. — Noble Dust
But what about suffering in general? The gospel itself actually communicates what I'm trying to communicate: Christ had to suffer and die in order to bring about salvation. — Noble Dust
I take that concept to be the fulfillment of the concept of necessary suffering that I'm outlining. To become like a child again means a childlike joy, wonder, and trust (towards the divine) without the tantrums, ignorance about the world, naiveté and selfishness of a child. It's the difference between childlike and childish. — Noble Dust
So I'm not talking about determinism in how thought unfolds over history, but I am saying there's an inexorable path which moves by it's own logic. It's not possible for thought to have gone a different way that avoided post-modernism, or conceptual art, or whatever. Or if a different path was possible (because of different individual decisions being made differently; Hitler becoming a successful artist instead of a failed one and having an art career, for instance), then the same principles would eventually be laid out, just in a different way or a different historical context; sooner or later, or whenever. — Noble Dust
Cage's goal for th33e piece in a direct way. So this is why 4:33 is conceptual: the value of the piece exists solely in the concept because the concept is so self-conscious that it prevents a direct, immediate experience (an aesthetic experience). It has an aesthetic goal, but the aesthetic is only achieved through apprehension of the concept, not through direct experience. The aesthetic is the idea, as I think you alluded to at some point.
... meditative; instead of focusing on musical notes, you focus on ambient sounds around you; the audience rustling, a leaky drainpipe, your own heartbeat
I'm not saying it would be a return to a specific past state, but a return to a state of health if you like. Think of having the flu. After you get over it you return to the state (health) you were in before you caught it, but you don't return to a previous version of yourself. That's why I said earlier that i don't have any idea of regression in mind here. — John
Was it inevitable that humanity went through the phase of conceptual art? — John
I was really trying to emphasize the feeling for the eternal that I think the innocence of the child consists in. — John
I find this in the great art, music and literature of the past, but increasingly less in (much of but by no means all) modern work, and the apotheosis of this absence is reached in conceptual art, as I see it, anyway. — John
My point all along, though has been that it doesn't change the fact that those mistakes are mistakes, and they may be devoid of spirit; they may represent the spirit turning against itself, denying itself; and I don't believe that any specific movement of the spirit is inevitable. I also think there is always something of value to be gained form any movement, even if that value consists only in the wisdom gained by denying the movement and moving beyond it. I also think the moving beyond is always in a significant sense a return; perhaps something akin to Plato's idea of anamnesis; without memory we could have no compass. — John
We seem to agree about the important details anyway. :) — John
in the subject, the object, in both or perhaps in their relationship. — Cavacava
Maybe this is the wrong question and 'art' is not something stored on a CD or hung on the wall, but rather, similar to reading a book, it's an active experience that we enter into with our imagination. We suspend reality and we become 'absorbed in' a reality created by an author. — Cavacava
a kind of purposeless purpose or unfocused focus. — Cavacava
Based on the ideas I outlined, I think so. But I don't think that the specific outline of actual history is important; it could have happened 400 years ago, or 400 years from now. — Noble Dust
Can you elaborate? I see you did a little bit, but I'd like to hear the in-between points of your argument about that; you seem to jump from childlike innocence to great art here — Noble Dust
Modern conceptual art is certainly not childlike; it's certainly the most egregiously adult art that history has seen. But as i mentioned earlier, I see it more as "pubescent" art. No mature adult is as self-conscious as conceptual art is self-conscious. What would true, purely "adult" art be? What would that mean? (I mean art that supersedes the "pubescent" conceptual art that I'm describing). — Noble Dust
Well, I do think we're in disagreement here. We just seem to need to talk about it differently. Mistakes are indeed mistakes, which has not been a focus of my argument. But, I think that if those mistakes are devoid of spirit, then that's an apophatic contribution to the development of spirit. — Noble Dust
I like paradoxes, but I fail to see how "the moving beyond is always in a significant sense a return". — Noble Dust
Time moves on as these philosophers stroke their....
All I am saying is that I think an ability to re-enter the state of childlike innocence is necessary, but I am not saying sufficient, for artistic (and spiritual) greatness. — John
I don't see history as 'humanity's growth' being analogous to the growth of an individual through childhood, adolescence to adulthood.I don't believe in 'progress' for humanity as a whole as 'becoming ever better', but rather as a progression as in 'chord progression'. — John
I think you may have meant to write "I do not think we're in disagreement here", but I'm not sure. — John
I agree that it is possible that the culture as a whole may learn form mistakes, but it's just as possible that what has been learned will be forgotten and the same kind of mistakes repeated again at another time. — John
I am just not convinced there is any telos to history; — John
or that we are somehow in a 'higher place' spiritually and creatively speaking than the ancients or the medievals or even the so-called 'primitives'. — John
it can go anywhere, end with a whimper instead of a bang, and then come roaring back; it is more like play, than programme. — John
I kind of get your usage of "apophatic" in this context, but I'm not sure it is really appropriate. For sure learning form a mistake is learning that this is not the way, that "not this"; but the "neti, neti" of Advaita is an all-encomapssing 'not this'. It is 'not anything' in a way similar to the God of apophatic theology. — John
A return to the spirit which is always there even if obscured. — John
I think this is our point of departure :P I don't have a strong argument for a telos (or I haven't taken the required time and thought/writing to articulate it); I just have an intuition about it. Maybe that intuition is wrong; who knows. I recently read through an excerpt of the Upanishads, and I'm working through the Gita right now. Aside from some great positives, I still get left cold by the cyclical cosmos of that philosophy; obviously Moksha is the telos, but I think I'm still too wrapped up in a Christian viewpoint to be able to shake the idea of a Messianic telos of some kind. I'm still working through it. I acknowledge that it could just be my upbringing. — Noble Dust
As I mentioned earlier, I think art exists within 3 stages: the artist, the middle-man and the audience. All of those elements have to come together for art to exist in the way that we know it on a common basis.
I think the main "seed" of art exists within the artist's experience of what they create, and nowhere else. The husk of art, then, is the rest: the middle-man and the audience. But the artist knows the art best. However, what prevents the artist from being allowed to be an asshole about this, is that the artist is only the vessel through which art comes into the world. I personally think this process is a divine process. The irony, though, is that because it's a divine process is exactly why there's no room for the artist's ego. The art is divine: that means the artist can't take full credit. The artist has to defer to the divine in the exact same way that the art dealer has to defer to the artist (not that they actually do), or, more realistically, in the way that the producer or the band members have to defer to the solo musical artist.
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