The Artist's Search for Reality

Reflected in the work of all artists is the sum total of their life experience, their belief system, and their unique individuality. Although every artist reflects a personal reality in his or her work, one consideration of how each differs depends on how perceptual variances are expressed. This expression may take several forms, depending on the individual aims of each artist.
Philosopher William James wrote, “The history of philosophy is to a great extent that of a certain clash of human temperament.” In much the same vein, the creation of, and reaction to art involve human elements that must necessarily ‘clash’, since human thought and perception differ. James further stated that philosophy is intimately related to how we “see” the world. Much that we see, he suggests, is shared and apparently the same, and yet our seeing is not identical. The same can be said of artists, be they musicians, poets, or painters. How they all “see” the world is different, not only from the inner emotional level of thought and perception to which James refers, but also in the physical act of seeing. His statement further implies that while we may be looking at the same subject, and may share great similarity in the physical appearance of that subject, there the similarity ends because our seeing is “not identical”. From this point of apparent similarity, a divergence begins to appear between how different individuals perceive what they see, with a further divergence among artists, because of what artists seek to find in what they see. This is the point where, perhaps, an independent reality begins to shape artistic vision. Christian Krohg wrote in an article about Edvard Munch, a statement that infers both the emotional and physical aspects of seeing differently are encompassed in that artist’s vision. “He paints, or rather regards, things in a way that is different from that of other artists. He sees only the essential, and that, naturally, is all he paints.”
The poet Maria Rainer Rilke wrote, in his Letters on Cezanne, “All the reality there is from him: in that dense muted blue, which is his, in his red, in his shadowless green, in the reddish black of his wine bottles.” Despite his unique handling of color, which may have been his physical perceptual reality, Paul Cezanne often spoke of the importance of his sensations and emotions before the bit of nature he selects for painting. Edward Hopper, who achieved deep emotion in his realist paintings, said, “The great painters, with their intellect as master, have attempted to force the unwilling medium of paint and canvas into a record of their emotions.” Expression, therefore, is reinforced as dependent not only on physical perceptual differences, but also on emotional reactions to the subject. These forces exert a direct and notable influence on outcome, with the amount of emotional content permeating the work often being a specific determinant of the level of abstraction inherent in it.
The level of abstraction, in addition to emotional content, is also affected by the visual harmony sought by the artist. Matisse, for example, said, “What I dream of is an art of balance, purity and serenity…a soothing calming influence on the mind, something like a good armchair which provides relaxation from physical fatigue.” In seeking to communicate this peaceful emotion that he defined as the goal of his art, he reasoned the use of color and line most appropriate to the task. This, of necessity, required an abstraction of the subject to achieve the compositional harmony he sought. The Nabis, led by Pierre Bonnard, Edouard Vuillard, and Maurice Denis, believed that the purpose of art was to decorate an interior space, decoration being used in the grander sense of its French origin and not in the pejorative manner it is commonly conceived of in English. The decorative goal led this group of artists to modify nature, or the subject, in whatever way necessary to satisfy their desired outcome. This conscious decision, substantially sacrificing realism to get closer to a personal reality, while far less common at that time than it is today, was rigorously applied by its staunch proponents who stretched the limits of what could be achieved with paint. Munch, for example, in painting Scream, distorted line and color to achieve pictorial representation of sound, and in the process created a motif that came to be identified as the symbol of modern man. Further, this painting, and others that followed, reflected his belief that the artist should be able to feel the pulse of his times, and convey this to his fellow man. Numerous other painters throughout history chose to express themselves through themes about the times in which they live. For example, on the theme of war, artists such as Pablo Picasso, Oskar Kokoschka and Jean Fautrier intended to stimulate dialogue about its direct effects. These, along with a majority of contemporary artists, have altered perceived realism to more effectively express and communicate vastly divergent aims.
But there have been other reasons for deviating from realism than compositional or narrative goals. Munch regarded Paul Gauguin as the embodiment of “reaction against realism”, and the man, who, by his example, established that “art was human work and not an imitation of nature”. Gauguin himself said, “My artistic center is in my brain, and nowhere else, and I am strong because…I do what is within me”. Relative to art and nature, he commented thus, “Art is an abstraction; derive this abstraction from nature while dreaming before it.” Andrew Wyeth, contradictorily, moved from “impressionistic” to “realistic” in his art, claiming that it brought him closer to his reality. A disdain of imitating nature was reflected in a dismissive manner by Vincent Van Gogh who said, “No painter or sculptor worthy of the name can ever be satisfied by the myopic imitation of the Nature’s excesses, the unimaginative observation, the optical deceit, the glory of being so faithful, so trivially exact as a daguerreotype.” Munch, most likely referring to imitative representation of his time, expressed the view that European Art was in a decline because artists interpreted the pleasures of the establishment and painted “pretty pictures to hang on the wall of a drawing room….”. Giorgio Morandi, whose metaphysical representations characterize his search for an essential reality, distances the idea of realism further in his saying, “I believe that nothing can be more abstract, more unreal than what we actually see.”
Even the work of the so-called realist artist is unique and represents a personal visual reality. Every artist, regardless of expressive style, conducts some form of manipulation to the subject for creation of a desired effect, which can be taken, in addition to being an aesthetic tool, as a way of expressing one’s inner vision. Even though the decision to bring one’s vision to the surface may not be a conscious one, the vision surfaces subconsciously. Wayne Thiebaud spoke of the use of “as many ways of seeing in the same picture- clear forms, hazy, squinting, glancing, staring, and even a sort of inner seeing”. He further noted about realism that “an artist can enliven a construct of paint by doing any number of manipulations to what he sees, which makes it possible for representational art to be both abstract and real simultaneously”. Commenting on completeness of subject matter, author Julian Bell compares the representation of a monkey by the 12th century Chinese painter Mao Sung that dwells on the animals’ inward sense of itself, and one by the 18th century British painter George Stubbs that relies on its relation to the viewer, and observes that these different approaches “obliges each of the artists to omit other facets of the represented animal”.
As Thiebold points out in speaking about special qualities he finds in his art after completion, “they are somehow there, even if deeply and unconsciously embedded”. In other words, straight realism, with no further motivation for its creation, is still art. However, it is possible to abrogate one’s responsibility as an artist by subjugating artistic vision to a lesser ideal, for example pure commercialism.
What other aims might there be, then, in the creation of art besides the harmonious, the decorative, the social, or the emotional? Van Gogh held that “the supreme artist, like Rembrandt, occupied himself almost exclusively with man, and made the quality of his soul felt throughout his work”. Alberto Martini wrote about Van Gogh that he “gradually came to realize that a landscape too could be so rendered that it mirrored the artist’s soul, and, being a visionary who was primarily concerned with penetrating the labyrinth of the soul and reaching the absolute that lay beyond, he repeatedly voiced his admiration for an art that spoke soul to soul”. The French poet and artist Antonin Artaud identified himself with Van Gogh, and sought desperately to reach his “internal other” in his art, once even defacing a self portrait to seek what was below the surface. Max Beckmann, too, looking below the surface, strived in his paintings to explore the dichotomy between bios (matter) and logos (spirit). He claimed that the artists’ task was, above all, “to penetrate bios to gain access to logos, in order to find a bridge from the here and now to the eternal”. We are apprised of the links between still life and the eternal, through writings of contemporary artists like Gary Faigin. He informs us that still life paintings dating from the time of Vermeer and Rembrandt came with a clearly readable moral, most often a reference to the impermanence of earthly goods and pleasures. He writes, “symbols like the flickering candle, the open watch, and the flittering butterfly, reminded viewers not to take too much comfort in the joys of the transitory material world, but to instead prepare for the real wealth in the world to come.” Other works that allude to the eternal include those of the abstract expressionists, such as the metaphorical contrasts between life and death by Robert Motherwell, separation of body and soul by Marcel Duchamp, and transcendentalism by Mark Rothko, Helen Frankenthaler and Barnett Newman.
The sources of early art were in general tied to specific and longer movements, like mythological or religious themes. Such broad categories disappeared with the advent of expressionism in the late 19th century, when the painter’s relation to his art became more private, and therefore more diverse. One can find reference to a great number of inspirations for art in the 20th century. The critic Harold Rosenberg wrote, “at a certain moment the canvas began to appear to one American painter after another as an arena in which to act….” This statement referred not only to American painters, but to non-American as well, and exemplified the variety of topics addressed by artists during this time. Contemporary artist Ellen Phelan is reported to have referred to art in a statement with which few will disagree, as “a long conversation that has been going on for five hundred years or more, and each artist brings what he or she can to it”. Topics that added to this conversation in art range in diversity from ideology by artists like Renato Guttoso, the Italian social realist painter, to anti-aesthetic subject matter by French painter and print maker Jean Dubuffet and Italian artist Piero Manzoni.
Other topics or mini-movements too numerous to cover, attest to the treatment of art as a stage to act out the artist’s particular preoccupation. The variety of styles, levels of abstraction and media chosen to enact this play suggest that the artist’s reality is an internalized phenomenon that is infused throughout one’s inner being, and must find its own language of transference to expose the ideals held as important. Focusing on painting within the vast array of media used to communicate in art, one aspect of the artist’s personal language is suggested by Thiebauld. He speaks of a personal “brush dance”, which he observes that for Georges Seurat might have been a foxtrot, Edouard Manet a waltz, and Willem De Kooning every tempo combined in one. This individualism of expression is yet another element in distinguishing the artists’ reality as they share viewpoints about topics of importance to them, and those that satisfy their individual aims in art.
In this dialogue, then, what might have been some further aims that artists have had in mind? One plausible target may have been mastery of the tools of art. David Park, in his painting The Cellist, created an image of an artist alone with her instrument, either intent on control or striving for the perfect performance. Could these aims have been the intent of Park himself, and of others as well? Piet Mondrian’s lifelong, single-minded search for “pure reality” rested in the “unity resulting from the equivalence of opposites”. Richard Diebenkorn stated his goal more fundamentally, saying “my initial intent, as well as intent in process was reduced to simply making things right – to as vague a goal as realization”. This inability to reconcile conception and realization seems to epitomize the search for a reality; a search that brings both anguish and satisfaction, and appears to be always just out of reach. This search for reality, then, just might be at the root of all artistic creation. The author, James Lord, referring to the painting of his portrait, wrote that the artist Alberto Giacometti “would regard it as a byproduct of his endless struggle to portray not merely an individual, but reality”. There appears to be an inability to adequately express this reality that is so internalized that it has become a part of both the psychological and physiological make-up of the individual. Expression would imply that one has fully encompassed every facet of the emotion involved with that reality, and is capable of transforming it in its entirety to a medium for its recording or communication.
Accomplishment of the artist’s expression of his or her reality appears to be beyond the grasp of any individual, with the result being only a reflection, and not a representation of that reality. To get it right according to the artist’s own reality, along with the challenge involved in doing that, seems to be at the heart of the artist’s goal. This elusive goal appears to be a major driver of creative desire, and even the masters never seemed to achieve the ultimate end. In attempting to achieve this end, how do different art forms vary? Bernhard Guttman links art to poetry with a belief that art is a personal, poetic expression of nature. Eugene Delacroix noted that while music and literature are obliged to unroll word by word, and requires one’s attention over a span of time; painting could deliver its message instantaneously. On the other hand, Jackson Pollock stated that his paintings should be viewed passively, and have them unravel over time, enjoying the experience as in music. The intent of the artist is difficult to interpret in paintings, particularly the abstract, and the more one delves into individual statements artists have made, the more one realizes that every reality is different. Could Pollock be speaking for the numerous artists who dealt in some degree of abstraction when he suggested that the experience of composing is the joy of the artist, and the experience of enjoyment is that of the viewer? Or could it be that the abstract artist has made a statement and challenges the viewer to come to their own self-realization through their art. This may be the object of the painting How to Look at Modern Art in America, by Ad Reinhardt in which a viewer laughs at an abstract image and asks, “What does that represent?” and the image replies, “What do you represent?”
For whatever reason one creates art then, or from whatever motivation, can the artist be content? In the text of Modigliani, Alfred Werner writes, “To an artist, the term ‘happiness’ stands for something different than it means to the average man. The artist is more likely to endure long years of poverty and concomitant miseries than is his neighbor, yet, when the artist tells us he has been a happy man, his remark is sincere, and unchallengeable. A creative person can never be entirely unhappy.” Ludvig Beethoven, deaf and isolated, wrote in a letter that only the artist or the scholar “carries his happiness within him”. Auguste Rodin considered true artists “almost the only men who do their work with pleasure”. The painting by Honore Daumier Le Peintre devant son Tableau (The Painter before his Easel) is described by Robert Rey, the author of Daumier, as a “hymn to creative solitude,” and one that glows with an aura of joy surrounding the artist, an individual who was always on the verge of destitution. From these writings, it would seem apparent that artists represent their perception of the universe with their own form of happiness.
There are, however, other challenges that artists must face in adhering to their personal philosophy and vision. In Process and Reality, 1929, Alfred North Whitehead claims, “In its turn every philosophy will suffer a deposition.” According to him philosophies come and go and none has the last word, but each contributes to a conversation destined to continue as long as people ask questions that seek understanding and wisdom. Herein lies another similarity between philosophy and art, each form of which suffers its own deposition, but will contribute to the dialogue with others who interact somehow with it. To determine where one fits in the continuum of this dialogue, and to make a statement that is different from what has been said before, the artist must be aware of the past. The philosopher George Santayana gave this advice, “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”.
In conclusion, the artist’s search for reality is a process of continual effort to render a personal vision, be it conscious or unconscious. Each vision is a subjective internal phenomenon that varies between artists, and is thus universally indefinable. The path to fulfillment of one’s vision is at once satisfying and frustrating, and each stage of the journey ends with a creation that is considered complete when it is “right” in the eyes of the artist. This may mean that it satisfactorily reflects the artist’s attempt at any goal that he or she has set, be that related to harmony, spirituality, commentary, or any combination thereof. The search is complete at each stage when the artist decides that a particular work will stop. But the search is not final, since, as with even the greatest of artists, there is always a higher level of accomplishment in sight. Another work must begin, because the artist has to respond to the ever-present challenge of expressing an indescribable reality, and achieving an unattainable end.
Bibliography:
Frank N. Magill, Masterpieces of World Philosophy, Harper Collins Publishers
Arne Eggum, Edvard Munch-Paintings, Sketches and Studies, J.M. Stenersens Forlag A. S.
Alfred Werner, Modigliani, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
Albert Martini, Van Gogh, Avenel Books, Division of Barre Publishing.
Peter Selz, Beckmann, Abbeville Press.
Gary Faigin, Moving Pictures – Exhibit Text.
Art Book Cezanne – DK Publishing.
Matisse, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
Tom Prideaux, The World of Delacroix, Time Life Books.
James Lord, A Giacometti Portrait, Farrar, Strauss and Giroux.
Caroline Jones, Bay Area Figurative Art, University of California Press.
Julian Bell, What is Painting? Thames and Hudson.
Editor: Jose Maria Faerna, Kokoschka, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
Meyer Schapiro, Cezanne, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
David Hopkins, After Modern Art, Oxford University Press.
Steven A. Nash with Adam Gopnik, Wayne Thiebaud, A Painters Retrospective, Thames and Hudson.
Consulting Editor Sir Herbert Read, Dictionary of Art and Artists, Thames and Hudson.
Robert Goldwater, Gauguin, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
E.H. Gombrich, The Story of Art, Phaidon.
Calvin Tomkins, “Can Art Be Taught?” The New Yorker, Article April 15, 2002.
Percy North, Bernhard Guttman -An American Impressionist, Abbeville Press.
Gloria Groom, Beyond the Easel, The Art Institute of Chicago and Yale University Press.
Robert Rey, Daumier, Harry. N. Abrams, Inc.
Karen Wilkin, Morandi, Rizzoli International Publications, Inc.
Hans L. C. Jaffe, Mondrian, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
All content except source matrial copyright 2002 by C. Aubrey McWatt.
Philosopher William James wrote, “The history of philosophy is to a great extent that of a certain clash of human temperament.” In much the same vein, the creation of, and reaction to art involve human elements that must necessarily ‘clash’, since human thought and perception differ. James further stated that philosophy is intimately related to how we “see” the world. Much that we see, he suggests, is shared and apparently the same, and yet our seeing is not identical. The same can be said of artists, be they musicians, poets, or painters. How they all “see” the world is different, not only from the inner emotional level of thought and perception to which James refers, but also in the physical act of seeing. His statement further implies that while we may be looking at the same subject, and may share great similarity in the physical appearance of that subject, there the similarity ends because our seeing is “not identical”. From this point of apparent similarity, a divergence begins to appear between how different individuals perceive what they see, with a further divergence among artists, because of what artists seek to find in what they see. This is the point where, perhaps, an independent reality begins to shape artistic vision. Christian Krohg wrote in an article about Edvard Munch, a statement that infers both the emotional and physical aspects of seeing differently are encompassed in that artist’s vision. “He paints, or rather regards, things in a way that is different from that of other artists. He sees only the essential, and that, naturally, is all he paints.”
The poet Maria Rainer Rilke wrote, in his Letters on Cezanne, “All the reality there is from him: in that dense muted blue, which is his, in his red, in his shadowless green, in the reddish black of his wine bottles.” Despite his unique handling of color, which may have been his physical perceptual reality, Paul Cezanne often spoke of the importance of his sensations and emotions before the bit of nature he selects for painting. Edward Hopper, who achieved deep emotion in his realist paintings, said, “The great painters, with their intellect as master, have attempted to force the unwilling medium of paint and canvas into a record of their emotions.” Expression, therefore, is reinforced as dependent not only on physical perceptual differences, but also on emotional reactions to the subject. These forces exert a direct and notable influence on outcome, with the amount of emotional content permeating the work often being a specific determinant of the level of abstraction inherent in it.
The level of abstraction, in addition to emotional content, is also affected by the visual harmony sought by the artist. Matisse, for example, said, “What I dream of is an art of balance, purity and serenity…a soothing calming influence on the mind, something like a good armchair which provides relaxation from physical fatigue.” In seeking to communicate this peaceful emotion that he defined as the goal of his art, he reasoned the use of color and line most appropriate to the task. This, of necessity, required an abstraction of the subject to achieve the compositional harmony he sought. The Nabis, led by Pierre Bonnard, Edouard Vuillard, and Maurice Denis, believed that the purpose of art was to decorate an interior space, decoration being used in the grander sense of its French origin and not in the pejorative manner it is commonly conceived of in English. The decorative goal led this group of artists to modify nature, or the subject, in whatever way necessary to satisfy their desired outcome. This conscious decision, substantially sacrificing realism to get closer to a personal reality, while far less common at that time than it is today, was rigorously applied by its staunch proponents who stretched the limits of what could be achieved with paint. Munch, for example, in painting Scream, distorted line and color to achieve pictorial representation of sound, and in the process created a motif that came to be identified as the symbol of modern man. Further, this painting, and others that followed, reflected his belief that the artist should be able to feel the pulse of his times, and convey this to his fellow man. Numerous other painters throughout history chose to express themselves through themes about the times in which they live. For example, on the theme of war, artists such as Pablo Picasso, Oskar Kokoschka and Jean Fautrier intended to stimulate dialogue about its direct effects. These, along with a majority of contemporary artists, have altered perceived realism to more effectively express and communicate vastly divergent aims.
But there have been other reasons for deviating from realism than compositional or narrative goals. Munch regarded Paul Gauguin as the embodiment of “reaction against realism”, and the man, who, by his example, established that “art was human work and not an imitation of nature”. Gauguin himself said, “My artistic center is in my brain, and nowhere else, and I am strong because…I do what is within me”. Relative to art and nature, he commented thus, “Art is an abstraction; derive this abstraction from nature while dreaming before it.” Andrew Wyeth, contradictorily, moved from “impressionistic” to “realistic” in his art, claiming that it brought him closer to his reality. A disdain of imitating nature was reflected in a dismissive manner by Vincent Van Gogh who said, “No painter or sculptor worthy of the name can ever be satisfied by the myopic imitation of the Nature’s excesses, the unimaginative observation, the optical deceit, the glory of being so faithful, so trivially exact as a daguerreotype.” Munch, most likely referring to imitative representation of his time, expressed the view that European Art was in a decline because artists interpreted the pleasures of the establishment and painted “pretty pictures to hang on the wall of a drawing room….”. Giorgio Morandi, whose metaphysical representations characterize his search for an essential reality, distances the idea of realism further in his saying, “I believe that nothing can be more abstract, more unreal than what we actually see.”
Even the work of the so-called realist artist is unique and represents a personal visual reality. Every artist, regardless of expressive style, conducts some form of manipulation to the subject for creation of a desired effect, which can be taken, in addition to being an aesthetic tool, as a way of expressing one’s inner vision. Even though the decision to bring one’s vision to the surface may not be a conscious one, the vision surfaces subconsciously. Wayne Thiebaud spoke of the use of “as many ways of seeing in the same picture- clear forms, hazy, squinting, glancing, staring, and even a sort of inner seeing”. He further noted about realism that “an artist can enliven a construct of paint by doing any number of manipulations to what he sees, which makes it possible for representational art to be both abstract and real simultaneously”. Commenting on completeness of subject matter, author Julian Bell compares the representation of a monkey by the 12th century Chinese painter Mao Sung that dwells on the animals’ inward sense of itself, and one by the 18th century British painter George Stubbs that relies on its relation to the viewer, and observes that these different approaches “obliges each of the artists to omit other facets of the represented animal”.
As Thiebold points out in speaking about special qualities he finds in his art after completion, “they are somehow there, even if deeply and unconsciously embedded”. In other words, straight realism, with no further motivation for its creation, is still art. However, it is possible to abrogate one’s responsibility as an artist by subjugating artistic vision to a lesser ideal, for example pure commercialism.
What other aims might there be, then, in the creation of art besides the harmonious, the decorative, the social, or the emotional? Van Gogh held that “the supreme artist, like Rembrandt, occupied himself almost exclusively with man, and made the quality of his soul felt throughout his work”. Alberto Martini wrote about Van Gogh that he “gradually came to realize that a landscape too could be so rendered that it mirrored the artist’s soul, and, being a visionary who was primarily concerned with penetrating the labyrinth of the soul and reaching the absolute that lay beyond, he repeatedly voiced his admiration for an art that spoke soul to soul”. The French poet and artist Antonin Artaud identified himself with Van Gogh, and sought desperately to reach his “internal other” in his art, once even defacing a self portrait to seek what was below the surface. Max Beckmann, too, looking below the surface, strived in his paintings to explore the dichotomy between bios (matter) and logos (spirit). He claimed that the artists’ task was, above all, “to penetrate bios to gain access to logos, in order to find a bridge from the here and now to the eternal”. We are apprised of the links between still life and the eternal, through writings of contemporary artists like Gary Faigin. He informs us that still life paintings dating from the time of Vermeer and Rembrandt came with a clearly readable moral, most often a reference to the impermanence of earthly goods and pleasures. He writes, “symbols like the flickering candle, the open watch, and the flittering butterfly, reminded viewers not to take too much comfort in the joys of the transitory material world, but to instead prepare for the real wealth in the world to come.” Other works that allude to the eternal include those of the abstract expressionists, such as the metaphorical contrasts between life and death by Robert Motherwell, separation of body and soul by Marcel Duchamp, and transcendentalism by Mark Rothko, Helen Frankenthaler and Barnett Newman.
The sources of early art were in general tied to specific and longer movements, like mythological or religious themes. Such broad categories disappeared with the advent of expressionism in the late 19th century, when the painter’s relation to his art became more private, and therefore more diverse. One can find reference to a great number of inspirations for art in the 20th century. The critic Harold Rosenberg wrote, “at a certain moment the canvas began to appear to one American painter after another as an arena in which to act….” This statement referred not only to American painters, but to non-American as well, and exemplified the variety of topics addressed by artists during this time. Contemporary artist Ellen Phelan is reported to have referred to art in a statement with which few will disagree, as “a long conversation that has been going on for five hundred years or more, and each artist brings what he or she can to it”. Topics that added to this conversation in art range in diversity from ideology by artists like Renato Guttoso, the Italian social realist painter, to anti-aesthetic subject matter by French painter and print maker Jean Dubuffet and Italian artist Piero Manzoni.
Other topics or mini-movements too numerous to cover, attest to the treatment of art as a stage to act out the artist’s particular preoccupation. The variety of styles, levels of abstraction and media chosen to enact this play suggest that the artist’s reality is an internalized phenomenon that is infused throughout one’s inner being, and must find its own language of transference to expose the ideals held as important. Focusing on painting within the vast array of media used to communicate in art, one aspect of the artist’s personal language is suggested by Thiebauld. He speaks of a personal “brush dance”, which he observes that for Georges Seurat might have been a foxtrot, Edouard Manet a waltz, and Willem De Kooning every tempo combined in one. This individualism of expression is yet another element in distinguishing the artists’ reality as they share viewpoints about topics of importance to them, and those that satisfy their individual aims in art.
In this dialogue, then, what might have been some further aims that artists have had in mind? One plausible target may have been mastery of the tools of art. David Park, in his painting The Cellist, created an image of an artist alone with her instrument, either intent on control or striving for the perfect performance. Could these aims have been the intent of Park himself, and of others as well? Piet Mondrian’s lifelong, single-minded search for “pure reality” rested in the “unity resulting from the equivalence of opposites”. Richard Diebenkorn stated his goal more fundamentally, saying “my initial intent, as well as intent in process was reduced to simply making things right – to as vague a goal as realization”. This inability to reconcile conception and realization seems to epitomize the search for a reality; a search that brings both anguish and satisfaction, and appears to be always just out of reach. This search for reality, then, just might be at the root of all artistic creation. The author, James Lord, referring to the painting of his portrait, wrote that the artist Alberto Giacometti “would regard it as a byproduct of his endless struggle to portray not merely an individual, but reality”. There appears to be an inability to adequately express this reality that is so internalized that it has become a part of both the psychological and physiological make-up of the individual. Expression would imply that one has fully encompassed every facet of the emotion involved with that reality, and is capable of transforming it in its entirety to a medium for its recording or communication.
Accomplishment of the artist’s expression of his or her reality appears to be beyond the grasp of any individual, with the result being only a reflection, and not a representation of that reality. To get it right according to the artist’s own reality, along with the challenge involved in doing that, seems to be at the heart of the artist’s goal. This elusive goal appears to be a major driver of creative desire, and even the masters never seemed to achieve the ultimate end. In attempting to achieve this end, how do different art forms vary? Bernhard Guttman links art to poetry with a belief that art is a personal, poetic expression of nature. Eugene Delacroix noted that while music and literature are obliged to unroll word by word, and requires one’s attention over a span of time; painting could deliver its message instantaneously. On the other hand, Jackson Pollock stated that his paintings should be viewed passively, and have them unravel over time, enjoying the experience as in music. The intent of the artist is difficult to interpret in paintings, particularly the abstract, and the more one delves into individual statements artists have made, the more one realizes that every reality is different. Could Pollock be speaking for the numerous artists who dealt in some degree of abstraction when he suggested that the experience of composing is the joy of the artist, and the experience of enjoyment is that of the viewer? Or could it be that the abstract artist has made a statement and challenges the viewer to come to their own self-realization through their art. This may be the object of the painting How to Look at Modern Art in America, by Ad Reinhardt in which a viewer laughs at an abstract image and asks, “What does that represent?” and the image replies, “What do you represent?”
For whatever reason one creates art then, or from whatever motivation, can the artist be content? In the text of Modigliani, Alfred Werner writes, “To an artist, the term ‘happiness’ stands for something different than it means to the average man. The artist is more likely to endure long years of poverty and concomitant miseries than is his neighbor, yet, when the artist tells us he has been a happy man, his remark is sincere, and unchallengeable. A creative person can never be entirely unhappy.” Ludvig Beethoven, deaf and isolated, wrote in a letter that only the artist or the scholar “carries his happiness within him”. Auguste Rodin considered true artists “almost the only men who do their work with pleasure”. The painting by Honore Daumier Le Peintre devant son Tableau (The Painter before his Easel) is described by Robert Rey, the author of Daumier, as a “hymn to creative solitude,” and one that glows with an aura of joy surrounding the artist, an individual who was always on the verge of destitution. From these writings, it would seem apparent that artists represent their perception of the universe with their own form of happiness.
There are, however, other challenges that artists must face in adhering to their personal philosophy and vision. In Process and Reality, 1929, Alfred North Whitehead claims, “In its turn every philosophy will suffer a deposition.” According to him philosophies come and go and none has the last word, but each contributes to a conversation destined to continue as long as people ask questions that seek understanding and wisdom. Herein lies another similarity between philosophy and art, each form of which suffers its own deposition, but will contribute to the dialogue with others who interact somehow with it. To determine where one fits in the continuum of this dialogue, and to make a statement that is different from what has been said before, the artist must be aware of the past. The philosopher George Santayana gave this advice, “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”.
In conclusion, the artist’s search for reality is a process of continual effort to render a personal vision, be it conscious or unconscious. Each vision is a subjective internal phenomenon that varies between artists, and is thus universally indefinable. The path to fulfillment of one’s vision is at once satisfying and frustrating, and each stage of the journey ends with a creation that is considered complete when it is “right” in the eyes of the artist. This may mean that it satisfactorily reflects the artist’s attempt at any goal that he or she has set, be that related to harmony, spirituality, commentary, or any combination thereof. The search is complete at each stage when the artist decides that a particular work will stop. But the search is not final, since, as with even the greatest of artists, there is always a higher level of accomplishment in sight. Another work must begin, because the artist has to respond to the ever-present challenge of expressing an indescribable reality, and achieving an unattainable end.
Bibliography:
Frank N. Magill, Masterpieces of World Philosophy, Harper Collins Publishers
Arne Eggum, Edvard Munch-Paintings, Sketches and Studies, J.M. Stenersens Forlag A. S.
Alfred Werner, Modigliani, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
Albert Martini, Van Gogh, Avenel Books, Division of Barre Publishing.
Peter Selz, Beckmann, Abbeville Press.
Gary Faigin, Moving Pictures – Exhibit Text.
Art Book Cezanne – DK Publishing.
Matisse, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
Tom Prideaux, The World of Delacroix, Time Life Books.
James Lord, A Giacometti Portrait, Farrar, Strauss and Giroux.
Caroline Jones, Bay Area Figurative Art, University of California Press.
Julian Bell, What is Painting? Thames and Hudson.
Editor: Jose Maria Faerna, Kokoschka, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
Meyer Schapiro, Cezanne, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
David Hopkins, After Modern Art, Oxford University Press.
Steven A. Nash with Adam Gopnik, Wayne Thiebaud, A Painters Retrospective, Thames and Hudson.
Consulting Editor Sir Herbert Read, Dictionary of Art and Artists, Thames and Hudson.
Robert Goldwater, Gauguin, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
E.H. Gombrich, The Story of Art, Phaidon.
Calvin Tomkins, “Can Art Be Taught?” The New Yorker, Article April 15, 2002.
Percy North, Bernhard Guttman -An American Impressionist, Abbeville Press.
Gloria Groom, Beyond the Easel, The Art Institute of Chicago and Yale University Press.
Robert Rey, Daumier, Harry. N. Abrams, Inc.
Karen Wilkin, Morandi, Rizzoli International Publications, Inc.
Hans L. C. Jaffe, Mondrian, Harry N. Abrams, Inc.
All content except source matrial copyright 2002 by C. Aubrey McWatt.
Art and Social Change

I have written about the Artist’s Search for Reality. My main conclusion was that the search for reality is a personal experience, an individual journey which no words can describe; it is a lifelong search that every artist feels compelled to undertake. This search, this freedom to seek individual expression, this desire and right to fulfill a personal dream is an integral component of the lives, not only of artists, but of almost everyone who lives in the Western world today.
For this power to exercise our compulsion for free choice we owe to the propositions and sacrifices of the artists of the Romantic Era. This is a challengeable statement for it is difficult to link current thinking to prior behaviors, actions and events. It is somewhat easier in cases where laws have been enacted to enforce changes in social attitudes as, for example, those resulting from the independence of India brought about by Gandhi’s peaceful revolution, or the freedom brought about by Martin Luther King’s civil rights movement or the new rule in South Africa brought about by Nelson Mandela. But despite such laws it still remains difficult to establish the acceptance deep in the psyche of those who are required to behave differently. Without a precursor to social change that results in new laws, such as that brought about by the art produced during a specific era, it becomes even more difficult to establish a definite link to modern thought. Nevertheless, I will attempt to establish links between today and a past era.
I suggest that our thinking, our actions, our social attitudes, and our politics today are a legacy of the Romantic Era. I further suggest that the social revolt of that era, that is to say the revolt piloted by the philosophers, the poets, the playwrights, the painters, the sculptors, the composers of music, and the architects of the Romantic Era has changed the social direction and social fabric of the Western world. Finally, I suggest to you that the changes brought about by this revolution have had the single most profound influence on social and political change that has occurred in the western democratic world, quite possibly greater than the influence of the teachings of Christ. Henry Hardy, editor of “Roots of Romanticism” transcribing from Isaiah Berlin’s 1965 Mellon lectures at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, stated in his editorial that “the interest of romanticism is not simply historical. A great many phenomena of the present day – nationalism, existentialism, admiration for great men, admiration for impersonal institutions, democracy, totalitarianism – are profoundly affected by the rise of romanticism, which enters them all. For this reason it is a subject not altogether irrelevant even to our own day”. The key point in this statement is the residual of existentialism. This existentialism owes much to Romanticism that places man as a free agent in a universe that appears to have no meaning. Let us attempt to conceptualize what we are trying to establish. Are there those in our society today who feels free to explore his or her independent thinking on any matter? That is a legacy of Romanticism. Are there those who, even if they choose to follow the teachings of another, still consider themselves free to think and behave independently? That is a legacy of Romanticism. Are there those who find beauty and mystery in nature? That is a legacy of Romanticism. Are there any Democratic political systems in the Western world today? That is a legacy of Romanticism.
What is Romanticism? When did it occur? What is the context in which it occurred? Why did it occur? Where did it start? How did it influence social change? What social effects remain today because of it? And is the world better off because of it? Some of these questions can never be answered clearly and definitively. In addressing the question - What is romanticism? Berlin refers to some of the most eminent writers on the subject as follows; “Stendhal says that the romantic is the modern and interesting, classicism is the old and the dull. Goethe says that romanticism is disease. Nietzsche says it is not a disease but a therapy. Sismondi, a Swiss critic, says that romanticism is a union of love, religion and chivalry. Von Gentz, a contemporary of Sismondi says it is a left wing menace, a menace to religion, to tradition and to the past. Friedrich Schlegel, the greatest herald of romanticism says there is in man a terrible unsatisfied desire to soar into infinity, while Ferdinand Bruntiniere says it is the opposite of self-transcendence, it is sheer self-assertion”. In these views there is contradiction without a common thread between them, leaving definition a less important element than elucidation of the idea behind romanticism.
I will attempt to unravel some of the intricacies of this most fascinating of subjects, and make propositions as to the impact on society of the art that drove this revolution. The period that dominated Europe just prior to the Romantic era was called the Enlightenment, and spanned the early to late 18th century. It was based on free thought, or thought that formed opinions on the basis of reason. In examining the context of this pre-romantic era the main philosophical are seen as unsupportive of independent thought by the masses. Whether all questions can be answered was an important issue, because that there must be answers to all questions was one of the fundamental philosophies that dominated Europe at this time. The writings of people like Voltaire and Fontenelle in France carried the message that science was continuously providing answers and that this would lead to people becoming happy and free. They and others like La Mettrie and Rousseau agreed that virtue consisted ultimately in knowledge. In America intellectual awareness flourished under Franklin, Jefferson and Paine. The Enlightenment philosophy considered independent thought to be crucial but unfortunately was thought not to be in the domain of the common man because the common man was incapable of understanding the mathematical and scientific basis of the answers that were being revealed. Therefore intelligent leaders were required to guide the masses and dictate to them what to do and how to live. Immanuel Kant, scientist and philosopher, although a proponent of Enlightenment took a slightly different position in his 1784 essay - What is Enlightenment? In which he wrote: “Have courage to use your own reason” - that is the motto of enlightenment. This article is crucial in the respect that while Kant believed in reason to answer all questions which is enlightenment philosophy, he also said “For any single individual to work himself out of his life of tutelage which has become almost his nature is very difficult. He has come to be fond of his state, and he is for the present really incapable of making use of his reason, for no one has ever let him try it out ….there are few who have succeeded by their own exercise of mind”. This says that many are followers but those who use their minds can be successful in achieving enlightenment.
The subtle but vital difference between Kant and others was that Kant introduced optimism for everyone to develop a higher use of the mind to stimulate independent and untutored thought. He wanted to prod the masses out of their inertia of not using the mind to its fullest potential. This is in fact a romantic idea and goal. Kant did not accept as a fact that the masses had to stay subdued, so in a sense he was also a proponent of change, and in a way influenced the movement towards Romanticism. Philosophically, therefore, the Enlightenment was the age of reason, where logic or science or God answered every question. If there was no answer then there was something wrong with the question. This idea stimulated man to search and to have independent thought, but it stifled creativity. It stifled creativity because it wanted to limit independent thinking to scientific explanation. It stifled the idea that there was mystery and beauty to be found in the universe. It stifled the creative possibilities of exploring a deeper inner sanctum within man and nature. It is this idea that was glued to the enlightenment idea of freedom and independence of thought to form the core thinking of Romanticism. Johann Georg Hamann, one of the most important of the Romantic philosophers, considered that “the whole of the Enlightenment doctrine appeared to kill that which was living in human beings, and appeared to offer a pale substitute for the creative energies of man…” and Fichte states that “A man who does not create, a man who simply accepts what life or nature offers him is dead".
Although Romantic influences surfaced in a number of different countries in both West and East Europe the major seats of development of Romanticism were in Germany, France and England. As far as the political context in the period of the Enlightenment, Europe was ruled by an aristocracy. Germany had 300 princes and 1200 sub-princes. Kings and Emperors ruled all over the rest of Europe. They worked in collaboration with the church to determine what art was acceptable and what was not. Nature was seen as seeking after perfection so the aristocracy required painters and sculptors to deal in ideal, symmetrical and proportionate forms. Classicism or classic ideas of beauty, and realism in its representation prevailed. Music had a classical method of construction, and composers were required to write music according to this symmetrical and clearly defined structure. 18th century poetry for example was written for the upper classes, and not for the common man, and was insensitive to the richness and spiritual value of nature. Architects built structures, usually of classical form, as commissioned by the wealthy. The masses were aesthetically and culturally deprived and the peasantry across Europe late in the Enlightenment was agitating for change with France already in the throes of upheaval. Romanticism took hold in the late 18th century and lasted through the mid 19th century. It was a way of thinking that opened up music, poetry and the visual arts to the public domain. It fostered independent thought and creativity. It is in the context described above that Romantic thinking started to breed in the heads and hearts of some. This some happened to be artists because artists, more than any other group in society, were feeling the pressures of an inability to either fully express their unique creativity, or to expand the reaches of expression beyond appealing to the mind in a concrete, classical and realistic manner.
Art had to be used in whatever form it would have its greatest impact to bring about a revolutionary change in thinking, and where necessary in more abstract form to bring man closer to the mystery and spirituality in nature and in the universe. I use the word spirituality here, not with its baggage of religiosity tied to it, but in reference to a beauty inside the human being and within the core of nature that is somehow sensed universally as being real. The Romantics forced nature into art. Nature as the main subject of a painting or a poem did not exist before. Nature as possessing a spiritual quality did not exist before. Nature to evoke compassion and express the human condition did not exist before. In fact from early Christian times right up to the Enlightenment nature was given the image of being wicked; this image stemmed from stories such as eating the forbidden fruit, the great floods that eliminated mankind save Noah and his flock, the idea of being born into the world as being born in sin, the idea of suffering from the forces of nature as eternal damnation for the vice of sin along with the idea of the destruction of the world before God returns for the reckoning and salvation of the blessed were all images of a nature that was used by God to punish.
The Romantics used the powerful images of the forces of nature to convey its mystery, as a place to find truth, inner peace and beauty, as a force to bring people a message of hope and fulfillment and change, and as a tool to enact social and political change. The Romantic philosophy is comparable to the philosophy of Christ in its dramatic method of impacting the human consciousness of the time. This dramatic method took the form of martyrdom for the benefit of the rest of mankind. This was the most powerful common element between Romanticism and the teaching of Christ in furthering their particular cause. The fundamental tenets of equality, freedom, self-fulfillment and attainment of one’s full potential were all goals common to both philosophies. The major difference is that Romantic philosophy was not held out as a promise for eternal life, but limited to the promise of a better and more fulfilling life in the here and now. This impetus propelled individuals to claim their freedom and fulfill their potential, leading to emigration of pioneers who sought the opportunity to develop uncharted spaces and forge their own destinies based on their individual potential. The flow of this emigration changed the face of America in social attitudes and behavior.
However the paradox of this equation is that over the following two centuries greed and materialism replaced the inherent compassion that was a part of the Romantic ideal. It replaced the idea that the thrust of the Romantic martyrs was working together for the benefit of all humanity. The compassion inferred and infused in Romanticism declined in direct correlation to the rise of the selfishness of human nature as material accumulation became a visible reality. The later changes in the history and social structure of the world can be directly associated with the philosophers of the Romantic era. Fichte’s speeches to the German nation delivered when Napoleon invaded Prussia were responsible for a fierce nationalism and belief in superiority of the German race. “Whatever their native land, whatever the language which they speak, they are part of our people or they will join it late or soon.” These words which became a German refrain for a century afterward were twisted by the Nazis to justify their own notion of Aryan purity and superiority, forever changing the history and social fabric of Germany and the rest of the world. Romantic artistic ideas of painters unintentionally also helped shape the German attempt at world domination. Such an effect came from Max Beckmann (1884-1950) who was hailed as the German Delacroix. His Carnival of 1920 illustrated in comic form the shock of the German nation in its defeat in 1918, and was a Romantic assault to moral and social constraints in Germany. These romantic philosophical, poetic, musical and visual media messages that stirred the pride and resiliency of the German nation were given a twisted interpretation to justify a national socialism that was offered as a basis for implementation of military initiatives to satisfy the egomaniacal desires of Hitler in seeking world domination. In a speech in 1937, Hitler described Romantic artists as ‘noble Germans in search of the true intrinsic values of our people’. The same groundswell of philosophical and other artistic stirring of the peasantry was at work in Russia but had a delayed effect in raising the sentiments of the masses in that country due to Czarist military might. The literacy rate in Russia in the 19th century was also quite low with only approximately a quarter of the population able to read and write. This may also have been a limiting factor toward rapid overthrow of aristocratic domination. Nevertheless, the contrast between the splendor of aristocratic Russia and the rest of the population could not be supported forever in light of the changes brought about by the Romantic revolution across their entire southern border.
The Bolshevik revolution of 1917 was a natural consequence, the difference in the political solution being the communist approach to the uneven distribution of wealth. These two events can be traced to Romantic roots. The painter Karl Pavlovich Bryullov (1799-1852) whose Last Days of Pompeii finished in 1833 suggests divine retribution in Pompeii’s obliteration by natural disaster and makes the distinct connection with the potential for a similar fate if there is no change in Russia’s despotic and economically divided circumstances. As late as 1915 the Russian composer Scriabin was planning an epic weeklong orchestral composition that would bring universal harmony to the consciousness of mankind. This work was never written but the intent of his philosophy was known and infused in other of his compositions which had an influence in the 1917 revolution. Romantic influences helped shape the revolution that has probably been unsurpassed in its impact on global political and social evolution. Symbolism was also central to all Romantic thought and found its place in national representation such as the passion associated with the flags of nations. Architectural symbolism was part of the art of this era so it is important to look at its historical associations and feelings it generated. The architecture of the early Gothic period between the 12th and the beginning of the 16th century, embodied a spirit of emotion and compassion which was the same spirit found in the Romantic period that started almost 300 years after the end of the Gothic era.. The Romantics revived the Gothic tradition because this is where they found a great deal of their inspiration, though not from the religious fervor of the work but from the emotion it connoted and from the connection to the rest of nature which it represented.
With the advent of the Renaissance, Gothic art became scornfully rejected and replaced by Roman art which was thought at the time to embody the Renaissance ideal that was closer to perfection. It was not until the Romantic Movement in art began in late 18th century that there was a revival of the Gothic tradition. Romantic artists who sought emotion and compassion did not subscribe to the classical tradition which did not reflect these qualities, but rather derived their inspiration from medieval art and architecture. Emotion is one of the dominant characteristics of Gothic imagery. The anonymous image c.1307 of Christ Crucified in the Perpignan cathedral, France is shown with compassion intended to affect the emotions of the onlooker. In the painting by Roger van der Weyden, Descent from the Cross, the parallel positions of Christ and the Virgin are intended to show the feeling of compassion so dear to the Gothic spirit. The residual from Gothic architecture is seen today in many structures. Grand Central station in New York is such an example. The first design of a modern condominium can be found in an 18th century draft of castles to house large numbers of families. Thus the impact of architecture of this period can still be felt. The gift by the French people to the people of the United States of the Statue of Liberty is an architectural and artistic symbol with deep significance to the freedom of spirit. Not only of the two nations, but representative of the freedom of the whole of Europe as well due to the fact that France was seen as the artistic capital of the continent at the time.
In music the Baroque period preceded classicism and reached it’s zenith circa 1750 in the works of Bach and Handel. Bach worked in sacred music while Handel worked in both sacred and secular operatic themes. The ‘sinfonias’ of these works settled into a standard four movement form with an opening fast movement, a lyrical slow movement, a short dance movement and a fast finale. Haydn perfected this model which was the beginning of classicism. The classical sonata with its own structural principles along with the symphony, the string quartet and the solo concerto were consolidated and developed by Haydn’s Viennese contemporaries Mozart and Beethoven. Beethoven, in later years, pushed the limits of classicism and spearheaded the Romantic era in music. His massive Eroica Symphony No.3 pushed classical symphonic form to its limit while his sixth (Pastoral) Symphony showed how music could be used to conjure up and illustrate humanity’s relationship with nature. This was the first of the influences of Romantic composers in bringing to the masses music that had been the sole domain of the aristocracy. The deaths of Schubert, Weber and Beethoven between 1826 and 1828 brought the full overlap between classical and Romantic music. While Germany led the musical world in symphonic terms, romantic composers like Dvorak in Bohemia, Borodin and Rimsky-Korsakov in Russia, Grieg in Norway and Chopin in Poland were introducing colorful inflections to their native music, which was another major influence to development of world music. Later Romantics like Liszt, Mahler, Brahms, and Glinka continued the work of earlier form builders in music, developing thematic ideas and patterns that can be found in today’s music. Italy, in the meantime consolidated its reputation as the operatic centre of the world, with masterpieces by Rossini, Donizetti, Bellini, Verdi and Puccini. In the 19th century England was “the land without music” until it was rescued by Gilbert and Sullivan and by Elgar, the first major British composer since Purcell. The music of these romantic era composers remains with us today; their legacy in bringing music to the general populace and their stimulus to individual creativity in developing national musical patterns that began with them and continued up to this time cannot be disputed. But let our composers remember Schopenhauer’s words, “The glory of all music is in its emotional depth”.
The term Romantic was first used by Schlegel in his journal Aethenaeum to refer to “progressive universal poetry. In poetry, the words of men like Byron, Shelley and Wordsworth carried great strength in advocating change to the status quo. Poems were written in language that the common man could understand and with a power to convey the truth of the human condition to which all men could relate. Thus the radical changes they proposed were able to penetrate the minds of the populace so that they felt compelled to take action. Further, the martyrdom of Byron in going to his native Greece to fight for liberty from Turkish invasion triggered deep sentiments and accelerated embracement of the Romantic ideal.
Byron wrote these prophetic words before going to Greece to give his life.
The isles of Greece! the isles of Greece!
Where burning Sappho loved and sung,
Where grew the arts of war and peace,---
Where Delos rose and Phoebus sprung!
Eternal summer gilds them yet,
But all, except their sun, is set.
The mountains look on Marathon---
And Marathon looks on the sea;
And musing there an hour alone,
I dream'd that Greece might yet be free
For, standing on the Persians' grave,
I could not deem myself a slave
Place me on Sunium's marble steep---
Where nothing, save the waves and I,
May hear our mutual murmurs sweep:
There, swan-like, let me sing and die;
A land of slaves shall ne'er be mine---
Dash down yon cup of Samian wine!
What did Wordsworth think was wrong with the modern world?
The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon,
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers,
For this, for everything, we are out of tune Although Friedrich von Schiller, poet dramatist and philosopher, believed that nature was to be subjugated by man , he provided, in his letters upon the Aesthetic Education of Man, a strong philosophic basis for his doctrine of art, and indicates clearly and persuasively his view of the place of beauty in human life. He outlines the plight of humanity of his time, and presses for a greater presence of art versus science.
“…..in our day it is necessity, neediness, that prevails, and bends a degraded humanity under its iron yoke. Utility is the great idol of the time, to which all powers do homage and all subjects are subservient. In this great balance of utility, the spiritual service of art has no weight, and, deprived of all encouragement, it vanishes from the noisy Vanity Fair of our time. The very spirit of philosophical inquiry itself robs the imagination of one promise after another, and the frontiers of art are narrowed, in proportion as the limits of science are enlarged”. Diderot preached that “there are two men. There is the artificial man who belongs in society and conforms to the practices of society and seeks to please; he is the normal sort of artificial, mincing little figure of the caricaturists of the eighteenth century. Within this man, however, there is imprisoned the violent, bold, dark, criminal instinct of a man who wishes to break out. This is the man who, if properly controlled, is responsible for magnificent works of genius.” The passage from the writings of the poet Lenz typifies the call to action. “Action, action is the soul of the world, not pleasure, not abandonment to feeling, not abandonment to reasoning, only action; without action, all knowledge is nothing but postponed death”.
The poets of the Romantic Era made a definitive contribution to the changes in independent thought of the masses, their will to fight for their rightful intellectual and creative freedom and their resistance to domination of their spirit. They simplified their language to bring the beauty of poetic literature to the appreciation of everyone. This has led to further simplification to bring a form of teaching to children through rhymes that are deeply embedded in the cultures of the West today. The legacy of this poetic art form of the Romantic Era is taken for granted and its value and source are not even considered. But it exists and its value and its source are clear.
The visual arts spoke to the people and were a powerful force in communicating the human condition of the Enlightenment that needed to be recognized and changed. Herder said “A work of art is the voice of one man addressing himself to other men… any artifact of human hands is in some way the expression of the attitude to life, conscious or unconscious of its maker.”
For the French critic and poet Charles Baudelaire, “Romanticism is precisely situated neither in choice of subjects nor in exact truth, but in a way of feeling”. He regarded Delacroix as the epitome of the Romantic artist. Delacroix’s “Death of Sardanapalus” is regarded as the most outrageous romantic painting ever made as it violated Byron’s poem and violated the senses as a rebellion to the dominant neo-classicist style of the period. Turner’s emotion for his painting Snowstorm – Steamboat off a Harbour’s Mouth was drawn from him being lashed to the mast of the mast of the boat during the storm and felt bound to record the experience if he survived. This is the feeling of romanticism that inspired the masses through the visual arts. Napoleon was the greatest exemplar of the Romantic era. He was self-made and wish- fulfillment personified, the person who emerged from nowhere to become the greatest hero of the day. In fact, Napoleon built his own image through the art that was created and defined by him.
Martyrdom played a great role in defining the resolute spirit of the Romantic, building these martyrs into superhuman hero figures, thus fuelling the movement that stimulated the masses to demand change from the various institutions in power. Byron was such a figure. The East had received his strong moral and practical commitment, as he deplored the Turkish domination of Greece. In 1821 Greece began a war of independence against the Turks. Byron joined them as a volunteer and died at Missolonghi in 1824. It was precisely this intervention that was widely received as a symbolic sacrifice of martyrdom, and made Byron the hero of the Romantic movement. The 1835 painting of the poet Byron – Byron in Arnaout Dress – by Thomas Phillips is a copy of an earlier 1813 painting by the same artist. In the same vein of appeal through death for the cause the 1793 painting Death of Marat by Jacques Louis David shows a bleeding wound, a cross made from the bath and the box as in memory of a dead Christ, the murderess’ knife and her letter for help: all powerful symbols of sacrifice for the common people. This was followed in 1794 by Death of Bara whose last words were reportedly “Long live the Republic”. “The Death of Gericault” by Ary Scheffer held Gericault up as a martyr to art. One man dying in his refusal to compromise his art is one of the proudest claims of Romanticism.
In July 1798 the Medusa was carrying French soldiers and settlers to Africa and ran aground off Senegal. Passengers were cut adrift on a raft and after 13 days there was sight of another ship. The message of this painting was that despite the suffering survivors rise up to wave at the distant mast in hope. These people are portrayed as heroes and martyrs to official incompetence.
The reverence and mystery of nature and its firm establishment as part of artistic language was the subject of many Romantic artists. Carl David Frederich painted The Monk by the Sea in 1809, which is a great tribute to this idea by the sheer scope of dimensions. Turner’s Dutch Boat in a Gale, 1801, and his Fall of an Avalanche in 1810 are some of British painters’ contributions to the reverence and mystery and peace many of us find in Nature today.
What drove these artists to go beyond the ordinary to seek what they thought was an inherent human right, the right to choose? The painter Benjamin Robert Haydon (1786-1846) called it “the voice within, the creative drive itself – This more than skill or talent is genius. Like religion, it can produce gales of ecstasy and euphoria. It must be obeyed and understood.”
The Romantic movement undoubtedly influenced significant changes to social and political structures. Much of present day social and political systems in place are due to the struggles of the artists and later on the masses of those who followed. The spirit of Romanticism gave a creative desire and a hope to millions to realize their potential and to fulfill their dreams. However, always attached to the Romantic spirit was the defiance of suppression with deep compassion for the multitudes to improve their human condition. The great irony of the movement is that millions have achieved material success through fulfilling their potential, but the greater their successes the greater the sacrifice of compassion has been.
Bibliography:
Isaiah Berlin, The Roots of Romanticism, Princeton University Press.
David Blayney Brown, Romanticism, Phaidon Press Ltd.
Wendy Thompson, Romantic Composers, Anness Publishing Ltd.
Arnold Whittall, Romantic Music, Alden Press, Oxford.
Carlos Reyero, The Key to Art: From Romanticism to Impressionism, Search Press Ltd.
Jose Bracons, The Key to Gothic Art, Search Press Ltd.
Jonathan Glancey, The Story of Architecture, DK Publishing
David Hopkins, After Modern Art, Oxford University Press.
Consulting Editor Sir Herbert Read, Dictionary of Art and Artists, Thames and Hudson.
E.H. Gombrich, The Story of Art, Phaidon Press Ltd.
Katharine Savage, The Story of World Religions, Henry Z. Walck Inc.
Richard S. Gilbert, The Prophetic Imperative, Skinner House Books.
Modern History Sourcebook
Adam Zamoyski, Moscow 1812, Harper Perennial
For this power to exercise our compulsion for free choice we owe to the propositions and sacrifices of the artists of the Romantic Era. This is a challengeable statement for it is difficult to link current thinking to prior behaviors, actions and events. It is somewhat easier in cases where laws have been enacted to enforce changes in social attitudes as, for example, those resulting from the independence of India brought about by Gandhi’s peaceful revolution, or the freedom brought about by Martin Luther King’s civil rights movement or the new rule in South Africa brought about by Nelson Mandela. But despite such laws it still remains difficult to establish the acceptance deep in the psyche of those who are required to behave differently. Without a precursor to social change that results in new laws, such as that brought about by the art produced during a specific era, it becomes even more difficult to establish a definite link to modern thought. Nevertheless, I will attempt to establish links between today and a past era.
I suggest that our thinking, our actions, our social attitudes, and our politics today are a legacy of the Romantic Era. I further suggest that the social revolt of that era, that is to say the revolt piloted by the philosophers, the poets, the playwrights, the painters, the sculptors, the composers of music, and the architects of the Romantic Era has changed the social direction and social fabric of the Western world. Finally, I suggest to you that the changes brought about by this revolution have had the single most profound influence on social and political change that has occurred in the western democratic world, quite possibly greater than the influence of the teachings of Christ. Henry Hardy, editor of “Roots of Romanticism” transcribing from Isaiah Berlin’s 1965 Mellon lectures at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, stated in his editorial that “the interest of romanticism is not simply historical. A great many phenomena of the present day – nationalism, existentialism, admiration for great men, admiration for impersonal institutions, democracy, totalitarianism – are profoundly affected by the rise of romanticism, which enters them all. For this reason it is a subject not altogether irrelevant even to our own day”. The key point in this statement is the residual of existentialism. This existentialism owes much to Romanticism that places man as a free agent in a universe that appears to have no meaning. Let us attempt to conceptualize what we are trying to establish. Are there those in our society today who feels free to explore his or her independent thinking on any matter? That is a legacy of Romanticism. Are there those who, even if they choose to follow the teachings of another, still consider themselves free to think and behave independently? That is a legacy of Romanticism. Are there those who find beauty and mystery in nature? That is a legacy of Romanticism. Are there any Democratic political systems in the Western world today? That is a legacy of Romanticism.
What is Romanticism? When did it occur? What is the context in which it occurred? Why did it occur? Where did it start? How did it influence social change? What social effects remain today because of it? And is the world better off because of it? Some of these questions can never be answered clearly and definitively. In addressing the question - What is romanticism? Berlin refers to some of the most eminent writers on the subject as follows; “Stendhal says that the romantic is the modern and interesting, classicism is the old and the dull. Goethe says that romanticism is disease. Nietzsche says it is not a disease but a therapy. Sismondi, a Swiss critic, says that romanticism is a union of love, religion and chivalry. Von Gentz, a contemporary of Sismondi says it is a left wing menace, a menace to religion, to tradition and to the past. Friedrich Schlegel, the greatest herald of romanticism says there is in man a terrible unsatisfied desire to soar into infinity, while Ferdinand Bruntiniere says it is the opposite of self-transcendence, it is sheer self-assertion”. In these views there is contradiction without a common thread between them, leaving definition a less important element than elucidation of the idea behind romanticism.
I will attempt to unravel some of the intricacies of this most fascinating of subjects, and make propositions as to the impact on society of the art that drove this revolution. The period that dominated Europe just prior to the Romantic era was called the Enlightenment, and spanned the early to late 18th century. It was based on free thought, or thought that formed opinions on the basis of reason. In examining the context of this pre-romantic era the main philosophical are seen as unsupportive of independent thought by the masses. Whether all questions can be answered was an important issue, because that there must be answers to all questions was one of the fundamental philosophies that dominated Europe at this time. The writings of people like Voltaire and Fontenelle in France carried the message that science was continuously providing answers and that this would lead to people becoming happy and free. They and others like La Mettrie and Rousseau agreed that virtue consisted ultimately in knowledge. In America intellectual awareness flourished under Franklin, Jefferson and Paine. The Enlightenment philosophy considered independent thought to be crucial but unfortunately was thought not to be in the domain of the common man because the common man was incapable of understanding the mathematical and scientific basis of the answers that were being revealed. Therefore intelligent leaders were required to guide the masses and dictate to them what to do and how to live. Immanuel Kant, scientist and philosopher, although a proponent of Enlightenment took a slightly different position in his 1784 essay - What is Enlightenment? In which he wrote: “Have courage to use your own reason” - that is the motto of enlightenment. This article is crucial in the respect that while Kant believed in reason to answer all questions which is enlightenment philosophy, he also said “For any single individual to work himself out of his life of tutelage which has become almost his nature is very difficult. He has come to be fond of his state, and he is for the present really incapable of making use of his reason, for no one has ever let him try it out ….there are few who have succeeded by their own exercise of mind”. This says that many are followers but those who use their minds can be successful in achieving enlightenment.
The subtle but vital difference between Kant and others was that Kant introduced optimism for everyone to develop a higher use of the mind to stimulate independent and untutored thought. He wanted to prod the masses out of their inertia of not using the mind to its fullest potential. This is in fact a romantic idea and goal. Kant did not accept as a fact that the masses had to stay subdued, so in a sense he was also a proponent of change, and in a way influenced the movement towards Romanticism. Philosophically, therefore, the Enlightenment was the age of reason, where logic or science or God answered every question. If there was no answer then there was something wrong with the question. This idea stimulated man to search and to have independent thought, but it stifled creativity. It stifled creativity because it wanted to limit independent thinking to scientific explanation. It stifled the idea that there was mystery and beauty to be found in the universe. It stifled the creative possibilities of exploring a deeper inner sanctum within man and nature. It is this idea that was glued to the enlightenment idea of freedom and independence of thought to form the core thinking of Romanticism. Johann Georg Hamann, one of the most important of the Romantic philosophers, considered that “the whole of the Enlightenment doctrine appeared to kill that which was living in human beings, and appeared to offer a pale substitute for the creative energies of man…” and Fichte states that “A man who does not create, a man who simply accepts what life or nature offers him is dead".
Although Romantic influences surfaced in a number of different countries in both West and East Europe the major seats of development of Romanticism were in Germany, France and England. As far as the political context in the period of the Enlightenment, Europe was ruled by an aristocracy. Germany had 300 princes and 1200 sub-princes. Kings and Emperors ruled all over the rest of Europe. They worked in collaboration with the church to determine what art was acceptable and what was not. Nature was seen as seeking after perfection so the aristocracy required painters and sculptors to deal in ideal, symmetrical and proportionate forms. Classicism or classic ideas of beauty, and realism in its representation prevailed. Music had a classical method of construction, and composers were required to write music according to this symmetrical and clearly defined structure. 18th century poetry for example was written for the upper classes, and not for the common man, and was insensitive to the richness and spiritual value of nature. Architects built structures, usually of classical form, as commissioned by the wealthy. The masses were aesthetically and culturally deprived and the peasantry across Europe late in the Enlightenment was agitating for change with France already in the throes of upheaval. Romanticism took hold in the late 18th century and lasted through the mid 19th century. It was a way of thinking that opened up music, poetry and the visual arts to the public domain. It fostered independent thought and creativity. It is in the context described above that Romantic thinking started to breed in the heads and hearts of some. This some happened to be artists because artists, more than any other group in society, were feeling the pressures of an inability to either fully express their unique creativity, or to expand the reaches of expression beyond appealing to the mind in a concrete, classical and realistic manner.
Art had to be used in whatever form it would have its greatest impact to bring about a revolutionary change in thinking, and where necessary in more abstract form to bring man closer to the mystery and spirituality in nature and in the universe. I use the word spirituality here, not with its baggage of religiosity tied to it, but in reference to a beauty inside the human being and within the core of nature that is somehow sensed universally as being real. The Romantics forced nature into art. Nature as the main subject of a painting or a poem did not exist before. Nature as possessing a spiritual quality did not exist before. Nature to evoke compassion and express the human condition did not exist before. In fact from early Christian times right up to the Enlightenment nature was given the image of being wicked; this image stemmed from stories such as eating the forbidden fruit, the great floods that eliminated mankind save Noah and his flock, the idea of being born into the world as being born in sin, the idea of suffering from the forces of nature as eternal damnation for the vice of sin along with the idea of the destruction of the world before God returns for the reckoning and salvation of the blessed were all images of a nature that was used by God to punish.
The Romantics used the powerful images of the forces of nature to convey its mystery, as a place to find truth, inner peace and beauty, as a force to bring people a message of hope and fulfillment and change, and as a tool to enact social and political change. The Romantic philosophy is comparable to the philosophy of Christ in its dramatic method of impacting the human consciousness of the time. This dramatic method took the form of martyrdom for the benefit of the rest of mankind. This was the most powerful common element between Romanticism and the teaching of Christ in furthering their particular cause. The fundamental tenets of equality, freedom, self-fulfillment and attainment of one’s full potential were all goals common to both philosophies. The major difference is that Romantic philosophy was not held out as a promise for eternal life, but limited to the promise of a better and more fulfilling life in the here and now. This impetus propelled individuals to claim their freedom and fulfill their potential, leading to emigration of pioneers who sought the opportunity to develop uncharted spaces and forge their own destinies based on their individual potential. The flow of this emigration changed the face of America in social attitudes and behavior.
However the paradox of this equation is that over the following two centuries greed and materialism replaced the inherent compassion that was a part of the Romantic ideal. It replaced the idea that the thrust of the Romantic martyrs was working together for the benefit of all humanity. The compassion inferred and infused in Romanticism declined in direct correlation to the rise of the selfishness of human nature as material accumulation became a visible reality. The later changes in the history and social structure of the world can be directly associated with the philosophers of the Romantic era. Fichte’s speeches to the German nation delivered when Napoleon invaded Prussia were responsible for a fierce nationalism and belief in superiority of the German race. “Whatever their native land, whatever the language which they speak, they are part of our people or they will join it late or soon.” These words which became a German refrain for a century afterward were twisted by the Nazis to justify their own notion of Aryan purity and superiority, forever changing the history and social fabric of Germany and the rest of the world. Romantic artistic ideas of painters unintentionally also helped shape the German attempt at world domination. Such an effect came from Max Beckmann (1884-1950) who was hailed as the German Delacroix. His Carnival of 1920 illustrated in comic form the shock of the German nation in its defeat in 1918, and was a Romantic assault to moral and social constraints in Germany. These romantic philosophical, poetic, musical and visual media messages that stirred the pride and resiliency of the German nation were given a twisted interpretation to justify a national socialism that was offered as a basis for implementation of military initiatives to satisfy the egomaniacal desires of Hitler in seeking world domination. In a speech in 1937, Hitler described Romantic artists as ‘noble Germans in search of the true intrinsic values of our people’. The same groundswell of philosophical and other artistic stirring of the peasantry was at work in Russia but had a delayed effect in raising the sentiments of the masses in that country due to Czarist military might. The literacy rate in Russia in the 19th century was also quite low with only approximately a quarter of the population able to read and write. This may also have been a limiting factor toward rapid overthrow of aristocratic domination. Nevertheless, the contrast between the splendor of aristocratic Russia and the rest of the population could not be supported forever in light of the changes brought about by the Romantic revolution across their entire southern border.
The Bolshevik revolution of 1917 was a natural consequence, the difference in the political solution being the communist approach to the uneven distribution of wealth. These two events can be traced to Romantic roots. The painter Karl Pavlovich Bryullov (1799-1852) whose Last Days of Pompeii finished in 1833 suggests divine retribution in Pompeii’s obliteration by natural disaster and makes the distinct connection with the potential for a similar fate if there is no change in Russia’s despotic and economically divided circumstances. As late as 1915 the Russian composer Scriabin was planning an epic weeklong orchestral composition that would bring universal harmony to the consciousness of mankind. This work was never written but the intent of his philosophy was known and infused in other of his compositions which had an influence in the 1917 revolution. Romantic influences helped shape the revolution that has probably been unsurpassed in its impact on global political and social evolution. Symbolism was also central to all Romantic thought and found its place in national representation such as the passion associated with the flags of nations. Architectural symbolism was part of the art of this era so it is important to look at its historical associations and feelings it generated. The architecture of the early Gothic period between the 12th and the beginning of the 16th century, embodied a spirit of emotion and compassion which was the same spirit found in the Romantic period that started almost 300 years after the end of the Gothic era.. The Romantics revived the Gothic tradition because this is where they found a great deal of their inspiration, though not from the religious fervor of the work but from the emotion it connoted and from the connection to the rest of nature which it represented.
With the advent of the Renaissance, Gothic art became scornfully rejected and replaced by Roman art which was thought at the time to embody the Renaissance ideal that was closer to perfection. It was not until the Romantic Movement in art began in late 18th century that there was a revival of the Gothic tradition. Romantic artists who sought emotion and compassion did not subscribe to the classical tradition which did not reflect these qualities, but rather derived their inspiration from medieval art and architecture. Emotion is one of the dominant characteristics of Gothic imagery. The anonymous image c.1307 of Christ Crucified in the Perpignan cathedral, France is shown with compassion intended to affect the emotions of the onlooker. In the painting by Roger van der Weyden, Descent from the Cross, the parallel positions of Christ and the Virgin are intended to show the feeling of compassion so dear to the Gothic spirit. The residual from Gothic architecture is seen today in many structures. Grand Central station in New York is such an example. The first design of a modern condominium can be found in an 18th century draft of castles to house large numbers of families. Thus the impact of architecture of this period can still be felt. The gift by the French people to the people of the United States of the Statue of Liberty is an architectural and artistic symbol with deep significance to the freedom of spirit. Not only of the two nations, but representative of the freedom of the whole of Europe as well due to the fact that France was seen as the artistic capital of the continent at the time.
In music the Baroque period preceded classicism and reached it’s zenith circa 1750 in the works of Bach and Handel. Bach worked in sacred music while Handel worked in both sacred and secular operatic themes. The ‘sinfonias’ of these works settled into a standard four movement form with an opening fast movement, a lyrical slow movement, a short dance movement and a fast finale. Haydn perfected this model which was the beginning of classicism. The classical sonata with its own structural principles along with the symphony, the string quartet and the solo concerto were consolidated and developed by Haydn’s Viennese contemporaries Mozart and Beethoven. Beethoven, in later years, pushed the limits of classicism and spearheaded the Romantic era in music. His massive Eroica Symphony No.3 pushed classical symphonic form to its limit while his sixth (Pastoral) Symphony showed how music could be used to conjure up and illustrate humanity’s relationship with nature. This was the first of the influences of Romantic composers in bringing to the masses music that had been the sole domain of the aristocracy. The deaths of Schubert, Weber and Beethoven between 1826 and 1828 brought the full overlap between classical and Romantic music. While Germany led the musical world in symphonic terms, romantic composers like Dvorak in Bohemia, Borodin and Rimsky-Korsakov in Russia, Grieg in Norway and Chopin in Poland were introducing colorful inflections to their native music, which was another major influence to development of world music. Later Romantics like Liszt, Mahler, Brahms, and Glinka continued the work of earlier form builders in music, developing thematic ideas and patterns that can be found in today’s music. Italy, in the meantime consolidated its reputation as the operatic centre of the world, with masterpieces by Rossini, Donizetti, Bellini, Verdi and Puccini. In the 19th century England was “the land without music” until it was rescued by Gilbert and Sullivan and by Elgar, the first major British composer since Purcell. The music of these romantic era composers remains with us today; their legacy in bringing music to the general populace and their stimulus to individual creativity in developing national musical patterns that began with them and continued up to this time cannot be disputed. But let our composers remember Schopenhauer’s words, “The glory of all music is in its emotional depth”.
The term Romantic was first used by Schlegel in his journal Aethenaeum to refer to “progressive universal poetry. In poetry, the words of men like Byron, Shelley and Wordsworth carried great strength in advocating change to the status quo. Poems were written in language that the common man could understand and with a power to convey the truth of the human condition to which all men could relate. Thus the radical changes they proposed were able to penetrate the minds of the populace so that they felt compelled to take action. Further, the martyrdom of Byron in going to his native Greece to fight for liberty from Turkish invasion triggered deep sentiments and accelerated embracement of the Romantic ideal.
Byron wrote these prophetic words before going to Greece to give his life.
The isles of Greece! the isles of Greece!
Where burning Sappho loved and sung,
Where grew the arts of war and peace,---
Where Delos rose and Phoebus sprung!
Eternal summer gilds them yet,
But all, except their sun, is set.
The mountains look on Marathon---
And Marathon looks on the sea;
And musing there an hour alone,
I dream'd that Greece might yet be free
For, standing on the Persians' grave,
I could not deem myself a slave
Place me on Sunium's marble steep---
Where nothing, save the waves and I,
May hear our mutual murmurs sweep:
There, swan-like, let me sing and die;
A land of slaves shall ne'er be mine---
Dash down yon cup of Samian wine!
What did Wordsworth think was wrong with the modern world?
The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon,
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers,
For this, for everything, we are out of tune Although Friedrich von Schiller, poet dramatist and philosopher, believed that nature was to be subjugated by man , he provided, in his letters upon the Aesthetic Education of Man, a strong philosophic basis for his doctrine of art, and indicates clearly and persuasively his view of the place of beauty in human life. He outlines the plight of humanity of his time, and presses for a greater presence of art versus science.
“…..in our day it is necessity, neediness, that prevails, and bends a degraded humanity under its iron yoke. Utility is the great idol of the time, to which all powers do homage and all subjects are subservient. In this great balance of utility, the spiritual service of art has no weight, and, deprived of all encouragement, it vanishes from the noisy Vanity Fair of our time. The very spirit of philosophical inquiry itself robs the imagination of one promise after another, and the frontiers of art are narrowed, in proportion as the limits of science are enlarged”. Diderot preached that “there are two men. There is the artificial man who belongs in society and conforms to the practices of society and seeks to please; he is the normal sort of artificial, mincing little figure of the caricaturists of the eighteenth century. Within this man, however, there is imprisoned the violent, bold, dark, criminal instinct of a man who wishes to break out. This is the man who, if properly controlled, is responsible for magnificent works of genius.” The passage from the writings of the poet Lenz typifies the call to action. “Action, action is the soul of the world, not pleasure, not abandonment to feeling, not abandonment to reasoning, only action; without action, all knowledge is nothing but postponed death”.
The poets of the Romantic Era made a definitive contribution to the changes in independent thought of the masses, their will to fight for their rightful intellectual and creative freedom and their resistance to domination of their spirit. They simplified their language to bring the beauty of poetic literature to the appreciation of everyone. This has led to further simplification to bring a form of teaching to children through rhymes that are deeply embedded in the cultures of the West today. The legacy of this poetic art form of the Romantic Era is taken for granted and its value and source are not even considered. But it exists and its value and its source are clear.
The visual arts spoke to the people and were a powerful force in communicating the human condition of the Enlightenment that needed to be recognized and changed. Herder said “A work of art is the voice of one man addressing himself to other men… any artifact of human hands is in some way the expression of the attitude to life, conscious or unconscious of its maker.”
For the French critic and poet Charles Baudelaire, “Romanticism is precisely situated neither in choice of subjects nor in exact truth, but in a way of feeling”. He regarded Delacroix as the epitome of the Romantic artist. Delacroix’s “Death of Sardanapalus” is regarded as the most outrageous romantic painting ever made as it violated Byron’s poem and violated the senses as a rebellion to the dominant neo-classicist style of the period. Turner’s emotion for his painting Snowstorm – Steamboat off a Harbour’s Mouth was drawn from him being lashed to the mast of the mast of the boat during the storm and felt bound to record the experience if he survived. This is the feeling of romanticism that inspired the masses through the visual arts. Napoleon was the greatest exemplar of the Romantic era. He was self-made and wish- fulfillment personified, the person who emerged from nowhere to become the greatest hero of the day. In fact, Napoleon built his own image through the art that was created and defined by him.
Martyrdom played a great role in defining the resolute spirit of the Romantic, building these martyrs into superhuman hero figures, thus fuelling the movement that stimulated the masses to demand change from the various institutions in power. Byron was such a figure. The East had received his strong moral and practical commitment, as he deplored the Turkish domination of Greece. In 1821 Greece began a war of independence against the Turks. Byron joined them as a volunteer and died at Missolonghi in 1824. It was precisely this intervention that was widely received as a symbolic sacrifice of martyrdom, and made Byron the hero of the Romantic movement. The 1835 painting of the poet Byron – Byron in Arnaout Dress – by Thomas Phillips is a copy of an earlier 1813 painting by the same artist. In the same vein of appeal through death for the cause the 1793 painting Death of Marat by Jacques Louis David shows a bleeding wound, a cross made from the bath and the box as in memory of a dead Christ, the murderess’ knife and her letter for help: all powerful symbols of sacrifice for the common people. This was followed in 1794 by Death of Bara whose last words were reportedly “Long live the Republic”. “The Death of Gericault” by Ary Scheffer held Gericault up as a martyr to art. One man dying in his refusal to compromise his art is one of the proudest claims of Romanticism.
In July 1798 the Medusa was carrying French soldiers and settlers to Africa and ran aground off Senegal. Passengers were cut adrift on a raft and after 13 days there was sight of another ship. The message of this painting was that despite the suffering survivors rise up to wave at the distant mast in hope. These people are portrayed as heroes and martyrs to official incompetence.
The reverence and mystery of nature and its firm establishment as part of artistic language was the subject of many Romantic artists. Carl David Frederich painted The Monk by the Sea in 1809, which is a great tribute to this idea by the sheer scope of dimensions. Turner’s Dutch Boat in a Gale, 1801, and his Fall of an Avalanche in 1810 are some of British painters’ contributions to the reverence and mystery and peace many of us find in Nature today.
What drove these artists to go beyond the ordinary to seek what they thought was an inherent human right, the right to choose? The painter Benjamin Robert Haydon (1786-1846) called it “the voice within, the creative drive itself – This more than skill or talent is genius. Like religion, it can produce gales of ecstasy and euphoria. It must be obeyed and understood.”
The Romantic movement undoubtedly influenced significant changes to social and political structures. Much of present day social and political systems in place are due to the struggles of the artists and later on the masses of those who followed. The spirit of Romanticism gave a creative desire and a hope to millions to realize their potential and to fulfill their dreams. However, always attached to the Romantic spirit was the defiance of suppression with deep compassion for the multitudes to improve their human condition. The great irony of the movement is that millions have achieved material success through fulfilling their potential, but the greater their successes the greater the sacrifice of compassion has been.
Bibliography:
Isaiah Berlin, The Roots of Romanticism, Princeton University Press.
David Blayney Brown, Romanticism, Phaidon Press Ltd.
Wendy Thompson, Romantic Composers, Anness Publishing Ltd.
Arnold Whittall, Romantic Music, Alden Press, Oxford.
Carlos Reyero, The Key to Art: From Romanticism to Impressionism, Search Press Ltd.
Jose Bracons, The Key to Gothic Art, Search Press Ltd.
Jonathan Glancey, The Story of Architecture, DK Publishing
David Hopkins, After Modern Art, Oxford University Press.
Consulting Editor Sir Herbert Read, Dictionary of Art and Artists, Thames and Hudson.
E.H. Gombrich, The Story of Art, Phaidon Press Ltd.
Katharine Savage, The Story of World Religions, Henry Z. Walck Inc.
Richard S. Gilbert, The Prophetic Imperative, Skinner House Books.
Modern History Sourcebook
Adam Zamoyski, Moscow 1812, Harper Perennial
Postmodern Ideas on the Function of Art

The range of art expanded most prodigiously in the post modern era spanning the last 40 years. Empty space, the earth, the human body, performances, events, and photographic and videotaped recordings were among the expanded definitions of art. This explosion spurred artists to postulate divergent functions for their own art, many being convinced that their own purposes were absolute. This work examines the viewpoints of selected artists and critics on the subject and interprets the thrust of post-modern art to determine whether there exists a mega-trend toward a universal function of art, a modernist concept that postmodernists in fact rejected.
Appropriation was a key characteristic of postmodernism, almost suggestive of a revitalized search for new meaning in artistic creation without necessarily finding a completely new subject for study and representation. Minimal artists like Joel Shapiro, on the very edge of post-modernism, found their aesthetic in the banal and ordinary form of the object while post-minimalists such as Robert Morris took the lead into post-modernism by distancing themselves totally from the object as art. Those who used matter focused on the natural form of their chosen medium while others relied upon art as experience, with most artists united in divorcing their art from any semblance of a commodity. Richard Serra stated that “art needed no justification outside of itself” and, through his creations, stimulated observers toward a sensibility of their own vulnerability, allowing his art to function more powerfully in the service of self awareness and understanding. Such self-awareness was also triggered by the art of Eva Hesse and Bruce Nauman. By examining the opposite of form, namely matter, it is possible that post-minimal artists required their art to function as a means of fusing all matter, including the observer, together as a part of universal existence or experience.
Supporting this idea of universality are artists expressions of their intent that indicate a trend toward a common function of art. To wit, discovery of the world and informing those in it of one’s ideas and experiences appeared to constitute a central theme of the function of art for many postmodernists. Richard Long believed “the function of art is to invent new ways to deal with the world”; Gilbert and George held that “the true function of art is to bring about new understanding, progress and advancement…”; John Cage believed “the purpose of art is to sensitize the public to the radical changes taking place in life”; Sol LeWitt felt that the idea was the most important component of the work of conceptual art. These thoughts should not be interpreted to mean that in the creation of art its function is preeminent in the mind of the artist, but they do indicate that a function does exist. The instability of material used by artists in this era attested to a universal given, the deterioration of all matter. Performance art of this period sought to communicate messages about life experiences. Moira Roth identified “three main tendencies in woman’s performance art: ‘the autobiographical/narrative, the mystical/ritualistic and the political.” Nauman also hinted at universality in a conceptual work that reads “The true artist helps the world by revealing mystic truths”.
Decorative artists pondered the question of a universal understanding and aesthetic appreciation of pattern, and art historian Ernst Gombrich proposed such an underlying universal psychological disposition toward order. Ned Smyth, a pattern artist, felt that decoration represented a move toward humanism, and Philip Guston once concluded “there is nothing left but to paint my life”. Robert Irwin touched on the transcendental in his works that dissolved into their environment and the pictures became their shadows. James Turrell’s purchase of an extinct volcano to contemplate the sky as a celestial vault attests to the search for transcendence as a function of art. These tendencies have in common a humanitarian undertone, informing the world of one’s experiences, and also a mystical consideration of a universal need for understanding the transcendental. The premise on a universal need of all humanity can be introduced at this point with the words of the distinguished anthropologist Joseph Campbell who said “What we are looking for is a way of experiencing the world that will open up to us the transcendent that informs it”.
All human thought and activity can be classified under this umbrella so that Campbell’s suggestion of a universal search for transcendence may represent a plausible universal function of art. Campbell further noted that “the ultimate mystical goal is to be at unity with one’s God. With that, duality is transcended and forms disappear… there is nobody there, no God, no you…the metaphorical image of your God is the ultimate mystery of your own being.” The exploration of form in its fluid state, of light and its effects, of connecting objects and their surrounding space, of dealing with the non permanent features of art, and the fusion of organism with environment points to support of the premise that the function of art is to satisfy the purpose of our existence as defined by Campbell.
The postmodernists came closer than hitherto in relating the aesthetic experience with transcendental need by distancing the idea of possession of the art object as a determinant of appreciation. They respected James Joyce’s formula for the aesthetic experience in that it does not move you to want to possess the object. The aesthetic experience is a simple beholding of the object. When a fortunate rhythm has been struck by the artist, you experience radiance. You are held in aesthetic arrest. William Dunning, author of “Advice to Young Artists in a Postmodern Era”, discusses the subject of the aesthetic experience and its relation to transcendence. He lists numerous words and phrases that have been used to describe the transcendental, among them ecstasy, epiphany, ultimate reality, immanence, cosmic unity, enlightenment, the sublime, and a state of grace, while he himself refers to it as the aesthetic experience, recognizing at the same time that such experiences are, “by the nature of our language, ineffable”. The inability to express this state is not an indication of subjectivity, and its’ reality will be attested to by those who have experienced it. That such a state does exist is irrefutable, and as the respected American philosopher John Dewey reminds us, there is little difference between the religious experience and the aesthetic experience, resulting in the extensive use of the aesthetic experience through art to strengthen religious faith. Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns and Elizabeth Murray were among those who revived expressionist painting with the idea that an emotion based on some other part of the psyche than the ego was at play.
Julian Schnabel as a part of the revival group dealt with such themes as spiritual transcendence, a theme that kept reappearing as a part of each new development in postmodern art. A similar trend was taking place internationally with German and Italian neo-expressionism. Francesco Clemente’s work possessed a sublime as well as mundane element, and the work of Anselm Kiefer is described as evoking “terror as well as ecstasy”. There were definite differences in ideas relative to the function of art during the postmodern era that clearly separated it from the transcendental idea. A 1979 editorial of the publication October, edited by Rosalind Krauss and criticizing painting of any kind, concluded that art is “the product of a specific set of temporal and topical, social and political conditions”. However, such a function for art is not to be taken to preclude artistic aesthetic goals. Among the many groups proliferating in the post modern era, the aims varied widely.
Groups such as the situationists supported art to draw attention to the environment, and deconstructionists such as Mary Kelley created work that revolved around political and feminist issues. During this period also a group called neogeo emerged. This name was conferred on them since they appropriated and recycled modernist labels and geometric forms. Ashley Bickerton and Jeff Koons were proponents of label appropriation and Peter Halley the geometric forms, which called into question the “transcendental rhetoric” and instead aimed at a meditation on culture. This trend led to the proliferation of work that idealized the culture of minority groups such as African-American (Adrian Piper) Native Americans (Jimmie Durham) and homosexuals (Robert Maplethorpe). Within these various expressions it is difficult to determine a specific transcendental goal. Whether such a function existed for their art besides their specified objective is left to speculation.
On the question of economics, the fact that less than 20 of the 40,000 to 90,000 artists in New York met with significant financial success put more pressure on artists of this era than on any other to produce material for shows where some income could be derived. This may have caused some diversion from a truer function of art, and may have led to a movement that has been termed a “punk aesthetic”, a combination of movies, music and performance art that was characterized by rough and rapid production. The use of the term aesthetic in this context reinforces the ineffability of an idea for which there is no comparator, and leads to confusion in the attempt to identify a transcendental aesthetic. From the 1990’s art has taken separate paths of either dealing with social issues or steering completely clear of any social commentary. Social issues are commanding less and less attention in the art world leading to a tremendous and increasing diversity of the art mass, with no predominant medium or style in evidence. Given the undercurrent of a search for transcendent reality throughout the art of the past and an increasing preponderance of this phenomenon in the more recent past, it is possible that the aesthetic experience could become a more consciously sought after element in the art of the future.
Bibliography:
Irving Sandler, Art of the Postmodern Era. Icon Editions - An Imprint of Harper Collins Publishers
William V. Dunning, Advice to Young Artists in a Postmodern Era - Syracuse University Press
David Hopkins, After Modern Art 1945-2000 – Oxford University Press-
Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth – Doubleday
Jonathan Fineberg, Art since 1940 : Strategies of Being -
Appropriation was a key characteristic of postmodernism, almost suggestive of a revitalized search for new meaning in artistic creation without necessarily finding a completely new subject for study and representation. Minimal artists like Joel Shapiro, on the very edge of post-modernism, found their aesthetic in the banal and ordinary form of the object while post-minimalists such as Robert Morris took the lead into post-modernism by distancing themselves totally from the object as art. Those who used matter focused on the natural form of their chosen medium while others relied upon art as experience, with most artists united in divorcing their art from any semblance of a commodity. Richard Serra stated that “art needed no justification outside of itself” and, through his creations, stimulated observers toward a sensibility of their own vulnerability, allowing his art to function more powerfully in the service of self awareness and understanding. Such self-awareness was also triggered by the art of Eva Hesse and Bruce Nauman. By examining the opposite of form, namely matter, it is possible that post-minimal artists required their art to function as a means of fusing all matter, including the observer, together as a part of universal existence or experience.
Supporting this idea of universality are artists expressions of their intent that indicate a trend toward a common function of art. To wit, discovery of the world and informing those in it of one’s ideas and experiences appeared to constitute a central theme of the function of art for many postmodernists. Richard Long believed “the function of art is to invent new ways to deal with the world”; Gilbert and George held that “the true function of art is to bring about new understanding, progress and advancement…”; John Cage believed “the purpose of art is to sensitize the public to the radical changes taking place in life”; Sol LeWitt felt that the idea was the most important component of the work of conceptual art. These thoughts should not be interpreted to mean that in the creation of art its function is preeminent in the mind of the artist, but they do indicate that a function does exist. The instability of material used by artists in this era attested to a universal given, the deterioration of all matter. Performance art of this period sought to communicate messages about life experiences. Moira Roth identified “three main tendencies in woman’s performance art: ‘the autobiographical/narrative, the mystical/ritualistic and the political.” Nauman also hinted at universality in a conceptual work that reads “The true artist helps the world by revealing mystic truths”.
Decorative artists pondered the question of a universal understanding and aesthetic appreciation of pattern, and art historian Ernst Gombrich proposed such an underlying universal psychological disposition toward order. Ned Smyth, a pattern artist, felt that decoration represented a move toward humanism, and Philip Guston once concluded “there is nothing left but to paint my life”. Robert Irwin touched on the transcendental in his works that dissolved into their environment and the pictures became their shadows. James Turrell’s purchase of an extinct volcano to contemplate the sky as a celestial vault attests to the search for transcendence as a function of art. These tendencies have in common a humanitarian undertone, informing the world of one’s experiences, and also a mystical consideration of a universal need for understanding the transcendental. The premise on a universal need of all humanity can be introduced at this point with the words of the distinguished anthropologist Joseph Campbell who said “What we are looking for is a way of experiencing the world that will open up to us the transcendent that informs it”.
All human thought and activity can be classified under this umbrella so that Campbell’s suggestion of a universal search for transcendence may represent a plausible universal function of art. Campbell further noted that “the ultimate mystical goal is to be at unity with one’s God. With that, duality is transcended and forms disappear… there is nobody there, no God, no you…the metaphorical image of your God is the ultimate mystery of your own being.” The exploration of form in its fluid state, of light and its effects, of connecting objects and their surrounding space, of dealing with the non permanent features of art, and the fusion of organism with environment points to support of the premise that the function of art is to satisfy the purpose of our existence as defined by Campbell.
The postmodernists came closer than hitherto in relating the aesthetic experience with transcendental need by distancing the idea of possession of the art object as a determinant of appreciation. They respected James Joyce’s formula for the aesthetic experience in that it does not move you to want to possess the object. The aesthetic experience is a simple beholding of the object. When a fortunate rhythm has been struck by the artist, you experience radiance. You are held in aesthetic arrest. William Dunning, author of “Advice to Young Artists in a Postmodern Era”, discusses the subject of the aesthetic experience and its relation to transcendence. He lists numerous words and phrases that have been used to describe the transcendental, among them ecstasy, epiphany, ultimate reality, immanence, cosmic unity, enlightenment, the sublime, and a state of grace, while he himself refers to it as the aesthetic experience, recognizing at the same time that such experiences are, “by the nature of our language, ineffable”. The inability to express this state is not an indication of subjectivity, and its’ reality will be attested to by those who have experienced it. That such a state does exist is irrefutable, and as the respected American philosopher John Dewey reminds us, there is little difference between the religious experience and the aesthetic experience, resulting in the extensive use of the aesthetic experience through art to strengthen religious faith. Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns and Elizabeth Murray were among those who revived expressionist painting with the idea that an emotion based on some other part of the psyche than the ego was at play.
Julian Schnabel as a part of the revival group dealt with such themes as spiritual transcendence, a theme that kept reappearing as a part of each new development in postmodern art. A similar trend was taking place internationally with German and Italian neo-expressionism. Francesco Clemente’s work possessed a sublime as well as mundane element, and the work of Anselm Kiefer is described as evoking “terror as well as ecstasy”. There were definite differences in ideas relative to the function of art during the postmodern era that clearly separated it from the transcendental idea. A 1979 editorial of the publication October, edited by Rosalind Krauss and criticizing painting of any kind, concluded that art is “the product of a specific set of temporal and topical, social and political conditions”. However, such a function for art is not to be taken to preclude artistic aesthetic goals. Among the many groups proliferating in the post modern era, the aims varied widely.
Groups such as the situationists supported art to draw attention to the environment, and deconstructionists such as Mary Kelley created work that revolved around political and feminist issues. During this period also a group called neogeo emerged. This name was conferred on them since they appropriated and recycled modernist labels and geometric forms. Ashley Bickerton and Jeff Koons were proponents of label appropriation and Peter Halley the geometric forms, which called into question the “transcendental rhetoric” and instead aimed at a meditation on culture. This trend led to the proliferation of work that idealized the culture of minority groups such as African-American (Adrian Piper) Native Americans (Jimmie Durham) and homosexuals (Robert Maplethorpe). Within these various expressions it is difficult to determine a specific transcendental goal. Whether such a function existed for their art besides their specified objective is left to speculation.
On the question of economics, the fact that less than 20 of the 40,000 to 90,000 artists in New York met with significant financial success put more pressure on artists of this era than on any other to produce material for shows where some income could be derived. This may have caused some diversion from a truer function of art, and may have led to a movement that has been termed a “punk aesthetic”, a combination of movies, music and performance art that was characterized by rough and rapid production. The use of the term aesthetic in this context reinforces the ineffability of an idea for which there is no comparator, and leads to confusion in the attempt to identify a transcendental aesthetic. From the 1990’s art has taken separate paths of either dealing with social issues or steering completely clear of any social commentary. Social issues are commanding less and less attention in the art world leading to a tremendous and increasing diversity of the art mass, with no predominant medium or style in evidence. Given the undercurrent of a search for transcendent reality throughout the art of the past and an increasing preponderance of this phenomenon in the more recent past, it is possible that the aesthetic experience could become a more consciously sought after element in the art of the future.
Bibliography:
Irving Sandler, Art of the Postmodern Era. Icon Editions - An Imprint of Harper Collins Publishers
William V. Dunning, Advice to Young Artists in a Postmodern Era - Syracuse University Press
David Hopkins, After Modern Art 1945-2000 – Oxford University Press-
Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth – Doubleday
Jonathan Fineberg, Art since 1940 : Strategies of Being -
Art and the Unconscious
In an earlier essay I arrived at the conclusion that the artist’s search for reality appears to constitute a process of continual effort to render a personal vision, be it conscious or unconscious. This led me to believe that, in addition to unconscious artistic vision, there may be an underlying unconscious source for artistic creation. If such a source existed, it might provide a commonality to the internal phenomenon of creativity experienced by every artist. Eric Maisel has reported on historical relationships with artistic creativity that include madness, genius, divine inspiration, the presence of certain personality traits, and sublimation of sexual instincts. Of those described, the most plausible for consideration of commonality is the relationship to the unconscious. Could Freud have described this phenomenon? Anthony Kenny reports on Freud’s “unflattering view of artistic creation as something very similar to neurosis: a sublimation of unsatisfied libido, translating into phantasy from the unresolved conflicts of infantile sexuality.” The amount of merit one proffers on this view, however, corresponds to the level of acceptance one places on this generalized Freudian concept of sexual suppression to explain virtually any phenomenon.
Jung, who subscribed to a collective unconscious rather than the Freudian individual unconscious, provides the basis for a proposition that could explain the presence in humankind of myths, passed down through the ages, and internalizing and perpetuating a human belief system. Joseph Campbell reports that these myths, held as truths common to man, remain in the unconscious as elementary ideas, this nomenclature ascribed to them by the German anthropologist Adolf Bastian. In this circumstance, could artistic creation be a latent desire of all mankind to express what is known to be “elementary”? Rupert Sheldrake, in the text Natural Grace, reports that his experience of almost two decades teaching art-as-meditation has convinced him “there are all kinds of artists in our world who have covered up their artistic talents.” He further advocates “listening to our images more and truly bringing out the artist in everybody...” Could it be true, then, that practicing artists have removed from its latent form the desire to create, and feel a compulsion to articulate this through their selected media? The variety of goals that artists find themselves compelled to pursue, and the powerful force of art as a means to express deep conviction, both lend credence to the argument that there is a fundamental need for bringing to a conscious level the valuable lessons of art that are stagnant in the unconscious. The involvement of every person in some form of creative endeavor, be it writing, painting, music, performing, or pruning plants in a garden, leads me to believe that an inherent need exists to bring forth from the unconscious what is known about art to reveal its mystical therapeutic and spiritual value. This idea is somewhat validated by Fox’s suggestion that the earliest paintings known to man, around thirty thousand years old, were made in caves and were central to the use of caves for religious, initiatory, and ceremonial purposes. Could Neitzche, then, be justified in his conviction that “art was the highest form of human activity”? If so, popularizing this concept could lead to a revolutionary shift in the public perspective of art, and to a reconciliation of humankind with an integral essential need. Relative to essential need, Henry E. Allison in writing on the Critique of Judgement describes Kant’s claim that pleasure in the beautiful consists in aesthetic reflection and judgment, and as such “the liking for the beautiful may be required by everyone”. Richard Schact takes this idea one step further in his writings about Nietzche by referring to art as “the creative transformation of the world…” and to the philosopher’s mature thought as having “expanded upon the idea of the basic connection between art and the justification of life.” Why is art capable of representing that which is difficult to comprehend about nature? T.L.S. Sprigge offers insight in his discussion of the philosophy of Schopenhauer. Regarding the system of laws of nature, he states, “The artist produces a perceptual representation which yields us awareness of these ideas (Ideen) rather than of the particular thing before us.” David Leeming states that “early mythmakers told stories that the collective mind already knew” and that “The true artist explores the inner myth of life in the context of a particular local experience”. The intrinsic attraction for artistic representation of these ideas to humankind may be explained also by the Jungian theory of a “second psychic system of a collective, universal, and impersonal nature which is identical in all individuals.” The eighth century monk Shantideva held that “I” is only possible in relation to “you”, and thus “there can never be an “I” existing in isolation. This offers another perspective on the universal appreciation of art, that being through intertwined consciousness that links all humankind. This principle has its basis in the theory of overlapping individual souls that are rooted in, but extend outward from the body, and a generic divine spirit that flows through all in the universe. This ubiquitous, omniscient, universal spirit, as the original creative source for which God is a metaphor, is recognized in some form in virtually every culture. Matthew Fox attributes to Aquinas the saying: “the very spirit…that hovered over the waters at the beginning of creation hovers over the mind of the artist as he or she creates.” Therefore, it is not beyond reason to accept that this creative source is the unifying element of the collective unconscious within us all, and is the same creative source for the artist to render his or her personal vision. Though the afore-stated is primarily conjecture, no alternate proposition can be offered without similar surmise. Bibliography: Frank N. Magill, Masterpieces of World Philosophy - Harper Collins Publishers Anthony Kenny, A Brief History of Western Philosophy - Blackwell Publishers Ted Honderich, The Philosophers – Oxford University Press Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth - Doubleday Joseph Campbell, editor / R.F.C. Hull, translator, the Portable Jung - Penguin Books Stephen Bachelor, Verses from the Center – Penguin Putnam, Inc. Liz Greene and Juliet Sharman -Burke, The Mythic Journey - Simon and Schuster, New York Matthew Fox and Rupert Sheldrake, Natural Grace – Doubleday David Adams Leeming, The World of Myth – Oxford University Press Eric Maisel, A Life in the Arts – G. P. Putnam’s Sons. The Nature of Humankind Introduction Philosophy, science and religion are some of the fields in which the question of the nature of man has been explored for millennia. I will add some reflections, which are based on my culture, life experience, beliefs and on the extent of my readings. It must be borne in mind that an assessment of philosophical views is often incomplete. Because there is such a wealth of literature about each question and, even when a complete search has been carried out, the sophistication of thought, the sometimes inadequacy of language to express exactness and the limitations on content constrain a complete in-depth understanding. It is incumbent on the author of any analysis to formulate an opinion with as much relevant data as possible. Such opinion must have a foundation built on exposure and openness to past proposals and ideas while bringing new and unique insights to the subject. I have tried to bring my personal insights to bear, while recognizing my own limitations in matters of this nature. On Self- preservation A primeval nature is intrinsic to all mankind, but the instinctive understanding of what it is has been neutered by what society has classified as good and bad. In my mind, there is no good and no bad in nature. In order to fulfill the fundamental goal of existence it is necessary to satisfy some requirements that have been deemed bad by society. Society must control the most fundamental requirements of nature, those of self-preservation and prolongation of life. Among natural urges that allow these to be accomplished are aggression and sexuality. Aggression will preserve and prolong one’s own life. Sexuality will prolong life of the species. Darwin postulates that sexuality involves a process of natural selection, i.e. gravitation to the most suitable partner for the greatest chance of successful reproduction and strength of progeny. These are the same factors that have driven evolution since the beginning of life more than four billion years ago. In recent times the Darwinian concept of natural selection has come under attack, the premise being the birth of human consciousness 3 million years ago and its continuing development as the major evolutionary driver. Aggression and unmitigated sexuality are counterproductive to global preservation so they must be controlled by laws and a system of justice enforced through laws that outline and implement appropriate punishment. There is no doubt that total awareness of the capabilities of the mind is an end in itself. The advances in science and technology over the past century alone have created awareness that the capabilities of the mind may be boundless. Post modernism has brought with it the need to filter vast amounts of information in less and less time. This has led, on the one hand to great strides in optimizing the mind’s possibilities, and on the other hand to starvation of the mind for a majority. The individual, while able to grasp the need for global preservation in order to ensure their ultimate goal of preserving the self, will not always submit to control of natural urges. On Equality All of mankind has been imbued with the capacity to attain a certain intellectual level. The difference between one achieving a higher level and another not achieving this is due to two factors, 1) Society’s offering the opportunity to become educated and 2) an individual exercising the will to learn. Opportunity to be educated in today’s world is often a function of access to the necessary financial resources to pursue such education, availability of the required institutions to provide it, and/or external influences on the person who has the possibility to be educated. Where the opportunity exists and has been taken, the will to continue is also a key requirement. Some choose to pursue education while others make conscious decisions to forego it. These decisions can be driven by circumstances such as the necessity to earn an income for survival, detrimental social influences of exercising the will and the right to choose a separate path. Even though the will to forsake an education may be exercised, there is always the opportunity to reverse such a decision. However, the survival needs and social pressures may continue to suppress the initiative to follow through. In some cases both opportunity and will may never occur because of a restrictive societal system. I believe that we are all equal and that it is incumbent upon us as a society to behave in accordance with such a stand. On Religion In general, strong believers in a particular religious doctrine are often unwilling to consider an opposing point of view or an interpretation of the teaching to which they adhere. There have been few prophets who can be considered to be larger than life. Jesus, Mohamed, Sidharta Gautama and Patanjali were some such prophets, and they all taught the same principle: how to live a life that will bring inner peace. Their methods of teaching differed in that some techniques were direct while some relied on metaphor. In the case of Jesus the language was for the most part metaphoric, but when one examines the commonality of the various teachings it becomes clear that there is no distinction between the shared goal of leading others via practice of the doctrines of religion, toward the achievement of inner peace. Distinctions arise between the various paths to this goal through an interest in proliferating religion for the primary purpose of increasing the power of the church, strengthening personal power and sustaining a lifestyle for religious leaders. These leaders then formed interpretations of the teachings that served their purpose. Thus metaphor was taken as fact where necessary and has survived time to become an integral belief system for those raised under the same religious umbrella and for converts to these religions. Belief differences first arose within the Catholic system by Luther’s disagreement with the practice of the leaders of the church in selling favors for salvation. The wealth of the church was squandered on the lascivious and extravagant lifestyle of the then Pope, his cardinals and his high-ranking team within the church. This led to further division in the church resulting in numerous sub-sects of the Christian religion, such as Lutheran, Anglican, Protestant and Baptist teachings, each professing that it’s own interpretation of the literal word of Jesus was the only correct one. Further, most religions also claim their own belief to be the only true one. Interpretation of the word of each belief system becomes the key to following a particular teaching in pursuit of an ultimate aim. In order to hold on to the power structure it is necessary for the church or place of worship to form interpretations of their prophet’s teachings that appealed to the basic human instinct for preservation of life through eternity. The result was an interpretation based on punishment and reward i.e. a withdrawal of an everlasting life if the word was not followed. Metaphors used to illustrate the need for living the life advocated by Christ became interpreted as a literal place for a heaven and a hell. Other literal interpretations ensued for the same purpose of power sustenance for the privileged leaders. For instance non-contraception ensured a continuing expansion of the follower base to secure a growing and continuous stream of financial support for the system. As someone raised in a system of Christian belief, in the existence of God, in Jesus as the path to God, and in an everlasting life promised by God to those who have accepted Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Savior during their lives on earth, I must address the question of Christianity within the context of my modified belief and its relation to other expressions to describe the same source Jesus called God, but under a different name and a different method of access. On Science Let us first accept the scientific evidence that matter is neither created nor destroyed. First matter to form life on earth was hurled from an explosion in space over four billion years ago. This matter enjoyed proximity from a sun around which it revolved to sustain life. The first life form occurred and all consequent life forms evolved along different paths, which gave us the diversity of life we know today. Three million years ago human consciousness occurred and was the foundation of the separation of man from all other species. Man obtained the capacity to reason, but there remained a physical connectedness between all living matter on the planet as the same subatomic particles that were there at the beginning of life are there in each and every one of us. We die and return our particles to form a part of some other life or object that too will die and perpetuate the cycle. This connection is not only physical. In life, we come with knowledge from the collective past of being and knowing the way to achievement of inner peace and contentment. This knowledge comes with a contradiction as man is driven by the fundamental need for survival and must be protected by a necessary social survival system that reinforces a selfish way of life. Thus, corrupting individuals by a will to mold them acts to defeat serving the soul and bringing a greater good to the rest of humanity. The spiritual, for want of a better word, connection between man and a universal spirit appears to exist alongside a physical interconnectedness and is as real as the physical. The spiritual transcends time and space and can therefore not be conceived in ways available to the human mind. Religious intervention occurs at this point to make a link and ensure understanding and acceptance by a process called faith. There will always be argument over varying religious belief, varying interpretations of the same religious belief, and martyrs who will carry tar belief to the ultimate end, dying for that in which they believe Jesus was a prophet who was somehow chosen to access a source of total and unconditional love that poured from the heart of what he termed the Father or God directly from his own heart. There were no blocks to this unbridled and complete love. Jesus’ mission was to take this promise of God’s love to those who had the least hope for safety and security on earth, the poor and the downtrodden and to make them the centre of eternal hope for salvation. The rich already had a material security that protected them from the pitfalls of a worldly existence and could assure them a pious belief that they were more entitled than the poor to an afterlife because of the assurances that could be bought with material dispensation to appropriate religious organizations. Brahman, the God of the Hindus is translated as ultimate reality, is worshipped through many God forms representing different aspects of Brahman. Brahman is, to the Hindus, the universal spirit with all the qualities of the Christian God. The ultimate association ought the Brahman is not one of separateness but an undivided oneness. Allah is purported to possess several forms representing ultimate reality, ultimate truth, ultimate love, and pure awareness. We need to understand and accept the scientific fact that we are energy, living and dead. On Self-knowledge I spent many years trying to find out who I am. I thought I had discovered who I was at the deepest level and was at great peace in this knowledge. However, when new situations presented that required me to exercise restraint and acceptance of life events, my behaviors demonstrated that I needed to do further self searching to find out who I really was. The analysis of my behaviors and attitude indicated to me that I needed to develop a deeper understanding of myself, which led me to modify consciously those behaviors and attitudes, thus making further changes in an attempt to become a more evolved person. This is a journey. I use teachings of those prophets whom I believe achieved total awareness and the greatest inner peace to learn from, while taking the observations and advice of those who can perceive my weaknesses where I cannot. Conscious decisions can then be taken to bring about change and subsequent growth. On Sexuality It is the basic nature of man to be charged sexually, with varying degrees in the extent of such charge between members of the species. The fundamental difference between those who appear to be more so inclined and those who are not is either the practice of suppressing this desire, or the choice to engage when they find the moment to be conducive to the greatest natural connection with a partner. Suppression is often due to a negative social perception toward those who expose their sexual urges openly to the public eye. Therefore, those who are less restrained and those who do not have a heightened insecurity about themselves are perceived to have greater sexual urges than others. In a partner relationship between the sexes both men and women are equally free to leave their inhibitions behind and enjoy the gratification that comes with the sex act. The level of engagement will necessarily vary between partners as a result of other factors such as depth of feeling, emotional stresses, physical energy, ambient preferences etc. In the absence of a partner with whom to engage in physical contact, men, in general, are more inclined to use the avenues available to them to satisfy their sexual urges, thereby exercising less suppression than women. These avenues include, for example, masturbation and/or seeking contact outside the established relationship. Women, in general appear to be more controlled in their willingness to gravitate to alternative avenues of sexual release, and tend more toward awaiting the most appropriate moment for ensuring deeper meaning and more rewarding gratification. (LGBT to be added). On Wholeness The whole person is made up of an interior and an exterior. One cannot exist without the other, for the inside cannot exist without something to contain it and the outside cannot exist without its contents. Contents are both physical and metaphysical with the physical accessible to a surgeon’s knife but the metaphysical accessible only through an understanding that transcends human capability at this time. Even so, the beginning of a mental process must emanate from within. The mind can travel beyond itself but it must start with a consciousness that initiates all action. The inner person is the essential element determining conscious decisions to carry out acts of empathy, kindness and love. However, the outer component must be capable to carry out those acts. Strength, speech, and listening are the bodily senses that the exterior person must engage when thoughts upon which decisions to act occur. Therefore it is clear that what we are made of a complementary relationship between inner and outer. Some take care of the inside to a greater extent than the outside, often extending themselves in their desire to carry out acts of kindness to others, while others take care of the outer aspect of themselves to the virtual exclusion of the inner side despite the constant voice from within that says ‘care deeply’. We are complementary to ourselves and a balance that feels right must be struck in order to be a whole person. This is not a simple task as pressures to move in one direction or another occur constantly throughout every waking moment. Change is the only constant in the universe. The occurrence of any given event is either the consequence of a prior action somewhere that produces an immediate stimulus for a person to act, or is the endpoint of a chain reaction that started somewhere unknown in nature. While both interior and exterior must be cared for with equal interest in the best welfare we must be concerned primarily with finding a wholeness of person that allows us to achieve the proper balance between self-preservation and preservation of the other person, and between self-development and development of the other person. On Normality What is normal appearance and what is normal behavior? The impressions of both physical and behavioral normality are largely determined by rules that culture and society have established. In the realm of appearance cultural unity guides the mind in perceiving certain physical qualities as attractive or unattractive, normal or abnormal. Major differences between the appearances of the human species during evolutionary development have not affected its members’ acceptance of the pervading physical qualities of the time. Even within the current evolutionary moment significant physical differences exist between the appearance of those within national and tribal cultures. These differences may be accepted as normal in large part but there are perceptive and mental boundaries as to how far such acceptance will apply. In the developed world the influence of the media is powerful in establishing and perpetuating particular physical attributes as the ones to be revered, thus creating a distorted view of normality. Normality in appearance is nothing more and nothing less than anything between the full spectrum of all humanity. Whatever people look like, tall or short, black or white, heavy or thin, each one falls within the boundaries of normality. This applies as well to all who are afflicted by defect, disease or illness whether physical or mental. In fact what is deemed mental abnormality may in many instances be closer to the center point of the norm, with those considering themselves normal in fact being on the fringe. On Love The greatest test of love is separation. It is not the separation only of a man and a woman but the separation of a parent and child and of any two human beings who share a kind of love. Between a man and a woman the separation of body is the least aspect of the test, for the body only houses the spirit within. The connection of the spirit is not dependent on physical presence, but on a connection that transcends the physical. It is a connection that transcends space and time for if love does exist it will withstand any physical distancing of the body. The love that any of the two feel which is dependent on a physical attraction is important in that the body is the shell that houses what is perceived as beauty. The cliché that beauty is in the eye of the beholder is based on this concept, for the shell is the only part that the limited senses of man can experience in a visible and tangible way. However, that which each person experiences, the individual perception of beauty, the feel of the touch, the sound of the voice, the taste and smell of the skin are the windows to the intangible and invisible inner spirit of the person who is loved. This inner beauty, the essential nature of the person, is the driver of the external shell, and is the source of vibration and the spiritual link that connects two people apart. If that connection is strong enough to be linked with the other regardless of time or distance it can transcend the limitations of physical absence. In the physical world the experiences of the individuals, their varying cultural and educational backgrounds, exposure to life and their individual belief systems determine their actions and reactions. Therefore it is the totality of the person that determines the extent of the love. The perception of the spirit of one person through the spirit of the other is like the inner vision of a light that shines from within the person being perceived. This is the light that emanates, not only to the person who loves but to all those who stand in the presence of the person who possesses the light. The idea of a light from within has also been likened to the light and warmth of a candle; a candle that warms but does not burn, unlike the candle of passion which warms but is also able to burn and to burn out eventually. The love of a parent for a child or vice versa is one that causes the experience of a similar inner glow and a connection between the two, but different in the nature of the connection between a man and a woman who share a love that involves physical unity. This difference is intrinsic and simply felt and understood by most in their deepest inner being. How this difference came to be cannot be determined by any means presently available to man, and can only be the subject of speculation. A need is often felt for self-preservation in the face of love. This is manifested in the form of control of one’s emotional state since a state that is affected by the disruption love reduces self control, and offers neither protection from the emotional disruption that love can bring, nor the emotional pain that the potential loss of love can bring. Some attempt to control love while others attempt to destroy it, with the end result a reduction or loss of the most wonderful experience imaginable. On Giving The most fundamental quality that man can possess is to give and the greatest satisfaction that man can receive is from giving. This giving is not from the excess of one’s possessions, or time or capacity to share empathy, but from the part of oneself that appears to have nothing left to give. This is the moment when a person is so devoid of any material possession, strength and emotion that the love that is present in its purest form and its profoundest depth within the hearts of all mankind can emerge. This is the moment that man is asked to perform his greatest sacrifice. There are examples of ultimate sacrifice in which the precious gift of life has been parted with for the larger good of the world. Jesus, Gandhi and many others less recognized or glorified than brave soldiers who have fought to resist the so called evil powers of the world have made such a sacrifice. The true determinant of the extent to which one is willing to go to express this love is when the situation presents itself for a choice to be made. Opportunities abound and have presented themselves to mankind in countless ways from the time that consciousness was born. The contrast is phenomenal between opportunities presented and those taken during the three million years since man acquired this ability to make a reasoned choice. The single greatest roadblock to making the choice of giving from the depth of one’s heart, or even giving at all is the lack of a priori knowledge of the joy that can be derived from such giving. Since a priori knowledge cannot exist, the basic instinct of self-preservation takes over and becomes the default mechanism that causes most of humanity to walk away from the brother or sister in need. The misguided perception that it is more important to take care of oneself as a first priority became a more powerful force since the advent of so called civilization and is on a constant upward incline with greater and greater access to material wealth. Even those more evolved in the process of giving from the heart are drawn to taking care of their most immediate circle of family and friends before extending the sharing to include others with whom they may share a connection conceived to be love. The test of this love is the extent one is willing to sacrifice the self and go beyond the ordinary. On Reciprocation The only form of reciprocation is the reciprocation of love. When a gift of generosity or kindness is given and a need to reciprocate is felt, that need is in fact a need to give love in return. The act carried out in return is often a transformation of love into elimination of debt. This transformation is a disguise for love through a socially acquired understanding of independence as freedom building debt. It is a mistaken form of love and is perpetuated by the same social principle that something given must be returned. However, this principle is not founded on the essential driving force of the act, which is that love is not given with a view to receiving but simply given for the sake of love. On Children The first experience of the child is severe trauma at birth. The pushing against its every sinew and the pulling and tugging from the safety, warmth and peace of its idyllic existence are destroyed in a few brief moments. The next part of its life is the experience of the mother providing for its basic instinct of self-preservation. This is all it knows, and it uses every means at its disposal to secure that survival. The means are minimal, crying when hungry at the earliest stages, then reaching out, then smiling to gain a comforting arm. These are all natural mechanisms for survival. Everything beyond that is learnt and is unnatural for the most part. Children first see movement of abstract shapes and colors, general mistaken by the parent for adoration. When they cry at the same or different people it is because the movement shape or color is threatening. Survival is at work again. As they grow they know not the value of things. They destroy and find fun in this. They then learn to be unnatural as they acquire a sense of material worth, and saving. They make no plans but behave as their spirit moves them from one moment to the next. They learn to be focused and play games that please both themselves and adults. Toys they may not want are forced upon them while they prefer to play with found objects. They then learn to want what the media has skillfully determined will appeal to them. But the satisfaction is usually momentary as is the case with all material possessions. They are loved and protected, staying close to those, parents and close relatives upon whom they have learned they can depend to satisfy their needs and wants. They mature slowly; often becoming rebellious trough frustration at being forced to fit a mold their nature tells them goes against their instincts. They generally respect their parents for the discipline provided to ensure their necessary force fit into society. Their love for the parent is different from the love the parent has for the child and will remain so throughout their lifetimes. When they grow and become independent they embrace the freedom to experience all the world has to offer. Parents, generally, are unwilling to let go and therefore suffer considerable pain because of the different kind of love they feel. They want to cling and belong in the life of the child, pulling it back throughout life. Parents are often seeking their own self-satisfaction and the child accommodates, although they may also want on occasion to be a part of the life of the parent. They provide what they know the parent seeks. Parents sacrifice relationships and joyful events in their own lives through mistaken assumptions that the child needs them. The love of the parent is always there and is constant. The love of the child is also there and constant but different. The child is not sacrificing to accommodate the parent, as his or her own life will take priority. Look at the trees and flowers for an example of how nature intends the connection to exist. They let the birds and the wind scatter their seed for they have done their job. Set your children free to live and allow them to return when they want. Welcome them with the love you have but do nor sacrifice your own life to satisfy them, or to satisfy your mistaken belief that short periods of a visit require total dedication, or a dedication that excludes the joy and building of relationships important to the future happiness of the parent. For the child leaves again and what the sacrificing parent has destroyed may never return to its original state, or may never return at all. Bibliography: Frank N. Magill, Masterpieces of World Philosophy - Harper Collins Publishers Anthony Kenny, A Brief History of Western Philosophy - Blackwell Publishers Ted Honderich, The Philosophers – Oxford University Press Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth - Doubleday Joseph Campbell, editor / R.F.C. Hull, translator, the Portable Jung - Penguin Books Stephen Bachelor, Verses from the Center – Penguin Putnam, Inc. John Lyden, Enduring Issues in Religion – Greenhaven Press, Inc. Liz Greene and Juliet Sharman -Burke, The Mythic Journey - Simon and Schuster, New York Matthew Fox and Rupert Sheldrake, Natural Grace – Doubleday David Adams Leeming, The World of Myth – Oxford University Press Swami Chetanananda, Open Heart Open Mind – Sterling Publishing Co., Inc. T. S. Eliot, The Sacred Wood – Methuen, Inc. Dan Millman, The Laws of Spirit – H.J. Kramer, Inc. Gary Zukav, The Seat of the Soul – Simon & Schuster Arthur Deikman, Personal Freedom – Bantam Books Inc. Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time – J.M. Roberts, A Brief History of the World – Oxford University Press Katharine Savage, History of World Religions – Edward FitzGerald, The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam – Dover.Thrift |
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