“Why do you paint them nude“ the tutor asked
“I want to see them the way God made them” Michelangelo answered
“You are not God, are you?” the tutor answered
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“Painting is poetry which is seen and not heard, and poetry is a painting which is heard but not seen”.
Leonardo da Vinci (1452 - 1519)
Italian artist, engineer, and inventor.
Perspective: is the way we see/value things and the arts can be seen from different perspective. Someone said “there is only one angle at which one can stand straight and a thousand at which one could fall but humanity is testing the angles”!
A Common Question in My Generation is “what is wrong about that”? And the best answer I have found is “is anything wrong about anything?”
Is anything really wrong about anything? Is anything wrong about the contemporary art?
To pry into the morality and rationality of the contemporary art, the question above will always show up and I will let you do the answering.
If for the reader there is nothing wrong about anything then that is a state of moral relativism. In other words a state of “no absolute truth” and hence “no moral law giver”. Then stretch such a state further up and you could conclude that there is no practical difference between a Hitler and a Mother Theresa! Since it depends on the way you look at it as there are no concrete benchmarks for evaluation: a state of lack of meaning, the very thing that science deals with. The questions of what? Why? And How?
The state of moral relativism is illogical. Life itself seeks coherence.
In contemporary setting, a lot of music sell for their beats and rhythms and not necessary for the meaning of the songs and this is exactly what Shakespeare implied when he said:
“Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”
We have a generation of music and drama which in the words of its fans “does not necessary signify anything”: “full of sound and fury signifying nothing” according to Shakespeare.
That would have not been too bad if the “fan” believes in such a “no significance” view of life as Shakespeare. A noble scholar once said: “First, art would imitate life, then life would imitate art. Ultimately Life would take its very existence from the arts”
In everyday life we evaluate source and then judge product from source, business men evaluate companies to rate their products. You would look at a restaurant’s setting before you consider their food, a vehicle before the service. It is only the ignorant that does anything less, and in the arts we have made the mistake of looking the other way.
The greatest crime really is simplicity!
The meaninglessness we perceive around every day I believe is because to some extent Life has taken its very existence from the art (something we didn’t necessary agree with but liked never the less).
The Law of Conscience
The Contemporary man I believe the law of his conscience when he chose that which he didn’t really agree with but likes none the less. When a young man sees a nude scene he doesn’t agree with but “just happens to like” he comes to a point where he must choose which appetite to feed; His heart or his feelings. It’s a question I have often asked myself; “why do I not feel good about that though I would want to see it again”?
It is in these choices that man either redefines art for himself or rejects himself. Because whenever we choose that which is against our better nature but excites our baser nature we not only estrange ourselves from God (the moral law giver and source of your heart-feelings), we estrange ourselves from ourselves.
Take a look at any contemporary artist of choice and you will see an estranged individual.
Man’s relish for the arts is a God given character as “Creatures are not born with desires unless satisfaction for those desires exists.” C. S. Lewis. We redefine the arts by taking responsibility for what we watch or listen to, knowing quite well that sooner or later we would take our very existence from those. But then contemporary man can only derive the strength from a superior affection; the compelling power of a new affection. (see my previous note with the title “the compelling power of a new affection”)
Thanks
Okwonna Nelson
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