[Fis] Art as human practice

[Mark Johnson]

Dear all,

I wonder if we confuse art artefacts (and the feelings they produce in us)
from the practice that produces them. Art is a labour intensive business.
Indeed, it may be the epitome of "work" if Arendt's distinction between
work and labour holds up.

So while I am sympathetic to the relationship between emotion and art
(particularly as was beautifully described by Suzanne Langer's view of
music as a "picture" of emotion), there remain explanatory problems if we
are to distinguish human art from natural processes that produce things
which appear beautiful to us.

Animals certainly have emotion, but they don't have artistic practice in
the way we do. Even the Lascaux pictures had to have been rehearsed and
practiced (maybe using primitive technology -
https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/atxurra-cave-art-experimental-archaeology__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!R_26-avMi9x22ING-WIFmusZlmTP8hzMs-p1hsl-3hIGe9TyyvxLi2fPYuCRg9ohDzF4BD-dNRsJoKK04zr4JRA$ ).
The skill of execution had to be gained, and that requires focus and
determination in learning and intention. While emotion plays a role, as it
does in all conscious existence, there is something which drives the
acquisition of skill, the construction of form, and the execution of intent
which may result in something that evinces an emotion, but whose
construction is not as emotional as one might suppose. Indeed emotion can
get in the way. It cannot be emotion that drives this acquisition of skill,
but insight and foresight into the effects of artistic execution.

The prerequisite of such insight and foresight perhaps includes shared
physiology and a shared environment. But perhaps Bucky Fuller hit on
something when discussion his creative process - "I didn't set out to
create a geodesic dome. I set out to discover the operative principles of
the universe".

When Mozart expresses the view that “The whole, though it be long, stands
almost finished and complete in my mind… I do not hear it successively, but
all at once.” (a letter to Rochlitz in 1789), I suspect that there is a
deep connection between Bucky Fuller's observation and Mozart, who must
also have known something about the principles of the universe.

And its important to say, such insight is culturally universal, and unites
vastly different artistic practices across different cultures. The
fundamental challenge to Paul Suni is that all humans inhabit the same
universe.

Best wishes

Mark


Dr. Mark William Johnson
Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health
University of Manchester

Department of Science Education
University of Copenhagen

Department of Eye and Vision Science (honorary)
University of Liverpool
Phone: 07786 064505
Email: johnsonmwj1 at gmail.com
Blog: https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://dailyimprovisation.blogspot.com__;!!D9dNQwwGXtA!R_26-avMi9x22ING-WIFmusZlmTP8hzMs-p1hsl-3hIGe9TyyvxLi2fPYuCRg9ohDzF4BD-dNRsJoKK0aYQdpIc$ 
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