Art as Experience

[Stacy]

I have John Dewey's book about this, but I haven't read it yet.

And it's already past 11 here, so this isn't going to be the grand well thought out post I was imagining. Guess I'll do that on my LJ later. Instead, you guys get my raw thought process.

Here's a blog post with some excerpts and discussion.

Pure Experience

I especially like the last comment, by Kevin - about Schopenhauer and ordinary awareness versus aesthetic awareness.

This is what drives me mad about the webfic culture, about the idea of different tastes, about people rejecting art without giving it a chance.

It's just - I think that if you come to a work of art with prejudices about its quality, its genre, its author, whatever, it dilutes the experience. You don't really get into the story, step into the world created by the art. It passes by you and you are left untouched.

And more than anything, I want to touch people. I want them to enter into the story. I want them to judge my work based on itself, not on their opinion of me or Sims stories or webfic or WordPress or horror/suspense/whatever it is I write or anything external to the work itself.

I was thinking about this, and I realized that at some point, the pure innocent experience of art may require some social advantages. Like thinking of my experiences with George R.R. Martin - my husband can enjoy his books for what they are because he's a guy and he's never been sexually abused. Me - I read an early scene with a dude abusing his little sister and threw the book down and had a mini breakdown.

So I don't think it's possible to come to every work of art totally innocent and open. But I think it's a good ideal to strive for.

And yeah - aesthetic awareness is my default setting. Thus why I was so drawn to Eastern philosophy once I found it. Western philosophy seemed so dry and white and male and logical and rational and materialist and left-brained and full of dick contests. And utterly boring. Then one day I wandered over to the Eastern philosophy section. I had come home.

But it's just - is experiential thought better than analytical criticism? I don't think so, because more and more I hesitate to say that one way of understanding the world is any better than another way. As long as no one is getting hurt. And so...

I don't think it's necessarily better, but I think our culture has perhaps gone too far over on the analytical side and could use some right brained Eastern experiential ideas. Like enjoying a work of art on its own and for itself.

And oh man - it's nearly midnight and I really need to get to bed, so I will leave the whole thing about how language forms attitudes which form thoughts which form actions (I'm not sure if I'm remembering that correctly - it's a formula I came up with years ago to show how language is extremely important and slurs are most definitely not funny jokes) and how everything is connected to everything else and so even debates on how to approach art have a trillion moral implications for later.

[thelunarfox]

This is all true and very interesting.

I think there is a flip side to this though. Yes it's aggravating that in any piece of work we write, they are going to muddle up the author and the writing. But at the same time, you can build up trust with readers because of this.

I know that's probably not always a good thing, but I think there are ways you can make it work for you. Once you've got the trust of the reader, I think you're pretty much free to do a lot of things. You might even be able to mess with the reader in that way.

A lot of the time, when I write, I do try to be aware of this. I think that's why, other than the comments, I don't really post any extra notes in the blog. I sort of try to stay out of it other than side notes at the bottom of my entries. Maybe in some way what I'm wanting to do is separate myself from my story.

[Stacy]

Lunar - will read your response soon. Am feeling sort of anxious. But hey, I managed the posts after mine in the generalized rules thread tonight! So I am making progress.

Oh! I remembered, today at work. It goes "Words form thoughts which form attitudes which form actions."

Have I posted about the other equation I came up with here? Surely I have. I came up with it when trying to figure out why talking about "giftedness" offended people. In mainstream American culture, I think that people have a subconscious equation in their head. Intelligence = Education = Money = Worth.

And you see - I don't associate any of those four things with each other, so I prattled on about intelligence and didn't even realize that other people were connecting that to ideas about the relative worth of living beings. I mean - all living beings are of equal and infinite worth. That's...that's like a bedrock of existence. I never even thought that other people didn't start out with that as a basic assumption.

And so the accusations of arrogance and thinking I'm "better" than others slapped me in the face from left field and I was like "What the hell? Where did that come from?"

So I thought about it a lot, and I'm fairly happy with that equation. Well - happy with it as a device for understanding how other people think. Not happy that other people think like that.

Today at lunch I googled Schopenhauer.

Wikipedia entry

I wonder if he knew he was describing the ideas of the Tao?

Ooh! Back in the day I made a private LJ entry with some quotes from the Tao Te Ching and put it in my memories to pull out when the secrets got to me. And how thoughtful of past Stacy - I put the link in the post.

Tao Te Ching

Free from desire, you realize the mystery.
Caught in desire, you see only the manifestations.

Also

Forcing a project to completion,
you ruin what was almost ripe.

Getting that feeling with 10.08 - I think I'm supposed to be writing this instead. But it is coming. Oh, it is coming.

I should introduce Grace to this guy - last night at the grocery store she was talking about pain and art and happiness and how more art in the world would mean less pain.

My mother would also appreciate him - I've been reading some more stuff by him and she's expressed a theory similar to what I just read.

But yeah - this is the central issue that has been bothering me for ages now. This feeling that other people are closed off in their own heads and they're not...they're not truly seeing my work. It's like...like why even write and publish if other people are going to judge it and reject it based on stupid things?

Well, okay - so I've come up with an answer to that question.

Because I must. Because...because that great burning joy and that power shaking down through my bones is worth anything, any pain, any hate, any barrier, any rejection.

I Burn

Yeah - on the same album as Possum Kingdom even. The Toadies should really use Seth as a mascot.

But in the context of a Stacy writing song as opposed to a Seth song - YES!

I drove the work vehicle home so I could jam out to this at top volume on the way. Man, I was getting all up into it and everything was bright and clear and perfect and existence was true and beautiful and good and omg. OMG. Anything is worth that.

a prayer in every spark

And so I'm not as bothered by things in general anymore. And after all, some people will see it - I think that you guys really see it and get it.

I burn the air you breathe

Oh man, I am going to get so much work done while I'm on vacation next week.

Err - rereading and realized I just sketched the surface of my thought process here. Yeah. Will try to write something more solid and in-depth soon.

ALSO!

sift the ashes for reminders
stony things remain
tooth and bone, unimpressive
I have left these things
because fire is bright, fire is clean
efficient and divine
tooth and bone
charms and dolls
I am free tonight!

And so the Toadies sum up writing and Schopenhauer and art as experience and the Tao and the essence of Seth, and you see - everything is connected. Everything.

So I just edited to add the whole subconscious American equation thing, and I realized - I do certainly have a low latent inhibition or whatever it was called. Ah-ha!

Most people are able to ignore the constant stream of incoming stimuli, but this capability is reduced in those with low latent inhibition. It is hypothesized that a low level of latent inhibition can cause either psychosis or a high level of creative achievement or both...

And yeah, 10.08 is coming. I sound a bit hypomanic, eh?

[Stacy]

I've been reading more Schopenhauer.

Dude could get snobby as hell on occasion.

But I will never discount someone's ideas or work as a whole just because of some small personal foible. It'd be highly hypocritical if I did that, considering how I go crazy when someone rejects me and my work because they didn't like one blog post, a post that they didn't fully understand and made assumptions about.

This is all still percolating around, even if I took yesterday off to research triggers and abuse and things. May still post a final complete essay on LJ - I don't know. I'm kind of getting the whole "Why put this out in public when obviously other people don't care?" thing.

Ah, the curse of reading comments. When you screw up your courage and do it, a lot of times you find that what you were so scared of was people being nice and friendly and complimentary.

Sometimes, though, you find a wide gulf, a vast difference in perception and worldview, and you have no idea how to cross it. Maybe it's impossible to cross it.

And being who you are - the one wide gulf, the one feeling of "I am not being understood and am not making the connection I want" overtakes all the other good friendly loving kind complimentary stuff, all the people who do get it and who you do connect with.

I've always been a gaping maw, impossible to satisfy. I am trying to learn how to end the hunger, to go and read the good feedback when I am feeling alone and not understood, to focus on all the wonderful gifts I have received and not on what I have not yet won.

And I gotta go to work. But then...vacation!!!

[Stacy]

Lunar - haven't read your post yet. Was talking about LJ comments.