tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post5809676335149212000..comments2024-03-18T11:06:05.506-04:00Comments on ILLUSTRATION ART: AUSTIN BRIGGS' OPINIONSDavid Apatoffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11293486149879229016noreply@blogger.comBlogger139125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-34104472654464554062016-03-29T14:57:39.962-04:002016-03-29T14:57:39.962-04:00I love your blog and I was wondering if
you could...I love your blog and I was wondering if<br /> you could post something from Max BeerbohmAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-53257690957034993292016-02-24T14:34:08.951-05:002016-02-24T14:34:08.951-05:00Kev: We are fooled, when watching a movie, however...Kev: We are fooled, when watching a movie, however, into thinking that the words we hear are coming out of the mouths of the characters who look like they are speaking, rather than out of a speaker system that could be located anywhere in the theater.<br /><br />**<br /><br />No we are not "fooled" in this manner at all. We speak of the story later as if the words came from the characters, but that's for the sake of discussion. If you were to ask me, was I fooled into thinking the words were actually coming from characters etc. etc. I would say (as you or anyone else would): NO. <br /><br />We speak of the story with the understanding that all the apparatus of cinema was there to get the movie up on the screen and the movie to our senses. <br /><br />Crediting the fundamental apparatus of cinema with creating the "illusion" that we identify with the lead character is connecting things that don't connect. Those mechanics (24 fps, etc) have not one tiny little thing to do with identifying with the lead character of a movie. You're simply trying to categorize too broadly. <br /><br />Creating a main character is a conscious encoding process. Receiving this information correctly from a film takes attention and understanding. Calling the process "illusion would only make sense if there really is no intention to have a lead character (or if you were going for some extreme and pointless point like "since all experience of meaning is Aesthetic, then all meaning depends on illusion"). If we were really "fooled" the way you describe, we would experience spacial disorientation every time we saw a beer commercial. But the process of identifying with a lead character is much closer to reading "duck" and experiencing the concept of duckness than it is to seeing Briggs' scribbles on a girl's dress and thinking they are detailed drapery.<br /><br /><br />Markhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03630903209033858724noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-3646635833779875492016-02-23T03:03:40.495-05:002016-02-23T03:03:40.495-05:00virtual voyage:I was about to say something ...virtual voyage:I was about to say something on this topic. But now i can see that everything on this topic is very amazing and mind blowing, so i have nothing to say here. I am just going through all the topics and being appreciated. Thanks for sharing.<br />Film making college in Indore http://www.virtualvoyage.edu.in/course/animation-and-film-making-college/Virtual Voyage College, Indorehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17487368415593870702noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-77203422054190148692016-02-20T16:56:58.260-05:002016-02-20T16:56:58.260-05:00This is an awesome discussion. I haven't seen...This is an awesome discussion. I haven't seen anything like it on the web.<br /><br />JSLAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-26449815986266277942016-02-17T10:35:10.566-05:002016-02-17T10:35:10.566-05:00If the lead character is an "illusion", ...<b>If the lead character is an "illusion", then the entire story is an "illusion". Words are "illusion". That way lies meaninglessness.</b> <br /><br />You're giving yourself over to hyperbole and hysteria here, instead of considering the inherent technicalities of the issue. Words are not illusions, they are sign symbols, "call numbers", in a sense, for particular ideas or references. We obviously aren't fooled into thinking that the word "Duck" is actually a duck. So the word duck is neither an illusion nor an "illusion" and nobody said it was. <br /><br />We are fooled, when watching a movie, however, into thinking that the words we hear are coming out of the mouths of the characters who look like they are speaking, rather than out of a speaker system that could be located anywhere in the theater. We are fooled into thinking that a bunch of photographic close ups of an actress that are speeding by in sequential order at 24 frames a second are actually listening to a recording made of an actor's voice done on a sound stage twelve years ago.<br /><br />I was going to start listing all the illusions we believe when watching a movie, but that would literally take days. Suffice it to say that, we are dealing with a repletion of illusion almost beyond comprehension.<br /><br />A great story sweeps us up in its aesthetic forces, and we are oblivious during that telling to the extent to which we are experiencing illusion upon illusion upon illusion. But if we only consider illusion to be a meaningless "trick", as you seem to, then we are cut off from appreciating the intense layering of meaningful illusions that goes into the making of Art. And as Joseph Pennell once wrote, "Art is the hiding of art by art." <br /><br /><b>"Identifying" with the lead character is deciphering the construct of a story. It is an act of comprehension, like reading sentences built from words. It's not a trick of the eye, the ear, the mind or anything else. </b><br /><br />Leaving aside your use of the word "trick" (see above)... Aesthetic experience is not a conscious deciphering process. Art gets its force from Aesthetic effect. Part of the intensity of watching a film with dialogue and diagram (Intellectual rather than aesthetic elements) is that in order to experience the film aesthetically, we are constantly trying to digest any information given through language or symbol into "mentalese" (into aesthetically-viable form) as quickly as possible so that it can be part of the aesthetic experience. <br /><br />Related to something else you said, it should be pointed out that we don't understand words, and we don't comprehend structures built of words. We understand the meanings of words and the structured relationships between those meanings. So the decoding process of language is only the prelude to understanding. Because, as mentioned earlier, meaning is built of sensation. Which is to say, that all experience of meaning is Aesthetic, including story structure. (There is a kind of rote understanding of meaning, like "dead metaphors," which seems anesthetic by comparison, but is really just the mind trodding a well-worn path of sensations; resulting in a boring mental experience without new insight, and thus no substantial neurotransmitter reward.) <br /><br />kev ferrarahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09509572970616136990noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-80744956030607571762016-02-16T21:02:26.006-05:002016-02-16T21:02:26.006-05:00Ales: "To "identify with the lead charac...Ales: "To "identify with the lead character" (isn't usually a side participant stance, Kev?) means psychological process of immersing oneself to the artist's idea through the narrative, rhythmic, metaphorical, etc expressive use of visual language and the sensory information from characters, their intentions and desires, simulation of events, our emphatic responses, etc. "<br /><br />**<br /><br />Fine. More simply, it means positioning yourself vis-a-vis the story being told so that the information comes through properly. <br /><br />If a story is written with a lead character and you do not identify with this character, then you cannot understand the story. A story might trick you into misunderstanding the main character or pull other literary tricks-- then we enter the realm of illusion.<br /><br />But if you were watching a man walk along the street, saw him trip and recover, and "identified" with that experience-- what "illusion" has been triggered? Whatever the answer, that's how we identify with lead characters in movies. And if that's "illusion", then what kind of human interaction is NOT illusion?Markhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03630903209033858724noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-21741964568376539542016-02-16T20:44:46.889-05:002016-02-16T20:44:46.889-05:00The lead character of a story is itself an illusio...The lead character of a story is itself an illusion, Mark. Why and how we come to believe and identify with that illusion or any other illusion of art is what is so fascinating in all this. <br /><br />**<br /><br />If the lead character is an "illusion", then the entire story is an "illusion". Words are "illusion". That way lies meaninglessness. <br /><br />You're stamping the label "illusion" on unrelated things and using that label to group them together. Illusions are tricks, by products of senses being fooled into experiencing something they are not ordinarily meant to. "Identifying" with the lead character is deciphering the construct of a story. It is an act of comprehension, like reading sentences built from words. It's not a trick of the eye, the ear, the mind or anything else. <br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Markhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03630903209033858724noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-15731799446651202232016-02-16T17:08:03.582-05:002016-02-16T17:08:03.582-05:00The lead character of a story is itself an illusio...The lead character of a story is itself an illusion, Mark. Why and how we come to believe and identify with that illusion or any other illusion of art is what is so fascinating in all this. kev ferrarahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09509572970616136990noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-71796598502333134182016-02-16T13:49:41.129-05:002016-02-16T13:49:41.129-05:00There are illusions for their own sake, as in magi...There are illusions for their own sake, as in magic acts. And then there are illusions with an ulterior purpose, as in Art. <br /><br />And then there is the experience of identifying with the lead character of a story which has nothing to do with "illusions". <br /><br />So your use of this narrative phenomenon as an example of why someone else doesn't appreciate the depths of "illusion" the way you do is just the same as saying "I use the word 'illusion' to mean a lot of stuff it doesn't really apply to and that's why it means so much more to me than it does to you".Markhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03630903209033858724noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-60214680007333250632016-02-13T21:22:37.575-05:002016-02-13T21:22:37.575-05:00When a movie goer comes to identify with the lead ...<b>When a movie goer comes to identify with the lead character of a film, it is a mechanism for finding meaning in a narrative. Calling this an "illusion" and then using this to compare it to what happens in any other "illusion" is to warp what actually happens when we digest a story and try to make it fit some other context. The way we comprehend actual stories is worlds apart from how we interpret images which are not connected to any set narrative.</b><br /><br />There are illusions for their own sake, as in magic acts. And then there are illusions with an ulterior purpose, as in Art. kev ferrarahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09509572970616136990noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-46447189584751641662016-02-13T16:08:01.294-05:002016-02-13T16:08:01.294-05:00Sean, I think I know the kind of people who pursue...Sean, I think I know the kind of people who pursue immersion without the reflection of a critical thought and I can agree that when arguing with them I can sense that they are actually (sometimes unknowingly) defending larger philosophical, sociopolitical views that you probably have in mind with "distinct philosophical shift". But I don't think I'm doing anything like that, It's just that the partial unconscious, intuitive state feels like a necessary state for the aesthetic communication to get its full impact. Anyway, I'll take a rain check here, I'll think about all that and read a book or two to get a clearer view on the concepts at work. Thanks Sean, you guys had an interesting debate.Alešhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11829918742785206010noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-84443433687483496122016-02-13T10:04:59.549-05:002016-02-13T10:04:59.549-05:00Ales, I didn't want to leave the impression th...Ales, I didn't want to leave the impression that I was averse to the concept of immersion. Being immersed in life is very real. I just think modernity forgot that conscience also shapes how we approach the present and our own future and all which is immersed in it, whether recklessly or with regard, gratitude, humility, etc. All the great allusions to eternity, mystery, infinity, unknowingness, the still small voice of conscience, the deep still waters, a great silence, etc. are also images of immersion. Thanks.Sean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-30241623373475164082016-02-12T15:35:20.764-05:002016-02-12T15:35:20.764-05:00Ales, Thank you. Yes, I also agree that sentience ...Ales, Thank you. Yes, I also agree that sentience can be intoxicating while still in harmony with heart and mind and yes, at the biological level is processed within the human being. No argument there at all. And certainly emotions can be discovered through and in artistic forms and also created by artistic formulas, intention.<br /><br />Conscience is largely overlooked in the process of falling in love with the intoxications of sentience, or sometimes as a matter of routine. But conscience was also dismissed as a matter of philosophy where it was described as perhaps functional, but denigrated as a thing of time, the past and so on. The dismissal of conscience came as an assault from all corners upon western culture. It came in the form of motivational speakers, eastern philosophy, aesthetics, novel approaches in education, an assault on values, as comedy and mockery, by interpretations relegating conscience but to guilt, novel interpretations of language, even as new forms of partying, listening to mind numbing disco, drugs and the rest of it. Immersion replaced reflection and all of this happened not in an organic way, but as a distinct philosophical shift, a belief that crashing of opposites created a new synthesis, a new person of higher intelligence and social fluidity, less uptight, etc.<br /><br />Listening to Norman Rockwell mention the way the father placed his hands on the son in Rembrandt's painting, one could tell he had looked at the painting quite a bit, that he was touched by the painting. There's great delicacy and tenderness in the touch of the father in the painting. Rockwell was a throwback to a different era, a soulful man. I don't know that much about him, but he was visual and thoughtful.Sean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-42918749375111724652016-02-12T11:42:34.553-05:002016-02-12T11:42:34.553-05:00Conscience doesn't negate the emotional relati...<b>Conscience doesn't negate the emotional relationships between things in a picture, movie, or novel.</b><br /><br />I do agree that consciousness and thoughtfulness are parts of experience. But... well, I don't have Kev's knowledge to explain this constructively, but when I look as Sargent's watercolor the mental experiential impression feels involuntary and uncontrollable. The vitality of forms, energy of existence, the sense of physical truths, the feeling of being in a presence of nature, a sight where the experience of a narrative is captured in a still image like an elixir of life in a bottle, all communicated through the use of visual language. It would take a conscious effort to disbelieve (I think that's one of the aspects in Kev's stage magic example), the awareness that a painted scenario is not happening for real is probably being maintained by latent rational distance in the background. But evoked emotions, simulation of sensory perceptions and the ability to be sensitively immersed feel intuitive. The ending of a state of being immersed in a painting or music feels a bit like being woken up from a dream, which you said "is unconscious".Alešhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11829918742785206010noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-24390303584667030422016-02-12T10:10:13.324-05:002016-02-12T10:10:13.324-05:00If one can perceive something, then it becomes par...If one can perceive something, then it becomes part of the subject of perception and in some way aesthetics. It's a huge subject, but conscience is apart of it as well, because we can perceive conscience from a lack of it, which is why I mentioned the Bad Lieutenant, Central Station, Children of Heaven and even the climactic moment in ET. Conscience is discovered in the mentioned stories and it is discovered in life, it doesn't come as an automatic part of nature. If it did we wouldn't be so good at losing it. That's why there is an attempt to cultivate it, because thoughtfulness is its fruit.<br /><br />A wild horse is beautiful, but so is a well trained horse. <br /><br />They are both perceivable, so we don't toss one out as not part of aesthetic experience. Much modern thinking, which became what we now call postmodern thinking is based on the notion that the well trained horse is less a horse, not truly free, not fully experiential, not fully experiencing itself and so on. Conscience doesn't negate the emotional relationships between things in a picture, movie, or novel. There's a reason Norman Rockwell's favorite was Rembrandt's, The Prodigal Son.Sean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-39188961884874578092016-02-12T05:51:55.130-05:002016-02-12T05:51:55.130-05:00Mark, to imagine being engaged in a narrative imag...Mark, to imagine being engaged in a narrative imagery with emotional and conceptual continuity triggers parts of our brains that lead to heightened physiological reactivity, we are moved to plan and execute action. We always found meaning in narratives, you can see that from bronze age reliefs to text illustrations from all cultures. I think Pyle wrote that while painting some civil war scene he had to go outside and clean his lungs of the imagined gunpowder smoke. Mental impression of being experientially present in the artistic representation of an idea enables "that magical moment of aesthetic arrest" as Kev said, so what he implies with a make-believe state of illusion makes sense to me. To "identify with the lead character" (isn't usually a side participant stance, Kev?) means psychological process of immersing oneself to the artist's idea through the narrative, rhythmic, metaphorical, etc expressive use of visual language and the sensory information from characters, their intentions and desires, simulation of events, our emphatic responses, etc. Alešhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11829918742785206010noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-32479699611126139192016-02-12T05:47:16.061-05:002016-02-12T05:47:16.061-05:00This comment has been removed by the author.Alešhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11829918742785206010noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-41501416680828765662016-02-11T21:39:04.721-05:002016-02-11T21:39:04.721-05:00Kev said: "Illusion is a much deeper and more...Kev said: "Illusion is a much deeper and more complex subject than you seem to appreciate. The simplest way into what I'm talking about is to ponder how and why it is that a movie goer comes to identify with the lead character of a film. "<br /><br />**<br /><br />When a movie goer comes to identify with the lead character of a film, it is a mechanism for finding meaning in a narrative. Calling this an "illusion" and then using this to compare it to what happens in any other "illusion" is to warp what actually happens when we digest a story and try to make it fit some other context.<br /><br />The way we comprehend actual stories is worlds apart from how we interpret images which are not connected to any set narrative.<br /><br />Markhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03630903209033858724noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-35735882140318345082016-02-11T10:22:56.036-05:002016-02-11T10:22:56.036-05:00Yes, I'm sure I will learn much from the recom...Yes, I'm sure I will learn much from the recommended texts. <br />The reason I mentioned the two movies is because each involved “inferred” meanings, something you rejected in a comment to David earlier. The presence of conscience is often contrary to feelings and desires and the movie Children of Heaven infers so by its title. A large part of the purpose of “inferred meaning” is to counter impulses to pragmatism. That is, much of the aesthetic reality lies in such areas outside of pragmatism.<br /><br />The movies Bad Lieutenant and Central Station are two others that are senseless without the concepts of conscience, mercy, redemption, life and death.<br /><br />Epistemology may spare one from the humility of one's own fallibility, but it does so at the cost of reductionism, reducing the the unknown to something of self and reducing the scope of emotion to itself. An example is Simone De Beauvoir who found her own approaching death confounding and couldn't accept that everything she had ever done was just going to stop. Sean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-36061665596150152612016-02-10T14:32:07.628-05:002016-02-10T14:32:07.628-05:00Yes, I understand.
Clearly you didn't. Think ...<b>Yes, I understand.</b><br /><br />Clearly you didn't. Think I'll leave this drudgery to Meyer and McKee. kev ferrarahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09509572970616136990noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-64635021863876974022016-02-10T12:52:50.295-05:002016-02-10T12:52:50.295-05:00Kev, Yes, I understand. Everyone knew ET was make-...Kev, Yes, I understand. Everyone knew ET was make-believe. He was a concoction of a new age guru with magic powers and a cartoon Christ figure with his pulsating heart, who reached out for the piece of candy, a powerless victim of unfeeling scientists as hope seemed to dwindle in his fading heart. He evoked a deep desire in the children to do justice and return him to his spaceship, even at the cost of the deep love in themselves, because they wanted to do otherwise and keep him. One could say all these things are cultural or literary themes and they would be right, but it is also true that despite the absurdity and the ugliness of the little creature, his physical unbelievability, people fell in love with him. <br /><br />Another little masterpiece is Children of Heaven, a story of a boy who hungers to make good on losing his sister's shoes. The adult-like conversation at the well between the two children is something people identify from their own memories as children, but it is hardly that of an involuntary act such as a fly avoiding a fly swatter. The reason we come to identify with these stories is because we allow ourselves to trust them and we identify with themes which we know involve ourselves through reason, attempting to come into compliance with unity or harmony in heart, mind, body and with others. <br /><br /><br />We live in a new century, one where evolutionary gradualism has been left behind for a new punctuated evolutionary theory. The leap of faith that beheld the gradual part no longer exists. I don't know how punctuated evolution is going to affect us going forward, but like cosmology, gradualism was very influential on the thinking and art of the 20th century. That is now behind us.<br />Sean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-9857042317903076452016-02-10T11:27:10.424-05:002016-02-10T11:27:10.424-05:00That people can be fooled into believing illusion ...<b>That people can be fooled into believing illusion has nothing to do with people being able to identify on some level a unity of mind, heart and body and its resulting sentient beauty. A good piece of art, theater, or music does so because people are able, by experience and reason, to identify with and experience unity or at least some part of it. </b><br /><br />Illusion is a much deeper and more complex subject than you seem to appreciate. The simplest way into what I'm talking about is to ponder how and why it is that a movie goer comes to identify with the lead character of a film. Or how a sports fan comes to think that what is happening to "his" team, is actually happening to him. kev ferrarahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09509572970616136990noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-25240283196479057812016-02-10T10:11:05.186-05:002016-02-10T10:11:05.186-05:00Kev, I brought in the statements of the scientists...Kev, I brought in the statements of the scientists because they were aesthetic statements which resulted by understanding and seeing formulations derived from nature, but not nature in any sentient sense. <br /><br />There is an unknowingness in all of this which is part of the larger subject of aesthetics and it involves the impractical reality of trust. We jump out of the way of an oncoming car instinctively and this act is involuntary. The seashell changes colors to fit its environment and in some way it is aware, but unknowing in the conscious sense of it. Likewise, the fly is so evasive from the swatter because it is aware of the swatter and reacts by a process which is involuntary. It can't say, no, I'm not going to move.<br /><br />The beauty of the story involves sentience and unkowingness, personal memories included. A memory of an innocent and simple nature can make a grown man instantly cry. But for human beings to experience unity with mind, body and heart, they must learn to trust, which is civilized, but often impractical. <br /><br />A unity in sentience is a desired aesthetic experience, but there is also an awareness, perception, which is why people almost involuntarily seek to grasp and hold it. The nature of the experience is not control, but a unity in the unknowingness of beauty. The experience itself is a unity with something, yes individual, but with something. <br /><br />Any reasonable person will recognize some unity with sentience in a thoughtfulness towards another. Because people assume a certain decency in themselves, they are not foreign to the idea nor the experience. It is accessible by reason then to posit that a person who practiced thoughtfulness on a continual basis would experience a more delicate unity with sentience. And it is just as accessible from that point to understand why historically, the aesthetics, (monks and saints) denied certain motivations and attachments in order to cultivate their relationship with unity.<br /><br />That people can be fooled into believing illusion has nothing to do with people being able to identify on some level a unity of mind, heart and body and its resulting sentient beauty. A good piece of art, theater, or music does so because people are able, by experience and reason, to identify with and experience unity or at least some part of it. Sean Farellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-35309451322545302092016-02-09T23:51:31.480-05:002016-02-09T23:51:31.480-05:00We perceive the world consciously, not unconscious...<b>We perceive the world consciously, not unconsciously.</b><br /><br />We perceive both consciously and unconsciously all our waking hours, and with each of our senses.<br /><br />Since illusion is the foundation of all aesthetic effect, and the whole success of illusion depends on a misdirected and ignorant consciousness, it stands to reason (as well as research and practice) that the unconscious mind is both the audience for and prime wellspring of Art.<br /><br /><br />kev ferrarahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09509572970616136990noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-84269611598430079702016-02-09T23:06:09.497-05:002016-02-09T23:06:09.497-05:00Kev, I didn't really address the humanists ver...Kev, I didn't really address the humanists verses pragmatists in the 20th century. The humanists were arguing for reason and the traditions of leisure and contemplation as the basis of civilization. The pragmatists were redefining reality through their own lens, in terms of function, function as motive, culture as function, etc. Pragmatism was asserting itself at a time when people were replacing their ties and customs which had been functional with non-functional pleasure oriented relationships. Almost every belief and school of thought has been eclipsed by the massive success of economic hedonism. Even the notion of work itself is being challenged by robotics. <br />Sean Farrellnoreply@blogger.com