tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post1011138683276599366..comments2024-03-28T22:57:07.128-04:00Comments on ILLUSTRATION ART: THERE BE DRAGONS HERE, STILLDavid Apatoffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11293486149879229016noreply@blogger.comBlogger61125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-21285628044228230432015-03-04T05:25:11.880-05:002015-03-04T05:25:11.880-05:00Good post!Good post!Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04884410952434553039noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-69409072346655499472015-02-17T18:03:16.772-05:002015-02-17T18:03:16.772-05:00Thank you David. I do see a note on the concern ab...Thank you David. I do see a note on the concern about the penetrating ability of the crossbow regarding the Taborite rebellion around 1410. Such concerns may also have been part of the earlier debates when the codes of Chivalry were written in the late 12th century, or even well before that because the crossbow was used in the first millennium too.<br /><br />Kenneth Clark's series is interesting on all kinds of levels, but his definition of what a civilization is and isn't and the beliefs and vitality required to defend it are quite relevant today.Sean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-84482628786076202342015-02-17T03:42:29.347-05:002015-02-17T03:42:29.347-05:00Tom and Chris Bennett-- I agree Clark is brilliant...Tom and Chris Bennett-- I agree Clark is brilliant. There aren't too many cultured intellects like him around these days. I have his Civilization book gathering dust on my bookshelf, but forgot how good the series is. The trick will be finding time to watch the whole thing.<br /><br />Sean farrell-- I remember reading that knights were most concerned about the crossbow because it was the great leveler; for years a knight's expensive, heavy armor made him virtually invulnerable in battle against superior numbers of peasants and urchins. Crossbows enabled the lower classes to shift the balance of power by piercing a knight's armor-- the first asymmetrical warfare! <br /><br />Robert Cook-- Very good! I haven't read Wolfe's science fiction but he wrote a very smart and thoughtful autobiography. <br /><br />David Apatoffhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11293486149879229016noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-72008192847510185612015-02-16T21:34:05.275-05:002015-02-16T21:34:05.275-05:00I won't even begin to try to contribute to the...I won't even begin to try to contribute to the very heady and fascinating conversation going on here; I just want to ask: Is the Bernard Wolfe you quote the Bernard Wolfe who wrote the brilliant and scabrous science fiction novel LIMBO? (This Bernard Wolfe also co-wrote Mezz Mezzrow's REALLY THE BLUES and was a secretary for Leon Trotsky during Trotsky's time in Mexico.)Robert Cookhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06951286299515983901noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-83681652368659408452015-02-16T13:05:39.346-05:002015-02-16T13:05:39.346-05:00Hi Sean, it is quite a series. even though it is 4...Hi Sean, it is quite a series. even though it is 40 years old. His explaination of the feminine principle, also struck me. <br /><br />When you mentioned seeing the crucification in Ireland I immediatley thought of Clark's description of Christians heading west to Cromwell and Ireland so they could live in some sort of peace. <br /> <br /><br />David;<br />I came across this quote that pertains to what we where discussing, "Once spiritual contact is established, the essential forms will be realized; the spirit of the universe will be captured. Will not a painting then be as real as nature itself?" Tsung PingTomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04641223414745777056noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-46825626092231898172015-02-15T17:07:17.219-05:002015-02-15T17:07:17.219-05:00Tom and Chris,
The entire series was outstanding....Tom and Chris, <br />The entire series was outstanding. More important today than ever.<br />SeanSean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-67123225703284677902015-02-12T13:43:24.700-05:002015-02-12T13:43:24.700-05:00I will start then with the first episode Tom, than...I will start then with the first episode Tom, thanks.<br /><br /><br />Sean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-26480432487194948972015-02-12T12:39:01.499-05:002015-02-12T12:39:01.499-05:00HI Sean
I am work right now. But since you menti...HI Sean<br /><br />I am work right now. But since you mentioned Ireland, I think you will really enjoy the first episode in Clark's series, "By the Skin of Our Teeth," He really drives home the point that civilization is in fact a fragile thing.Tomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04641223414745777056noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-55772187101852669772015-02-12T11:21:40.877-05:002015-02-12T11:21:40.877-05:00Tom and Chris,
Thanks, I will be watch the whole s...Tom and Chris,<br />Thanks, I will be watch the whole series. Kenneth Clark's explanation of the feminine principle, the will of the north which replaced it and the embodiment of the faith which remained in Catholicism were excellent. A procession explained the civilizing effect of people wearing their wants, desires, and respect openly as a public expression. <br /><br />Visiting Italy, Brazil and Ireland over several years I had no clue of any of this, yet discovered it in an interior way as observed it in the public religious sculptures and also through several expressions of paganism in Brazil.<br /><br />On Slea Head drive in Dingle, Ireland, there's a small unpaved parking lot where one can get out and view from an elevation, the Basket Islands, the largest of which is called Old Man. On a good day, the sun glistens and sparkles on the sea through clouds and the islands fade back as shadows in a haze. With the senses heightened from the wonderful view, one turns to return to the car, where across the road against a hill facing the ocean is a scene of the Crucifixion in white stone. Without a lick of faith, a sense of perfection awakened from nature understands the perfection of the sculpture and theater at once, as the two magnify each other as overlapping visual experiences.<br /><br />Upon returning to New York, where people held to a disembodied sophistication, cool while competing with their own self consciousness, the difference was striking and profound. I didn't know it at the time, but over the course of the trips, I was being slowly being drawn to something very human without a word, through art and very much what Kenneth Clark was explaining in the video. <br /><br />With a laptop and a little adapting wire for about $5. you can watch the videos on your TV and the quality is surprisingly good.<br /><br />Another thought on our enlightened era as we get ready to witness more automated television warfare. When the crossbow was introduced, the knights debated whether it should be permitted because it didn't give the other man a fair chance to defend himself.Sean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-18785971237914488352015-02-12T04:34:12.975-05:002015-02-12T04:34:12.975-05:00In fact, the whole of Kenneth Clark's 'Civ...In fact, the whole of Kenneth Clark's 'Civilisation' is a grand monument of British television and well worth getting on DVD. There was also a very good book written by him to go with it.<br /><br />Clark also writes well about Rembrandt too.chris bennetthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02088693067960235141noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-17389817905266890992015-02-11T20:56:59.651-05:002015-02-11T20:56:59.651-05:00Tom, I did enjoy the clip you posted very much and...Tom, I did enjoy the clip you posted very much and plan on watching the whole thing now.<br />Thanks, SeanSean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-63702972741712498592015-02-11T19:53:11.232-05:002015-02-11T19:53:11.232-05:00Hi Sean
You might enjoy the Kennth Clark link I ...Hi Sean<br /><br />You might enjoy the Kennth Clark link I posted above, if you have not already seen it. He has a genuinely positive view of the church and its civilzing<br />influence. <br /><br />The whole episode is called<br />Civilisation: Grandeur and Obedience (1969)- Part 07 of 13Tomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04641223414745777056noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-14968034938233326912015-02-11T19:40:36.001-05:002015-02-11T19:40:36.001-05:00David, thank you for the description of the execut...David, thank you for the description of the execution of the Albigensians which I never read before. I will look for the article. The following is a fairly standard take on the matter: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albigensian_Crusade<br /><br />Also thank you for your generous openness.<br /><br />It is noteworthy that more people died in wars in the 19th century than all the wars in history combined. The 20th century, also noted for its enlightenment, far surpassed the death toll of 19th century. Of course, these were not religious wars in the usual sense, but were largely ideological, which is a kind of religion for ideological believers, who seek novel solutions for all of mankind. We are still in such an age.<br /><br />Many find defending the nuclear bombings on Japan difficult even today, but I wonder how they will be viewed 750 years from now? Will we be viewed as enlightened or insane, burning people in nuclear radiation?<br /><br />Over the upper doors in the House of Representatives, there are discs with pictures of people who contributed to the development of law. They begin with Moses in the rear and circle around to Jefferson. Among them are two Popes and Suleiman the Magnificent. We are linked with the past, however embarrassing and painful it may at times be.<br /><br />There is an experience in countries where religious sculpture isn't outlawed in public places. The experience is one of magnification, where the sculpture is reflected in the environment and the environment in the sculpture. This is true in some places in the USA, such as the Statue of Liberty in NY harbor and some fantastic statues at Gettysburg, where environment and history magnify the significance and beauty of the art. This cross categorization of time and space is part of the magnification, the real sense of being transported and present at the same time, which mixes with beauty and or significance of the sculpture in a way which is hard to categorize.<br /><br />Such is very true in Rio de Janeiro, where the Christ the Redeemer statue holds benevolent arms outstretched over the two beaches of Copacabana and Ipanema.<br />The beauty of all below the statue, is enhanced by the statue itself and in the same, the beauty of the statue is enhanced by the wonderful scenery below.<br /><br />When art crosses categories or shares categories in new ways, there is often an experience quite different than what one is used to. The combining of various musical idioms with country music in the two guitarists is an example. But there is something special when viewing ancient art involving time and larger meanings too, such as standing before a bust of Julius Caesar, or the giant head of Augustus Caesar at the Vatican Museum.Sean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-8376636670066982092015-02-09T10:56:48.631-05:002015-02-09T10:56:48.631-05:00III.46 A. And R. Yohanan said in the name of R. Si...<i>III.46 A. And R. Yohanan said in the name of R. Simeon b. Yohai, “It is permitted to contend with the wicked in this world,<br /> B. For it is said, ‘Those who forsake the Torah praise the wicked, but those who keep the Torah contend with them’ (Prov. 28:4).”<br /> C. It has been taught on Tannaite authority along these same lines:<br /> D. R. Dosetai bar Matun says, “It is permitted to contend with the wicked in this world, for it is said, ‘Those who forsake the Torah praise the wicked, but those who keep the Torah contend with them’ (Prov. 28:4).”<br /> E. And if someone should whisper to you, “But is it not written, ‘Do not contend with evil-doers, nor be envious against those who work unrighteousness’ (Ps. 37:1),” say to him, “Someone whose conscience bothers him thinks so.<br /> F. “In fact, ‘Do not contend with evil-doers’ means, do not be like them, ‘nor be envious against those who work unrighteousness,’ means, do not be like them.<br /> G. “And so it is said, ‘Let your heart not envy sinners, but fear the Lord all day’ (Prov. 23:17).”<br />H. Is this the case? And lo, R. Isaac has said, “If you see a wicked person for whom the hour seems to shine, do not contend with him, for it is said, ‘His ways prosper at all times’ (Ps. 10:5).<br /> I. “Not only so, but he wins in court, as it is said, ‘Your judgments are far above, out of his sight’ (Ps. 10:5).<br /> J. “Not only so, but he overcomes his enemies, for it is said, ‘As for all his enemies, he farts at them’ (Ps. 10:5).”</i>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-26451789705681945432015-02-09T05:10:19.048-05:002015-02-09T05:10:19.048-05:00David Apatoff wrote: “I agree that "the conne...<b>David Apatoff wrote: “I agree that "the connections between the selections" is important. My only question is this: since every selection involves otherwise random data points, how "manifest" must its connections be to the other selected data points? For example, one point may be noted to map out the length of a leg; a second point may reflect an area of strong contrast between light and dark objects; a third point may be to note an emphasis on meaningful eyes. The only "connections between the selections" is that the artist assigns each a priority for his subjective purposes.”</b><br /><br />I believe that the connections are far more than important; they are vital; they embody everything that can be communicated. Kev has just said the same thing regarding truth being communicated by way of what is expressed within the relationships between text symbols.<br /><br />So the “connections between the other selected data points” must be entirely manifest and go far, far, far beyond merely assigning priority between the elements. And assigning each a priority for his subjective purposes is, to my mind, absolutely meaningless aesthetically. Simple example: an artist likes yellow, so yellow is featured more dominantly than his next favourite colour; red, and his least favourite colour, blue, gets a muddy smear in the right hand bottom corner. So what?<br /><br />Let me express this in a more sophisticated way; Michelangelo was sexually attracted to men and even when sculpting women (his ‘Night’ is a good example) the priority was on the musculature of her body to the point of maleness. But the meaning of this work is in the connections between the forms written as a frozen music of mass. So although Michelangelo’s passion was pushed by a sexual proclivity different to my own it is the ‘push’ that is written in the connections and transmitted as a commonality of experience. So to pinch Kev’s Staunton chess piece for a brief moment, the sequence of moves are the same whatever the chess pieces look like. Love is love whether gay or straight. <br /><br />Ingres’ ‘Odalisque’ has a very long back, a strong contrast between her thigh and the background, and the importance of her right eye is emphasised by its iteration in the pattern of the peacock fan she’s holding. So what? What communicates can only be read in the totality, the connective flux of everything, all together realised by the self-supporting, inter-defining, orchestration of the whole. <br /><br />I’m not sure if I’ve answered your question because I may have misunderstood your meaning, so apologies if I’ve rambled on about something you already understand!<br />chris bennetthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02088693067960235141noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-55638161674798918172015-02-08T23:28:18.830-05:002015-02-08T23:28:18.830-05:00David
Isn't the experience the visual artist ...David<br /><br />Isn't the experience the visual artist brings into being the rhythm of form, proportion and space? The aesthetic elements is what makes the art work, not its ability to mimic the real. <br /><br />The rhythm of a work is not a secondary experience, is it? Rarely when I experience beauty do I feel a violent or aggressive or any emotional reaction that pertains to the world of jealous, anger or grief. What I do feel is wonder, satisfaction and a freedom from self centered thought.<br /> <br />Kenneth Clark gets the feel of it. Here he is discussing St. Peter's and Michelanglo in Civilisation.<br /><br />It runs from the 12:00 mark to about the 15:00 mark. <br /> <br />http://youtu.be/0rnHls282HUTomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04641223414745777056noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-20194218712022055522015-02-08T22:59:49.190-05:002015-02-08T22:59:49.190-05:00Sean Farrell-- I note that President Obama and the...Sean Farrell-- I note that President Obama and the national media have now taken up our discussion of the crusades. How does it feel to shape the national dialogue? (I didn't even know Obama was an illustration fan!) <br /><br />As for the Albigensian crusade ("Today historians are saying that the stories which brought concern were fabrications. They involved some peculiar charges, that incest was being sold as the true sexuality because in the bible they called each other brother and sister.") I read a fairly extensive account in the Smithsonian Magazine that didn't mention any of that, but said that the Pope hired German mercenaries to lay siege to a small town of pacifist cathars, blind them and cut their tongues out. According to that version, the Pope's army not only burned the heretics alive (a la ISIS today) but heretics who had the audacity to die before the army reached them were dug up and their bones were burned, just in case. That all may have changed as a result of new scholarship in the past decade. Were the stories fabrications? I don't claim to have kept up up with the changes after that article, but the article really stuck in my mind. (Incest is pretty bad, but I'm not sure it would ever motivate me to burn people alive).<br /><br /><br />Chris Bennett- I agree that "the connections between the selections" is important. My only question is this: since every selection involves otherwise random data points, how "manifest" must its connections be to the other selected data points? For example, one point may be noted to map out the length of a leg; a second point may reflect an area of strong contrast between light and dark objects; a third point may be to note an emphasis on meaningful eyes. The only "connections between the selections" is that the artist assigns each a priority for his subjective purposes.<br /><br />Kev Ferrara wrote: "I think the reduction of experience to the abstract level of graphics or cartoons or diagrams is only a “good thing” when a real insight is nailed down in the process."<br /><br />I agree. It's extremely difficult to do well, and most artists fail miserably. But when they succeed, the graphic / cartoon format gives art an immediacy and universality that we don't get from other more layered art.<br /><br />"As I’ve already mentioned, the ad hoc “creative” patching together of knowns, which is a hallmark of the postmodern, is no substitute for the sensible comprehension of the true relation of things."<br /><br />Agreed.<br /><br />"Thus, given, and through, our limited perspectives as mortal beings, it would seem that all true relations echo equally through existence and time."<br /><br />Whoa. I'll get back to you in a month on whether I agree with that.<br />David Apatoffhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11293486149879229016noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-36862061408833382282015-02-08T15:54:48.950-05:002015-02-08T15:54:48.950-05:00On abstracting experience destructively…
I think ...<b>On abstracting experience destructively…</b><br /><br />I think the reduction of experience to the abstract level of graphics or cartoons or diagrams is only a “good thing” when a real insight is nailed down in the process. Like for instance that Saul Steinberg cartoon about the different life lines of people that you posted on this blog a few years ago. That, to me, is a gold standard for educational abstraction. But most abstraction is lossy to an equally extreme extent without offering a comparable mental reward. I think our educational institutions are replete with trivializations of information, abstracting and de-contextualizing everything from real life application, which is truly malpractice, in my view. Which, for my money, is why the average American student leaves school utterly clueless about life, lacking in any creative abilities, and generally dependent on outside sources for their thoughts. <br /><br />As I’ve already mentioned, the ad hoc “creative” patching together of knowns, which is a hallmark of the postmodern, is no substitute for the sensible comprehension of the true relation of things. I really do think hodgepodge cultural products mess up people’s minds. I’ve caught so many glimpses of children’s programming that is clearly just a mishmash of this and that, references that kids will have no idea about from junk culture, jokes that don’t make sense, and almost no reference to anything related to actual life. Increasingly it seems to me that all the institutions of education, from schools to the media to the arts, are staffed with unreflective people who are indoctrinating the entire culture into their blithe trivializations of knowledge, philosophy, and even life itself.<br /><br /><b>On “all truths are equal”</b><br /><br />We cannot grasp anything except through proxies, which I think are always fictions of one kind or another. The characters of a play are simply far more complex proxies than the letters and numbers of a mathematical formula or Staunton’s chess piece designs, (the shapes of which indicate their respective movement/capture meanings.)<br /><br />So when we regard some communication as ringing with truth, we are, usually without realizing it, ignoring the proxy symbols which are textual and fictional, and instead generally referring to the essence of what is being suggested. <br /><br />Another way to put it…. This may be a little too philosophical, but; Math is a method whereby essential physical relations (which include interactions) can be strictly incrementalized. Yet Mathematics is a very small subset of form (in the large sense of plasticity) available to our experience/senses. Which is to say, the way we understand direct physical relations through the incrementalist paradigm we call Math is a very small subset of the total amount of understanding we can garner about all the different kinds of relations we might notice through our experience.<br /><br />Another way to put it is that math is only one way to notate/understand one particular kind of essence we experience in life, but there are many other kinds of essential concepts to notice and consider and reflect upon.<br /><br />The grander theory of form, as I understand it, would place any essence/comprehension/relation that resounds with truth on the same level of verity, whether the form has been incrementalized or not (whether it has been formalized or not). Incrementalization doesn't make math formulations of physical scenarios any more repeatable than the essential emotional scenarios that human beings have endured repeatedly since time immemorial. (These human scenarios are just another kind of comprehending relation between elements.)<br /><br />Thus, given, and through, our limited perspectives as mortal beings, it would seem that all true relations echo equally through existence and time. <br /><br />Regarding a 90% true piece of art... the failure of any particular expression or statement to express a truth fully or succinctly, has no bearing on whether the truth aimed at is fully true or not. This idea mixes up the attempted expression of a truth with the truth itself.kev ferrarahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09509572970616136990noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-29338381704131708182015-02-08T13:46:59.922-05:002015-02-08T13:46:59.922-05:00Tom wrote: "I don't think Art is a stand ...Tom wrote: "I don't think Art is a stand in for another experience. The experience of drawing, painting, or sculpturing a form is just as real as any other experience."<br /><br />I don't deny that an artist is breathing and touching and seeing as he or she draws, so in that sense art is indeed a form of experience. Yet, there is always some percentage of the process that seems to be gawking through a keyhole. Perhaps the best analogy is theatre: the actors on stage are alive but the events being acted out on stage are not life being lived-- they are artificial simulations of life, selected and condensed and manipulated based upon the playwright's observations about real life as it goes on outside the theatre. The love and pain being imitated on stage aren't genuine love and pain, they are the emotions that the playwright has created by stepping back and reflecting on the real experiences.<br /><br />I will definitely check out that David Sedaris routine, I've seen him in concert and I think he is very, very good.<br /><br />Kev Ferrara wrote: "The more we fracture existence or experience in order to map it at an easily graspable conceptual level (graphics/cartoons)… the more of actual life is discarded in that process."<br /><br />I think this is a crucial issue. Personally, I think it is often a good thing to simplify experience down to the graphics/cartoon level-- it is hard to do well, but when it is, it gives the viewer the openness and flexibility to build back up to complexity from the initial shock of simplicity. What concerns me is when we go past the graphics / cartoon level to the sub-atomic particle level of simplicity-- those 1's and 0's that make up digital reality. They break reality down into such tiny granular elements that they can't be reconstructed into something meaningful except with the aid of a machine. <br /><br />I think the open question about your view is how much of discarded life can be restored to bytes by use of the fabulous manipulative powers of today's information technology? We can slice and dice those 1's and 0's any way we want today. We can use them to make digital art. We can use them to make animation. Yet, I agree that most of the art we have seen assembled so far from that "fractured" reality lacks the connective tissue that more traditional great art has. <br /><br />Kev Ferrara also wrote: "I think all truths must be equally true, or else they are not really truths."<br /><br />Wow, that's a tough one. Definitionally you are probably right. On the other hand, some truths are bigger or better or more useful than others. Can't some truths be more true as well? Can't art be 90% true?David Apatoffhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11293486149879229016noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-45681998451063392162015-02-04T20:16:54.863-05:002015-02-04T20:16:54.863-05:00This is a hard thing to answer, how can science un...This is a hard thing to answer, how can science unify the disunity of mind and body, ethereal and material, this historic and metaphysical wound which is at the center of so many problems.<br /><br />Science can only act as an identifier or in identifying what is. It is in what is identified or signified that the unity follows and the wound heals.<br /><br />There will be little healings as the mind and body and its identifications are better understood, with possibly more physiological connections between bonds and actions verified.<br /><br />It is the will (or spirit, sometimes called the heart) which lurches by appetite or hunger outwardly for things. This reunification then comes from the outside, since it is what is being sought. Such is why the individual search for reunification is like a shell game where the individual always loses, because the reunification is in the will which isn't an end in itself, nor is it simply body because it is in the body, acting for unity from disunity.<br /><br />Let's say someone is moved by the beatitudes and they experience a softening of the will akin to humility and in this there is something approaching a unification of the body and the will. Most people find such fascinating and beautiful and refer to it as being touched; some might say it is like being touched by love.<br /><br />The identification of the blood samples, point to the words of Christ regarding the following. The emphasis on the spiritual happened in 1524 under Thomas Muntzer, who taught that people needed a second baptism to verify their faith and threw out the last supper as part of salvation. Many people agreed with Muntzer and that's fair because one can read it that way if they wish. <br /><br />Overlooked is that Christ always appeared embodied, rose in his body and appeared to the apostles with his wounds, bearing the wounds of division in forgiveness. He was in his body when he breathed the spirit upon apostles and when he ascended. The story goes, he will come again...in his body. So the body and his spirit, (meaning the intentions or will of his person), are undivided in him having overcome the world. Heaven and earth are reunited through forgiveness by the sacrifice of his body. He imparts his unitive self to the believer as the high priest, in a manner that incorporated the old blood sacrifices of Jacob and Joshua offering himself and transformed them into the bloodless offerings of Melchizedek in the bread and wine.<br /><br />Whether one believes such is one thing, but the concept of a body and mind undivided or unitive in intentions through a divine humility is not foreign to the eastern or western mind.<br /><br />If for this alone, science has reinvigorated this now ancient concept of unitive humility, then it did something very good.Sean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-53139902412867429022015-02-04T18:20:41.978-05:002015-02-04T18:20:41.978-05:00David Apatoff said: “…the selection of those notes...<b>David Apatoff said: “…the selection of those notes is not a mechanical process (or at least not exclusively a mechanical one). Isn't it a selection of highlights, points of contrast, points to emphasize, etc. reflecting the editorial judgment of the artist? I'd think that makes it different from the raw, undiscriminating mapping information in the data base of a GPS? Even the quantitative notes, marking the length of a leg or the location of a tree, depend on the subjective impressions of the artist.”</b><br /><br />The choosing what to select is certainly influenced by the state of the artist’s temperament at the time. But without manifesting the connections between the selections their meaning as a realisation of the artist’s unconscious synthesising thought remains mute. In the plastic arts it is difficult to give an analogy, but as literature I could say this: what would be the meaning of a toy robot, a greeting card and a wooden bowl? Anything. But if the author tells us the bowl contains a young boy’s ashes, an insight about them begins to glimmer within. <br /><br />In its crudest, basest form, ‘mapping’, in the plastic arts, would be a collection of consensus symbols standing for nameable things. So when drawing a head this would result in the type of image produced by complete beginners using a symbol for the nose, eyes, mouth, ears and hair plonked down in roughly the right place to be legible as a ‘face’. However, it is very important to note that this also happens at much higher levels involving pure plastic ‘non-naming’ means. I’ve caught myself doing it when a particularly important portrait commission is giving me trouble.<br /><br />So in this sense, unless the subjective selections are orchestrated into a meaningful relationship to one another, the result is as aesthetically dead as the ‘undiscriminating mapping information in the data base of a GPS’.<br /><br /><br /><b> As for your point that "it is how we get to the words ‘I love you’ that makes us believe them, not the sentence itself," I've heard that argument from plenty of guys before, but women don't believe it until they hear the sentence itself.</b><br /><br />:) Would they accept the HTML protocol smiley meaning the same thing I wonder? <br /><br />chris bennetthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02088693067960235141noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-51351591965117434532015-02-04T12:30:08.784-05:002015-02-04T12:30:08.784-05:00I can't defend the stupidity and cruelty of al...I can't defend the stupidity and cruelty of all Christians across two millennium but I will try and put something in context. The slaughter of the Jews along the Rhine by Emico is indefensible as were some other shameful events. The Albigensian controversy is less simple. Today historians are saying that the stories which brought concern were fabrications. They involved some peculiar charges, that incest was being sold as the true sexuality because in the bible they called each other brother and sister. Such stupidity might have been going on, but I don't really know. The heresy was no just local but spread across to Italy. There was a very long inquisition before the slaughter, which itself is controversial as per the numbers. <br /><br />There was a break from reality later with the Adamites in 1421 and during the the Peasants Revolt of 1524 and Munster Revolution of 1530. The Taborites 1419 involved a breakdown of order, resorting to raiding neighboring towns for provisions. There had been previous controversies such as Pelagianism which lasted hundreds of years and addressed as far as I know, without force. <br /><br />Poland had the first constitutional democracy around the year 1,000. Progress was made under Sylvester III and was credited with the invention of the abacus and for a love of learning. It was for the elites and not the serfs, but it happened. The Crusades did bring back a great deal of stuff from antiquity and signaled when Europe began turning for the better and I thought this was a common understanding. Jews and Muslims played a role in the interpretation of ancient texts. After Albert the Great and Aquinas, there came the era of John Wycliffe 1380, and his thoughts on freedom and the early revolutionaries mentioned above whom he inspired. The power structure had been a confederacy of empirical and religious governance. The Church governed the monasteries and the Princes ruled the serfs with the Church's nod in exchange for protection. The era was a lot of things, but philosophy made massive headway. Art, math and science made real strides. Strides were made in the development of the written word, grammar and the new languages and more people were beginning to be educated, though general government public education as we know it today didn't become a reality until the 19th century and late 19th century in many places.<br /><br />Life was still harsh even if there was a global warming at the time. There were adequate provisions, but it was still a hard life with a physicality that was part of the faith in ways no one would understand, no less endure anymore. Such physicality was present in major denominations up until the mid 20th century. <br /><br />Yet, despite such harshness in disciplnes, progress in the mentioned subjects was taking place as learning for learning's sake. There was a spirit in the age for learning. Much of it was from the era of antiquity. The painstaking work of reproducing books written one letter at a time was a common occupation and part of a slowly developing economy and contributed later economic thought. It wasn't until the 19th century that the steam engine and combustion engine burst on the scene to rapidly move things along and it was just 100 years ago that most cities and homes were hooked up to electricity. But all such had its humble beginnings in the universities of Europe begun in the early middle ages yes by antiquity. Some of which survived owes itself to those hand copied books.Sean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-70415577795956155342015-02-04T10:24:32.157-05:002015-02-04T10:24:32.157-05:00David, you are asking some profound questions. I w...David, you are asking some profound questions. I will try and answer them but was thinking along a different line when I wrote the following.<br /><br />Truths may be equal in that they are true, but they are certainly not equal in what their truth signifies. Truths signify other truths. By category, some truths are quite significant and others true enough, but of little significance. The truth that there is a small puddle in the middle of a jungle in Burundi may be an unimportant truth. Yet, by some unknown way of understanding the economy of significance the puddle may be of importance.<br /><br />That the DNA of children takes residence in a mother's brain, is not of any significance by itself, but becomes significant by what else it signifies. That it may represent a physiological reality to a mother's connection to her children may or may not be true, but it certainly is a bit of evidence which lends itself to being possibly true and very significant. No one knows yet because the discovery is so recent. Oxytocin on the other hand is now a prescribed drug.<br /><br />If a bit of dried blood pulsates as living blood and is identified as living blood under a microscope, though it's 1,300 years old, it is still a scientific fact. But it is a confounding fact. Is it just the exception that proves the rule, or does it become significant in relation to words spoken in regard to such two millennium ago by those words would have extraordinary significance.<br /><br />It appears reasonable to conclude, that although there was competition for significant relics of saints in the early middle ages and they were used as part of competition with other monasteries, as well as charges of abusing such for gain in the same, etc., at least the two blood samples were identified by science and confounding scientific expectations, to be true. There are dozens of other such samples still in existence and though Dr. Castanon an atheist out to prove such was a hoax is no longer an atheist, there are plenty of objective labs left to do the work of identification.<br /><br />As an art student I once asked a drawing teacher why drawing was important because at the time, influenced by the annihilation of eastern thinking I was having doubts and he said, "It's important to me." I was puzzled by that answer, but know exactly what he meant today. Without our identities, we become little insignificant puddles.Sean Farrellnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-47269977511075005292015-02-04T04:20:35.464-05:002015-02-04T04:20:35.464-05:00Chris Bennett-- Thanks for such an interesting com...Chris Bennett-- Thanks for such an interesting comment. As I understand the "mapping" process in painting, even if it represents a stage where "we stop seeking out and realising connections and only see and realise the notes," the selection of those notes is not a mechanical process (or at least not exclusively a mechanical one). Isn't it a selection of highlights, points of contrast, points to emphasize, etc. reflecting the editorial judgment of the artist? I'd think that makes it different from the raw, undiscriminating mapping information in the data base of a GPS? Even the quantitative notes, marking the length of a leg or the location of a tree, depend on the subjective impressions of the artist. <br /><br />As for your point that "it is how we get to the words ‘I love you’ that makes us believe them, not the sentence itself," I've heard that argument from plenty of guys before, but women don't believe it until they hear the sentence itself. <br /><br /><br />Sean Farrell wrote: "The lonely search for reunion of the embodied spirit has been like a sorry shell game, where the player never wins. This is the old wound that's now being healed by scientific verifications."<br /><br />It's not clear to me how the separation of body and spirit can be healed by scientific verifications. The two elements that you say were "torn apart" have gone by many names over the millennia (The basic polarity is not just body and spirit or faith and reason-- isn't it also the split between the Dionysian and the Apollonian, between Ionian materialism and Eleatic mysticism, between philousia and philosophia, between maya and metron, and so on, and so on, echoing through the ages?) The roots of this tug of war seem to go way back and spread across multiple cultures. We often see the advocates of spiritual primacy in eastern religions such as Hinduism or Buddhism, with empiricism centered more often in the west (at least, historically). Those religions and others have historically rejected the fundamental premises behind "scientific verifications" and the rationalist delusions of the west. Even Cartesian skeptics say that scientific verifications miss the point. What is likely to change that? <br /><br />I don't take much solace from that outline of scientific development, as the same period might be cited for the opposite conclusion. The wisdom of Pythagoras and other Greeks was preserved by other cultures after the fall of Rome, it's true, but the knowledge accomplished next to nothing until it was re-planted in Europe where it flourished once again and helped lead to the Renaissance. That suggests that science isn't nearly as objective or universal as it's supposed to be. I haven't read Ms. Brown's book about Pope Sylvester III, but I am familiar with some of the Popes who followed him and I would hardly say he led to an era of scientific enlightenment. Just a few years later, Pope Urban launched mobs of uneducated paupers as "soldiers of Christ" to take back the Holy Land from the muslims. Along the way they slaughtered Jews and others for not being Christians. Later, Pope Innocent II launched the monstrous Albigensian crusades, hiring German mercenaries to slaughter the peaceful Christian cathars for deviating from Papal dogma-- an abomination against reason. All this in "a time of scientific openness and encouragement"? Many scholars and historians believe that Mendel falsified his test data to reach the (correct) result he intuited. Keppler, too, supposedly arrived at his famous theories intuitively, after stumbling through a series of erroneous calculations that pointed him in a different direction. So many of these scientific verifications still aren't accepted everywhere as scientific.David Apatoffhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11293486149879229016noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-12189014.post-29377069159497994732015-02-02T15:06:01.041-05:002015-02-02T15:06:01.041-05:00I agree that "Art has no journalistic obligat...<b>I agree that "Art has no journalistic obligation," but it often performs journalistic functions, and in huge ways. In fact, it is frequently commissioned for that specific purpose-- Daumier and Kollwitz and Goya and Oliphant and Jeff MacNelly, all conveyed strong opinions about the news of the day. Bierstatdt performed a reportorial function that was the equivalent of the NASA photograph. So these distinctions aren't very tidy, I think.</b><br /><br />I would say there is a confusion here between journalism and opinion. And then beyond that between opinion and art. I’d be interested to hear your take on whether you consider these things as different things qualitatively and if so how so… how would you draw the distinctions between these things? Or do you think that journalism, opinion and art are more the same than different?<br /><br /><b>Your discussion of precise maps and GPS as way to de-emotionalize experience can easily be viewed from the opposite perspective-- today's maps are a way to eliminate unwanted subjectivity. </b><br /><br />Well, I wasn’t critiquing today’s hyper accurate geographic maps for being unemotional, or inexpressive. I thought you were doing that with your original post. I was more critiquing the scaling out of the map making instinct to everything else but maps.<br /><br /><b>If we're defining "truth" as "shared comprehensions of experience," wouldn't you say that the experience of reality on the GPS is shared more universally than any art on view in a museum?</b><br /><br />I believe I said that a good map was the egg heads of dream of being truthful and factual at once. And I think the hallmark of truth is that it can be shared. Again, I don’t see any truths as more true than any others, definitionally... whether presented via map or Art. The difference, as I see it, between the kinds of truths one can map, and the kinds of truths Art is best equipped to deal with is that once the stationary facts of some area of interest are mapped sufficiently, the task is done. Whereas art deals with complex moving targets and emotionally tangled tensions and must constantly update its proxies in order to catch the eye and ear of each new generation seeking clarity and mental organization.kev ferrarahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09509572970616136990noreply@blogger.com