Art: The All Powerful God Who Escapes Definitions & Defiles Certainty
Never have I read a definition of “Art” that fully satisfies me.
Early formal definitions of “Art” and “Artist” tend to primarily concern technical ability. This narrow understanding excludes the spiritual and emotional dimensions of Art, rendering such descriptions gravely inadequate.
Many definitions of Art make me mad.
Art: The ability to replicate reality *Art creates reality too, bitch.*
Art: Aesthetic pleasure. *Um. Not necessarily Art can shatter you!*
Sometimes I find explanations of Art that make me think…yes…that is a piece of it…but just a tiny pebble in the vast dirt pile.
Some of my current favorite pebbles:
“We have Art in order not to die of the truth.” - Friedrich Nietzsche
“Art is a mediator of the unspeakable.”- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
“Art is not a mirror held up to reality, but a hammer with which to shape it.”-Berthold Brecht
“The role of the Artist is to make the revolution irresistible” - Toni Cade Bambara
Ana Mendieta, “Body Tracks”, 1974
I am both frustrated and dazzled by Arts proclivity to evade solid definitions while remaining a fundamental aspect of life.
How can arranged and manipulated materials, sounds, words, performance, and light have the ability to fill us with such intense feelings of emotion and spirit since forever? What is that? I demand an explanation!
I believe I will be seriously disappointed because humans are always in crisis when it comes to pinning down an exact meaning and definitive shape to Art.
The Philadelphia Wireman is the name given to an unknown Artist responsible for about 1,200 wire-frame sculptures found abandoned outside on a street in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1982.
On a personal level, I first knew Art to be multidimensional communication. The language that fails us the least.
Art came through to me at a time when my energy and truth was bound up and suffocated in an environment of much restriction. Something was about to blow one way or the other! Art was a place I poured into, which really assisted me in dispersing the path of self annihilation.
Here is my non-exhaustive list of observational pebbles related to “Art” and “Artist” in no particular order.
Art is a gift of life: The holy grail of human expression. Inspiration and creation are precious resources that everyone needs, whether or not they identify as an Artist.
Art is a highly advanced technology of communication. Once again, it is the language that fails us the least. Art allows others to see what plays before our eyes with remarkable precision. With practice, Art becomes a language capable of holding great nuance and accuracy when conveying complex experiences. This still blows my mind. Without Art, so much connection would be lost because there would be no congruent translation.
Unity creator and destroyer. Most of us can relate to the experience of listening to a song, reading a book, or beholding a painting or sculpture when we are suddenly struck by a powerful wave of connection to the Artist and to our fellow Earthlings. This is the electrifying current of Art. But like any powerful tool, Art can be used to serve many different purposes. It can unite people through shared feeling and understanding, or it can deepen division depending on how it is created and received. The same force that brings us together in recognition of our common humanity can also shape belief, identity, and power.
Art moves through culture like a current through a wire, carrying emotion, memory, and meaning from one mind to another. In this way, it becomes one of the most potent forms of communication we have, capable of shaping how we see the world and how we see each other.
The Nazi regime in Germany manipulated Art by promoting specific aesthetics that aligned with their white supremacist ideology, while censoring and vilifying other forms they deemed “impure” or “degenerate.” This agenda was most notably showcased in the dual Art exhibitions held in Munich in the summer of 1937. One was titled Entartete Kunst (Degenerate Art Exhibition), where modernist Artworks were deliberately displayed in a chaotic, overcrowded manner, accompanied by derogatory labels intended to provoke public ridicule. In contrast, the Große Deutsche Kunstausstellung (Great German Art Exhibition) debuted with grandiose fanfare, featuring Art that conformed to Nazi ideals of racial purity, heroism, and traditionalism.
Interior view of the Degenerate Art Exhibition, Munich 1937. Room 3 “Take Dada seriously!”
All this to say, let not Art be used against us to alienate one another, and never let fascist nazis think they can control the Artistic narrative.
From the looks of it, I would certainly be having Artistic revelations in the room of degenerate art. So, i’m not so sure how successful the nazi regime truly was in forcing their hand into the artistic narrative.
Art is an invaluable resource for the disenfranchised. Images are free. Sounds are free. Poetry is free. Our expression and connection through Art are nearly impossible to destroy or control completely.
Art is extra sensory perception in practice.
The Artist may “fail” to succeed on many levels in a normative sense, and in doing so reap the rewards of experimentation. One guy’s failure is another’s freedom.
Art wants the truth. Yet art can just as easily become a tool of deception and illusion. Hopefully, when practiced with integrity, art can facilitate revelations that honor the multilayered nature of reality.
When I experience art that is complex and beautiful in strange ways, I feel more open to the vast mysteries within myself and others. Art helps me see the boxes I place myself in and gives me the opportunity to question whether I want them to remain.
The Artist knows when to NOT shut the fuck up and/or hopefully knows exactly when to be quiet. (Not derogatory)
“Faun by Moonlight” by Leon Spilliaert 1900
Art is where you can go as far as you want. Where you can channel all your intensity and excess energy if you learn how and practice.
This was so freeing to me when I first started thinking about it. I am an intense person in particular ways so I have struggled frequently in trying to understand where to put that severity in normal constructs of society. I have often felt very self conscious and even exasperated by the parts of me that make it difficult to fit in with others.
Art is a place where I am learning to embrace my intensity and my oddities, as many artists have done and will continue to do throughout time. It gives me great solace to know that my Art practice is a space I build to withstand and support the full extent of myself.
“Mandang Celestial” by Eugene Von Bruenchenhein 1958
The Artist is not the author but the catcher.
Maybe the “audience” for Art is less consequential than we think. Many Artists I love and admire find resources, support, and notoriety well within their lifetime.
Yet there are many more Artists I love whose work is not fully appreciated or in some cases noticed until after their death. On one level this breaks my heart, but a part of me understands this as part of the Artist’s path.
To name a few: Hilma af Klint, Pamela Coleman Smith, James Hampton, Eugene Von Bruenchenhein, The Philadelphia Wire Man (anonymous sculptor who made thousands of works in the 70s.), Ana Mendieta, Edgar Allan Poe, ect.ect.
(Lately I am especially touched by the work of self-taught Artists or, often referred to as outsider Artists)
If you are laboring something into this world, you cannot know how or when it will be received. Similar to a child, you cannot control your creations’ experience once it is delivered here. An Artist’s job is to trust their instincts and do the work regardless of external validation.
The Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations’ Millennium General Assembly by James Hampton made 1950-1964. Hampton worked as a janitor and made this work in relative secret over the span of 14 years within a garage space off the apartment he was renting. He used scavenged materials such as aluminum and gold foil, old furniture, pieces of cardboard, light bulbs, jelly jars, shards of mirror and desk blotters held together with tacks, glue, pins and tape. The work was discovered after his death and now lives in the Smithsonian.
Art drags something ancient back into consciousness.
Art crashes the future into the present no matter how upsetting some may find it.
“Black Girl’s Window” Betye Saar 1969
Art teaches us to be active instead of passive. If you want your ideas to match your reality, you must struggle with your material in order to shape it.
Art teaches us to be passive instead of active. Creative seeds of origin exist beyond the self. Step yourself aside and let it come through you. Accept the limitations of physical reality and shape the ideas you receive to the best of your ability.
The Artist must protect their freedom. Learn to regularly throw away conventional standards that others hold themselves too. Actively write your own standards to live up too.
The Artist must build strong instinct and intuition. Technical skill is king but intuition is QUEEN of the land.
and I could go on! Please let me know if you have anything to add to this list. I long to glimpse the shape of Art.
For now I am humbled and grateful to be on earth at this time with you, thinking and aspiring to the Arts. Thank you for reading and see you next time!
If you would like to get writing like this delivered to your inbox: