In a
society governed by capitalism, there is no room for any personal
endeavor that does not yield to some sort of financial utility—it
must make sense for one to participate in any enterprise. It
is by no means a contemporary feature of convention that art also
serves as a utility of survival, as artists have composed works for
the sake of financial security for centuries. The term “artist”
is one that should be brought to question, as contemporary society
conceives of the status of which as a profession, a job, and like any
job, one is more driven by economic demands than by passion. Is art
just another item of utility, an object that one uses for personal
gain on some level or another (for either artist or audiences)? Is
the artist simply another professional seeking to scrape out a
dollar? My intention is to explore Nietzsche's notion of artistic
intuition, and how it conflicts with the popular conceptions of art.
In the process, I will examine his idea of Apollonian, as well as
Dionysian, values in art. From my analysis I hope to indicate a sense
of artistry that eludes the language of utility, and support a type
of creative expression that is not isolated in subjectivity and
rational discourse.
What
Do We Mean By “Art”?
The
most I can offer concerning a general meaning of the term artist is
simply a personal interpretation as I have come to know the term
growing up, or a dictionary definition. I am sure that many people
have various understandings of the term, but as it pertains to my
endeavor of challenging the popular conception, some sense of “art”
as such should be provided. As a child, whenever I engaged, or at
least attempted, in activity that seemed somewhat fanciful to adults,
I was called “artistic”, or “creative”. The two terms seemed
to accompany each other so often that I came to equate the two, using
them interchangeably. Let it be said then that my childhood
definition is that an “artist” is a creative person. Nauseatingly
vague, yes, but no less so than the definition acquired from a
digital dictionary: a person who produces works in any of the arts
that are primarily subject to aesthetic criteria.1
So it is one who produces a particular type of object, and by object
I mean anything available to any one of our senses. What is this
object, and how does it qualify as art?
At
this point I depart from usage of textbook definitions, and return to
personal interpretations. Art is a certain kind of object in which we
bear a particular relationship to, and we apply the term “art” to
set it apart from those objects that do not meet the qualifying
standards. It is often thought that art objects are those that are
different from those Heidegger describes as “ready-to-hand”.2
These kinds of entities in the world are those we use by looking past
them: when one operates a hammer, one does not theorize about it, nor
does one take much notice of the hammer insofar as it is functioning
properly in order to fulfill some end. Those objects that we do take
notice of, but do not appear to be of any immediate use are
“present-at-hand”. It's because we take notice of these objects
that one is in a position to theorize about them. Art, it would seem,
walks a fine line between the two types, as it an entity in the world
available to the senses, and thus in a position to be theorized over.
Also, art seems to serve as a utility for both creators and audiences
in that it is argued that art assists in providing some sort of
psychological end. Art may be cathartic for the artist, as well as
pleasurable to audiences. It's this tightrope walk between both types
of states that art is understood as being different from both
present-at-hand, and ready-to-hand.
Walking a line between these two states is not unique, however, in
that a hammer motions between both at various times over the course
of its existence; I imagine that no one walks about with a hammer in
hand all the time ready to smash in protruding nails. It's still
unclear as to what makes something an art object as opposed to being
simply ready-to-hand, or present-at-hand. Another argument in favor
of differentiation may be that art is unique in being simultaneous
both. I feel no need to enter into details here in that this
suggestion is outright confusing given multiple simultaneous
perspectives. While for one who uses a hammer, it is ready-to-hand,
but for any onlooker who is not involved in the other's endeavor,
it's present-at-hand.
It
seems as though we are looking for a conception
of art, an understanding that allows for one to cover all cases of
possible experience. Nietzsche's analysis of this is favorably noted,
by myself, in his example of “leaf”.3
At some point in the very distant past, some creature or another that
was capable of uttering sounds in some fashion came across a leaf and
uttered “leaf”. This experience, which was unique to this
particular creature, becomes the experience for us all in that we
take his single utterance as the conceptualization of anything we
might come to experience in the world that resembles that single
instance. Nietzsche thought this to be the construction of concepts,
the “equation of the dissimilar”, in which the application of a
term is believed to cover the essence of an experience in all
possible cases. Reaching an understanding of “art” appears to be
making the same appeal in that we wish for the term to symbolize a
concept that is the universal understanding for any given experience.
Returning
to our conundrum of figuring out what quality, possessed by art, sets
it apart from mundane, everyday objects, it does not do that any
conclusion we might reach on the matter is ephemeral. In our current
day and age it seems that if knowledge it to be reached, its object
must be one that exists for all cases—our knowledge must be of
something eternal and unchanging. If this were not the case, then of
what use
would knowledge be? Plato's “Divided Line” supplies us with
a metaphysics that aligns knowledge with objects that surpass change
and time, objects referred to as “The Forms”.4
Any type of disposition we may have regarding physical objects,
things that change, switching between being ready-to-hand and
present-at-hand (let's say), will be marked by belief or opinion.
This type of disposition falls short of knowledge, and if the latter
is to be accomplished, our sights must be set on objects that
transcend the physical world. It should be noted that Plato placed
art on the lowest of possible sections on his line, claiming that art
is twice removed from truth, serving as a copy of a copy. While most
of us are prone to agree with his idea of an object of knowledge, we
are not commonly disposed to view art as being removed from truth. As
such, there seems to be a desire to place art in the Forms, as
something we can have knowledge of so as to set it apart from
everyday objects, and to help us get ever closer to The Good.
Reducing our epistemological relationship to art as one of opinion
offers us no support on the matter.
Placing
art in the Forms results in its conceptualization. As we tend to
agree that art exists, and “art” is meant to signify a
differentiation between objects so that there are things we would not
phrase as such, art as a concept must function in a manner that
transcends all experience in that it makes it possible for any one of
us to understand any given experience, even those had by others. This
understanding enables us to think that when a friend tells us “I
went to look at some art,” that she did not go wandering about a
hardware store. One may argue that our friend is a tool enthusiast,
and from her perspective such hardware is art. A Platonic response
may be that our friend is under the opinion
that tools qualify as art, but for us we exhibit an understanding
of concepts, and we are in a very good position to say that our
friend is mistaken—those who exhibit understanding are in a far
better place to speak of experience than one who is partaking in the
experience.
Art As Utility
While
there is still no exact understanding of what qualifies as art, we do
have some sense of what we expect from an understanding of the
concept of art. Although we are not eager to instantiate art as being
ready-to-hand, our analysis so far seems to consistently align art
with utility: that it is used to serve some rational end, or to
fulfill a purpose. Perhaps art can be conceived as assisting us to
understand Beauty, as it resides in the Forms, or to reach The Good.
This is one such use, as I'm sure there are many that can be
conceived. The point is not in establishing a proper use, rather that
an understanding of art is commonly thought to coincide with utility.
Other such possible uses of art have been alluded to: financial gain,
and psychic health. Art seems to be predicated on economics,
epistemology/metaphysics, and science.5
Economic
stress is what I take to be the heaviest impression on artistic
engagement. Survival is pressed upon us as one of the most demanding
aspects of our nature, given that in high school it is endlessly
emphasized that life cannot proceed without a job (parents tend to
contribute to the same pressure). If this is the case, then any youth
aspiring to be an artist will be thinking in terms of a professional
living, one that provides financial security—one does art to the
extent that there's money in it. Sometimes it may be the case that
one passionately desires to make art, and it just so happens that
there is a job market out there for such a passion. This type of
person we will return to later, as the kind who is on the right track
toward “creative acts”. For the time being we shall remain
focused on those who are confined to reactivity.
Nietzsche describes this state as one in which persons restrict
themselves to acting in regards to, or in correspondence with,
historical discourse. Reactivity, in a sense, is practical in that it
allows for one to partake in all the advantages that society has to
offer, and seeing as money is the particular advantage one acquires
by the conduct under question, art is one's segue into the market
place.
The scientific understanding of art can take many view points,
depending on the exact study one is disposed to. The one in question
here is a concern of psychological well-being. This tends to be
complimented by observations regarding the disposition toward
survival discussed above. If one confesses to having artistic
ambitions, whether or not one seeks financial gain through them or
not, the ability to exercise such ambition is not always readily
available due to economic demands. Someone who wishes to practice
dance may not always be able to if one must attend to work in order
to have access to the market place. In this event, science may
“observe” that artistic practices serve as cathartic expression—a
manner in which to combat psychological repression. Art then serves
the purpose of promoting better health by scientific standards. This
too is understood as “practical”, and that it is “reasonable”
for one to pursue art. The language of science and economics may both
wonder: “If it were not the case, then why would one do it?”
The Intuitive Drive
Camus'
idea of the absurd consists of the scenario in which the rational man
meets the irrational world.6
The absurd is not something that is contained in the world, instead
it is what emerges from our desire to become calculable, to have
insight into all ends—we create absurdity. What of the irrational
man? We have thus far discussed those of us who are led by the notion
that all meaningful activity in art must be predicated by utility, a
reasonable purpose. These insights constitute a good portion of
Nietzsche's idea of Apollonian values in art. We'll return to this
notion later, but prior to our current point, we made mention of a
person who has a passion for art, and by chance, happens to find a
market for his expression. We might ask, what if the market had not
happened to be in the artist's favor? Would she have “turned back”,
and resorted to bagging groceries at your local supermarket? This
would make sense, would it not, to keep one's eye on the practical
prize?
Like
Camus, Nietzsche also establishes a conflict: when the rational man
meets the intuitive man.7
While Camus' battle results in the absurd, Nietzsche's ends up with
tragedy.
This consequence will be elaborated on once we reach the
Apollonian/Dionysian values, until then we should examine what
Nietzsche means by the intuitions. In the same text where Nietzsche
discusses the formation of concepts, he also talks about how the
function of language is not to serve as a literal description of the
world and events. Instead, language is metaphorical, enabling one to
interpret one's experiences rather than describe them. It's in this
way that our current conventions are merely someone else's art. In
the case of “leaf” it was someone in the past who made such a
noise at an experience, and this initially was a creative act.
However, from then forward we have been in the position of copying
someone else's act—we have been reactive to a language. We have
also been reactive to an understanding of language, to its literal
functioning as being able to make sense of the world. In this way our
current reasonable discourse is a less an instance of subjective
will, and more a matter of reiteration.
What
is it then to be intuitive? This can be viewed as a simple antithesis
of the rational man, but this isn't completely accurate. To be
involved in the everyday play of metaphors is, in some sense, to be
an everyday poet. The routine discourse is one that imprisons us in
that we seek to implore word as a literal description of how things
are. Looking back at our notions of art, the conceptualization of
“art” is a means of solidifying our experiences in order to think
that one single experience grants us access to the understanding—we
express a drive to be calculable. Nietzsche does not think this
“rational” drive is the only one we have, there is one that is
still held to reiteration, and yet aspires to make new provinces of
discourse. This sort of person is not disillusioned, she exists in
the conceptual prison like anyone else does, and a history of
concepts is what she has to work with. Rather than fit herself to the
concepts as they are reiterated by others, she listens to her drive
to actively engage
concepts. Similar to how a lighthouse listens for the horn of a ship
encased in heavy fog in the night, someone who hears the call of the
intuitions puts up no resistance to the oncoming force. Think of a
child given a puzzle to put together: the child did not create the
pieces, they are simply what have been given to her. Adults look down
at her and expect her to piece together a particular image, to follow
the manner in which things have been conceived to fit together. The
child's intuitive drive compels her to put things together in
whatever manner she feels like. The end result is probably something
that makes little sense to those who operate off of mere reiteration:
when has a landscape been pieced together is such a way that a
mountain stands upside-down?! Where is the sense in putting things
together in a way so that the common man is confused?
Looking
back at my childhood, when adults referred to me “artistic”, this
is not because I was reacting to a historical discourse, rather, I
was involved in senseless
activity—it
was of little concern to me what practical basis there was for
putting the pieces together as they have fit before: I fancied the idea
of coloring the sky purple, or making a mustache for myself by gluing
macaroni noodles to my face. None of these features bore much
utility, except under the eyes of the psychologist who diagnoses my
irrationality as healthy, but the doctor is merely someone on the
outside looking in—the party is a mystery unless you're in on it.
Apollonian/Dionysian Values
This
outlook of conceptualization, and utility already provides us with
some insight into the Apollonian sense of art. The alternate sense of
art that Nietzsche highlights is the Dionysian.8
To each sense he assigns specific styles of art: sculpture, and
perhaps painting, pertain to the Apollonian, while music and dance
belong to the Dionysian. The point of the latter is that the art
contained therein is “non-imagistic”, while the former seeks to
produce imagery, or form, in one way or another. One may wonder what
the point is of differentiating styles of art in this way, is this
not also to conceptualize? I can imagine various interpretations of
Nietzsche that may yield equally plausible responses. I tend to refer
back to what was said about the intuitions, and how one is not
disillusioned from conceptual imprisonment, but what this dichotomy
seeks to establish is the manner in which we engage historical
discourse. The child can either put the puzzle together in a way that
makes sense, or she can make a different picture—it may not
necessarily be new, but it does not adhere to the language of
utility.
Each
of the values pertain to a different type of involvement: the
Apollonian deals in dreams, while the Dionysian engages by
intoxication. This relationship is very much in resemblance of the
rational man against the intuitions, as the Apollonian is very much
like the rational man. The appeal to dreams is similar to how we
resort to conceptualization, as dream, as conceived for our purposes,
seeks to elude individual experiences. Our encounters with the
physical realm is saturated with change and instability, a horrific
landscape for the rational soul. Focusing on dreams is to turn our
heads upward toward Mount Olympus, to the gods that transcend a world
in flux. Here we find not only Forms, but form, as mathematical
precision is also available to knowledge. Sculpture fits just fine
here in that one endeavors to mimic things as they appear; the better
a work resembles mathematical precision, or shapes, the more sensible
it is in the eye of society. In this manner of art, we are disposed
to what is intelligible, to entities that surpass change and position
themselves in such a way so as to be available to the intellect. The
Apollonian artist, then is one who partakes in images that spring
with life eternal, a practice that places one apart from others. The
language of subjective contemplation reigns as one considers oneself
as tapping into something by means of a rational dialectic, searching
for combinations of imagery that are useful for reaching Beauty—one
must imagine the pieces of the puzzle fitting together so as to be
perceived as Beautiful, for it is the beautiful work that succeeds in
capitalistic landscape. This subjectivity is beyond individual
experiences so as to avoid the horrific deceptions of opinion and
belief, and this refuge from the terror of the world also separates
one from other people—after all, “hell is other people.”9
It's in this way that the task of conceptualization is made easier in
that we do not consider the imprisoning factor of our poetry.
Dionysus serves as the antagonizing brother to Apollo, the kin the
latter wishes would not show up for holidays. Endeavors in Dionysian
art are not imagistic, they are not concerned with producing a
product that aligns itself with some concept. While music and dance
were mentioned as being practices that emerge from Dionysian art, one
may argue that each of these two styles lend themselves to both the
present-at-hand, and ready-to-hand in that “music” and “dance”
indicate a conceptualization, and both can be conceived as being
involved in sensible enterprise. This kind of criticism, however, is
still encased in the tradition of utility and the understanding, and
so there is still much effort in framing all events and activities in
a rational network of purposes and usefulness. The language of
utility will not be able to comprehend Dionysian art without becoming
queasy and fearful. Thinking back to our artist who just happens to
find a market for her practice, this economic gain shares more with
luck that with rational purpose, for the artist would have continued
with her passions regardless if there was a market for her to take
comfort in. “What nonsense,” exclaims the survivalist as well as
the epistemologist, while the psychologist proclaims “it's still
useful as it concerns one's health!” Such shouting touches a deaf
ear to the artist who seeks not to react to historical discourse, but to
be actively engaged in one's passions. Both of the reactions to the
artist are in vain in that they are still predicated on the notion of
sensible utility—each residing in the tongues of rational purpose
as a means to The Good. Each disposition is housed in a place where
the literal function of language is constitutive of concepts, and
it's because of this that dream is even more enticing in that each is
unaware that they are dreaming.
Even
though Nietzsche places great emphasis on music, my bias as a dancer
will be toward dance. My area of practice is in breakdance, an
activity I find to be an exquisite example of intoxication. One of
the unique features to this style of dance is that is has very few
foundational moves, and being involved in it usually entails that one
expresses great skills of improvisation. Because of this, rational
onlooker are usually given a headache at the sight of the
unpredictable movements, and someone spinning on their head—heads
were made for thinking! Breakdance is still young in its age, and
quite far from possessing any sort of professional stability, but
this does not prevent practitioners from partaking in it. Returning
to the criticism mentioned above, is it not the case that even in
dance one is orchestrating a product for audiences to conceptualize?
Maybe so, if we're to remain in that sort of language, but the
important feature to grasp in Dionysian art is its notion of
intoxication. This mode of living is not like dreams, where in the
latter one lives amongst images that appear to purport Beauty.
Instead, a dancer is not one who is a spectator to art, a dancer is
art.
Being intoxicated is to be so infused with one's activities that the
thoughts and language of product and utility fall flat in the dirt:
one does not subjectively experience oneself as being a rational
agent that molds things together so as to create a product, set apart
from appearances and experiences. In Dionysian art one returns to the
forefront of hell, and meets with other people again, becomes friends
with flux and terror. In breakdance, with little foundation to play
off of, the moves one exhibits are temporal, and one acquires great
excitement at the notion that one's efforts are ephemeral, and
financially futile (and for a good portion of the time physically
hazardous). Convention emphasizes that it's a terrible thing for one
to be conducting oneself in a manner that is insensible, to abandon
all sense of future comfort, but after partaking in the ecstasy of
dance, calculability appears to be nothing but a boring refuge. The
Dionysian is not completely blind to Apollonian aspiration, as when
the two meet, tragedy is what emerges: the intoxicated artist can no
longer take the rational man seriously. Conceptualization and utility
operate as a great cane to walk us through life, but if the
daredevil intuitions call to us, if we feel driven to putting the
pieces together in way that is shocking, even to the artist, this gives us
a taste of creative
activity:
making new linguistic/symbolic provinces that do not match up with
reiterated conduct. There is no sense of planning one's movements in
breakdance, nor does the practice involve any logical discourse in
providing a product for the sake of some benefit, one just hears and
succumbs to the call of intuitions.
Conclusion
This
analysis is not meant to be a judgment. For those who practice art,
whatever this term might mean to one, I am not disputing that it can
be a practice that one can simultaneous enjoy and
have it be an economic resource. My position is simply to put ideas
on the table for contemplation, or spite, if you will. If anything, I
mean to take notice of the popular trend in our society that
everything we do is done under the scope of utility, that passion is
restricted to calculated planning—subjective discourses reigns
supreme. To gain sight into an arena of discourse that is not limited
to utility is difficult in that it will be done through concepts and
the language of the original creature. I advocate that we don't lose
sight of the child, the horn in the night, and that art can partake
in practices that are both terrifying and temporary, and do so
without restraint.
1Dictionary.com
2Heidegger,
Being and Time
3Nietzsche,
“On Truth and Lying In An Extra-Moral Sense”
4Plato,
The Rebuplic
5I'm
aware that psychology is arguably a science, but for the sake of
this discussion I'm addressing psychic health as such seeing as
certain scientific discourse asserts that artistic expression is
psychologically beneficial as fact. Given this, it's argued that
it's practical to pursue art because of its scientific benefits.
6Camus,
The Myth Of Sisyphus
7Nietzsche,
“On Truth and Lying In An Extra-Moral Sense”
8Nietzsche,
The Birth Of Tragedy
9Sartre,
“No Exit”
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