proactivity in art AND DOES IT NEED A KICKSTART FORWARD? A C A D E M Y O F F I N E A R T S I N G D A N S K AUTHOR Michelle Tylicki Masters Thesis 2010 PROMOTOR P r o f . N i e c z y p o r o w s k i idea If you believe in evolution then anything 100,000 years ago then we should agree that human kind -when the individual was at the whim is not finite. We have not reached the of the collective (survival of the fit- ultimate form of our species and no test). Then, it was efficiency: social such thing may actually exist, but it adaptation, dominance, war, preda- is possible to say we are definetly ad- tion. If we try too look beyond this, vancing in some direction. With the the future evolution would give us the communication technology advances traits that bring tendencies of truth, such as the guttenberg press, radio & justice, freedom and peace because television and most recently, the inter- these are necessities. those who have net, we are all connecting on an expo- already aquired such traits (be it na- nential level. We are an extraordinary ture or nurture) have the responsibilty collective consciousness. this aware- to pull the rest of mankind forward ness of our existence and information -away from what would distroy it (as demands responsibility: the ability to the future may seem dark and doomed decide who we are in the world com- for many)- which is due to an unsus- munity, which sets an example and tainable human population that leads further shapes the future of our kind. to injustices such as war, poverty, and the exploitation of nature which we If one looks at the high- have sprung from but still depend on. lights of human development, evo- lution can be put on a linear times- As one of my favorite utilitarians once cale: 2,000,000,000 years for life, held the idea that: 7,000,000 years for the hominid, “No great improvements in the lot of man- 100,000 years for man kind as we kind are possible until a great change takes know it. Further we develop: agricul- place in the fundamental constitution of ture 10,000 years, scientific revolution their modes of thought.” 400 years and 150 for the industrial revolution. We can see the further ex- That being said, ponential advancment in time. This “Everyone who recieves the protection of so- means we should be able to see dra- ciety owes a return for the benefit.” matic anthropological transforma- tions within our lifetimet1; within one and this requires the understanding generation’s worth the human popula- where tion has doubled. “A person may cause evil to others not only by his actions but by his inaction, and in With much independence either case he is justly accountable for the from surviving the external (most of injury.” us have, to some extent, satisfied basic needs such as housing and food), it is -John Stuart Mill (1806 – 1873) more of an individual process rather English economist & philosopher 1 Waking life. Richard Linklater. Fox Searchlight Pictures, 2001. Throughout our short history are worried that we don’t exist -He- Today we have quite the op- This brings me to the main idea be- of ‘civilized’ man, the powers to be have gel. Seeing and communicating with posite in obvious forms. Beauty and hind my written venture: always wanted us to be passive observ- each other are what form the unique virtue are not parallel. In a simple ers. Even now, in the supposedly dem- experiences that condition the out- example: dexterously designed public Art can be an influential vehi- ocratic parts of the world, we are given come of our person. In contrast to billboards evoking an attractive air cle for taking important issues into the no other options except for the purely new and abstract forms of communi- to a man smoking a cigarette. Even mainstream – reaching beyond bor- symbolic participatory act of ‘voting’. cation such as writing or mathematics though everyone is aware of the dan- ders and backgrounds to collaborate, The ways of the world seem beyond us, which are much more demanding. gers, such as a painful death, young inspire and communicate to all sorts even to such an extent that it is not the Hence the popularity of Arts such as people continue to light up to such of people, and in all sorts of ways.2 people who decide upon what resourc- music, dance, film, and media like persuasion. Other examples of artis- es are worth war, and for what reason television and internet as sources of tic propaganda include how the Nazi “The situation which we face as humans they will be giving away their life. information. And hence the lack of regime used design to a tremendous demands to be matched at every level; philosophical, political, pragmatic and Yet we should never simply write our- interest of hard, written facts (such as effect. From the agressive use of the personal. The role of art institutions is selves off and see ourselves as a victim threats shown by climate change sta- colors red, white and black in the SS now truly cultural; to create the culture of various forces. Its always our deci- tistics) by the majority of the human logo, unforgettable and powerful swas- which nurtures nature, not only human sion who we are. And we are remind- population. Here we are caught in a tika, to fascist architecture of Goering. nature but all forms of nature. This is ed of the power of such awareness place where the importance for glo- Or late Gothic Cathedrals, revolution- neither a hobby nor a luxury. It is not a Status-Impact Event. It is an exigency through even the most hopeless times, bal sustainability and survival are not ary structures of their times, (“How?,” which affects everything, from the blunt by individuals who break through, recognized as priorities in comparison thinks the uneducated farmer of the demand for emissions- reductions with- such as Nicolaus Copernicus, Ma- to the more trivial yet more capturing medieval ages, “Does a stone stay in in institutions to the tenor of our lan- hatma Gandi, Martin Luther King, forms of short term entertainment. the sky above my head? -It must truly guage and the cast of our thought.” Jr., Marcel Duchamp and other he- That, which convinces and is most re- be a work of God!”) to them it was an -Jay Griffiths3 roic activists/revolutionary thinkers. ceived, is the sensori-emotional values unexplained phenomenon to build a And the power of an individual is one of aesthetic hedonism. stone roof -espcially that of a Gothic In Buddhist thought, the sec- thing, but the power of a collective Cathedral. This is really putting the ond noble truth is that the root of suf- is eccential to attain any further de- The Greeks would not dis- artificial in art. fering can be defined as the craving velopment towards a liberated world: tinguish beauty from virtue -to them for or clingin to the wrong things. So Taking examples from movements it was a unified ideal. The life of an It is safe to infer that the moral aquisitivness and searching for stabil- towards the eradication of slavery, individual was to be based on the value of a piece for art/design working ity in this constantly shifting world emancipation of women and the Ani- same values as those of aesthetics (it as a rhetorical device wholly rests in results in unhappiness. One obective mal Liberation Front... is important to note that the can- the fact that it has this content. And of meditation is to free oneself from non for art of the time was based on that real beauty lies in truth. habitual states of mind like greed Which brings me back to the premises such as proportion, har- and delusion that cause us to suffer. potential of communication vehicles. mony, and nature). The creation of But here it seems I am rejecting Probably the most easily assimilated such art required extraordinary artis- the power of Aesthetics. That beauty The philospher Schopenhauer senses are of the audio-visual recog- tic abilities and ambition. This tran- has too often been a tool of deception also identified happiness as the absence nition. In the course of the 100,000 scribed into the living ideal demands to be valid any longer. Now I would of suffering with a fatalistic approach. years of homo sapien development we great efforts of considering actions like to argue quite the contrary. Since He considered we do not control over have learned to create meaningful re- and their consequences, rather then art is often more accessible than ster- may of circumstances and argued that lationships in life by exercising these the easier, passive approach, which ile intellectual treatments it is possible desire is a source of pain because it stimuli and gestures. Until we are not leads to a life of dissatisfaction (lack that when these two communication makes us see our present situation as acknowledged by another person we of control) and evential doom of man. mediums are combined, they can have lacking in some way. He concluded, a very powerful effect. however that if we feel no desire, we are also dissatisfied because we are bored. by this he meant, that we feel a different absence, that of desiring. 2 www.fritzhaeg.com/writing/frieze-oct2009. html 3 CEO Julie’s Bicycle Fredrich Nietzche took this I would like to resist this say- idea further, arguing that since when ing art should be accessible and per- we are bored we say we have nothing vasibly placed.