Art as Microcosm (2004)

[reason.on]

Exposing, expressing, and realizing one's "sense-of-life" in the creative process is one way, but not the only.

It is Rand's Procrustean bed in art.

Yes, but it is also like the psychologist who asks little Johnny to draw a picture, in order to glean the embedded secrets of his soul......

Rand treats art-work like the criminologist treats a swab of cheek cells...

RCR

Edited February 24, 2007 by R. Christian Ross

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Christian,

From where I sit, we agree. You said what I said with different words, and we both mean that "sense of life" is a valid concept for some art, but not all art.

Correct?

So where is the trouble?

Michael

[Dragonfly]

Here is at last my post about some Schubert songs. It was impossible to choose the three I liked most, as there are so many which are all my favorites. I ended up with only two songs, as it takes me just too much time at the moment (even about these two songs I could write a lot more yet). We can always add songs later. I chose two songs from Die schöne Müllerin: Der Jäger and Eifersucht und Stolz. In fact one cannot discuss these songs well without also discussing the complete cycle, as they form an integral part of it and their mutual connections are important, but that would take me years and I could fill a whole book with it, so the discussion will necessarily remain rather superficial. I will only briefly mention a few of the other songs in the cycle.

The cycle is the story of young journeyman miller who loves to wander. He comes across a brook that becomes his companion when he follows it. The brook leads him to a mill where he finds work and falls in love with the daughter of the master miller. First she seems not to be averse to his advances, but then the hunter arrives and she is drawn to him. The miller is disconsolate, and finally drowns himself in the brook. The brook is an important “player” in the cycle, which in one way or another returns in many of the songs. The miller talks to the brook about his feelings, and in the last song the brook sings a lullaby for the drowned miller (that was originally the third song I wanted to discuss, but that's just too much for the moment). Another recurring theme is the color green, but it doesn’t play a role in the two songs mentioned here. The interpretation I use as a reference is that by Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau and Gerald Moore (the 1972 recording). This is for me still the gold standard of this song cycle (as is their version of Die Winterreise).

Let me stress that while this is of course an example where music and text (“a story”) are narrowly linked and where the music in fact does tell and illustrate a story, this doesn’t mean that in non-vocal music the same has to be true. This is a special category of music.

The music examples are drawn from a version for bass, so the keys are not the original keys. You can find the complete score here (use the maginified version for better readability) and a translation of the text (which I’ve used in a few cases) here.

The first of the two songs, Der Jäger, is a turning point in the cycle. So far everything has been fine and dandy between the miller and the miller’s daughter (not his own daughter of course, but that of the master miller, where he is working temporarily). In this song the miller sees a dangerous rival arrive, the hunter. He is understandably agitated, as he realizes that the colorful hunter might be more attractive in the eyes of the miller’s daughter than he himself is, a plain journeyman miller. It’s a bit like Eddie Willers courting Dagny, who knows that when suddenly John Galt pops up, his prospects have become very dim. The miller’s reaction is a furious but impotent monologue, warning the hunter off from a safe distance. Schubert illustrates the miller’s mood with fast, biting staccatos for the piano, which at the same time evoke the impudent taratata tatata tatata noise of hunter horns. The singer here follows the piano, all those short eighths evoking a breathless agitation and hardly suppressed fury:

Beginning at the second line (“Und willst du das zärtliche Rehlein sehn, so lass deine Büchsen im Walde stehn”) the singer has a repeating, steadily climbing phrase in groups of three times the same note (the many fast repeated notes suggesting the monomaniacal character of the monologue), two times starting at the same note, then two times starting at a major second higher, and finally two times another major third higher. The effect is that of pent-up anger breaking through:

The treble part of the piano consists of two voices, one mainly repeating the same note, contributing to the frenetic character of the music, the other one moving downward, thereby creating dissonants like minor and major secunds, reflecting the inner pain of the miller:

In the next song, Eifersucht und Stolz (Jealousy and Pride) the miller definitely knows that he has lost the miller’s daughter to the hunter. In this song, like in other songs, the miller talks to his companion, the brook. Often the musical illustration of the brook reflects the mood of the miller. In the second song Wohin? (Whither?) the miller for the first time arrives at the brook; his mood is cheerful and this is reflected by the quiet bubbling of the brook, depicted by broken chords in sextuplets, which consist in fact in two wobbling triplets:

In song no. 10, Tränenregen, the atmosphere is quite different. It is evening and the miller and the miller’s daughter are sitting dreamily near the brook. It is an atmosphere of quiet bliss, although darkened by a presentiment that this will not end happily. Here we hear the brook only intermittently in groups of three measures. The tempo is much slower than in the previous example; also here the notes come in groups of six, but the rhythm is now in groups of two notes, up-down, up-down, giving a slowly swaying effect.

In Eifersucht und Stolz the mood is quite different again. In the first part of the song the jealousy is dominating and this mood is reflected by the wildly rushing brook:

No longer is the movement rendered by quietly broken chords, but by fast and restless up-and-down up-and-down passages. The miller asks the brook: Wohin so schnell, so kraus und wild, mein lieber Bach? eilst du voll Zorn dem frechen Bruder Jäger nach? Then he scolds the miller’s daughter for her cheap flirtations (...für ihren leichten, losen, kleinen Flattersinn”) and sneers at her for craning her neck (“mit langem Halse” = “with a long neck”) to look at the road for the hunter returning from the hunt. The “langem Halse” is musically illustrated by a long note followed by an octave jump:

Here you can hear the difference between Fischer-Dieskau and an average singer: he doesn’t try to sing beautifully here, but makes his tone thin and hateful, it is as if he’s making a caricature of the miller’s daughter with an exaggerated long neck. It’s almost as if he spits the words.

In the next phrase: “Wenn von dem Fang der Jäger lustig zieht nach haus, da steckt kein sittsam Kind den Kopf zum Fenster ‘naus” (“When from the catch, the hunter returns gaily home, then no decent girl sticks her head out the window”), the “brook” accompaniment is silent for a moment, to be replaced by single chords with a martial rhythm, echoing the hunter horns.

In the last part of the song the mood changes from jealousy to pride. In the music this is reflected by the change from the minor key to the major key. The fast “brook” accompaniment returns, but now mostly in broken chords, without the restless up-and-down passages of the first part:

Now the miller urges the brook to tell the miller’s daughter nothing about his misery, but instead to say: “Er schnitzt bei mir sich eine Pfeif aus Rohr und bläst den Kindern schöne Tänz und Lieder vor” (“He is carving a pipe of cane and plays for the children pretty dances and songs”). There is a false cheerfulness, the miller tries to keep a stiff upper lip, but the manic repetitions of the same phrases betray him, the tears are not far behind: sag ihr’s, sag ihr’s, sag ihr’s!

Edited February 24, 2007 by Dragonfly

[reason.on]

Christian,

From where I sit, we agree. You said what I said with different words, and we both mean that "sense of life" is a valid concept for some art, but not all art.

Correct?

So where is the trouble?

Not really sure there is any, didn't mean to suggest there was. I did go back and noticed some ambiguous pronoun usage in my original post, so I edited for clarity.

I was just using your general statement as a springboard to writing some quick thoughts about the specific limitations of the idea; my comments were not directed directly at yours, just a general observation in my own words that someone else might take issue with....and sometimes different words spark different thoughts.

RCR

Edited February 24, 2007 by R. Christian Ross

[Roger Bissell]

Dragonfly, thank you so much for taking the time to select and comment on these Schubert songs. I think your analysis is fine; I see nothing to disagree with, particularly, in how you characterize the passages you display and remark about.

Time is in scarce supply for me right now, but I do want to comment briefly on one of the examples. You wrote:

Beginning at the second line (“Und willst du das zärtliche Rehlein sehn, so lass deine Büchsen im Walde stehn”) the singer has a repeating, steadily climbing phrase in groups of three times the same note (the many fast repeated notes suggesting the monomaniacal character of the monologue), two times starting at the same note, then two times starting at a minor second higher, and finally two times another major third higher. The effect is that of pent-up anger breaking through:

A small correction: the phrase starts at the same note, then at a MAJOR second higher (first on D, then on E), then another major third higher (on G#).

In general, when I see a melody with successive "waves" of notes gradually moving higher, I interpret it as some form of persistent assertion or striving, and when it is in a minor mode, that striving takes on a defiant, negative attitude. Certainly, "pent-up anger breaking through" is a bit more specific than that, but then the lyrics support the more specific interpretation.

I also liked your discussion of the "jealousy" passage. A melody in a minor mode that seems to churn and not make much upward or downward progress would seem well suited to depicting the emotion of jealousy, or at least "underscoring" its presentation in the lyrics.

I see these kinds of lyric-melodic/harmonic connections appearing frequently in American popular music, and since I regard the best of such music as America's own "art songs," I am not surprised to see the same principles at work in Schubert's songs. Your brief presentation has whetted my appetite, and I am now going to have to get the recording you referred to and hunker down for some serious study and enjoyment, not necessarily in that order. :-)

REB

[Dragonfly]

A small correction: the phrase starts at the same note, then at a MAJOR second higher (first on D, then on E), then another major third higher (on G#).

Oops, you're right, I've corrected it.

[Victor Pross]

Mr. Bissell,

Thank you for your feed-back.

I happen to take your thesis for seriously.

If I were to summarize your position while standing on one foot, it would be something like this:

Art is fundamentally a microcosm. It is a sort of “little reality” (if that is an accurate abridgment). The re-creation—this microcosm--is the creation of a fresh (and necessarily finite, stylized, partial, limited, selective) structure of the actual reality we live in, the microcosmic figure by the very selectivity of what is included (or not) communicates an abstract view of the world. This form, to be intelligible, must have a coherent subject: it must, as its innermost feature, present coherent objects or (as in music) melodic patterns. However, those objects or patterns are there not to replicate or copy something from the real world. As Rand said, they serve as the means of "expressing a view of man's existence"(Now I need to put my foot down).

When I say “abstract art”—I do NOT mean, as MSK cited, a presentation of “abstract lines, circles, triangles, squares and their relationships to one another” in some work. I am referring to smears of blobs and drips of paint arbitrarily applied to a canvas by a stick dipped in paint buckets while the ‘artist’ strutted a chicken like dance around the horizontal canvas. I am speaking of the iconic Jackson Pollock. How does a microcosm apply to this:

You wrote here:

Teasing out the exact philosophical or emotional meaning of abstract art is the real challenge, and there is much room for scam artists to claim that they are re-creating reality. But discarding it all as non-art is throwing out the baby with the bathwater…Whether Rand was willing to discard all modern (= abstract?) art, or just the absolute crap (such as paintings by monkeys and canvases with excrement flung at them), I don't know. She certainly would not rule out "The Scream" as art, just because it had a malevolent view of life. As for geometric/color art, she might have continued to appreciate it, but just as "pleasing pattern" (much as Kant appreciated music) or decoration, rather than "true art." Again, I don't know.

In the above passage, you speculate as to what Rand would think of this and that--but, please, what do you think? That is more important thing for the time being.

What works of “abstract art” would serve as an example of being 'pro-art' so that we might not toss out the baby with the bathwater? The geometric/color art? Is that it? You cite as “absolute crap” those works as done by monkeys and plus the excrement spattered canvases. I agree. But why would not Pollock’s work also be included in the ‘absolute crap’ or ‘scam artist’ category? Yes, why not? (Parametrically, of course “The scream” is art—it is representational! It’s “malevolence” is irrelevant to judging it as art or not. It is art. It is among the Ortho-Objectivists to reject it, and to do so by a non-essential stand point.)

What I wrote on some other thread is very relevant to this issue:

‘Is abstract painting a justifiable activity to engage in for those who value it without it being art? Sure, why not? But why must we confer the status of ‘art’ upon it to feel justified in the creation or enjoyment of it? We enjoy doing crossword puzzles and needlepoint—and many other things--and we don’t feel the urgent burst to designate these activities as ‘art.’ Why abstract painting? Oh, because it's paint? I think Mr. Roger Bissell’s hypothesis of art as a microcosm leaves ‘abstract painting’ (if it is a matter of inscrutable swirls and blobs of paint) out of the file-folder where a definition of art is concerned. I simply cannot reconcile abstract painting to a microcosmic approach, as illustrated by him, let alone the entire history of painting.’

Mr. Bissell, it seems to me that when addressing these issues, I sense that you are aware of the possibility of irking members of your reading audience who greatly appreciate abstract art, and you know them to appreciate it, and therefore you are very gingerly and ever so tip-toeingly hesitate in your views here.

Sir, it seems to me that your microcosm approach cannot--by the very logic of the thesis, by its definition and essence--admit so-called abstract art within its central position. It is time to live up to the brilliance of that thesis and to apply it.

Finally, you said this:

I think it is a mistake to treat "modern art" or "abstract art" as a category of uniformly non-representational and/or aesthetically meaningless junk.

Well, I don’t know exactly what you mean here. If the “abstract art” is representational—it is not “abstract art” by which I mean, as I have made clear here and elsewhere, “non-representational” and “non-objective.” It is the “non-objective” work—the anti-microcosmic, the anti-art approach (you will forgive my indulgence here) that I would either call meaningless junk at worse, or a pleasant decoration at best.

Thank you.

-Victor :turned:

Edited February 24, 2007 by Victor Pross

[Brant Gaede]

Hello all. Is this where I come for the irrational discussion of art?

--Brant

[Rich Engle]

Hello all. Is this where I come for the irrational discussion of art?

--Brant

Heh... bring your Kevlar<tm>? :devil:

rde

Admits he just saw a piece of floor material in one of our properties that rivals the Pollock piece Victor put up there.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Mr. Bissell, it seems to me that when addressing these issues, I sense that you are aware of the possibility of irking members of your reading audience who greatly appreciate abstract art, and you know them to appreciate it, and therefore you are very gingerly and ever so tip-toeingly hesitate in your views here.

Victor,

LOLOLOLOLOLOL...

I wouldn't go there. You obviously don't know Roger very well...

Michael

[Victor Pross]

Mr. Bissell, it seems to me that when addressing these issues, I sense that you are aware of the possibility of irking members of your reading audience who greatly appreciate abstract art, and you know them to appreciate it, and therefore you are very gingerly and ever so tip-toeingly hesitate in your views here.

Victor,

LOLOLOLOLOLOL...

I wouldn't go there. You obviously don't know Roger very well...

Michael

Michael,

I'll take your word for it. So now I'm even more confused.

-Victor

[Ellen Stuttle]

So, I am somewhat at odds with the recent arguments that Ellen Stuttle and MSK have made, though I have no time to get into the tangled discussions that are still going on.

Roger,

I want to make it clear that I have not thrown out Rand's ideas like "sense of life" and "metaphysical value-judgment." I have merely posited a more restricted use for them.

I basically have thrown out both ideas. Or, being more precise, I never took them aboard to begin with, since I never found these ideas either clear or useful. I'm distinguishing "clear" and "useful," since there are ideas which I don't find "clear" which I nevertheless find "useful." Jung's idea of "archetypes" is a prime for instance. Jung himself never quite made up his mind just what he meant by that, and I've yet to meet a Jungian who thinks that he or she could say exactly. The idea is vague. Nevertheless, I find it useful. "Sense of life," on the other hand, I've never felt told me anything. And "metaphysical value-judgments" I've seen the moralistic features of from the beginning.

An example which Roger mentioned: "The Scream." What's going to be said in short order by an Objectivist about that painting? That it depicts a "malevolent" "sense of life" and "metaphysical value-judgments" of an inhospitable universe. But is this accurate, or useful, in understanding the painting? I don't think so. The painting depicts an emotional state of cut-of-from-others angst, a screaming which isn't heard by others. Is there anyone who has never experienced such a state? Maybe so, but I'm not one of those people if so. If an artist depicts this state, is the artist therefore revealing that he or she feels this as a characteristic mood? Is the artist claiming that people should feel this? Or that happiness is impossible in existence? Would the Objectivist say that such a painting would better not be done? That there's something inherently wrong with the artist for doing it? That's there's something inherently wrong with anyone who likes it? (I like it; my husband likes it. Are we both malevolent universers?)

These sorts of questions immediately arise if Rand's views on aesthetics are "taken to heart," if they're believed and made a feature of one's way of approaching art works. Thus I think they simply get in the way instead of assisting.

Another point: She claims that there are two dimensions of existence in both of which the motor, as it were, is the person's "sense of life": art and romance. I think that right there a big flaw in the scheme is revealed. For instance, Wagner, whose music has been talked about on a recent thread. I do like Wagner's music -- not intensely; I'm not a Wagnerphile; I'm not that keen on opera in general. But I do like his music. From everything of what I can glean of Wagner's personal characteristics, I would have disliked Wagner as a person. What in Rand's theories would explain this disconjunct?

Or do it in reverse fashion: Could anyone have predicted from knowing of my intense love of Beethoven's music that I would immediately feel attracted to Larry Gould when I met him in late '68 and would now be going into my 39th year of romantic involvement with Larry? I think that even a complete list -- which would be a very long list -- of my artistic preferences and a comparable list of his would have given no one a clue as to how we would respond to each other. But if Rand is correct that art and romance are co-domains powered by what she calls "sense of life," shouldn't it have been possible to predict?

Ellen

___

[Ellen Stuttle]

Dragonfly, wonderful post on Schubert. You put a lot of work into that!

Ellen

___

[Dragonfly]

Thanks, Ellen. At a certain moment I just had to wind it up, otherwise Roger would think I'd never deliver...

[Dragonfly]

And apart from the Jung stuff, I agree completely with your post #262.

[Mike Hardy]

Or do it in reverse fashion: Could anyone have predicted from knowing of my intense love of Beethoven's music that I would immediately feel attracted to Larry Gould when I met him in late '68 and would now be going into my 39th year of romantic involvement with Larry? I think that even a complete list -- which would be a very long list -- of my artistic preferences and a comparable list of his would have given no one a clue as to how we would respond to each other. But if Rand is correct that art and romance are co-domains powered by what she calls "sense of life," shouldn't it have been possible to predict?

You don't tell us whether your list matched his. If they did, surely

you know that _some_ people _would_ predict that outcome?

(I'm not one of them, but maybe that's only because I lack that

particular ability.) Whether they are right to do so is a more difficult

question. -- Mike Hardy

[Victor Pross]

And apart from the Jung stuff, I agree completely with your post #262.

Yeah, apart from the Jung stuff. Thanks, Dragonfly.

[Ellen Stuttle]

Or do it in reverse fashion: Could anyone have predicted from knowing of my intense love of Beethoven's music that I would immediately feel attracted to Larry Gould when I met him in late '68 and would now be going into my 39th year of romantic involvement with Larry? I think that even a complete list -- which would be a very long list -- of my artistic preferences and a comparable list of his would have given no one a clue as to how we would respond to each other. But if Rand is correct that art and romance are co-domains powered by what she calls "sense of life," shouldn't it have been possible to predict?

You don't tell us whether your list matched his. If they did, surely

you know that _some_ people _would_ predict that outcome?

(I'm not one of them, but maybe that's only because I lack that

particular ability.) Whether they are right to do so is a more difficult

question. -- Mike Hardy

OK, Mike, you're right. I didn't spell that out well enough. Filling in some further details: No, our lists wouldn't match.

Musically, we're both keen on classical music (generically, including the whole range of what's called "classical," not just the Classical Period). For me, and probably for him as well, a love of classical music would be a requirement to a sustained romance, to living with a person for year after year. But how many people do both of us know who deeply love classical music? Many; and there are many, many more whom neither of us knows. Far from all of those people, or even a small percentage of them, would be in the running for either of us. In regard to specific favorites among composers, and specific emphases, specific reasons for those favorites, our respective lists aren't identical. The same would be true between either of us and any other classical music lover.

In regard to literature, there are some novels that are on both of our favorites lists, but only a few. The rest of the list would have some large differences. E.g., he's very fond of Jules Verne. I enjoyed reading the Jules Verne books, once, but I don't feel about them the way Larry does. On the other hand, there are lots of literary works I've read, some of which I've especially loved, which he's never read, wouldn't have much desire to read even if he had time to read, and wouldn't respond to the way I do if he did read them.

In regard to painting, we both appreciate quality and I think we'd both pretty much agree as to what that is, which works are good. There'd be differences in specifics as to favorites, and, again, as to the reasons for the favorites.

In general, I don't think that any two people's lists are identical, including the specific reasons for the rankings. But even supposing strong overlap, that isn't going to say that the two people would make a good romantic pair. On the other hand, there can be numerous differences in tastes between two people who do make a good romantic pair. In general, knowing a list of artistic preferences isn't a basis for predicting a romantic click.

As to people's making predictions on the basis of aesthetic checklists: oh, yes, there are those people -- among Objectivists (does any other group of people do this?) -- who would predict. There were a great many failed Objectivist romances entered into on the basis of such predictions. If a prediction made on such a basis happened to pan out, I think this would have been sheer luck.

Ellen

___

[Brant Gaede]

Another point: She claims that there are two dimensions of existence in both of which the motor, as it were, is the person's "sense of life": art and romance.

___

Ellen, can you reference this for me? I suspect it's in "The Romantic Manifesto." It's interesting that she doesn't include work.

--Brant

[Ellen Stuttle]

Another point: She claims that there are two dimensions of existence in both of which the motor, as it were, is the person's "sense of life": art and romance.

___

Ellen, can you reference this for me? I suspect it's in "The Romantic Manifesto." It's interesting that she doesn't include work.

--Brant

See the 4th paragraph and following.

From "Philosophy and Sense of Life,"

Signet paperback, 1971,

pp. 31-33

(Originally appeared in

"The Objectivist Newsletter")

A given person's sense of life is hard to identify conceptually, because it is hard to isolate: it is involved in everything about that person, in his every thought, emotion, action, in his every response, in his every choice and value, in his every spontaneous gesture, in his manner of moving, talking, smiling, in the total of his personality. It is that which makes him a "personality."

Introspectively, one's own sense of life is experienced as an absolute and an irreducible primary--as that which one never questions, because the thought of questioning it never arises. Extrospectively, the sense of life of another person strikes one as an immediate, yet undefinable, impression--on very short acquaintance--an impression which often feels like certainty, yet is exasperatingly elusive, if one attempts to verify it.

This leads many people to regard a sense of life as the provide of some sort of special intuition, as a matter perceivable only by some special, non-rational insight. The exact opposite is true: a sense of life is not an irreducible primary, but a very complex sum: it can be felt, but it cannot be understood, by an automatic reaction; to be understood, it has to be analyzed, identified and verified conceptually. That automatic impression--of oneself or of others--is only a lead; left untranslated, it can be a very deceptive lead. But if and when that intangible impression is supported by and unites with the conscious judgment of one's mind, the result is the most exultant form of certainty one can ever experience: it is the integration of mind and values.

There are two aspects of man's existence which are the special province and expression of his sense of life: love and art.

I am referring here to romantic love, in the serious meaning of that term--as distinguished from the superficial infatuations of those whose sense of life is devoid of any consistent values, i.e., of any lasting emotions other than fear. Love is a response to values. It is with a person's sense of life that one falls in love--with that essential sum, that fundamental stand or way of facing existence, which is the essence of a personality. One falls in love with the embodiment of the values that formed a person's character, which are reflected in his widest goals or smallest gestures, which create the style of his soul--the individual style of a unique, unrepeatable, irreplaceable consciousness. It is one's own sense of life that acts as the selector, and responds to what it recognizes as one's own basic values in the person of another. It is not a matter of professed convictions (though these are not irrelevant); it is a matter of much more profound, conscious and subconscious harmony.

Many errors and tragic disillusionments are possible in this process of emotional recognition, since a sense of life, by itself, is not a reliable cognitive guide. And if there are degrees of evil, then one of the most evil consequences of mysticism--in terms of human suffering--is the belief that love is a matter of "the heart," not the mind, that love is an emotion independent of reason, that love is blind and impervious to the power of philosophy. Love is the expression of philosophy--of a subconscious philosophical sum--and, perhaps, no other aspect of human existence needs the conscious power of philosophy quite so desperately. When that power is called upon to verify and support an emotional appraisal, when love is a conscious integration of reason and emotion, of mind and values, then--and only then--it is the greatest reward of man's life.

Art is a selective re-creation of reality according to an artist's metaphysical value-judgments. It is the integrator and concretizer of man's metaphysical abstractions. It is the voice of his sense of life. As such, art is subject to the same aura of mystery, the same dangers, the same tragedies--and, occasionally, the same glory--as romantic love.

Of all human products, art is, perhaps, the most personally important to man and the least understood--as I shall discuss in the next chapter.

(February 1966)

[Mike Hardy]

As to people's making predictions on the basis of aesthetic checklists: oh, yes, there are those people -- among Objectivists (does any other group of people do this?) -- who would predict.

I'm pretty sure lots of non-Objectivist airheads do that.

I don't actually know whether any intelligent non-Objectivists do. -- Mike Hardy

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I echo the praise for Dragonfly's post on Schubert.

Ellen and Brant. If I had to name the one "extra-self" psychological principle that Objectivism rests on, it would be the mirror principle. People exist as mirrors of the individual and so does art.

I fully agree that both have an aspect (and an important one) of being mirrors of myself, but I find both people and art to be so much more in my life than simply a reflection.

Michael

[Victor Pross]

Here is a link to artist ERIC WHITE.

Now, given this discussion of “metaphysical values judgments” and “sense of life”—here is an artist that would make you wonder what his state of mind is, if one gave any credence to Rand’s more esoteric concepts. Eric White is a master—technique wise—and his paintings take on a more bizarre microcosm than anything Dali is known for. You be the judge.

Take a look: http://www.ewhite.com/index2.html

Edited February 26, 2007 by Victor Pross

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I plan to print your words and tack them prominantly in the studio. They are really priceless. Thank you.

Jim,

Thank you. It is quite an honor to see my goofing around appreciated so much.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

I echo the praise for Dragonfly's post on Schubert.

Ellen and Brant. If I had to name the one "extra-self" psychological principle that Objectivism rests on, it would be the mirror principle. People exist as mirrors of the individual and so does art.

I fully agree that both have an aspect (and an important one) of being mirrors of myself, but I find both people and art to be so much more in my life than simply a reflection.

Michael

I believe Nathaniel called this "The Muttnick Principle," after his dog. I say yes to this plus an interactive principle based on certain commonalities out of psycho-epistemology. Why do actors love the stage? Because of the tremendous mental energy traded back and forth with the audience based on visibility and values.

--Brant