Monday, January 17, 2011

what is art for? 4 (art in our merchant society)

but let's forget about the economic importance of art and art education. this importance should be evident to anyone who ... has had enough education to understand the importance of education...although this maybe isn't dependent on how much education one gets. many of our current political `leaders' have had quite a lot of education...but of what type, one cannot fail to wonder.

that is where art comes in, and art education as well.

ultimately, in my not so humble opinion (imnsho), the question `what is art for?' revolves around the same sun as the question: `what gives our existence meaning?'. personally i do not believe that money, power, sex, drugs [let's say the four modern horsemen of the apocalypse...] come close to this sun, although our current merchant society would really have us believe that these four horsemen are the beginning and the end of all our longings, and that the sun shines out of their arse...

albrecht dürer, the four horsemen of the apocalypse
albrecht dürer, the four horsemen of the apocalypse (click on the image for an enlargement)

i mean, look at italy, where a complete `civilized' country is being dominated by the arch-caricature of money power sex drugs: berlusconi. after all the scandals and corruptions, has italy managed to regain the upper hand? no. do the other countries of the european union even try to stop the incredible corruption in italy from spreading throughout the union? i for one fail to notice any real progress in this matter.

and all of this is because we as a society -at EVERY junction- stress the importance of money. the importance of power. the importance of sex, and drugs as well. because the main societal credo seems to be: "as long as I feel happy, as long as I am in control of things around me, as long as I am rich and powerful, who cares about the rest?".

since money is the generic means to obtain all of the above four horsemen, our merchant society drools over money like one wouldn't believe.

what then is one of the main ways to illustrate that money isn't everything? if we need to get across the message that there are other values in this world which need protection from the money-scheming white-collar criminals? i would say that art is in a unique position for this. (this includes all forms of art, not just the visual arts).

what is art for? 3 (art in our merchant society)

[to continue our discussion: art and art education is important for economic development]

the first reason why art and art education are economically important was given already by looking at the world of design, and the importance of colour, form, perception for this discipline.

a second reason can be found on a more profound level. it turns out that much of our thinking is `visual'. we `see' things, see? so when we say we understand something, it often means we have a visual representation of this something which makes sense to us. also, new ideas, creative ideas, often come in visual form. but that means that we can hardly train enough our capacity for visualization and for visual communication.

for example, read this interesting article on colour by ibm researchers rogowitz and treinish: Why Should Engineers and Scientists Be Worried About Color?. they argue that specific colour representation of research data is critical for its understanding, and that colour theory should be applied when presenting data.

this is just a small portion of the ways in which we think and communicate visually. clearly, for industrial and technological innovation, visualization is of the essence. good education in visualization therefore is a vital pillar to economic development, imnsho. this also covers training in simply `seeing', `looking'.

from neurophysiological brain studies, it becomes clear that our brain has several large visual `modules', large parts of which are activated when we try to understand things.

so we come back to wittgenstein: wir machen uns bilder der welt
(we make ourselves images of the world), by which wittgenstein means that this is our way of thinking about the world and being able to grasp parts of this world.

then thirdly, there is the direct economic aspect of art: art appreciation in all its forms has a direct economic component. of course this is what most of the criticism and `looking down' on artists is about, in our merchant society, because many artists cannot really make a living out of their art.

but on who does that reflect poorly, really?

given the utmost importance of visualization, colour, creativity for human development, and given the often back-breaking effort put in by visual artists to achieve profound levels in their artistry, on who does it reflect poorly that these artists often struggle to get by?

Sunday, January 16, 2011

what is art for? 2 (art in our merchant society)

[continued from previous post]

so if we adopt the utilitarian viewpoint, then clearly art is for the benefit of mankind.

in my not so humble opinion (imnsho): if the dutch political party pvv wants to state that `art is a leftist hobby', they really show to understand so little of what the world needs that they should be disqualified by voters as quickly as possible.

but -and now i'm coming back to education and johannes itten- in the netherlands we have a long tradition of considering education in the arts to be unimportant. this results in a merchant mentality in large parts of society, a mentality which is actually hampering the netherlands in its economic development - try explaining that to someone who cannot think beyond quick profit.

first of all: design is a key element of industrial commerce, so that design in all its aspects is of major importance in developing one's economy. however, the key aspects of design are largely concomitant with the key elements of the visual arts...and nobody, nobody comes close to what visual artists have developed in this respect over the centuries. so take another look at `kunst und farbe' by johannes itten:

kunst der farbe, johannes itten
johannes itten, kunst der farbe (art of colour)

in this book many insights about colour are developed and explained in a very inspiring manner. one could easily call this book a scientific text on the `feel and use' of colour. this also illustrates that the words `art' and `science' are in a way on the same level...since art is also the science of esthetics - as contrasted to esthetics as a branch of philosophy (you should really read this link, if this topic `what is art for?' interests you).

so instead of teaching `dry' economy for three hours a week, four years of secondary school, why not add a module `economic impact of colour'...? that would certainly straighten some not-so-leftist strange ideas about the importance of art...and hopefully also about the importance of art education.

(i simply repeat johannes itten's work from the previous post, since it is about education:)

johannes itten
johannes itten "Education is revelation that affects the individual."--Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, The Education of the Human Race, 1780. From the series Great Ideas of Western Man. (1966, click on the image for an enlargement)

[to be continued]

what is art for? (art in our merchant society)

you probably don't remember me posing that question around new year's day...
and you certainly won't expect me to answer it i hope ;-) !!

but alright, perhaps it is interesting to elaborate a little on this question `what is art for?'. the question smacks a little of utilitarianism (excerpt from wikipedia below:)
Utilitarianism (also: utilism) is the idea that the moral worth of an action is determined solely by its usefulness in maximizing utility or minimizing negative utility (utility can be defined as pleasure, preference satisfaction, knowledge or other things) as summed among all sentient beings. It is thus a form of consequentialism, meaning that the moral worth of an action is determined by its outcome. The most influential contributors to this theory are considered to be Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill.

Utilitarianism was described by Bentham as "the greatest happiness or greatest felicity principle".[1] Utility, the good to be maximized, has been defined by various thinkers as happiness or pleasure (versus suffering or pain), although preference utilitarians define it as the satisfaction of preferences. It may be described as a life stance, with happiness or pleasure being of ultimate importance.

Utilitarianism can be characterised as a quantitative and reductionist approach to ethics. It can be contrasted with deontological ethics (which do not regard the consequences of an act as a determinant of its moral worth) and virtue ethics (which focuses on character), as well as with other varieties of consequentialism.

In general usage, the term utilitarian refers to a somewhat narrow economic or pragmatic viewpoint. Philosophical utilitarianism, however, is a much broader view that encompasses all aspects of people's life.

so you see, with one little question we are already well into the minefield.

few people challenge the value of michelangelo, rembrandt, van gogh, picasso,...for society. still, recently the pvv (dutch political party) declared by word of spokesman martin bosma: `art is a leftist hobby'.

%%%%%%%%

in the course `world and image' that i teach at the unit academy in nijmegen, we recently discussed the societal importance of colour...not even art, just colour. there is a lot of marketing research going into colour, because -obviously!- we are very sensitive to colour when it comes to buying the things we buy. so i quoted some studies on the economic importance of `knowing about colour'.

and i showed the students the absolutely marvelous book `art of colour' by johannes itten:

kunst der farbe, johannes itten
johannes itten, kunst der farbe (art of colour)

itten was a marvelous teacher, i think, and i also consider this book to be one of the most inspiring books i ever came across. (will continue this in a later post).

one of his art works:

johannes itten
johannes itten "Education is revelation that affects the individual."--Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, The Education of the Human Race, 1780. From the series Great Ideas of Western Man. (1966, click on the image for an enlargement)

[to be continued]

Saturday, January 15, 2011

nostalgic cityscape

nostalgic cityscape, own work, partly after kokoschka
nostalgic cityscape (own work, partly after kokoschka, 2010, click on the image for an enlargement)

the original inspiration came from a painting of the charles' bridge in prague by kokoschka (no good reproductions available on the web, but see below for an impression, you can see the paintings don't really resemble a lot, but the composition is largely based on a cut-out from kokoschka's painting)

oskar kokoschka
oskar kokoschka, charles bridge prague

Thursday, January 13, 2011

digital self portrait 3 (& more photoshop)

digital self portrait, own work
welcome to my world (digital self-portrait 2011, click on the image for an enlargement)

having a severe cold has the benefit (? i hope...) of forcing me to keep posting on this blog...the above self-portrait appeals to me for various reasons, one of them being that i really enjoy what photoshop has to offer in terms of enhancement of an original image. i know there are purists who think that this type of photoshop enhancement is over the top, but to me it opens up the possibility to add new dimensions to a picture, like in painting.

in this self-portrait, i feel that something of the relation `inner world - outer world' is visible. this relation is the first basis of what i teach my students at the unit art academy in nijmegen. perhaps interesting to post some of the lessons' material here too. you can also look on the lessons' blog beeld en wereld (image and world) which i maintain, but it is in dutch. however, google translate has become quite awfully good...

let me add some more photoshopped stuff while i'm busy, then i can finish this thread sooner.

cows, own work
cows (digital, 2007-08, click on the image for a small enlargement)

and more subtly photoshopped, and also more philosophical, and therefore more my favourite:

cows, own work
water trough (digital, 2007-08, click on the image for an enlargement)

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

monarchy & vpro continued 3 (art in our merchant society, more digital design)

[oh well, i probably should have added what follows next to the previous post, but it would have become so terribly long.]

one thing certainly strikes me: last year's theme `the monarchy' certainly struck home a lot more than this year's theme `ode to paper'. in fact, looking at the designs which were pitched, the first thing that glares at us is that so many of last year's designs were so negative about our royal family. so let me make a small leap of imagination here.

first of all, last year the vpro chose as winner a non-committal design, bland even, which did not relate a lot to the briefing, but which did have the decided advantage that it would not give negative publicity (one must remember that the royal family still has the support of well over 80% of the population - incredible but true.). looking at the submitted designs, there were obviously enough excellent designs that -if made vpro cover- would have led to a lot of commotion under vpro members, and possibly non-members too.

so could it be that in our merchant society, the vpro hesitates to use covers which are really confrontational, which really touch on the societal issues at hand? i would not be surprised if the vpro was surprised last year by the vehemence of the designs offered. so that might explain the rather bland theme this year: `ode to paper'. no way that there will be controversial designs coming out of that theme!

ok, sorry for bitching, but it still is a fundamental issue: why would the vpro not be happy with the real societal response they had with the theme `monarchy'? is that not truly fantastic, if you can mobilize people's visual creativity around current societal debates? [ongoing, in case of the monarchy, for this great institution costs our society 114 million euros a year...if you can believe that in a time where we are budget-cutting hospitals, care centers, schools etc.].

so once more i hope the vpro will take the stance that controversy is better than blandness. we do not need blandness in this society which is sorely late for some real refurbishing. we do not need more bland television, more entertainment, empty amusement. we need sharp criticism of banking institutions, of greed, corruption, of discrimination etc. etc. IF we are ever to do better than our predecessors who made such a mess of things.

&&&&&&&&

ok, then i still owe you my design for last year:

design frank waaldijk, VPRO Gids Cover 1, 2010
design frank waaldijk, VPRO Gids Cover 1, 2010 (click on the image for an enlargement)

the design was largely based on the vpro briefing, in which the television series `bernhard, scoundrel of orange' featured prominently. elements in the design: the picture of the st. bernard dog to me is the symbolization of the sanctimonious denial by bernhard of all his missteps, i added the halo for the same effect. the dog is in black and white, visualizing that all this was in the past (bernhard passed away in 2004; original colour photo of the st. bernard by daniel steger, under a creative commons license 2.5, which implies my design is under the same cc 2.5 license, see the original picture on wikipedia)

the orange crown was added, to picture bernhard as saviour of the monarchy. you will see the colours of our national flag in the background. all in keeping with the sanctimonious picture of our royal family as being good for our country.

the added text reads: `bernhard and the monarchy' ... however, i added a little venom, because in dutch this would read `bernhard en de monarchie' but if you look carefully you will see that there is in fact no space between `de' and `monarchie' so it really reads (though unobtrusively so):

`bernhard and demonarchy'

$$$$$$$

not a very brilliant design perhaps, but it finally gave me the opportunity to vent some of the indignation i felt as an 11 yr old, when bernhard wasn't even prosecuted for his corruption.

oh, i also made a version with lettering (but i could not easily obtain high quality fonts) because i thought it would be nice if the halo passed through the lettering:

design frank waaldijk with logo, VPRO Gids Cover 1, 2010
design frank waaldijk with logo, VPRO Gids Cover 1, 2010 (click on the image for an enlargement)