On Integral Art

-- I'd love to hear more about this 'Integral Art' thingie.  I read somewhere about Grey (by Wilber), and noticed several of the postings on Integral Naked - all very interesting, some inspiring, but transcending? So, can we have a dedicated 'art' area on this site [forum, open community, postings of art, comments]?  Seems to me that Creativity, one of the five free therapies, would be a must in a balanced integral practice.  From here (lol), it appears that integral art is concentrically emanating from Colorado

Electronic Heroin - Isn't she beautiful, that box, ever-glowing and inviting - calling us from our paths of creativity and enlightenment?

 Hi Bruce and JBHM,

I'm happy to finally have some comments on my blog. Yoohoo! Whatever else happens, we are already cool from now on.  Of course Timothy, too, as soon as he has read the article. ^^

Bruce, you're right that Alex Grey seems to be THE Avantgarde Integral Artist right now. In fact I get the impression that the whole notion of 'Integral Art' is built around Grey (speak about complexity and skill).  Are they trying to build a movement around a single artist? I'm sceptic if this is gonna work, but I'm open to be surprised in that regard.

JBHM, thanks for bringing up McLuhan; I was not aware that he wrote about Finnegans Wake. I'll check him out. I agree: "The Medium is the Message" might be one of the skeleton keys necessary for de-coding this unreadable book of mystery. Fact is, nobody ever reads it, but IT IS THERE and it dangles over our heads like Damokles' sword. Someone will get quite a headache when it falls down! So we better be ready for this. Plus, I don't know how many rock bands named themselves after one of those Joycian nonsense words (Radiohead for example). The Quarks (subatomic particles) were named after a passage in the book. Etc.pp. O and I love your profile, Jay-Bee. :-)

When I re-read my initial blog post today, I thought it's a bit emotional, but I'm still fine with it. What I said about Integral not being revolutionary, I guess my feeling was that Integral Art like Keith stated it, feels like a step back, like being smaller (excluding more)  than postmodernism. I mean, yes, Integral Art is still a young movement, and maybe something like puppy protection is still necessary, but on fine day, it has to step out of the sanctuary and compete with today's top artists, them being green postmodern or not.

One of these top artists is Damien Hirst, for example, who is used by Keith as an example for 'Bad art'. I actually like the Giant Ashtray. Yes, it's a social commentary, it's ironic, it's fun. Just labelling it 'BAD' for being ironic is not valid in my eyes. It seems to have successfully created a (negative) emotional response in Keith, no? Hirst plays with the possibilities of contemporary artists, often pushing the limits of the market, like in creating the 'most expensive artwork ever', a skull made of diamonds and platinum. A symbol for vanity (Vanitas), made out of everlasting material! Now that's ironic again, isn't it? (Isn't it ironic? don't you think?). Yes it is ironic, and I like it. Maybe the problem is the kind of humour one has. Could this be a criterium for judging art? [...] so what. If you disagree with what I say, comment and tell me why.

Here is another paragraph from the article I want to comment on "Most of us have been to modern museums of art, and seen the rather dull geometric shapes painted onto canvases that are, at best, mildly interesting. These museums bore or confuse most of us, which is why they struggle to continue to exist and most would go out of business if it were not for wealthy benefactors.  Much of the work inside their walls speaks to the head, to the postmodernists who “get” their irony and finds it attractive.  But most of us agree that a triangle painted on a black canvas, or ink blots thrown across a wall, have nothing whatsoever to say to the heart, to the person looking for an emotional or even spiritual connection to a work."

I'll come back to this later.

Okay, found the article, I will read it in full when I get the chance. I did look it over . . . This comment you cite as a source of ire (complexity of skill is THE SINGLE most important . . ." ) does strike as a little problematic, but that might also just be because it is poorly stated.

The problem, to me, come in assessing "skill." I think we tend to think of that in the formalistic (largely UR) sense, or at least that's how that statement strikes me and how I believe it would most immediately strike most people.

But skill can be something which is not immediately available to the senses. Truly great postmodern art would seem to exemplify this fact almost all the time. The great skill is in the choices that the artist made. How and why s/he made them, and in what way. Generally speaking, this kind of skill is transcendent of formalistic skill because it still includes it, at least intellectually, but probably also physically. Thus, for example, I have more or less mastered the art of painting, I understand what has been done with it before, what is done with it traditionally and now, having mastered/understood all of those rules, well, usually it begins with "I'm more or less sick of them." I know them so well it and what they can do do not interest me anymore. Thus, when I begin to create a key feature is that I am going to specifically challenge them on each point. The result then is something new. I am using this as an example. Many, many great artists in the last century or so did just this. And the work was completely criticized at first until others eventually realized what has been done. My god, he took everything and . . . changed it. But, he did not do this because he was an idiot who did not understand the rules, he did this because he was a genius who understood them perfectly, all too well and maybe better than anybody. There was tremendous skill in that monstrous "bastardization."

Then when this trick was learned by enough, some said where can we go now? And many found places. Generally speaking, these artists went even further and experimented more with context as the main driver of the work. How can I manipulate, essentially, all that which will surround the work hen it is received, with the work itself? Once again tere is a great skill here in understanding all of those factors, or at least being aware of them. But in the most remarkable cases, having to some great degree mastered them.

The trouble is, both of these later developments takes us further and further away from obvious formalistic skill. This affects audience reception - because they are unsure without some amount of information (education) as to what they are looking at or experiencing - but, unfortunately, it also affects . . . . less skilled artists or artistic aspirants who would like to say "I can do that" and be the genius of all time from the start.

Enter now the pre/trans fallacy. Since both preconventional and postconventional are non-conventional they are mistaken for being the same thing. So the question is: does it transcend and include the conventional, or does it not yet even reach it?

Surprisingly, however, another reality emerges: what used to be postconvetional is now conventional. And I do think we have been beginning to see the bubbling emergences of post-postconventional here and there for a long time. The criteria: does it transcend but include postmodernism? And modernism, and etc., all that went before? My opinion is tat a lot of geninely post-postconventional bubblings-forth are ignored because conventional elements are overtly present, and so thus the greater depth behind and above this is simply ignored. [Edit: actually, I should modify that. In most cases, the greater depth is probably simply not seen.]

Now, a problem which you also seem to be hitting upon - I was having quite an extensive discussion with a friend quite recently over the problem of determining something to be "Integral Art" soley by means of it's CONTENT.

While it is reasonable and accurate in some way, in some respect to call something "x art" because it's content is or contains x, that really isn't (lo and behold this kind of took me by surprise here too) any assessment of post-postconventional knowledge or skill.

My own drawing skills left off at a reliably earlier level. That is, I drew throughout my childhood but stopped when I was about 12-13 and even kind of lost (or am really rusty with) the top-most of what I was capable of technically then. So, by my estimation, my drawing/painting skills are within the range of about 7-11 years old.

But if I draw a picture of Ken Wilber or something representing the causal peak experience I once had, is this "Integral art?"

Now we're onto something. If postmodernism was notoriously guilty of the pre/trans fallacy in terms of elevating pre-conventional skill to the heights of postconventional glory, the great challenge of the Integral community is not to make the mistake of elevating the mediocre conventional or cusp precon/con artist to the heights of "Integral art" glory simply because they have expressed their Integral worldview through some artistic medium. In many ways this is simply an extension of the same problem.

Once again (and I wasn't planning in in this ramble) we come to the question of skill, the formalistic. How much does that person know about their medium and it's potentials and possibilities and how effectivey can they execute within it or by means of it?

None of this, of course, is even the full story anyway. "Complexity" of skill, for example, is highly problematic in numerous ways. (Example. autistic savant.) But some things to consider and some rambling thoughts as I awake in the morning. :-)

I will read the article when I get the chance.

Tim

PS: a point I was trying to make but rambled past:

It takes no overt, very obvious-to-the-senses skill to grab a urinal and prop it up in a curious direction. But it certainly does or may take knowledge of a medium and all of it's potentials and possibilities - all of which  is not obvious to the senses - to make such a choice for artistic reasons and manipulate it into something which is genuinely art. I think this is where the whole matter get's confused, and postmodernism -or at least postmodern criticism - has been of little help in articulating the issues, and lots of help in massively confusing it. Aside from the pre/trans fallacy (where toddler choices of toilets are the same as masters and equally "expressive") there is the so-called fallacy of intent. The truth of the fallacy of intent is that, yes, audiences will always make differing interpretation, etc. The fallacy of the fallacy is that this LL truth means there's no artistic intent, or no artists UL. The whole way of appreicating that urinal - or a major part of it - is in appreciating that artist's UL. His knowledge, skill, his why, what for, how, etc. Further, the art just can't exist without some kind of intent, and it's level of mastery certainly can be judged along a hierarchy of developments.

Wilber points out that each of the following styles of art – realism, impressionism, expressionism and symbolism, can be applied to the psychic, subtle, causal and nondual realms. This would give a grid of sixteen types of transpersonal art. 

Okay, so I finally read the whole article and, so long as this conversation is not dead and want to keep going I would like to come back with a number of comments, as well as a few continuations of comments above. This is an important conversation.

A few off-hand comments for now though.

I think it's very good. I don't think it's complete though. This is where I would like to offer a few more specific comments, later.  Maybe I'll accidentally make them now while I'm writing this, but for example there are a few things I question regarding the whole premise to begin with. This is not specific to the article, but to what might essentially be called the "academic" or philosophical approach to art in general. Generally speaking,

1.) this tradition is a critical tradition dominated by folks who are not themselves artists. Thus, whatever value this tradition has it remains partial in many ways. It misses or outright neglects, not the artists thoughts or intentions, plans for the work, etc. (these things it usually includes to some extent), but the nature and reality of the creative process. I grow increasingly and increasingly frustrated with this tradition for just this fact. Ultimately, it's not that it takes no account of the artist, but that it does not take adequate or thorough account of the artist and how and why that "thing" was created to begin with. If Integral can't begin to integrate this and other aspects of creative reality into Integral Art theory and criticism, then it remains itself still partial.

2.) I also grow increasingly frustrated with art theory and criticism that does not adequately take into accounting the nature and reality of talent and how it works. Essentially, what I mean by this is: there is no art without the lines of development - specific intelligences - that support it's various forms. Nay, to some very real and significant degree are it's various forms. Thus, there is no music without musical intelligence. It is neither created nor received. So too on down the list of art-related intelligences and correlative arts (or arts where one defines and dominates; they all require more than one in the final analysis). This greatly affects how we should think about how art is created and received.

3.) The Western tradition is also historically bias, thus partial. Biased toward math (strongly associated with logic, of at least a certain type) and language, particularly written language (i.e. literacy). There is nothing wrong with any of these, of course, it's just that they do not capture nor tell the whole story. Thus, I wouldn't call it the Integral story. In particular - and as many in recent time are more and more discovering and emphasizing - they do not take into account art as performance. In general, they are biased against the performing arts, telling us little or nothing of significance about them. Thus, for example, a play is judged on it's "literary" value, which means it's linguistic significance and, more or less, how it works on paper. This applies, say, to music as well . . . since a.) a good deal about music lends itself easily to "mathematic" determination or theory and b.) largely because of this, it can be written down (i.e. turned into some kind of "literature" on paper) - or the reverse. Trouble is, that "map" of music is highly inadequate to capture the whole thing. Simply put, not the territory . . .. in some respects, completely silent or blind to the territory . . . or offering a (Kosmically musically) limited territory . . .

4.) The relationship between great art - through all ages - and academia (or philosophy), in general, remains still and always highly questionable. This relates to all of the above in important ways. One is still hard pressed -very hard pressed - to say whether a collegiate education is a sound means of turning out great artists and thus great art. It also remains highly questionable (and I believe a matter that requires more very serious study) as to how much "too much," "poor" or "improper" teaching, instruction and education damages an otherwise genuinely developing artist (and so thus, also art). This is a very serious matter, but again, I also think it requires more serious study to determine, somehow, just to what extent this is true or not. (I think it's clear that it is to some very important degree true. It's just a question of how true. To what extent is it true. That is, can a poorly instructed and so "damaged" artist recover from such and return once again to where he/she left off in their otherwise natural development, or is there always going to be something more or less permanent? Etc. )

To be fair, of course, I have also stated numerous times in this thread already how important it is for development of an artists to, well, learn his art, which requires some degree of experience and knowledge of past achievements, approaches and forms. And here's then where I think all of the above (and this one, 4.) come in. Essentially, I don't believe any (or many) college level approaches adequately understand the arts. There needs to be a much better and more real and realistic relationship between the genuine artist and arts theory and education. Integral can change this. But not simply by continuing with a new strain of the old format. I've seen a number of presentations now that do a wonderful job of exploring art utilizing the Integral model (such as this article). But I am far from convinced yet that any of them are aware of, or account for, the full story, or at least a fuller story. And it would seem to me that it is the imperative of Integral to tell the fullest story possible.

5.) The whole question of "culture" from an academic standpoint in this context is itself often somewhat partial or biased. In other words, following the traditional academic/philosophic modeling of art history and development, even today, just does not capture the whole story. That is, they tend to ignore the more widely popular and pervasive forms. Thus, their partial. Not all of everything is encompassed, they don't tell the whole art story. For example, read any general history of music. Generally, with a few precursors, it will begin with or around Bach, go through all the classical and Romantic composers, and then mention a few in the 20th century (Aaron Copeland, and somehow John Cage always get's mentioned as a last note.) Nowhere will they mention Chuck Barry, John Lennon, Metallica (in my rude, crude professional opinion, as Bach typified the fullest development and pinnacle of Baroque music, Metallica does so for Heavy Metal, or at least an argument can be made - but this is just an example) the whole of what I would call "the small band era" and the nature an innovations of recorded music, it's impact of culture and the human race in general, etc. That's just an example. All kinds of other things are missing from the "history" of music as well although a few progressive folks are more and more beginning to fill the story in. In large part this could all be called (historically) "folk" art (e.g. Christmas carols and songs of the troubadours, traveling performers, etc. even to tribal-cultural music, etc.), or today, "pop" art, but there is a lot there and by my estimation a lot that is at least to some degree significant but not yet thoroughly or adequately accounted for, because it just rarely or ever honorably gets treated or considered in any academic or philosophical discussion.

6.) Martin-Smith makes a little comment in his article that I think is also an unchecked bias (culturally and academically influenced, of course). That is, that somehow "entertainment" is fundamentally or primordially - or simply just assumed - inferior to "art." Don't get me wrong, I used to follow this bias too. Only recently did I begin to say . . .  isn't "entertainment" itself an art? Further, where exactly do you draw the line? There is such a thing a GREAT entertainment. And just because it doesn't "say something" "deep" or "profound" or "moving" to the core of your sole or whatever, . . . I mean, does that make it necessarily "cheap" or not an art? Consider the film "That's Entertainment" and the whole era in movies that inspired it. Not at least something significant to be valued and appreciated? I think in this respect, while we continue to make this "this is ART!" and "that is "mere" entertainment" distinction, we are still too heavily under the influence of previous stages and ideals that were mentioned in that article, and actually, not just modern and postmodern, but premodern as well. In short, we need a better distinction in this area, but before that, to check our unchecked biases.

Anyway, these are at least some of my initial comments for now.

:-)

Tim