Quite Mad! So It Appears!!

https://fineartamerica.com/featured/cloudscape-lucca-sketch-viva-anderson.html

Welcome to my World, Ronald.......as I see it, draw it.....madly,deeply......hand-art, emotional, though I love photography, this IS why
I agree with him ... no right/wrong on this one: to each his/her own, imho

"think; therefore I am."
Rene Descartes

Beyond this fundamental truth, everything else is supposition.

To know what others see is impossible. To assume others see as I see is indeed an assumption. To assume they see differently is an assumption also. To assume others exist is also an assumption.

If billions of people exist then in all probability each individual's vision of the world is unique.
If only one exist then there can be only one vision.

I exist as a thinking thing is a bit closer to what Descartes said but aside from that it is true what you say but what do you think of what he said?

I left architecture because:....To me:......

For architecture to excel,... it CAN'T make sense.

To justify my participation with that personal axiom looming, became IMPOSSIBLE


How often, does one have the opportunity to create a ridiculously expensive, free flowing sculptural staircase, soaring 40 feet to a locked door?





And there are 2 of them

Ron,

I think we take little time to ourselves just to be.

We think ourselves into oblivion till we realize in our final moments we have had no life.

"Everything else is supposition" , well this is what I suppose..
https://fineartamerica.com/featured/artists-perspective-james-mccormack.html

And I do think people are mad.

James, nice image! David B , I could not agree more! Only the rats win the rat race!

Disagree, Bridberg......................passionately! ALL (but re family) my time
is
FOR ME! my expression. I am obsessed.

This life is just a prelude, I live it to the best of my ability. I try to see the good in all things without denying the bad that plagues humanity.

Vivian,

Good luck with that.

My mind spends some quiet time. adding where and when I am here in the room I am actually residing.

I remember the first time I saw a class titled "Art Therapy" offered by a local community college. I thought "Cool! Therapy for artists! Finally! Sign me up...oh wait. Damn."

I think human beings are quite mad because they are not always content with the world being "quite beautiful". One sometimes wants to add to it; subtract from it; alter it or for some even to create a world of their imagination. Be it in sculptures, paintings, drawings or other art forms, I think it's the same. And I think it's fun as far as art is concerned.

…

.

Since we all live in our own little universe,

Reality can only be what comes through our own individual senses, and processed through our own individual mind.

To expect others to act the way you perceive reality is an impossible task.

"Education" can free or muddle up one's own perception

As a follow up to Roger.

Richard Bach ( Johnathan Livingston Seagull) in a later book titled “Hypnotizing Maria” explains our perceptions of the world as a total combination of all of the suggestions we have accepted in our life time.

"The camera sees geometrically, and we must see psychologically."

I very much disagree. At times even the most hastily snapped snapshot sees psychologically. Get into fine art photography, and there is a whole lot of the way the photographer interprets the world in there.

That being said, I am quite sure that no two of us perceives the exact same reality.

To me,

Photography usually captures a split second

While reality is constantly in motion

agreeing with Roger, the framed composition is a limited dynamic with boundaries.

Reality is constantly in motion is time.

Photography records the surface reality for the split second, not reality over time.

Six years ago I was on an airplane as we passed through a storm. I was looking at the back of my seat (tray, tray lock) and this is what jumped into my head. I did a watercolor sketch in my book and later this painting.

David - "We think ourselves into oblivion till we realize in our final moments we have had no life" that might be a very common occurance. I have been trying to live mindfully - not always easy!

Interesting painting, Kevin!

Valarie,

Certainly might be.

Ronald; it is surprising; how long a long exposure can be, many days (many nights) in fact*. They can also capture things the eye can not see.
I believe the records is in fact 4 years 8 mouths!

Ron,

Negative is more pop psych.

I think we are tired. Covid fatigue. Self examination because of time with self. Short days in the autumn. Rain my neck of the woods. The news.

Living with self can overwhelm any idea of studying psych in art.

If the art is in front of us to view we will go all in. But that is in a time and place of our choosing with the full sized work of art.

The forum it is hard to generalize on nothing but me in front of me in order to discuss psych in general.

I think we take little time to ourselves just to be.

We think ourselves into oblivion till we realize in our final moments we have had no life.


I am exercising the former these days, but that is because I live the latter far too much.

“What does the world really look like? I know it doesn’t look like photographs. The camera sees geometrically, and we must see psychologically. So what does it really look like?

The camera sees nothing for the camera has no mind to see.

The psychology is in the questionnaire and the volunteers who freely respond.

The world is understood partially by a individual's sensory faculties and the processes of the individual's mind.

Constructs form in the mind as the mind explores the constructs.

Open your eyes, listen with your ears, taste, smell, feel the wonderment even if all faculties are not working.

Enjoy the perception for it's a gift not to be dismissed.

Of course, this is only one individual's perception among billions and billions of other possibilities unless the sensory aspect is miss understood and the constructs are just an illusion whereas the mind is alone and existence is unique.

I agree with you Drew but I wonder if people sometimes have more of a hive mentality such as during a riot or watching a sporting event ?

Ron,

Life comes and goes....hives come and go.....

Drew,

In a word, awareness.

Ronald I am with you on your last point. I might also add the word tribe to hive. In a more general sense I have always wondered does the viewer view the art or is it the other way around.
Putting it another way I often feel the best art is the art that makes us look at ourselves. My guess is, is that many would disagree.

To take an esoteric slant: the great French thinker and philosopher Teilhard De Chardin had a marvellous vision on art, creation and nature.
He went to a high place on a hill, saw a majestic view - and in realising that by his act of being there and seeing - that it was he himself who
had created that view (in all its magnificence). Anybody else would have created a view that was significantly different to his own particular
vision: no-one else could have created his view. It is unique. It is in him, and of him.

To convey 'what it really looks like' is to understand that an objective stance (i.e. the real) is a balance of all the individual subjectivities
(all those unique views) of the same place.

Objectivity in the end is a democratic process: it is the balance of all the subjectivities - all those opinions of "what is reality really like?!"

Descartes was probably right but: "I sometimes think, therefore I sometimes ... !"

Jack; a very interesting Philosopher. A Philosopher I admire is Ivan Illich; it is interesting what they have in common.

Does existence depend on thinking; or for that matter does thinking depend on existence. Back to the principle of plenitude again (but may be in its temporised version rather than the static one)
Added to that is the whole statement just a very good example of a logical fallacy.

We are who we think we are, but to others far less.
Me 2021

Many artists see more than their fingers can portray.

@Abbie - that quality is supreme!
It prevents an "ineluctable modality" ..... (meaning an unchangeable changeableness aka set in stone!)

What?!?!?!?!?

James Joyce coined this phrase for
an act of memory-made-art (Ulysses)
in that he hoped the act of writing would
allow the day he records in his work -
16-June-1922 - to spring from the page
"exactly reconstituted as it was!" But it
is a fallacy.

If our fingers would perform as perfect
makers of our imaginations, then we would
have constituted that Joycean vision, art as
fallacious endeavour!

But maybe there's a market in it?!

Oh no I need a shower, I am finding navel lint. LOL

David; photograph it and upload it. Who knows it might sale.

Abbie such a wonderful comment. For reasons I can not fathom; it has got me thinking about blind artists.

Here is a very interesting take on blind people actually making something
(in a comedy show from UK Radio) - and no, it's not making fun of the blind!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0010ndq

The world so big and complex, no one ever gets to see all of its realities. The philosophers can continue to ponder, but the artist paints what he or she wants and how she or he wants. After all art is not so much about the subjects and their realities, but about the artist. People pays millions not because it is a sunflowers but because it is a Van Gogh.

SD,

I have never been desperate for ideas.

"I wonder if people sometimes have more of a hive mentality such as during a riot or watching a sporting event ?"

The hive is a choice the individual makes. Hive behavior is quite an interesting subject and thing to observe. Another name for it is sociology. Unless one chooses to be a hermit then there is some sort of hive mentality in all human interactions.

Mob mentality is an extreme aspect of hive behavior. How can a group of people be taken in by a blathering idiot who spouts vomit from their mouth? Fear and ignorance is my shot at the answer! The individual is subject to, brainwashing and programming and fear and ignorance are the tools of the enchanter.

In my college days we said it was "group thinking".

The sociologists keep changing the label to sell more books on the topic.

"The world is quite beautiful, but human beings are quite mad"
OR
The world is ugly and people are aware.

Could go either way I guess but I lean towards the madness of humans and the beauty of the world.

If there is no absolute then,
Some of the world is quite beautiful, and there exists human beings who are quite mad
AND
The world can be ugly and there exists people who are aware.

The question is, to what degree does one have a choice? The perspective one is born into plays a role. The belief system one is immersed plays a role. The lies one believes and the truths one dislikes are shaped by environmental forces. These forces if ignored, robs an individual's discovery and subdues one into submission and mediocrity.

So, what is Madness?
Conformity to the groups expectations?
So, what is awareness?
To challenge those expectations through exploration and exposure of the lies in search of the truth?

Maybe it's the other way around? Submission to one's destiny without question and dutifully walking on the path laid out by the group, one becomes aware of their place in the world in which they are destined. Beauty is defined and good is determined. Acceptance leads to being accepted thus pitfalls are avoided and pain is reduced. The idea of being part of the group that supports its members as long as each member conforms to a common vision and rule set, madness may be eliminated as one accepts their place within the world that they find themselves engulfed within.


Even an ancient Greek Philosopher amongst many thinkers of the day was considered mad. But was Diogenes truly mad?

"If there is no absolute then",

then it's all meaningless Drew, nothing but vanity is what it all becomes.

Lucky for me I believe in the absolute, and yet I can look at the world and people and see both the good and the bad.

Lucky for you Mario, yay!

If Diogenes had of lived in today’s world he most certainly have been considered mad. It is likely he would have been arrested multiple times for indecency. To a point he reminds me of Baroness von Elsa, she cared very little about societies norms and lived life as she deemed fit. Very interesting person to bring up Drew!

Well Drew it's not really a yay or nay thing. I'd love to discuss it further but you know my "perspective" which really is not "mine" at all is not permitted here, lucky was really a poor choice of words on my part. :-)

Philosophy in all it's diversity of thought and splendor has really accomplished little on a global scale in art and in the progression of humanity in my opinion, if that were not the case I think the world would be in a much different situation at the present time than it is..

Diogenes certainly was an interesting character from westerner's historical record. Perhaps he had Tourette Syndrome; perhaps he simply casted off all social filters for seeing hypocrisy by those who imposed such constructs onto human existence.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diogenes

Diogenes represents man prior to the mythical fall of man. The aware human being prior to the social constraints binding civilization but limiting reality by the pretention of self importance relative to a group mentality.