Spirituality and art history

[sun rise]

Taking a break from the news of the day, I found this article on acknowledging the spiritual in art to be a great read.

Spirituality Has Long Been Erased From Art History. Here’s Why It’s Having a Resurgence Today
...
In 1986, a now legendary exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art proposed a link between these two developments. “The Spiritual in Art: Abstract Painting 1890-1985” challenged prevailing formalist histories of modernism by tracing the origins of Western abstraction to a confluence of ideas about spirituality current at the turn of the last century.
...
However, the notion of the artist as channel for otherworldly forces is hardly unique to af Klint. Artists as comfortably canonical as Whistler, Mondrian, Kandinsky, and Malevich were also inspired by theosophy and anthroposophy. None of them created the kind of “pure abstraction” extolled by mid-century critics. Kandinsky, for one, produced controlled explosions of color that bear a striking resemblance to images that appear in Thought-Forms, a standard theosophical text. Mondrian’s geometric compositions were meant to express the “dynamic equilibrium” of the immaterial realm. And, of course, the Surrealists were entranced by automatic drawing as a way to connect with the unconscious.

 

[leov]

Taking a break from the news of the day, I found this article on acknowledging the spiritual in art to be a great read.

Spirituality Has Long Been Erased From Art History. Here’s Why It’s Having a Resurgence Today
...
In 1986, a now legendary exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art proposed a link between these two developments. “The Spiritual in Art: Abstract Painting 1890-1985” challenged prevailing formalist histories of modernism by tracing the origins of Western abstraction to a confluence of ideas about spirituality current at the turn of the last century.
...
However, the notion of the artist as channel for otherworldly forces is hardly unique to af Klint. Artists as comfortably canonical as Whistler, Mondrian, Kandinsky, and Malevich were also inspired by theosophy and anthroposophy. None of them created the kind of “pure abstraction” extolled by mid-century critics. Kandinsky, for one, produced controlled explosions of color that bear a striking resemblance to images that appear in Thought-Forms, a standard theosophical text. Mondrian’s geometric compositions were meant to express the “dynamic equilibrium” of the immaterial realm. And, of course, the Surrealists were entranced by automatic drawing as a way to connect with the unconscious.

Look up DMT trips, e.t.c.

 

[sun rise]

Look up DMT trips, e.t.c.

I took various psychedelics during the 60's and know for certain that true spirituality has nothing to do with drugs.

 

[Windwalker]

I myself have always found the divine expressed through the art of Jackson Pollock. It is something I connect with on a deep level, as if it is expressing the nature and being of the divine, to the birthing of stars and galaxies, plasma streams strewn through the space, formlessness becoming form, emerging patterns, full of limitless potential. See my avatar pic, which is the expansion of the strands of all the galaxies in our universe.

I believe true art comes from that place of the infinite within us, whether or not someone has any beliefs surrounding that as a theology of sorts. I believe true art contains that limitless potential, which spawns itself into a new creation of its own through the participation of the hearer or seer. This is how evolution unfolds creation, from the source through its energetic streams.

Everything less than this, is art for entertainment.

I took various psychedelics during the 60's and know for certain that true spirituality has nothing to do with drugs.

Many of these types of drugs can be used as "assists", to grease the wheels a little as it were, but the true spiritual experience is something that is already there within us. It is a mistake of many that reason that these "produce" the experience. One can have those same states without taking any sort of drug at all, naturally. It is really the intention of the seeker, both with or without assists.

The same thing is true to an extent about drinking alcohol. What it and all these others "assists" to a better mood, do more or less, is to simply suppress the lower negative energies, such as shame and guilt. With those distractions out of the way, what is more natural, the happy states becomes more free to come out. This is all good and fine, until it becomes a substitute for actually being able to maintain those states naturally, which would occur more regularly and frequently if they were to deal with the underlying obstacles in themselves.

But that's hard work for many, and the drug or drink become an escape to happiness, without actually dealing with the underlying cause that creates the disconnect in the first place. Now it is no longer an "assist" to the higher spiritual levels, such as what a DMT experience might expose one to, it becomes a "shortcut to Nirvana", and those typically end in starting back at ground zero again.

So it really depends if someone is approaching these things recreationally, as a form of entertainment and escape, or as a tool for actual spiritual work, like types of yoga, breathing techniques, chanting, or such other state-altering practices. But these too, can be abused as an escape. These can be forms of spiritual-bypassing, just like drug abuse is.

I suppose, this too, like above, there is a difference between art for art's sake, and art for entertainment. It is the intent of the artist, that makes it one versus the other.

 

[leov]

I took various psychedelics during the 60's and know for certain that true spirituality has nothing to do with drugs.

True? May be? DMT is naturally in human brains. Few have too much and it manifests naturally. That is how humans constructed.

 

[sun rise]

True? May be? DMT is naturally in human brains. Few have too much and it manifests naturally. That is how humans constructed.

I had DMT back in the day along with DET and others. My experience and the understanding I derived from that are as I stated .

 

[sun rise]

true spiritual experience is something that is already there within us

I agree wholeheartedly. I'd add in addition that having an experience is one thing. Grounding the experience through action takes matters to a very different level.

 

[leov]

I had DMT back in the day along with DET and others. My experience and the understanding I derived from that are as I stated .

i do not know your regiment of your taking entheogens , so, i can not comment, i read reports from scientific experiments, they are most entersting. i do not have any experience of my own. still have time but had a vision that makes it questionable of purity
of my own experiments.

 

[Windwalker]

I agree wholeheartedly. I'd add in addition that having an experience is one thing. Grounding the experience through action takes matters to a very different level.

Oh, very much so. I always say having an Enlightenment experience is the easy part. That's just the beginning. It's integrating that into our lives that is another matter. The goal is transformation, not attaining a state experience. That's not to say that state experiences aren't quite enlightening. They are. They show what is possible. But you can't shortcut transformation. That is a process.

 

[PureX]

Art-making is by it's nature somewhat of a mysterious endeavor. The sharing of one human's 'being' with another through a physical medium requires the artist to 'dig deep within themselves' to unearth their most profound awareness of who they are and how they see and understand the world they are living in, in that moment. Every artist I know will readily admit to the mysteriousness of this process, and to how impossible it is to call up on demand, or to control by fiat. Which tends to lead a lot of people, both artists and art enthusiasts, to view the creative process and the artifactual results as a kind of 'spiritual' phenomena. I have stood in front of works of art in galleries and museums that literally raised the hair on the back of my neck they were so psychologically and emotionally powerful. And I am sure that anyone reading this could say the same about their experience of a piece of music, or theater.

Art is the 'language' we humans use when we want to convey more than just ideas. We want to convey our "spirits", and our "souls" to each other. And when we engage in that area of human experience, these tend to be the only words we have available to us, to use.

 

[Revoltingest]

I took various psychedelics during the 60's and know for certain that true spirituality has nothing to do with drugs.

I wonder.....did you have to disguise the pills by putting them in your kibble?

 

[sun rise]

I wonder.....did you have to disguise the pills by putting them in your kibble?

I refuse to answer on the grounds that RF does not want me to answer one way or the other. It's not the 5th, but it will have to do.