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See also: -[Through a Ritual Darkly - Artist as Shaman]- (my original doc on this) -[LIght]- (as art material)The Artist as Shaman
On this page: {Intro} {} {} {} {The Seen and Un-Seen: Artist as seer/seeker} {The "Laws" of Art and the Universe} {Communitas} {} {} {Refs} {Links}The Seen and Un-Seen: Artist as seer/seeker
Similarities
Note that in the Renaissance the artist interprets and *creates* the view of the thing - more than (as with traditional artists or -[tribal art]- who *merelY* carry on traditions, styles, and symbols. For example, with Navajo quite makers don't get Pollock or Krasner - but rather (minor) variants on traditions and "normalcy" - indeed it would be as un-thinkable for a Navajo Shaman (acting as a sand painter) or a Navajo potter) to to use such abstract and "meaningless" symbols or styles as used in expressionist paintings. However, for the Shaman or Artist, they *must* transcend the now and the familiar. They see the un-see-able potentialities (positely infinite as such) and pluck from these the exact (concrete/manifest) solution to the problem at hand. For both the Artist and Shaman it is the "balance" or the "needed un-balance" that is necessary to see through the current situtation towards a solution. For the Shaman it is to heal the person/tribe/universe, for the Artist it is to express the internal as external - a print/painting/etc. The searching for that "perfect" (or appropriate to the task - ie, less than perfect, but adequate) solution depends on the experience of the Shaman/Artist. And it expresses itself (we presume) differently and evolvingly each time the Shaman/Artist delves into the other world; ie, begins a new problem/canvas/patient/encounter. We may also (i would assert) view a Shaman's actions to heal/balance the conditions as parallel to an artist undertaking a mural.The Seen and Un-Seen: Artist as seer/seeker
Differences
But, there are differences in that the symbol world of the Shaman is much more fixed (except for actions by the trickster) than for the Artist. For us, our past (experience/thoughts/works) is always over-laid by the "new now" - indeed our very self would be erased if it were not for our ability to "sort it all out". And we do this via our "language" - Art History. It is (i would maintain) this *key* that allows us to transcend the "now" in both our see-ing and our seek-ing. But, both the Shaman and the Artist art trying to "see" beyond the here and now. consider the proto-surrealists (eg, Redon, Dali, Moreau, and many of the post-1000AD painters depicting heaven/hell/the devil/etc) -- all of them were trying to get in touch with the "other world". That is, the world of dreams --or-- some transcendent reality over-laying our world --or-- the regligious here-after, etc. And note as well, that this trying to see is both a quest and on on-going training for the Shaman/Artist; and so-too for all professions. Vis, "Everything is easy after the first 5_000 mistakes" - Betty Edwards, --or-- "An expert is a person who has made all of the mistakes before". And if we read "mistakes" to means the journey of enlightenment, then clearly we see the path of the artist and shaman as identical in purpose, directed-ness, and personal intensity. Purpose - to refine and merely learn the symbols and their meaning and applicability. Directed-ness - to open the mind of the Shaman/Artist ato all events that are passivleyThe "Laws" of Art and the Universe
Law allows humans to tame symbolically a section of the natural ENV, to establish boundaries between natural space and social space. Law permits society to become the human life-milieu. Law likewais responds to the challenge of time: FLUX. Archaic man did not want to make history but rather to return to the time of creation. [Eliade] And yet the more humans introduced technology, literacy, and rationality into their relationship to nature, the more un-predictable life became. There were un-intended social consequences to every artificial and voluntary attempt to control nature. Law established the regularity in social relationships that myth and tirual were by themselves unable to provide anymore. [Stivers, P. 21]Communitas
Communitas - Liminal/Liminoid
Again, via Victor Turner: Turner identified three disticnt forms of communitas: Spontaneous Ideological Normative [Turner (1980), PP. 47-48] Spontaneous communitas is a "direct, immediate and total confrontaion of human identities", a deep rather than intese style of personal interaction. "It has something 'magical' about it. Subjectively there is in it a feeling of endless power." ... What I have called Ideological communitas is a set of theoretical concepts which attempt to descrit ethe interactions of spontaneous communitas. Here the retrospective look, "memory", has already distanced the individual subject from the communal of dyadic experience. Here the experiencer has already come to look to language and culture to mediatethe former \ immediacies, an intnac of what M. Ciskszenthhalyi and J. MacAloon have called a "flow break". [See below] ie, an interruption of tha texperience of merging action and awarness (and centering of attnetion which [Turner (1980), PP. 47-48]Refs
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