Art is the result of a subconscious human madness

[toogoodforyou]

Long time ago I'd read some place that art is a result of the subconscious madness in our human mind, when our mind releases the madness then art disappears. I can't find the source anymore, but do you think it's true?? From my personal experience I find some truth in that statement. I was most creative when I was abusing weed and when I had unstable open relationships. Now that I've become more zen, calmed down, stable and living in the present moment, my need to be produce art has disappeared. Now I prefer non-twisted movies and art over something twisted and eccentric, maybe that's also cause I've grown up and have a more realistic view on the world.

Whats your opinion on art as a result of subconscious human madness??

 

[toogoodforyou]

Also, if you notice many movies contain so much drama and lots of art contains twisted images as well. As I became more centered in life my interest in twisted movies dropped, I enjoy more of animated movies that have fantasy, surreal ness but wisdom in it. In an 'enlightened' society maybe we would enjoy activities like natural beauty over art filled with twisted meanings and movies filled with drama. Wouldn't it be more fun to go out in nature and experience it yourself than checking it out in paintings. Obviously not all art and movies are negative, but a lot of it actually looks like its coming from the madness of our psyche.

 

[toogoodforyou]

What if you do meditation as a form of catharsis?? That would be like sublimating your madness instead of throwing it on a canvas. Then would you still be motivated to produce movies filled with drama or twisted art? Maybe if we all meditated regularly we would prefer more simplicity in our lives and art.

 

[toogoodforyou]

Maybe, yes. But unless we institute some form of hippie fascism we're not all gonna meditate regularly. When I think of the world's great religions/mythologies/literature/narratives in general, there's always a tension between a wish for some form of blissful stasis (be it bucolic beatitude, nirvana, union with the godhead, etc.) and a fascination with the sound and the fury. I for one wouldn't want to give it up. It could be that I'm twisted and deranged, but as much as I love *peaceful* art like Blake's Songs of Innocence or polyphony, among my pathways to aesthethic joy are also writers like Dostoievsky or Lovecraft, black metal, Bergman's films, etc. Wanting to get rid once and for all of the deep, gut-bound mechanisms that such works may appeal to would eventually lead to a return of the repressed in my opinion, and perhaps not in the form of art this time.

Meditation has nothing to do with hippie fascism, i know you're being sarcastic but that is exaggerating the entire meaning of meditation. By meditation i don't mean only the stereotypical cliche of sitting cross legged with your eyes closed, i mean living in the present moment while running, exercising, walking, working, cooking, listening to music, sex, playing etc. Also, i meant catharsis and throwing the subconscious noise outside through breathing exercises and catharsis. If you're sublimating the unconscious darkness and throwing it out using such methods, a person's needs to indulge in twisted art, music, and drama would naturally reduce. You don't have to be in a blissful statis permanently, but you can be in bliss when the dark or the light nature show up in life. In fact there is no need to be in a stasis most of the time, you can do whatever activity you're doing at present and enjoy it completely. By meditation i don't mean a repression of any kind, in fact i'm talking about sublimating the dark repression and indulging in the light natured of reality. I know its not possible to sublimate the dark totally and you need to face it in life, but there is no need to be blatant about the dark natured of reality and promoting it through twisted art. I'm talking about what Eckhart Tolle says about pain bodies "Eckhart Tolle calls the pain-body, an energetic field that actually feeds on toxic thoughts and emotions" Basically we're feeding our pain bodies through aggressive music, art, and violent movies. People release their darkness on a canvas, art and movies, politics, violence and other pain bodies feed on it by looking at it, watching it or reading about it.

By meditation and bliss i don't mean you stay in a permanent non functional reality fixed on light reality, you still carry about your daily activities and things to do list only you do it meditatively. Life is emptiness in the end, you can make that emptiness pleasant or you can make it twisted, depends what kind of a mental world a person lives in. Wouldn't you be in a better, calmer and less aggressive place of mind while listening to some peaceful, melodious music than some dark metal??

 

[toogoodforyou]

I'm not talking about burrying your head in the sand when the dark emotions do arise in life as my heart is large enough for both light and dark natured reality as well, nor am i condemning anybodies choice of art. All I'm wondering is if as i read originally would art or choice of aesthetics change if they meditated or sublimated the unconscious madness and became fully conscious in the moment. I understand the yin and yang of life, but certain people can go to extremes when it comes to representing the darkness in art or drama, it can be unbalanced. Art is definitely the domain of creation, but what isn't the domain of creation? The minutest particle on earth can be termed in the domain of creation. I'm talking about raising your consciousness to such levels through majorly mindfulness, yoga, meditation, inner knowledge and minor psychedelic use that art would be simply a play of colors than throwing up of negative emotions on the canvas or films. In fact when you actually raise your consciousness enough your need for a dark natured reality and drama naturally gets reduced from personal experience. Who would consciously want to feel bad?

Also, in my original post i was wondering as i read somewhere whether art is a form of gathering of subconscious human madness.

 

[Finarfin]

I think art is the result of human creativity and human fantasy. I would not call art the result of madness. Mad people may make crazy art and some artist may be crazy. I do not think you have to be crazy to make intresting art. Maybe being crazy helps in making intresting art. Like they say there is a thin line between mad or being genius.

 

[Finarfin]

When looking cave paintings (the earliest art) i don,t see those as an expression of madness. I see them as an expression of creativity and fantasy. Maybe art comes from the subconsiousness but why would the subconsious be madness. The subconsious and the irational are terms that come from the rational. The rational calls it madness because it doesn,t make any sense to the rational mind. It needs to put a label on it to try to catagorize and understand it. Madness is an expression of the rational mind. I think people are creative beings it,s part of being a human. Some people maybe better at expressing themselves.

Personally i do not enjoy disturbing art that is only about shocking. I think such art has a purpose and a place. personally i like art to have more depth to it then only the shock effect of it. Madness maybe an aspect of art, i think there is more to it then only madness. Even mad people are not only mad. Madness is just one aspect of peoples unconsious and personality.

 

[toogoodforyou]

I think art is the result of human creativity and human fantasy. I would not call art the result of madness. Mad people may make crazy art and some artist may be crazy. I do not think you have to be crazy to make intresting art. Maybe being crazy helps in making intresting art. Like they say there is a thin line between mad or being genius.

By madness i don't mean the literal psychiatric definition of madness. I'm talking about the subconscious or conscious distortions that exist in almost the entire humanity, which will supposedly go away as we mentally evolve. The subconscious madness that makes us rejoice in dark art or movies filled with negative drama.

When looking cave paintings (the earliest art) i don,t see those as an expression of madness. I see them as an expression of creativity and fantasy. Maybe art comes from the subconsiousness but why would the subconsious be madness. The subconsious and the irational are terms that come from the rational. The rational calls it madness because it doesn,t make any sense to the rational mind. It needs to put a label on it to try to catagorize and understand it. Madness is an expression of the rational mind. I think people are creative beings it,s part of being a human. Some people maybe better at expressing themselves.

Personally i do not enjoy disturbing art that is only about shocking. I think such art has a purpose and a place. personally i like art to have more depth to it then only the shock effect of it. Madness maybe an aspect of art, i think there is more to it then only madness. Even mad people are not only mad. Madness is just one aspect of peoples unconsious and personality.

You make sense about cavemen, saying their art was innocent and not expressions of madness, but again they hadn't explored consciousness or mind like we have in present times. They were totally unconscious in their behavior so they were they exact opposite of evolved. They weren't even aware of the subconscious and conscious mind and just lived for fulfillment of the basic needs. But you do have a point, maybe innocent natural art is our primordial nature. We can compare stone age art to current day innocent animated movies, something that is pleasing and does not unnecessarily invoke dark emotions.

 

[toogoodforyou]

^ forget animated movies, I just used them as an example, I'm simply discussing here, not imposing my view on anyone. What I'm trying to say is, in an evolved society there wouldn't be much drama to create movies like the Hamlet, so people wouldn't be able to relate to it. Of course maybe we'd still watch them as art history, similar to the way we find Stone Age art aesthetic since it is so rare and so old.

 

[Finarfin]

Not all art is negative or dark. You talk about dark emotions. The dark or negative is just one aspect of the human emotions. It is one color in a whole spectrum of emotional colors.
When i go to an art museum and look at a painting i do not see only dark negative art.
I see for example a painting of a landscape or of flowers I see portraits.
I would not call a painting of a landscape dark or negative.
Some paintings are painted very skillfully by what i would call master painters. When looking atthese painting i see skill and talent.
When i listen to music (also a form ofart) i do not only hear dark negative music.


The dark or lightness of art has nothing to do with the evolution of art or the evolution of humanity.
It has to do with the style,inspiration, fantasy and creativity (and evolution) of the artist.


The term madness is vague and it is not very clear what your understanding of madness is.
I agree that madness may have a role in art. I do not think that ALL art is a product of madness.
Art i think is the product of creativity and fantasy combined with skillfulness.

 

[toogoodforyou]

Hamlet is a play by William Shakespeare, not a film (it was adapted several times though), and it appeals to people because it deals with a number of themes that were/are/may well remain central to human life: power, duty, sex, suicide, etc., and because it is beautifully crafted. Even if we could meditate away the former (which I doubt but nevermind) the play would not cease to be one of the gems of world literature. And this is just one rather obvious example. That's why I cannot agree with you, the domain of art is simply too big for me to flush most of it down the toilet because it is not 'evolved' according to some utopian standard of what humanity should be.

An evolved society would not mean a utopia without any problems. Problems would still be there, only our energies would be directed from power, duty, suicide etc. to emptiness, sex, creativity, nature, music, functional work, traveling etc. Such a drama less reality is definitely possible and need not be an imaginary perfect future state. Personally the more I got into yoga, meditation, mind exploration, exercise my need to chase after power and drama dropped. Obviously authority would still exist to keep matters in check, but not with the intention of dominating or having power over others. Have you seen or heard of the Buddhist temples in Thailand where tigers were raised by monks?? These tigers eat dog food and their innate behaviour of attacking and aggression humans has disappeared. They mingle with the humans openly, if such wild animals can evolve cause of meditation effects passed down from other sources, imagine what would happen if the world evolved. It definitely shows a drama less reality is possible, only we're not yet there. Just think how much humanity has evolved in the last 20 years spiritually, socially, technologically, and think what would be possible in the near future. Of course as I said the Hamlet would then be a work of art history, something to look at, observe and learn from our ancestors. Maybe before we're ready to evolve again some destruction might happen on the way, which would lead to more art work influenced from such destructive realities and conditioning. But definitely there is a slight shift in our conditioning that is slowly happening. I'm not saying we'd all be equal, but definitely there is a chance of a more peaceful reality with minimum drama. And when this occurs there would be a natural shift in the kind of art we produce or derive pleasure from

 

[Finarfin]

Tigers raised by people are not wild. It has nothing to do with meditation, I think that is superstition. They are just tame like circus animals or like killer whales jumping trough hoops. There could be a shift in art produced or enjoyed. I think these shifts are individual.

 

[Finarfin]

For a lot of people the shift happens when growing older or when something changes in there life. When growing older taste and style may change. I think this has not so much to do with dark emotions or madness or meditation. As a wrote human fantasy and creativity has both dark and light to it. As well as a lot of other emotions. madness and sanity dark and light positive and negative are all dualistic concept. Isn,t it the point of meditation to rise above or (to be more precise) beyond this whole dualistic mindstate.

The drama has a greek root, it means to act in the sense of action or an accomplishment. the word is used to distinguse two forms of plays, the other form is comedy. Drama is not negative it is dynamic and the opposite of comical.

Some art can be dark and jet beautyfull. Or it can be shocking, sick twisted or just evil. Think of a burningman with people locked up inside it .

 

[Finarfin]

One artist who talks about a shift in his art is the painter alex grey. His shift happend after meeting his wife and taking lsd. Alejandro Jodorowsky is another artist that talks about shifts in his book psychomagic. he talks about how the poetic act (art) must be constructive not destructive.

 

[Finarfin]

A paradigm shift is a shift in the way we think about things. For example the change from a geocentric to a heliocentric model was a paradigm shift. When talking about art there is also something as the zeitgeist and fashion that marks the art made of specific era. There is always change going on. Even if you want, you can not stop the change. Change happens automaticly. If you don,t die you will get older.

Meditation or mindfullness is the observation of this stream of changing ideas and emotions without doing something to or with it. This is how I understand it. today you may be happy or feel bliss tomorrow you may feel down or depressed. for meditation this does not realy matter.
there are different schools of buddhism and many types of meditation. Just like there are many types of yoga.

We are complex creatures of many dimentions. We have all kinds of emotions. We are not 2d (cartoon) characters that can be reduced to negative and positive. I don,t think it,s that black and white there are all shades of color in between.

I am willing to believe that people may have a shift in art produced and enjoyed. However I do not see why art is the result of madness.

 

[Finarfin]

I totally agree with larry that a lot of the change is just another lifestyle on the marked. A lifestyle to be sold to people. It,s like people wear mask to hide themselfs and instead of changing themselfs they change there masks. They put on the masks of rebellion or of spirituality, and the masks is not the real thing. The mask is there to hide the true authetic self. Good art I think is art that stays true to the authentic self. A good artist is not a domesticated animal who forgot his authetic self. Like those tiggers raised by monks.

a lot of the counter culture burningman call it what you want scene as well as the new age scene is just another fake lifestyle that is copied by people. a lot of it is about being part of the collective, the scene, the community. The authentic is about being yourself, being an individual.

For example the 2012 hype was copied and talked about by people as being a paradigm shift. In the end not much happened.

The real shift is the shift from the inauthentic to the authentic. And it,s something individual not a collective shift. That,s what i think

 

[toogoodforyou]

We are complex creatures of many dimentions. We have all kinds of emotions. We are not 2d (cartoon) characters that can be reduced to negative and positive. I don,t think it,s that black and white there are all shades of color in between.

I am not talking about negative or positive, I'm talking about the shift in art once a person learns to accept the emptiness of life.

Sure, life exists in a variety of emotions and mental states, the emotions come and go as projections on this empty screen, but in the end what is left is emptiness. Once you feel and accept the emptiness that exists all around us and in the mind, through meditation, yoga or psychedelics you understand you can project on this emptiness anything you want. You may project a fairty tale or project a horror movie or you may simply enjoy the empty screen, it is all up to the individual, but it is partly in our hands and conditioned thinking. Just think of doing shrooms, and think of the blissful moments of timelessness that you are propelled in for a temporary period, you can enter this state of bliss perpetually if you learn to tap into that mental state say through mindfulness, meditation or yoga. And once you learn to tap into that mental state the art you produce or are attracted to changes. Once you open your eyes to the miracle of life melodrama naturally becomes less appealing, maybe even escaping our reality all the time through movies or sitcoms wouldn't be that necessary.

Today you may be happy or unhappy, but when you become meditative the fluctuations in the mood reduce, you learn to be in a perma blissed state with more of an empty but celebrative quality to it.

 

[toogoodforyou]

Tigers raised by people are not wild. It has nothing to do with meditation, I think that is superstition. They are just tame like circus animals or like killer whales jumping trough hoops. There could be a shift in art produced or enjoyed. I think these shifts are individual.

Are you saying that Tigers raised by a normal human or circus people are same as Tigers raised by Buddhist monks?? Even water crystals have proven to change their form through our thinking, imagine the effects the large number of meditative monks must be having on those tigers, you wouldn't understand the situation until you go there and see it for yourself, how a wild animal's primitive behavior and thinking has been edited. A circus tiger is nothing compared to these Tigers that eat dog food.

 

[neonoctafish]

Great discussion, guys. For what it's worth, my favourite definition is that art is an ongoing dialogue on what it means to be human.