Can I be surprised anymore? I think to myself what a great and unique fiction writer plus a translator of Russian works and all around talented guy. Then you come out with this! You just keep getting better. I think I need to ‘desupriseify’ myself. ☮️ ❤️.
Fantastic, what a beautiful breakdown of what makes art. Nothing to add except these two quotes from my favorite artists your piece has reminded me of:
“From Impressionism to Pop Art, the commonplace and even the comic strip have become ingredients for the artist's cauldron. What Cézanne did with apples, Picasso with guitars, Léger with machines, Schwitters with rubbish, and Duchamp with urinals makes it clear that revelation does not depend upon grandiose concepts. The problem of the artist is to defamiliarize the ordinary.”
— Paul Rand
“If you really want to communicate something, even if it’s just an emotion or an attitude, let alone an idea, the least effective and least enjoyable way is directly. It only goes in about an inch. But if you can get people to the point where they have to think a moment what it is you’re getting at, and then discover it, the thrill of discovery goes right through the heart.”
Interesting work. The selection of the quotes alone deserves commending. I always thought religion—and certain types of related alterations of consciousness, such as induced by psychedelics—fundamentally relied on disrupting habituations in perception, providing the opportune circumstance in which to discover the matter of existence “an sich” in a different light. Call it revelation, or enlightenment, and yet most think of religion as the opposite: the following of predetermined rules of established convention.
Beautifully articulated Vanya! I love the insight into Tolstoy’s defamiliarization.
As for the artist’s “projection of their unique view of reality,” ever since I first sensed the purpose of art, I’ve referred to this as [the artist’s attempt at] “soul transmission.”
Vanya! Words after my own infinite heart, becoming "better" was about reaching as close as we can to our unique selves, our piece of an infinite universe.
Actually otstranenie (detachment or suspension, I guess) is different from ostranenie (estranging/making strange). There’s no t in the original spelling https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Остранение
When I first discovered it I also thought there should be t but it’s not the case haha
Can I be surprised anymore? I think to myself what a great and unique fiction writer plus a translator of Russian works and all around talented guy. Then you come out with this! You just keep getting better. I think I need to ‘desupriseify’ myself. ☮️ ❤️.
🙏
This was a wonderful read. 👏👏
Fantastic, what a beautiful breakdown of what makes art. Nothing to add except these two quotes from my favorite artists your piece has reminded me of:
“From Impressionism to Pop Art, the commonplace and even the comic strip have become ingredients for the artist's cauldron. What Cézanne did with apples, Picasso with guitars, Léger with machines, Schwitters with rubbish, and Duchamp with urinals makes it clear that revelation does not depend upon grandiose concepts. The problem of the artist is to defamiliarize the ordinary.”
— Paul Rand
“If you really want to communicate something, even if it’s just an emotion or an attitude, let alone an idea, the least effective and least enjoyable way is directly. It only goes in about an inch. But if you can get people to the point where they have to think a moment what it is you’re getting at, and then discover it, the thrill of discovery goes right through the heart.”
— Stanley Kubrick
Thanks Dima! Those are wonderful quotes, I might steal them
Interesting work. The selection of the quotes alone deserves commending. I always thought religion—and certain types of related alterations of consciousness, such as induced by psychedelics—fundamentally relied on disrupting habituations in perception, providing the opportune circumstance in which to discover the matter of existence “an sich” in a different light. Call it revelation, or enlightenment, and yet most think of religion as the opposite: the following of predetermined rules of established convention.
Beautifully articulated Vanya! I love the insight into Tolstoy’s defamiliarization.
As for the artist’s “projection of their unique view of reality,” ever since I first sensed the purpose of art, I’ve referred to this as [the artist’s attempt at] “soul transmission.”
Vanya! Words after my own infinite heart, becoming "better" was about reaching as close as we can to our unique selves, our piece of an infinite universe.
YES
Vanya, you misspelled the term "ostranenie." It should be Otstranenie, ot-stra-ne-nie.
Actually otstranenie (detachment or suspension, I guess) is different from ostranenie (estranging/making strange). There’s no t in the original spelling https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Остранение
When I first discovered it I also thought there should be t but it’s not the case haha
Thank you, Vanya, for graciously educating me. It is a valuable lesson, had I kept quiet, I would not have learned.