First, this quote just floors me: (from the back of a whitestripes album)
When ideas become too complicated, and the pursuit of perfection is misconstrued as a need for excess. When there is so much involved that individual components cannot be discerned. When it is hard to break the rules of excess, then new rules need to be established. It descends back to the beginning where the construction of things visual or aural is too uncomplicated to not beautiful. But this is done in the knowledge that we can only become simple to a point and then there is nowhere else to go. There are definite natural things which cannot be broken down into lesser components. Even if the goal of achieving beauty from simplicity is aesthetically less exciting it may force the mind to acknowledge the simple components that make the complicated beautiful.
Is our way of seeing passive? How do we interact with our visual world or this cyber induced "go green," crazed culture? Can or do we push to see and recognize the yellow flowers along the side of the road, the light rays reflected off shack windows, or even the folds in a little pink dress dancing in the sun?
How easily I forget about beauty. Easily I forget that beauty plays a part in my visual world and my mood, my emotions, etc. How easily I become passive to my world of appreciative opportunity-filled moments and days. At what point to I become numb?
Living is actively seeing. Seeing HAS TO BE active, naturally. But then again, can a blind person see? But is it taken as a passive sort of active. Non-interactive? These thoughts about interacting with my visual world make sense to me. Living, can you reach a point of passivity? Can you forget to seek out? Has the ability to see many things everyday hindered our acceptance of seeing new things differently. Or similar things in a different way?
I ask what beauty is to me. Do/can I actually "techicalize" it? Is there a standard of beauty to be realized? Can a prison be beautiful. Can poop be beautiful? I argue that beauty is situational and varies on a standard of personal taste. The general idea of beauty can be understood across the world. This is usually by association with the female body (a bride) or natural/grandios light situations (a sunset/sunrise).
Summer makes it easy to appreciate "beauty." But at some point I have to remind myself that this world, this visual world, the way I see is mostly relative to me. It is not interactive unless I make it that way due to the repetitive ability to simply see but not see in a new way. And no matter how surrounded I am with visual stimulants I am, at some point have to wake up and realize that our world is fucking beautiful whether I can see it or not.
1 comments:
Great post, Jacki. I think our whole class has proven that beauty exists in places/things/people that we least expect it to: in the prison, on the bus, in a dirty factory,etc. But you're right, it is so easy to forget that the world is a beautiful place. I think part of the reason that we don't always recognize beauty right away is that it is in our nature to make comparisons. We always relate what we see to something else and subconsiously rate it. For instance, let's say that it is sunrise and you see a flower that has just opened and its petals are dusted with dew. You think that it is beautiful and want to take a photo, so you go in for a closer look and realize that the underside of the flower is decayed and ants are crawling in and out. Is it still beautiful now that you have seen it in its entirety? Why is our first instinct to search for something that is more perfect or beautiful instead of appreciating something for what it is? It sounds cheesy, but everything is unique, and therefore beautifully made. Maybe we wouldn't be stuck in such a rut if our language held so many connotations that persuade us to think either positively or negatively when we see, hear, or say a word. Can you really say "prison" or "poop" or "decay" without the first thoughts popping up being "convict" "waste" "death"? Why don't our minds think "sanctuary" "used to be yummy food" "life cycle"? If we did think those things first, how could we ever not be blown away by beauty?
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