[lit-ideas] Re: When do we know enough?
- From: Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Fri, 16 Dec 2005 12:09:32 +0000 (GMT)
> >> For even if the knowledge is not "the same"
> that does not mean it is
> as "knowledgeable" in both cases.
>
> Here I can pinpoint what bugs me. After five years
> of studying the subway, I will probably know more
> about the subway than in year one.
>
> However, after five years, an artist will not
> necessarily be more knowledgeable about his
> painting--only different.
Well, there are a number of issues - I agree that an artist may not
*necessarily* feel more "knowledgable" (in some sense of knowledge) - they
may even feel the well-springs of their creativity have dried up, and that
what once they could create with ease now seems difficult, and that their
creations are worse not better etc. A similar deteroriation might be imagined
in the case of someone's knowledge of the subway - but I would guess we would
think this unusual and resulting from, say, a degenerative brain disease or
some cognitive malfunction: in the ordinary course of things we expect our
knowledge of a subway will improve as time goes on and we explore (and come
to know) more of it (but this is probably not true for everyone).
The position re knowledge of art is perhaps not quite as straightforward as
'knowing our way about' the subway; but then our knowledge of art, whatever
primitive cognitive faculties may be involved and stimulated, is less
'primitive' and straightforward perhaps than our capacity to orient ourselves
geographically using 'pointers'.
But while there is less obvious necessity to steadily improving knowledge of
art, such improvement is possible and does frequently occur- with perhaps
some later falling off after an artist has passed the 'height of the powers'
(which may be at a relatively young age). It is also perhaps useful to
distinguish an artist's knowledge or understanding of their art (and others'
art) and their capacity to create: the latter may fall away even though the
former in some sense improves, and indeed improvements in knowledge (in, say,
some technical sense) may be felt to interfere with and inhibit the capacity
to create - hence some artists conspicuously avoid much technical study of
their field. Nevertheless, I suggest, there is nearly always some 'progress'
from an artist's earliest work and nearly always progress in their
'knowledge'. However, the law of diminishing returns must eventually apply in
both cases.
Never trust the teller, trust the tale - artists (and some scientists too)
can have quite weird accounts for the source of their creativity: some see
their work as self-expression (under the influence of theories to this
effect) while others (eg. Bach) may see their work as a tribute to the divine
(as Haydn once said on hearing one of his compositions "I did not write
this"). The feeling of being divinely inspired is perhaps even more common to
artists than the feeling that they are merely expressing themselves (which
even the least artistic do anyway, and so is hardly explanatory of what gives
their creations artistic merit).
>If artistic knowledge
> were always cumulative, then we would pay no
> attention to Picasso's blue period paintings but
> only his later-style paintings. These later
> paintings would be where the artistic knowledge
> was.
It does not follow that we would necessarily dismiss, nevermind consider
inferior, an artist's earlier work. But bear in mind that Picasso's blue
period was not his first stab at painting and neither was Symphony No.1
Rachy's first tilt at musical composition. There can be degeneration as well
as progress, of course - just as in mathematics it is a commonplace that most
great mathematics is done in the earlier rather than later parts of a
mathematician's career, it is hardly surprising that in some art forms there
is an eventual falling away in creative output.
>We would consider Rachmaninoff's Rhapsody on
> a Theme of Paganini to be totally superior to his
> Symphony no. 1--which it isn't.
> Artists mature, yes, but that isn't always the
> same as gaining more artistic knowledge. Sometimes
> it means a cooling down of vision, or getting
> trapped in their own style.
It depends what we mean by "more artistic knowledge" - certainly artists may
feel they have lost a "knack" they once had just as mathematician or
scientist may feel this, they may feel that what once they could handle like
a precision instrument they now handled with numb fingers (on a close look
they will often have this feeling, of an up and downness in their creativity,
even at the height of their powers).
>Whereas someone
> studying the subway can reasonably expect to know
> more over time.
So can an artist - but they may not be able to always create any better "over
time"; there will typically be a time of marked improvement and then some
falling away or consolidation. But, though the case is more straightforward,
this can surely happen on the subway too - imagine an octogenarian not
managing to negotiate the subway, despite their increased accumulation of
experience, quite as well as they did thirty years before.
Donal
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