CHINESE VIEWS OFNATURE AND ART

I. NATURE

II. THE CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE SAGE

OR ARTIST

III. THE CREATIVE PROCESS

CHINESE VIEWS OFNATURE AND ART

I. NATURE Nonbeing Dao (Tao) Heaven The Creative

NONBEING

There is more to reality than we can see or comprehend. In other words, it does not have the limitations that Being does.

That reality is creative. Things of reality emerge out of it, and return into it.

Analogy: waves emerging out of an undifferentiated ocean.

It has reality yet there is no place where it resides--this refers to the dimension of space. It has duration but no beginning or end--this refers to the dimension of time. There is life, there is death, there is coming out, there is going back in--yet in the coming out and going back its form is never seen.

--Zhuangzi

“The End, The Beginning”

If there were not an utter and absolute dark

of silence and sheer oblivion

at the core of everything,

how terrible the sun would be,

how ghastly it would be to strike a match, and make a light.

 

But the very sun himself is pivoted

upon a core of pure oblivion,

so is a candle, even as a match.

And if there were not an absolute, utter forgetting

and a ceasing to know, a perfect ceasing to know

and a silent, sheer cessation of all awareness

how terrible life would be!

how terrible it would be to think and know, to have consciousness!

 

But dipped, once dipped in dark oblivion

the soul has peace, inward and lovely peace.

--D. H. Lawrence

DAO (TAO) The basic patterns and principles of the

“natural world” we see. The world is characterized by orderly change

and harmonious interrelationships. Example: yin and yang. These are

complementary opposites: wet and dry, winter and summer, valley and mountain, dark and bright, female and male.

The Way cannot be heard; heard, it is not the Way. The Way cannot be seen; seen, it is not the Way. The Way cannot be described; described it is not the Way. That which gives form to the formed is itself formless--can you understand that? There is no name that fits the Way.

--Zhuangzi

HEAVEN

Not the Heaven of Christianity. There is one, organic universe, made of heaven,

earth, and humans. 2 meanings:

“the heavens,” as opposed to the earth“the sublime principles of the universe.”

The inaction [spontaneity] of Heaven is its purity, the inaction of earth is its peace. So the two inactions combine and all things are transformed and brought to birth.

--Zhuangzi

THE CREATIVE

The universe exhibits ongoing spontaneous transformations.

These are skillful, beautiful, and creative. It is an ongoing process that works by itself.

There is no separate Creator, only the spontaneous creativity of the universe.

II. THE CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE ARTIST

Tranquil observation of nature

Oneness with nature

Bringing nature within.

Tranquil observation of nature

Great art arises out of a highly sensitive awareness and appreciation of nature.

The only way we are able to cultivate that sensitivity is by cultivating an inner calm, a tranquility that allows us to see clearly and deeply.

But if I did not live in perfect harmony and ease and were not seated at a bright window before a clean table burning incense to dispel all anxieties, the fine verses and excellent ideas would not take shape; the inner mood and beauty of their meaning would not be realized in my thoughts. How can it then be said that the principal thing in painting is easily reached?

--Guo Xi (Kuo Hsi)

Oneness with nature

The great artist and sage goes beyond mere awareness of nature.

True consciousness of nature involves the loss of a sense of a self separate from nature.

There is no longer a sense of a subjective consciousness and an objective reality. There is just: nature.

Bringing nature within, or entering into nature

Sometimes artists and sages talked about this oneness in terms of nature (e.g., a mountain) entering into oneself.

Sometimes they would talk about it as entering into an object of nature (e.g., a bamboo).

When Yü-k'o painted bamboo,

He saw bamboo, not himself.

Nor was he simply unconscious of himself:

Trance-like, he left his body.

His body was transformed into bamboo,

creating inexhaustible freshness.

--Su Shi

III. THE CREATIVE PROCESS

The spontaneity of the artist

The artist and the Creative

The process (forgetting and waiting)

Spontaneity

A sage and a great artist does not act out of desires or will or reason. He acts spontaneously on his true nature.

Poems and paintings come naturally of themselves.

The artist and the Creative

Artistic activity arises in a state of calm, openness, and spontaneity.

The creativity of the artist is the same kind of thing as the creativity of nature.

Since we are essentially a part of nature, and since the artist acts on his true nature, art is one manifestation of the Creative.

The process One of the principal disciplines of the artist is to

remove the obstructions that prevent one from acting on one’s true nature.

In general, the process of becoming a great artist and the process of becoming enlightened is one of subtraction.

Sometimes this is talked about in terms of “forgetting” – forgetting the self, its desires, concerns about success or acclaim.

In that state of “forgetting,” what does the artist do? He “waits”