On Beauty
Crikey, this is a big one. I could, of course, rattle off the various theories on Aesthetics which I encountered during my academic career, but that would be a little technical, not to mention a smidge..dry. To me, and I emphasize this is personal, beauty does not have to be pleasant. I can for example, find beauty in the efficiency of Hitler's plans, the way viscera gleam in a surgical operation. Conversely there is beauty in way a wave breaks upon a rock, the way a crow's feather gleams with dark, rainbow promise, the curve of a hip, the crookedness of a smile.
I could wax lyrical about Fibonacci sequences, and the Golden Mean. But I won't, for, in my world, the small things and the epic ones come together in beauty. One is capable of eroticising almost anything - something that is unsurprising given that it's the primal human urge. But what is erotic is not always beautiful. I know many of my friends who I consider beautiful, yet there is no erotic component, Equally, I am unashamed to admit that there are those I know, both people and places which stir the erotic within me.
What is beauty then? I am afraid I may turn these posts into one trick ponies, but the simple fact is, something which stirs the Soul. I am not classing the soul as some ghostly etheric thing separate from the body - no, here, I speak of the Soul as the woven tapestry of our senses and emotions. There is that which is terrible in its beauty, and that which soothes and salves within its beauteous nature. Beauty then, is an active principle - an interface between object and perceiver, a medium that blends the two into something unutterable in its complexity and breathtaking in its simplicity.
We exist in worlds of movement, rushing hither and yon, rarely stopping to appreciate, to allow the beauty to be revealed to us. All becomes everyday, a terrible chaotic mundanity that skims and glances off our senses like water from the back of a duck. There is little depth, little inter-action. Our fingers, our faces, they do not sink to the depths, or rise to the heights. Our songs, our musics - these are not embraced, made part of us, and our awakened selves.
Stop. Breathe. Be.
These things are there, and in that breathing, we may become truly inspired, and through that inspiration, evoke beauty that also inspires.
I could wax lyrical about Fibonacci sequences, and the Golden Mean. But I won't, for, in my world, the small things and the epic ones come together in beauty. One is capable of eroticising almost anything - something that is unsurprising given that it's the primal human urge. But what is erotic is not always beautiful. I know many of my friends who I consider beautiful, yet there is no erotic component, Equally, I am unashamed to admit that there are those I know, both people and places which stir the erotic within me.
What is beauty then? I am afraid I may turn these posts into one trick ponies, but the simple fact is, something which stirs the Soul. I am not classing the soul as some ghostly etheric thing separate from the body - no, here, I speak of the Soul as the woven tapestry of our senses and emotions. There is that which is terrible in its beauty, and that which soothes and salves within its beauteous nature. Beauty then, is an active principle - an interface between object and perceiver, a medium that blends the two into something unutterable in its complexity and breathtaking in its simplicity.
We exist in worlds of movement, rushing hither and yon, rarely stopping to appreciate, to allow the beauty to be revealed to us. All becomes everyday, a terrible chaotic mundanity that skims and glances off our senses like water from the back of a duck. There is little depth, little inter-action. Our fingers, our faces, they do not sink to the depths, or rise to the heights. Our songs, our musics - these are not embraced, made part of us, and our awakened selves.
Stop. Breathe. Be.
These things are there, and in that breathing, we may become truly inspired, and through that inspiration, evoke beauty that also inspires.