 |
 |
Dear fellow ludics In Australia we have a wonderful story about a magic pudding by Norman Lindsay (The Magic Pudding) : >>>>>> "You'll enjoy this Puddin'," said Bill, handing him a large slice. "This is a very rare Puddin'." "It's a cut-an'-come-again Puddin'," said Sam. "It's a Christmas steak and apple-dumpling Puddin'," said Bill. "It's a *. Shall I tell him?" he asked, looking at Bill. Bill nodded, and the Penguin leaned across to Bunyip Bluegum and said in a low voice, "It's a Magic Puddin'." >>>>>> Art, as practice, is like a magic pudding: you can just keep on arting slices off the magic endlessness of possibility. Such is true of life: one thing follows another in an endless sequence. Of course this is a illusion that we don't often bother to puff away with the seeds of weeds. So, life is primary and the history of life is a secondary activity that is also part of life and hence it is sometimes primary, as an experience of making, for historians; sometimes secondary, as the experience of readers of history. Though, sometimes, reading history is a making of another history and can thus be experienced as a primary awareness - an awareness of something as a thing that changes one like when we see a painting or a film that changes us. Some artists enjoy this slippage from a primary object (actual painting) to another primary object (subjective experience of a painting). Some resist the slip and attempt to hold on to something that might survive the critic or historian or stupid kid who thinks PoMo is crap. Whatever, history (as a mere sequence of events) was changed forever when humans started to tell stories about mere sequences of events. This change was a cognitive change not simply a trade union dispute between those who performed actions and those who reflected on actions performed (frequently the same person in a reflective society). One might suggest that the values given to certain social activities, like art, are only discernible in a reflective society. That is, without language about art there is no art, there is merely mucking about with paint and stuff. The fact that languages about art might also be embedded in works of art as derivable meanings is hardly surprising. Until we name a dive it is merely another way of falling from a tower. And, I suggest that there is quite an amount of rudeness inherent in such discussions. All of us make all of the time; some of us reflect on such makings in a developing critique of our lives. If we elect certain objects of our making to the status of refinement we might call art or design, it is because these objects can be seen to embody a range of values that we have derived from reflection on our makings and the makings of others, including our makings of conversation, discourse, theory, and criticism. Hey it's wet today cheers keith russell OZ Newcstle