Dear Charles and all
 
Thank you for opening up this discussion with your experience in intentional
disposition. 

I think we might be able to contribute to this growing field of embodiment
by perhaps concentrating on basic level aesthetics in two areas:
 
1.)  how things attract us at a basic level and cause us to move or give us
a feeling of movement (weather it is for pleasure or pain) before we have
"read" the sign.
2.)  how things attract us at a basic level yet do not evoke physical
movement but rather, as you say give meaning and expression, to what we
experience.    
 
Through my own experience in constructivist art, projects with product
designer and through working with the literature in embodiment  I am
becoming increasingly unsure of where these two worlds overlap and separate
from each other. I guess this is the problem in any study of boundaries, the
closer you observe the dividing surface the fuzzier it becomes. I believe
the concept of embodiment supports this fuzziness because there is no
separation between body and mind or body and emotion.
 
If our emotions can not be separated from our concrete experience then this
would imply that working with the concrete models, prototypes, forms etc.
at a  basic level of aesthetics would parallel or touch the emotional world.
Artist have understood this connection and now natural science is giving us
some support for this.

The work of Neurobiologist Semir Zeki on ³Inner vision an exploration of at
and the brains² explains how some of these mechanism work.
 
 
I have written a book that is a summary of my foundation teaching material
entitled ³Three dimensional visual analysis² The four chapter are:
1) Elements and their properties
  Which introduce geometry and volume, plane, line and point.
2) Movements and forces
  Axis, forces, accents, gesture
3) Relationships 
  Continuel, oppostional, tensional, divide, adapt, merge, destort etc.
4) Organization
  3-D, spatial matrix, static-, dynamic-, organic- frameworks, overall
proportions, spatial activation.
 
The research I am working on now tries to put this work in the context of
the design process. I aim to connect this basic level aesthetics to the
gestalt process which involves the designer/ artist intent.

Charles your work in intentional disposition and formative thinking seem to
be focused in this area.  Could you explain more about your work and if you
have a conceptual model that suggest this interconnection.
  

Hope this post isn´t too long and too late.

Take care

cheryl
 
 
 







Den 04-06-03 04.09, skrev "Charles Burnette User"
<[log in to unmask]>:

> Dear Cheryl:
> What should we accept as basic level? I would argue that it is that level at
> which an intentional disposition is taken toward whatever circumstances we
> confront. I believe such dispositions, and there are several basic ones, are
> emotionally motivated at the level of the limbic system and are thus
> embodied physiological events that do not always activate motor responses. I
> believe that there are different intentional dimensions at the basic level
> that address different aspects of experience, and organize our knowledge
> regarding it. One such basic level dimension, Formative Thinking, includes
> aesthetic experience. It is concerned not just with perception, but also
> with how we feel about and give meaning and expression to what we
> experience. I think it is at the level in which people interact with their
> environment but would not say always optimally. Both pleasure and pain are
> possible.
> 
> What Johnson and Lakoff are saying is very important, but both see it from
> their own histories. We need to think with them from our own.
> 
> Charles Burnette