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The Transformation of Nature into Art
An attempt to explain the theory behind medieval European and Asiatic art, especially art in India.
245 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1934
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About the author
Ananda K. Coomaraswamy
210Ìýbooks170ÌýfollowersAnanda Kentish Coomaraswamy was a Ceylonese philosopher and metaphysician, as well as a pioneering historian and philosopher of Indian art, particularly art history and symbolism, and an early interpreter of Indian culture to the West. In particular, he is described as "the groundbreaking theorist who was largely responsible for introducing ancient Indian art to the West." (Wikipedia)
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
November 21, 2018
Even though not as expected, the book was an interesting read. A lot of revelations on art, the artist and the process that leads to creation have been discussed here with notes and references to an abundance of Sanskrit texts. There are certain short flashes of wisdom when travelling through the verbose interpretations.
The personal view of the author is expressed, pointing to ancient texts, through the aim and motive of the aesthetic process. Art merely for sensual gratification is meaningless and the whole process of creation (of art) should be a process of devotion and expression of the highest principles of aesthetic expression. He sees art as a sacred process through which one may attain release (bliss) only by approaching it with reverence, love and devotion.
Notes:
The true and timeless relation of soul to God could now only be expressed in impassioned epithalamia celebrating the nuptials of Radha and Krsna, milkmaid and herdsman, earthly bride and heavenly bridegroom. So there came into being songs and dances in which at one and the same time, sensuality has spiritual significance and spirituality physical substance
Aesthetic experience is a transformation not merely of feeling (as suggested by the aesthesis), but equally of understanding the state of 'Deep Sleep'," A condensed understanding in the mode of ecstasy".
The level of pure aesthetic experience is indeed that of the pure angelic understanding, proper to the Motionless Heaven, Bhramalokha. With a flash of lighting.
Competence depends on purity or singleness of heart and on an inner character or habit of obedience tending to aversion of attention from external phenomena; this character or habit, not to be acquired by mere learning, but either innate or cultivated, depends on an ideal sensibility and the faculty of self-identification with the forms depicted.
The essential or soul of poetry is called Dhvani, ' the reverberation of meaning arising by suggestion'.
In grammar and logic, a word or other symbol is held to have two powers only, those of denotation and connotation. The rhetoricians assume for a word or symbol to have a third power, that of suggestion. In other words, denotation, connotation and suggestion correspond to literal, allegorical and anagogic significance.
The world is said to be differentiated or known in plurality by, and only by, means of names and aspects, namarupa, idea and image; " Voice is an apprehender; it is seized by the idea as an over-apprehender, then indeed by voice one utters thoughts, and similarly "Sight is an apprehender; it is seized by the aspect (rupa) as an over-apprehender, then indeed by the eye one sees things.
The whole conception of human life in operation and attainment is aesthetic: man is an artist in analogy of the exalted work and his idea of 'sovran good' and 'immutable delight' is that of a perfected art. Art is religion, religion art. No one can study theology without perceiving this.
To speak of art exclusively in terms of sensation is doing violence to the inner man, the knowing subject; to extract from Eckhart's thought 'a theory of taste would be doing violence to unity'.
Type and prototype, pattern, idea and ideal are used only with reference to things known and seen intellectually, the others in the same sense or with reference to the image materially embodied. What is an image in these two senses? An image 'is anything known or born'.
When the artist makes a statue out of wood or stone he does not put the image in the wood, he chips away the wood which hides the form. He gives nothing, he takes it away; carves it out where it is too thick, pares off overlay, and then there appears what was hidden.
So then normally there will be nothing of the artist in the work except his skill: 'the painter who has painted a good portrait therein shows his art; it is not himself that it reveals to us'. But if the painter paints his own portrait, as God does then both skill and his image will be in it, himself as he knows himself, but not his very self: "this reflects credit on the painter who embodies in it his dearest conception of his art and makes it the image of himself.
When God made man the very innermost heart of the Godhead was concerned in his making, and yet "Gods works enclose a mere nothing of God, wherefore they cannot disclose him".
Things flowed forth finite into time while abiding in eternity. " The idea of work exists in the worker's practical mind as an object of his understanding, which regards it as expressing his idea to which he forms the material work", that is, not in his mind as a mode of understanding, but as things already and directly understood, for "I make a letter of the alphabet like the image of that letter in my mind, not like my mind itself"
When will is at rest; there can be nothing meritorious in the possession of images. Since an image 'receives its being from the thing whose image it is, for it is a natural product... prior to will, will following the image'
The Angles communicate with each other in a hidden language, which embraces all things, but, does not extend to, or is not understood by all. The utterances are simple but exemplary; they confess all things, but do not specify them.
When one considers the impressive volumes of art, in which the form is as it were pressed outward from within by an indomitable will, one thinks also of those numerous passages in literature where the hero is said to swell with anger, or of the women's expanding bodies that expand in adolescence or in passion, or of those pregnant trees whose pent-up flowering must be released by the touch of a lovely foot. With the passing time all these energies were and must have been brought under great control, softened and refined in expression, the will no longer asserting, but now rather realising itself in an active quiescence.
In any case one could not if one wished to turn back the movement of time. To be other than we are would be for us the same as not to be; to wish that art of any period had been other than it was is the same as to wish that it had never been. Every style is complete in itself, and to be justified accordingly, not to be judged by the standards of a former or any other age.
Images receive material offerings and services, which they are said to 'enjoy'; we know that the real presence of the deity is invited in them. On completion of the image, its eyes are 'opened' by a special and elaborate ceremony. And is regarded as if animated by the deity.
The personal view of the author is expressed, pointing to ancient texts, through the aim and motive of the aesthetic process. Art merely for sensual gratification is meaningless and the whole process of creation (of art) should be a process of devotion and expression of the highest principles of aesthetic expression. He sees art as a sacred process through which one may attain release (bliss) only by approaching it with reverence, love and devotion.
Notes:
The true and timeless relation of soul to God could now only be expressed in impassioned epithalamia celebrating the nuptials of Radha and Krsna, milkmaid and herdsman, earthly bride and heavenly bridegroom. So there came into being songs and dances in which at one and the same time, sensuality has spiritual significance and spirituality physical substance
Aesthetic experience is a transformation not merely of feeling (as suggested by the aesthesis), but equally of understanding the state of 'Deep Sleep'," A condensed understanding in the mode of ecstasy".
The level of pure aesthetic experience is indeed that of the pure angelic understanding, proper to the Motionless Heaven, Bhramalokha. With a flash of lighting.
Competence depends on purity or singleness of heart and on an inner character or habit of obedience tending to aversion of attention from external phenomena; this character or habit, not to be acquired by mere learning, but either innate or cultivated, depends on an ideal sensibility and the faculty of self-identification with the forms depicted.
The essential or soul of poetry is called Dhvani, ' the reverberation of meaning arising by suggestion'.
In grammar and logic, a word or other symbol is held to have two powers only, those of denotation and connotation. The rhetoricians assume for a word or symbol to have a third power, that of suggestion. In other words, denotation, connotation and suggestion correspond to literal, allegorical and anagogic significance.
The world is said to be differentiated or known in plurality by, and only by, means of names and aspects, namarupa, idea and image; " Voice is an apprehender; it is seized by the idea as an over-apprehender, then indeed by voice one utters thoughts, and similarly "Sight is an apprehender; it is seized by the aspect (rupa) as an over-apprehender, then indeed by the eye one sees things.
The whole conception of human life in operation and attainment is aesthetic: man is an artist in analogy of the exalted work and his idea of 'sovran good' and 'immutable delight' is that of a perfected art. Art is religion, religion art. No one can study theology without perceiving this.
To speak of art exclusively in terms of sensation is doing violence to the inner man, the knowing subject; to extract from Eckhart's thought 'a theory of taste would be doing violence to unity'.
Type and prototype, pattern, idea and ideal are used only with reference to things known and seen intellectually, the others in the same sense or with reference to the image materially embodied. What is an image in these two senses? An image 'is anything known or born'.
When the artist makes a statue out of wood or stone he does not put the image in the wood, he chips away the wood which hides the form. He gives nothing, he takes it away; carves it out where it is too thick, pares off overlay, and then there appears what was hidden.
So then normally there will be nothing of the artist in the work except his skill: 'the painter who has painted a good portrait therein shows his art; it is not himself that it reveals to us'. But if the painter paints his own portrait, as God does then both skill and his image will be in it, himself as he knows himself, but not his very self: "this reflects credit on the painter who embodies in it his dearest conception of his art and makes it the image of himself.
When God made man the very innermost heart of the Godhead was concerned in his making, and yet "Gods works enclose a mere nothing of God, wherefore they cannot disclose him".
Things flowed forth finite into time while abiding in eternity. " The idea of work exists in the worker's practical mind as an object of his understanding, which regards it as expressing his idea to which he forms the material work", that is, not in his mind as a mode of understanding, but as things already and directly understood, for "I make a letter of the alphabet like the image of that letter in my mind, not like my mind itself"
When will is at rest; there can be nothing meritorious in the possession of images. Since an image 'receives its being from the thing whose image it is, for it is a natural product... prior to will, will following the image'
The Angles communicate with each other in a hidden language, which embraces all things, but, does not extend to, or is not understood by all. The utterances are simple but exemplary; they confess all things, but do not specify them.
When one considers the impressive volumes of art, in which the form is as it were pressed outward from within by an indomitable will, one thinks also of those numerous passages in literature where the hero is said to swell with anger, or of the women's expanding bodies that expand in adolescence or in passion, or of those pregnant trees whose pent-up flowering must be released by the touch of a lovely foot. With the passing time all these energies were and must have been brought under great control, softened and refined in expression, the will no longer asserting, but now rather realising itself in an active quiescence.
In any case one could not if one wished to turn back the movement of time. To be other than we are would be for us the same as not to be; to wish that art of any period had been other than it was is the same as to wish that it had never been. Every style is complete in itself, and to be justified accordingly, not to be judged by the standards of a former or any other age.
Images receive material offerings and services, which they are said to 'enjoy'; we know that the real presence of the deity is invited in them. On completion of the image, its eyes are 'opened' by a special and elaborate ceremony. And is regarded as if animated by the deity.
March 1, 2022
A tough nut to crack from Coomaraswamy. Published in 1939, one can see this as a sort of companion piece to Christian & Oriental Philosophy of Art (originally published as Why Exhibit Works of Art? in 1943). But let the reader beware!
Contrary to the latter book, which aims to address the general but learned reader (it was published by Luzac & Co., a kind of Inner Traditions of the early twentieth century), The Transformation of Nature in Art is technical book, first put to light by Harvard University Press. Coomaraswamy assembled here a host of essays, chiefly on the meaning of specific terms of Hindu and India philosophy of art. The exceptions are the two first, “The Theory of Art in India� and “Meister Eckhart’s View on Art,� but these too are bulky writings, the pages littered with diacritics and references to Asian scriptures.
Those who are familiar with Coomaraswamy’s works will find again his main arguments: Art has nothing to do with aesthetics or with vain enjoyment. There are equivalences in the views of art in the Orient and in the West (at least up until the end of Scholasticism). All those who work are artists and should treat their works accordingly. And his famous “Art imitates nature in its manner of operation� surely is here too.
What distinguishes this work from others Coomaraswamy dedicate to these subjects is that he is trying to convince the scholar that he is right. Coomaraswamy goes at lengths to show that certain terms, such as Äå²ú³óÄå²õ²¹, ±è²¹°ù´Ç°ìá¹£a, ±è°ù²¹³Ù²â²¹°ìá¹£a, etc., have a certain meaning and one should translate them in a certain way. Plus, all these terms have a link to metaphysics and religion, and one should treat them—and art as a whole, in the East or the West—likewise.
This book should not your first if you are fresh to Coomaraswamy, or to Traditionalism in art. Christian & Oriental Philosophy of Art, as I said, will be a more pleasant read. Some of the essays in that book are transcriptions of radio broadcasts, so it was tailored to new ears. What is more, other books from the Traditionalist standpoint on these themes are less cumbersome. A fine example is Brian Keeble’s God & Work (2009). (The very first essay in it is on Coomaraswamy’s views on art, by the way.) Be that as it may, any time spent with Ananda K. Coomaraswamy is no time wasted.
April 14, 2018
Kitap spesifik sayılabilecek konulara değiniyor. Yazarın kendi yazdıklarından çok, alıntılar dikkatimi çekti. Çok da kaydedeğer değil ortalama okur için.
“İdeal Güzellik bilgisi sonradan elde edilemez, bizimle birlikte doğar� Blake
Namarupa: dünyanın isim ve görüntüden ibaret olduğuna dair düşünce.
"Bilgi üç çeşittir; 1- Duyu organları ile hissedilen 2- Mantık ve zekayla kavranan 3- Metafizik bilgi."
"Sanatçı özel tür bir insan değildir. Fakat her insan özel tür bir sanatçıdır."
"Şimdi sanat normal bir faaliyet şekli olmaktan çıkmış ve bir lüks haline gelmiştir. Bütün insanlar sefalet ve kargaşa ortamında yaşamaya zorlanmışlar ve meşakketlere öyle alıştırılmışlardır ki, kaybettikleri şeyin farkında bile değildirler."
“İdeal Güzellik bilgisi sonradan elde edilemez, bizimle birlikte doğar� Blake
Namarupa: dünyanın isim ve görüntüden ibaret olduğuna dair düşünce.
"Bilgi üç çeşittir; 1- Duyu organları ile hissedilen 2- Mantık ve zekayla kavranan 3- Metafizik bilgi."
"Sanatçı özel tür bir insan değildir. Fakat her insan özel tür bir sanatçıdır."
"Şimdi sanat normal bir faaliyet şekli olmaktan çıkmış ve bir lüks haline gelmiştir. Bütün insanlar sefalet ve kargaşa ortamında yaşamaya zorlanmışlar ve meşakketlere öyle alıştırılmışlardır ki, kaybettikleri şeyin farkında bile değildirler."
January 7, 2019
"Jesus and his disciples were all artist, praise is the practice of Art; Israel delivered from Egypt is Art delivered from Nature and Imitation; The eternal body of man is the imagination: The gods of Greece and Egypt were mathematical diagrams; Eternity is in love with the productions of time; Man has no body distinct from his Soul" Some amazingly heady stuff. A portal to the Art of the Universe.
August 18, 2022
Love how this person was about a million years ahead of their time in terms of social justice. Can't say it was the most stimulating or well-written read of my life, but I learned a lot.
October 7, 2021
Total hogwash.
Avoid this book.
Avoid this book.
September 9, 2009
La estética del arte oriental y sus acercamientos al arte del medioevo occidental.
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