Well, David:
That's one way to get a response: Be divisive (i.e.: "...While great
strides were made in the areas of science and technology, the art world
slumbered in outmoded pursuits."
But then, I suppose the argument has been made from the other side, and
quite often, that while late 19thC science was slumbering in its
Victorian dreams ala H.G. Wells and Jules Verne and various escapes to
other worlds -- while those romantic imaginations of the new Darwinisms
were taking the place of any real progress, great strides WERE being
made in this world, in color and composition, and in the theory of
representation in general.
Contrarily to what you say, the optical studies involved in
Impressionism, Pointillism, Fauve, etc., were in a way much more
"advanced" than Science's primitive moves from 17thC wood and bronze
gadgets (beautifully crafted, however) to the first mastery of
electricity using pointer meters (quite ugly by comparison).
And I can't say that the move to individual digital readers has been
improved by any new aesthetic quality. Notice that surgery cutting tools
are quite beautiful still, but only as they reflect their primitive
origins, while real lasers never have the design as that in the James
Bond movies. REAL ones are merely poorly put together boxes, out of
which something emerges, but why, is anyone's guess.
On the other side, the occasional rack of highly inventive glass tubes,
condensers, etc., used by chemical types is about as good in reality as
old Frankenstein movies showed them. And I must admit, the great walls
of lights and digital meters used for tracking power grids (real ones)
is truly a beautiful composition (the engineer's aesthetic).
So tell me, David: Do you think you will find the answers to such
aesthetic questions as these in the area of the prefrontal lobes? Or
perhaps around the corpus collosum, or actually IN it as the highway to
everywhere? Or maybe it will be found in the right hemispherical lobe
alone, of the cerebral cortex?
Indeed, might not much of this be investigated in the nerve train of the
backbone, and not in the brain at all?
BUt what do I know? My small knowledge of physiology is not only minute,
its antique. Still, I cannot help but wonder how much the relationship
between the praxis of design and its theory have really changed. For
instance, many years ago when I asked Julian Hochberg (Cornell) to take
his perception psychology courses, he said, "What's the point? As an
architectural design student you are far beyond anything we will come
across in class." Happily, my intuition was that I could learn a great
deal in spite of Prof. Hochberg's negative position; and I did. But what
I learned was a help only to me, and only because I was already a
designer and could recognize certain patterns and relationships held in
common by psychology and design.
In other words, I don't think that polarizing these issues as retarded
art versus advanced science will lead to very much -- UNTIL (and
probably this is what you were hoping for) we agree on WHAT IS THIS ART
STUFF, to which you are referring. Otherwise, you become trapped in yet
another solipsistic discussion on brain-works, presuming some contact
with art think, but in reality having no aesthetic content.
And there's the rub. How may we describe (forget "defining", just try
describing) the aesthetic experience in such a way that it provides
physiological affirmation?
If then, the Science part of the curve is presently up while the Art
portion of it is down, does that really make any difference? For if
scientific studies entirely fail at explaining aesthetic decisions --
usually making very poor aesthetic decision in their own behalf -- how
may scientific imaginations make even a comment on aesthetics? Unless
they come to grips with aesthetics' very slippery system of truths, and
candidly confront aesthetic values themselves, is not all this talk of
an aesthetic mere wishful thinking?
This is nothing new. Science had all this explained to them by Susanne
Langer's neat little book in 1942, "Philosophy In A New Key". Until its
issues are confronted and overcome, I doubt that anything will change.
All this "advance" and progress stuff is mere puffery when those who are
so puffed up cannot even make a conscious aesthetic decision, much less
explain it in terms of its system of values and truths.
Richard McBride
School of ARchitecture
University of Texas at Arlington
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