2010.03.12 07:00 - The Art and Language of Not Knowing

The Guardian for this meeting was Eliza Madrigal. The comments are by Eliza Madrigal, who was joined by Yakuzza, Bleu, Zen, and later in the village, SophiaSharon.

This was a nearly blissful session wherein we discussed phenomenology and art, not-knowing and Knowing. Then we took a field trip to Bleu's guardian spot in the village, which led us to Zen's offsite gallery. The only thing missing was the wine but well, for some of us it was morning. ;-)   

Yakuzza Lethecus: hi eliza
Eliza Madrigal: Hey Ya :))
Yakuzza Lethecus: i hope you´re fine ?
Eliza Madrigal: yes very well, thanks... thinking about consciousness and such this morning
Eliza Madrigal: You?
Yakuzza Lethecus: fine, i was just talking to a guy from japan living in germany through skype
Yakuzza Lethecus: very interesting
Yakuzza Lethecus: and when i noticed that i was still in sl i came over :
Yakuzza Lethecus: :)
Yakuzza Lethecus: hey bleu
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Bleu! :)
Bleu Oleander: hey Eliza, Yaku
Yakuzza Lethecus: could you elaborate more on ur thoughts about conciousness eliza ?
Eliza Madrigal: Hm, actually Bleu's timing is perfect because we were talking yesterday about this
Eliza Madrigal: and I followed up on a link....
Bleu Oleander: yes
Eliza Madrigal: which caused me to keep going with other links...
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Zen :)
Bleu Oleander: hi Zen
Zen Arado: Hi Eliza, Bleu, Yaku
Eliza Madrigal: So I ended up with videos about phenomenology which were also very clarifying
Bleu Oleander: which ones?
Eliza Madrigal: we piece things together... here, there... never know when it all begins to congeal
Eliza Madrigal: Ah, listening to Dreyfus discuss Heidegger
Eliza Madrigal: and Merleau-Ponty
Bleu Oleander: I would enjoy a video on phenom
Yakuzza Lethecus: itunesU the hubert dryfuss lectures ?
Eliza Madrigal: youtube actually
Eliza Madrigal: Let me see....
Eliza Madrigal: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aaGk6S1qhz0

Eliza Madrigal: These are the videos I was watching... not specifically phenom I guess and light on husserl
Eliza Madrigal: but I'd read a heidegger book a year ago and this helped me to understand it a bit better
Eliza Madrigal: the idea of spaces for authenticity were especially interesting...
Bleu Oleander: what book was that?
--BELL--
Eliza Madrigal: You know I couldn't tell you... it was a tiny book

Maybe it was a book 'about' Heidegger I was reading, but it centered around daisen and authenticity ...

Bleu Oleander: I'm reading "Intro to Phenomenology" by Sokolowski
Eliza Madrigal: Oh? How do you find it?
Zen Arado: it wasn't 'Being and Time then it's a pretty hefty book
Bleu Oleander: It's great ... helps a lot
Zen Arado: ty for link wiil look at video later
Eliza Madrigal: What is your background here Bleu? Just now interested or for a while?
Zen Arado: I have that book too Bleu
Bleu Oleander: Interested for a while
Bleu Oleander: exposed to many ideas through our group
Eliza Madrigal: I think I'd like to read Being and Time, and to go back into a discussion on Dogen's "Time Being" I eavesdropped on from the time workshop last year
Eliza Madrigal: Ah, really
Zen Arado: I had to read parts of it for a dissertation
Zen Arado: it's pretty incomprehencible :)
Eliza Madrigal: :))) Which one, Zen? Dogen or Heidegger??
Eliza Madrigal: heheh
Zen Arado: Heidegger
Zen Arado: Dogen isn't easy either :)
Eliza Madrigal: we each have angles which enable us to come at things in a personal way which opens up
Eliza Madrigal: for me authenticity seems a door
Bleu Oleander: for me, insatiable curiousity
Eliza Madrigal smiles!!!
Bleu Oleander: not enough hours in the day!

Being in the presence of two artists, I felt an almost entirely clear overlap. Perhaps this is due to lately watching my own reactions when observing, and in particular that 'first sight'.

Eliza Madrigal: Interest in art and consciousness seem the same thing
Bleu Oleander: one thing leads to the next .... interrelated
Eliza Madrigal: in some ways... was also part of the discussion... regarding the object giving the viewer a distance to work with...
Eliza Madrigal: that the work itself situates the observer?
Zen Arado: I am trying to get away from intellectual, rational philosophising kind of thought
Bleu Oleander: to what?

Not Knowing...

Zen Arado: I am reading a book called 'The Book of Not Knowing
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Bleu Oleander: ha!
Bleu Oleander: great title
Eliza Madrigal nods
Zen Arado: by the time I finish it I won't know anything :)
Eliza Madrigal: hahahahahahha
Bleu Oleander: Ha!!
Zen Arado: but it takes 579 pages for that
Bleu Oleander: wow
Eliza Madrigal: the thing is... immediacy and a way of 'not knowing' IS what these intellectual discources are about...
Bleu Oleander: that's a lot of pages to say nothing
Eliza Madrigal: as much as anything else
Zen Arado: yes
Eliza Madrigal: direct experience
Zen Arado: before you know you have to 'not know'
Zen Arado: like thew epoche
Yakuzza Lethecus: hmm, i feel like that when i read TSK
Eliza Madrigal: you have to get comfortable in the anxiety
Eliza Madrigal: Definitely, Ya

Epoche...

Bleu Oleander: how do you understand the epoche Zen?
Bleu Oleander: (btw, how do you pronounce that?)
Zen Arado: kind of suspending our preconceptions and seeing what is there directly
Bleu Oleander: oh like PaB
Eliza Madrigal: epo- he'.... which was a surprise to me until hearing Pema
Zen Arado: French word?
Eliza Madrigal: suspension of belief even in 'world'
Zen Arado: same as 'not knowing'
Eliza Madrigal: hm... i dont think so but that was my pronunciation best attempt
Eliza Madrigal: hehe
Bleu Oleander: is that like ee po hey' ?
Zen Arado: we have so many ideas 'about' everything already that prevent us really seeing and knowing
Eliza Madrigal: Right, so in PaB we suspend our ideas and conceptualizations and 'just try'.. notice
Eliza Madrigal nods to Zen... and yes Bleu that's much better!

Language...

Bleu Oleander: can we know something without using our language to describe what we know?
Zen Arado: apparently we can
Eliza Madrigal: well the next second we begin to articulate... to add on...
Eliza Madrigal: but we can get more and more comfortable with that 'instant' perhaps
Bleu Oleander: how would we know then?
Zen Arado: like there is a deeper kind of knowing
Eliza Madrigal: yes, not knowing of 'some thing'
Zen Arado: like an artist gets creativity from a deeper place
Eliza Madrigal: awareness aware of itself
Eliza Madrigal: hmm, nods
Bleu Oleander: I articulate my thoughts on my art while I'm creating it
--BELL--
Eliza Madrigal: we're always going to fall short... so that's the anxiety
Eliza Madrigal: of articulating/understanding... Knowing would be something 'else'...?
Zen Arado: but real creativity seems to be not from rational mind
Eliza Madrigal: and in working with a piece isn't there a kind of back and forth communication...
Bleu Oleander: why do you say that Zen?
Zen Arado: or like Einstein haing inspiration from somewhaere
Eliza Madrigal: room for surprise beyond what one thinks or intends...
Bleu Oleander: yes, Eliza
Eliza Madrigal: so that room then... ?
Zen Arado: just feel that real creativity isn't a rational process
Bleu Oleander: I think the rational mind can be very creative
Zen Arado: of course we can rationalize it afterwards
Eliza Madrigal: when flexible, agreed.... why these discussions are so interesting

Creativity...

Bleu Oleander: "real creativity" ... how do you define that?
Zen Arado: I find a lot of painting is trying to get away from conditioned patterns of what it should be
Zen Arado: for me that is
Zen Arado: like in trying to paint abstracts
Bleu Oleander: are you a painter?
Zen Arado: feel my rational mind still wants it to represent something
Zen Arado: yes
Zen Arado: and you notice how people are anxious to find something they recognise in abstracts
Eliza Madrigal: that's why pollock was so controversial
Zen Arado: 'it looks like such and such....
Bleu Oleander: I use painting as a tool to express my feelings
Zen Arado: wish I coould
Zen Arado: but maybe I am trying to n
Zen Arado: not know' what I am doing
Bleu Oleander: I paint when I can't find the words

Flow, and getting out of the way...  

Eliza Madrigal: one of the things discussed in those videos also, is a place of 'coping' where one is not necessarily conscious of 'doing' and yet doing is being done...
Zen Arado: good point Bleu
Eliza Madrigal: Ah, nice Bleu. The few times I'm painted that's what took me there
Zen Arado: art speaks for itself ...not in language
Bleu Oleander: yes
Eliza Madrigal: it responds
Eliza Madrigal: 'deep unto deep' perhaps
Zen Arado: you see? Not knowing
Eliza Madrigal: if one can get out of the way or make their getting in the way more flexible/transparent?
Eliza Madrigal: YES :))
Zen Arado: rationality needs language ?
Bleu Oleander: (makes note to clean up studio and start painting!)
Eliza Madrigal is positively giddy to be having this discussion
Eliza Madrigal: Yes, Bleu!! Is the work you have displayed in the village representative of your work generally?
Eliza Madrigal: It is beautiful, refreshing
Eliza Madrigal: fun
Bleu Oleander: no
Bleu Oleander: not exactly
Bleu Oleander: It's from a show I had 2 yrs age
Zen Arado: getting out of one's way is good Eliza
Bleu Oleander: I work out issues with my art
Zen Arado: I am not a professional painter
Bleu Oleander: and get thoughts clarified
Zen Arado: though I do sell
Bleu Oleander: don't think it's important to be a "pro" .... just to enjoy it
Eliza Madrigal: so that makes you professional to some extent :)
Zen Arado: I used to just copy photos mainly
Eliza Madrigal nods
Bleu Oleander: the process is what is important
Zen Arado: but found it was color that turned me on
Eliza Madrigal: and when one is able to enjoy that, then others might pick up on that when experiencing the work...
Bleu Oleander: process, experience, being in the moment, flow ....
Zen Arado: so now I paint colors in abstract
Eliza Madrigal: what one experiences though, is perhaps all that 'first' thing... that instant... THEN look closer and draw meanings, etc?
Eliza Madrigal: MM, yes flow
Bleu Oleander: I love flow .... keeps me painting!
Eliza Madrigal: how do you feel there?
Zen Arado: many painters find it so difficult to paint abstracts
Bleu Oleander: transported
Zen Arado: so conditioned about what paintings 'have' to be like
Zen Arado: hard to overcome that conditioning
Eliza Madrigal smiles and considers 'transported'
Eliza Madrigal: and flowing from not-knowing... hehe
Zen Arado: :)
Zen Arado: so hard to 'not know too

I think the following was a typo, but it fits so well... loosening or losing ...

Bleu Oleander: the kind of painting or subject really doesn't matter to me ... it's all about the process and loosing myself in flow
--BELL--
Yakuzza Lethecus: i have to overcome my non constructive form of not knowing to a postive form of not knowingness
Eliza Madrigal: to break that down ?
Zen Arado: I think you hae to not know fully Yaku....but I can't do it
Eliza Madrigal: Hm... I'm thinking we have to work with what we've got... but in doing so we can find more and more space in that...
Zen Arado: you can't let your rational mid tell you how to 'not know'
Zen Arado: mind
Bleu Oleander: I think not knowing is really knowing but from an interconnected position
Eliza Madrigal: !!
Zen Arado: I'm lost...but that's good
Zen Arado: as Pema would say
Zen Arado: :)
Eliza Madrigal: :)))
Bleu Oleander: this conversation has an element of flow to it .... the time has zipped by!
Bleu Oleander: fun topics!
Eliza Madrigal: Stim talks about even our limitations being open ... TSK would use the term "Great Knowledge"
Zen Arado: yes agree :)
Eliza Madrigal: YES
Zen Arado: have to show me your paintings Bleu
Bleu Oleander: I would love that Zen
Yakuzza Lethecus: we could go over and make a bleu art exhibition :)

We head to the village...

Eliza Madrigal loves that the last guardian meeting brought up so many ideas for everyone to share
Bleu Oleander: :)
Zen Arado: missed that...I had to go to a friend's last week
Eliza Madrigal: Sure! Let's go
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Zen Arado: where we going?
Eliza Madrigal: Bleu's spot is near the hall
Zen Arado: ok
Yakuzza Lethecus: and i guess we could open our microphones :)