Wednesday, August 6, 2008

more strange-making

Sam,

Got to be a sealed-off PLACE for this kind of activity,
thinking, converse- action and art-going-on.
 
Not in the marketplace. 
 
School qualifies, but even there: got to differentiate between
the  Get R Done  agenda and  the liberal art: between
scissors, paper, and rock.   


This morning as I was walking up on Sunset Mtn, I was thinking (for a moment) about the theatre as a place where it was safe to really see (theatron, right?), where we go to really attend to what is happening, because usually we have to filter out so much noise that we end up filtering out the important signals as well.  Also thinking about the notion of "coherence" in art and how that quality might aid in seeing (I don't think "coherence" in this case is quite the same as we might use it to describe, say, a logical system of thought--though, frankly, I'm not sure how to define "coherence" in art).

Anyway.

I like the idea of "school" qualifying as a "theatron"--maybe thinking that way helps to distinguish between what aids Liberal Art and what doesn't.

Graham

1 comment:

  1. Theater was religious,
    originally, true?

    Catharsis: the purgation
    of fear AND pity--both,
    so as to be able to see
    without those 2 interferring
    as they naturally do?

    Purgatory: a purification.
    Washed in the blood of the
    spam.

    The Play's the thing.

    I agree with you: "coherence"
    (and consistency) are words that
    mean one think among logicians,
    radically different and
    incommensurate among artists.

    And yet: the same words.

    No wonder we confuse each other,
    collapsing and conflating
    realms of activity, yet using/
    abusing the same words across
    the curriculum.

    Can't be helped. But maybe
    seen--factored inn? Talked
    about a lot so as to at least
    be able to track the confusion?

    Dramatize?

    Best, Sam

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