From: Platt Holden (pholden@sc.rr.com)
Date: Wed Mar 26 2003 - 17:02:57 GMT
Hi Johnny:
Rick is more capable than I to detect the flaws in your argument that
Dynamic Quality is something that "just changes things according to
how the static patterns dictate that it must." So I'll leave it to him to
show you the error of your ways in that regard. I want instead to pick up
on something you said about art.
> We don't like artists who make carbon copies of others' artwork,
> we EXPECT artwork to be innovative in some way, or it isn't high quality.
We may not like the forger who copies another's art, but to claim only
innovative art is high quality goes against not only the judgment of art
collectors and connoisseurs, but the public. For example, many art
critics and historians agree that no paintings have ever exceeded the
quality of those found in caves near Lascaux in France, put there by
unknown prehistoric humans. Jump ahead to a 17th century painter.
Thousands are now flocking to the Metropolitan Art Museum in NY to
see paintings by the Spanish court painter, Velazquez who many say is
the greatest painter who ever lived. Pirsig speaks of another great
Spanish painter, El Greco, who in several of his most famous paintings
caught the Dharmakaya light, a sign of Dynamic Quality. My personal
favorites are the 17th century Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer and the
19th century American Winslow Homer whose non-innovative paintings
of non-innovative scenes bowl me over with esthetic impact. Most of the
"innovative" paintings of the postmodern era intended to shock and awe
are better described as shlock and awful.
No, innovation doesn't determine high quality art. The criteria for artistic
quality are the degree that the artwork in question reveals truths about
life and excites "apprehensions of things to obscure for existing
language."
I would just add that if you've never experienced a DQ moment, whether
touched off by a work of art, a heart attack (as described by Pirsig in
Lila, Chap. 9) or by some other catalyst, then it will forever escape your
knowing what it is. It can't be defined.
Platt
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