The Alien Jane Goodall and The Artists Creed: 

#1

The Fundamental elements of art are perennial.

     Imagine yourself an Alien Jane Goodall, sent from Alpha Centauri.  You came in order to study human beings, and have made yourself invisible to us in order to avoid changing our behavior as you observe. (The law of Cause and effect still applies, so you would want to minimize your effect upon us and visa versa.)  The development of your species and civilization would be very different from ours.  This vast difference would in fact be so great that it would afford you certain objectivity from which to observe us, that we could not achieve observing ourselves.  

     One of the human habits you might find most interesting is our insistence upon making things, not just functional things but special, what we would call beautiful in fact.  You might watch us repeatedly remake even the most functional tools, hypothesizing that this is done in order to improve their visual and functional appeal.  You would observe that we place great value upon certain objects.  Some ancient, some brand new.  We build large expensive structures, wherein we maintain and care for these objects at great expense, time and effort.  You would observe us often making pilgrimages to view these objects, taking our children to see them repeatedly.   You notice that among adults it becomes ever less common to make these pilgrimages.  You might hypothesize that it is some sort of right of passage to go to these places and that once the process is complete, it is no longer necessary to attend.  Perhaps you think these places as a sort of indoctrination center, where we are introduced into the special rights of each civilization.  The buildings and objects may have a kind of spiritual or religious function.  Several of these buildings are in every major city and many smaller towns, all housing ‘special’ objects from various places and peoples on the planet.  Yet, there seems to be some basic characteristics in common among all of these objects that our observer would see as fundamental.

     The first great invention of humanity may actually have been adopted from our lost brethren the Neanderthals.  This invention, far more significant than any other, is the simple, humble, ubiquitous line.  In every time and in every place where there have been modern humans there has been the line.  It has existed in many of the current manifestations for as long as there has been the written word, approximately 5200 years.  Long before that, we drew lines making crude maps of the paths of Mammoths in the snow while planning our attacks.  We drew lines upon our faces, and on the outside of our dwellings.  We made lines when we fashioned ever more straight spears and arrows.  We made lines when we fashioned their points fine, strong and sharp.  We marked out our territory by imagining lines that connected distant hills and a meadow edge.  Lines are our first and greatest invention, though taken for granted by us, to you our Alien observer this simple tool might be quite remarkable, after all a completely alien being could have developed completely different adaptations.

     You as our observer would note that given the significance of the line (from your point of view) human visual arts have not really changed significantly over the last 35,000 years.  (Upon his visit to see the caves at Lascaux in 1940 Picasso said; “We have invented nothing.”) Civilizations have grown up and fallen, been reduced to rubble and used as the foundation of the next.  This cycle has occurred many times. On the continent of Africa, the birthplace of modern humans, we still do not know the exact number of civilizations that have risen and fallen since we first ventured north. The difference between the painting on the walls of Roman homes 2,000 years ago and the painting of other eras is only slight from her point of view.  A variation of emphasis within the elements marks the great superficial differences we see.  The changes in the technology of paint and support, in the manufacture of brushes, canvas, panel or wall also show in the finished product.  When we walk through a museum, we might see very different paintings in each room, yet the fundamental elements are all there.

     If we were to observe a painter beginning work on a fresco in ancient Rome, and another starting a painting in the middle ages, we would find the beginning remarkably similar to those used by most painters today.  Due to modern technology, paint is a great deal less expensive than it was then, so today a painter can choose to skip the preliminary drawing phase if they like.  In all three works, line, shape, value, texture & color begin the process of making a visual image. When finished all human beings will comprehend on some level, the three images though the context is completely different.  In this way the visual arts, like music, is a form of communication independent of verbal language, ethnicity, custom, age, race, and nationality.  It reaches beyond our momentary place in human time, and the boundaries we make for ourselves called civilization. 

There may be nothing new under the sun, but the novelty of a new individuals experience of life from their own personal ordinary life, can be extraordinary in its ability to remind us of our deepest selves, to touch that secret part of us that is ‘me’ and ‘you.’ Work that can recall in us what actually is and is not significant in life, setting that most ancient and most common key into the lock and opening us to the timeless language within The Arts.

NOTES:

-The elements of visual art and design are; Line, value, shape, texture, color, rhythm, harmony, variety, balance, contrast, movement, proportion, and form. 

-Perennial as in continuing without interruption and/or constantly reoccurring.