Chung,
S. K. (2003). The challenge of presenting cultural artifacts in a museum
setting. Art Education, 56 (1), 13-18.
Chung,
S. K. (2004).Zen (Ch’an) and aesthetic education, in Diaz G. &
McKenna M. (Eds.), Teaching for aesthetic experience: The art of
learning. NY: Peter Lang.
This
article is presented here as a writing sample. It was originally published
in the Journal of the National Art Education Association (NAEA) in January,
2003. Please respect NAEA 's copy rights of this article.
The Challenge of
Presenting Cultural Artifacts in a Museum Setting
Sheng Kuan Chung
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
This article is a
self-reflection that followed my on-site museum presentation to a group of
graduate students. The goal of the presentation was to help students understand
and appreciate artifacts from the collection of the Asian Art Gallery at a
Midwestern university’s art museum. The purpose of this self-reflection is
twofold: first, to describe existing and emerging problems related to multicultural
art appreciation and criticism activities conducted in museum settings, and
second, to offer some insights into the presentation of cultural heritage
in educational environments. This personal reflection is intended to serve
as a catalyst for art and museum educators, helping them to examine their
own practices that utilize museum cultural objects.
Cultural Objects
in the Art Museum
With the increased
emphasis on art literacy, many art educators have given increasing attention
to museum cultural objects. A cultural artifact is easily accessible to students
because it is a concrete, observable manifestation of a cultural belief, scientific
breakthrough, or aesthetic accomplishment of an examined culture, as opposed
to a piece of abstract information. Therefore, educators can use cultural
objects to explain aesthetic expressions, complex concepts, values, traditions,
and ideas from various cultures; these objects can be used to support a substantial
learning experience. In-depth explorations using a variety of cultural objects
can help students understand themselves and the visual world around them.
There is a general perception that
every item stored or displayed in an art museum represents the artistic achievement
of some human group. This raises the question of whether an object in an art
museum collection reveals more than its outward artistic significance, as
well as the question of whether the meanings conventionally associated with
the term art limit a museum’s capacity to educate visitors about the range
of human accomplishments in general. Art museums are institutions where humans
not only preserve their artistic accomplishments, but also the everyday items
related to their cultural heritages, scientific discoveries, and sociopolitical
developments; all of these phenomena are preserved in varied visual forms
over the years. These cultural objects are preserved and passed down primarily
due to their social, political, religious, and/or aesthetic significance,
and are accompanied by a rich repertoire of human beliefs and values. Displaying
these cultural objects in a so-called art museum may restrict the viewers
to see them simply as art (under the art for art sake tenet) and nothing more.
It is certain that a work of art is a cultural product; however, a cultural
product may not be regarded as a work of art.
As art museums expand their collections
of visual objects from other cultures, the conflict between the contextual
meanings of these cultural objects and the typical expectations for an art
museum setting will become increasingly salient. Once art museums become filled
with exotic cultural objects, a careful examination of the inter-relationships
among art, cultural objects, and museums will be needed. Art educators should
be aware that displaying cultural or religion-bound objects in the art museum
is unsettling and when cultural objects are shown in a so-called art museum
or art gallery, viewers are likely to appreciate them from an aesthetic standpoint,
and they will unquestionably disregard the social, cultural, religious, and
political layers of meaning originally embedded in them.
A Critical Lens
Historically, art museums have
maintained social hierarchies. Many art museum practices developed in response
to middle-class traditions of modernism, such as the museum’s interior structure,
how art and cultural objects are displayed, as well as educational initiatives
(Moore, 1997). For example, in a typical exhibit space, a desirable two-dimensional
piece is well proportioned in relation to its wall space, whereas a three-dimensional
piece is positioned and protected by high-tech glass. The wall-like painting
in the art museum is ideal for generating a climate of awe. As art or museum
educators, have we ever questioned why all visual objects in the art museum,
from ancient to contemporary, were displayed in the same fashion? Did African
tribes hang their masks on the walls for sheer aesthetic enjoyment? Did Indian
Buddhists position their sculptures of Buddha as window displays? Or did Ancient
Chinese place their kitchen utensils on the pedestals with a spotlight on
them?
According to Karp (1991), art museums
present visual objects of other cultures in such a way that they are simply
a visual resource for the advancement of modern art. Karp’s claim can be further
verified by carefully looking at how modern artists (e.g., Picasso, Gauguin,
Van Gogh, and Dubuffet) appropriated foreign symbols to create their masterpieces.
It is uncertain how a Euro-centric, aesthetic paradigm of museum practice
can present the context of a discourse that is culturally specific. Undoubtedly,
when cultural artifacts are arbitrarily displayed in the art museum, they
most likely will be deprived of their original purpose in the cultural milieu
where they were made. For art and museum educators, the emerging challenge
is how we present cultural objects to the viewers so that each cultural object
truly unveils its contextual significance.
By naming culture-based exhibit rooms art galleries (e.g., Asian Art Gallery
or African Art Gallery) art museums both assume and convey the idea that all
of the displayed cultural items are art. This is problematic because the meanings
of these cultural items and modern notions of art often contradict. In addition,
what does Asian Art mean? Is a contemporary abstract painting made by an Asian
artist called Asian Art? What criteria used to distinguish Asian art from
non Asian art among Asian art?
Asian Art
On the day of my presentation,
I led my participants to a corner of the Asian Art Gallery where a Chinese
ink painting, “Lohan Seated in a Tree,” was displayed (see Figure 1). As the
participants began embracing me in semi-circle, I gathered my thoughts for
the talk. I then pointed to the painting and said, “Let’s look at this work
of art.” At that moment, I thought, “Is this really a work of art?” It had
seemed logical to me, as art instructor, to assume that everything displayed
in the art museum was a work of art. After five minutes or so, the painting
revealed more than its aesthetic appearance. Eventually I ceased referring
to this painting a work of art.
For postmodernists, the notion
of art implies certain derogatory connotations, for example, that art is bourgeois,
esoteric, and created for its own sake. In the Western modern era, one can
convincingly argue whether a work possesses the necessary qualities to be
classified as art when the work was created within the discipline of art.
In the Eastern pre-modern world, however, most visual products were created
primarily because of their utilitarian values, not for their own sake. For
example, a Chinese rice bowl was produced for containing rice and a Buddhist
sculpture was carved to inspire Buddhist followers. The Chinese rice bowl
would be appreciated as a work of art only after it was able to hold rice
(see Figure 2). Commonly displayed in art museums, so-called Asian art pieces
are actually the ordinary household items that early Asian folks used in their
everyday lives. Indeed, these functional objects do not fully relate to the
notion of art proposed in the Western modern world. First, most Asian cultural
objects are not intellectually inaccessible in any way since they were produced
with the intent of having functional utility in people’s lives. Secondly,
they were not merely created to serve the sheer enjoyment of bourgeoisie.
Western Art Criticism
Approaches
Standing before “Lohan Seated in
a Tree,” I guided my participants in exploring the components of the painting.
A 5-minute visual inventory was enough for me to describe what I saw in terms
of its elements and principles of design. Next, I analyzed the connections
between the depicted components of the painting, using Feldman’s approach
(1981) to art criticism, which consists of the four stages: description, analysis,
interpretation, and evaluation. Based on Feldman’s model, I also developed
an activity worksheet that required my participants to work collaboratively
on a designated artifact after my demonstration. When I reached Feldman’s
interpretation stage, I started to apply my understanding of Asian culture
to the painting, and I could not resist the temptation to clarify that common
seen Asian artifacts were rooted in natural, unsystematic, and spiritual beliefs.
I suddenly realized that Feldman’s approach was systematic, analytical, and
logical, and the contradiction between these two perspectives became clear.
Art criticism is a very Western
enterprise. Along with Feldman’s work, several similar approaches have been
proposed (Anderson, 1993; Barrett, 1994; Broudy, 1972). Anderson's (1993)
instrument comprises five sequential stages: reaction, perceptual analysis,
personal interpretation, contextual examination, and synthesis. Broudy’s aesthetic
scanning (1972) is another often-used approach to art appreciation. Broudy
invites the viewer to inspect a work’s sensory, formal, technical, and expressive
properties systematically. In a work of art, sensory properties are its depicted
elements, such as lines, shapes, colors, values, and textures. Formal properties
are the principles of design, i.e. organization, composition, variation, repletion,
and rhythm. Technical properties deal with media, processes, and tools, while
expressive properties cope with mood, dynamics, and idea. Barrett’s approach
(1994) includes the four processes of description, interpretation, judgment,
and theorizing. Of these, Barrett emphasizes the process of interpretation,
which, he maintains, is the most critical aspect of art criticism because
a viewer cannot describe, judge, and theorize art without interpreting it.
As my presentation continued, even
though I had intended to follow the Feldman’s four sequential stages. I was
aware of my constantly shifting from the stage of interpretation to that of
description, analysis to interpretation, evaluation to interpretation and
vice versa. I found that in order for the viewers to make sense of what is
going on in any given stage, one must simultaneously provide necessary interpretations.
My experience confirmed Barrett’s belief that without interpretation, any
stage of art appreciation would be impossible.
A number of art criticism models
developed in the West share many similarities. Hamblen (1991) states that
“both Feldman’s and Broudy’s methods have primarily focused toward an analysis
of the perceptual, ostensibly intrinsic, qualities of the art work. It is
assumed that an analysis and interpretation of art’s formal qualities are
universally applicable” (p. 8). This assumption is slowly fading away, however,
as human society moves toward multiculturalism. In a culturally aware society,
it would be naive to assert that a universal instrument can be meaningfully
adapted to understanding other cultures and their products, since every culture
has an identity characterized by a unique set of norms, values, beliefs, and
practices. Hamblen states that “an analytical probing of meaning and value
is most characteristic of formalized academic art criticism and of art criticism
dealing with unfamiliar art forms” (1991, p. 8). Using a formalist analysis
to interpret a cultural object will result in misinterpreting and misunderstanding
that object. Even color theory is not universally applicable. Wearing a black
suit, for instance, is considered formal at a Western wedding but represents
death in the East. The differences among cultures are complex and cannot be
oversimplified.
This does not suggest, however,
that analytical methods of art criticism do not have a place in contemporary
art education settings; they are important in some respects. In the Western
art arena, artists, critics, art historians, aestheticians, and educators
of modernism have worked in unison based upon a shared vision of values, beliefs,
and artistic practices, developing and establishing a great body of art knowledge.
Therefore, analytical approaches to art appreciation are appropriate for penetrating
the set of art beliefs, values, and practices established by the modern art
world. The stages of description, analysis, interpretation, and evaluation
can help art teachers facilitate meaningful dialogues about such art as abstract
expressionism or post-impressionism. Art teachers should not adopt these methods
without careful consideration. Teaching models can be helpful, but they also
can restrict one’s capacity to see the unexpected.
Lohan Seated in
a Tree: About and Beyond
Finally, I discarded the activity
worksheet that I drew from Feldman’s model because it was clear to me that
this painting was not merely an aesthetic construct; more importantly it was
a sociocultural representation with embedded meaning and values. Suzuki (1957),
a pioneer in delivering Asian culture to the Western world, suggested that
Western arts portray form, while Asian arts depict spirit. In aesthetic practice,
the former focuses on the execution and concreteness of what is portrayed,
whereas the latter stresses imagination beyond what is seen. To make another
comparison, Western aesthetics is brain-oriented (more of intellectual) whereas
Asian aesthetics is mind-centered (more of sensational). Suzuki’s Eastern-Western
polarity may be a contestable generalization, which may not fully reflect
on the range of art movements developed respectively in the East and in the
West. Nonetheless, the point here is to illuminate that analyzing a spiritual
Buddhist artifact according to its principles and elements of design would
be nothing more than misinterpreting it.
During my presentation, I glanced
at the caption of the painting to support my interpretation: “Ding Yunpeng's
style is characterized by a lively, bright quality of line and color. . .
. Liang Kai depicts a Lohan (enlightened being) meditating in a tree.” The
caption did not give me adequate contextual information, only some formal
analysis. If the viewer were to rely only on the information that the museum
provided, he or she would be unable to see the full landscape of the painting.
With my previous knowledge on Asian art, I started describing the painting:
In “Lohan Seated in a Tree,” the
center of the tree is almost hollow; nonetheless, the density of its leaves
is as healthy as that found on a normal tree. Therefore, it is reasonable
to conclude that the man is indeed part of the tree, providing the tree with
necessary nutrition. The relationship between the tree and the man manifests
an Asian belief that nature and humans are one co-existing entity. Some of
the man’s features are also associated with the tree, i.e., the man’s clothes
and the bark, the man’s facial expression and that of the tree, and the aging
of the two. The vines surrounding the tree and the length of the man’s nails
indicate that he had been studying for a long time. The position of the vines
suggests that they had changed since the man entered the tree.
The man is in seated meditation.
In Zen Buddhism, meditation is the means to enlightenment and intensifies
one’s self-awakening process. During meditation, Zen practitioners normally
situate themselves in tranquil natural environments where they can unlock
their minds and see their own inner landscapes. Enlightenment, in Buddhism,
is a blessed state of mind in which the individual has achieved true wisdom
and evolved beyond human suffering. Buddhists generally believe that human
desire imprisons Homo sapiens in the land of physical, mental, and emotional
suffering. Suffering can be avoided by understanding the true nature of reality.
To cease suffering one must first discard human desire.
Lohan
Seated in a Tree (1608)
Ding Yunpeng (1547-c.1628)
Chinese, Ming dynasty, 14th-17th centuries, 49" x 17 1/4"
Krannert Art Museum
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. |
Most Asian artifacts
are manifestations of efforts to unify nature and humanity. The Asian culture
respects the spirit of nature, which is expressed in varied visual forms.
Zen Buddhists believe that human beings cannot control nature; nature has
its own rules by which all living beings should abide. The rules drawn by
human beings only lead to catastrophes and disharmonies shown in constant
wars and power straggles. True power is discovered or strengthened by acting
in accordance with the rules of nature.
Zen Buddhism has played an influential role in the sociocultural formation
and development of Asian regions (e.g., China, Korea, India, and Japan). It
would be impossible for an outsider to understand a religion-bound painting
like “Lohan Seated in a Tree” without mentioning the basic philosophy of Zen
Buddhism. Understanding Zen Buddhism helps the audience appreciate Asian artifacts
at a deeper, more meaningful level. In ancient Asia, for instance, the purposes
of making religion-bound objects are either for spiritual functions or for
the creator’s self enrichment. Most likely, the creator painted “Lohan Seated
in a Tree” for self-enrichment in an effort to attain enlightenment, or perhaps
it was used as a visual sermon to inspire Zen followers. In the school of
Zen Buddhism, implicit messages are often inserted into aesthetic objects
to transmit Buddhist doctrines. The purpose of making aesthetic objects is
to convey meaning, not for the sake of visual pleasure.
Recommendations
Conducting a multicultural art
appreciation and criticism activity in museum/educational settings can be
a daunting task. Based on my teaching experience, I would like to offer some
of my personal insights regarding the appropriate presentation of cultural
heritage in educational/museum environments.
Zen (Ch’an) and Aesthetic
Education
Sheng Kuan Chung
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
A new monk came
up to the Zen master Joshu.
“I have just entered the brotherhood, and I am anxious to learn the first
principle
of Zen,” he said. “Will you please teach it to me?”
Joshu replied, “Have you eaten your supper?”
The novice answered, “I have eaten.”
Joshu then said, “Now wash your bowl.” (Zen Buddhism, 1959, p.33)
The dialogue between the master Joshu and his student describes well the
essence of Ch’an. To most Westerners, the discipline of Ch’an may be
mysterious and sometimes ambiguous, yet it is a significant factor in
the development of Asian culture. How does the idea of Ch’an originate?
The inception of Buddhism in China was a critical turning point. It was
said that after Bodhidharma, an Indian monk, brought the Mahayana form
of Buddhism to China in A.D. 520, Buddhism was soon challenged by the
Chinese philosophers of Daoism (Taoism) for its lack of relevancy to
the knowledge of the laypeople. Indian Buddhism then was highly intellectual.
The materialization of Ch’an resulted from a synthesis of this Mahayana
form of Buddhism and the Chinese philosophy of Daoism. Ch’an Buddhism
was thence a common term used to refer to the discipline of Ch’an and
widely practiced in Chinese societies. Five centuries later, Japanese
pilgrims studied Ch’an in China and further took it to the world stage
in the work of the 18th century Japanese Zen philosopher, Daisetz T.
Suzuki, under the name of Zen. Since its emergence, Zen, a spiritual
discipline, has played a major influence on every facet of sociocultural
practice in the East. Today, not only does the Buddhist seek to understand
the significance of Zen, but the Asian aesthetician attempts to do so
as well.
Buddhism generally believes
that human desire imprisons Homo sapiens in the land of physical, mental,
and emotional suffering. To live without suffering, human beings must
realize the fact that suffering comes from insatiable human desire. For
example, the desire for the material aspects of gain, like a black hole,
can never be fulfilled, which only causes further pains and disturbs
one’s peaceful mind. In Buddhism, Zen is the discipline of cultivating
the mind to reach a state of emptiness (nothingness) or liberating the
mind from continuous suffering.
Buddhism also holds that all
sentient beings (living beings) and their surrounding entities are created
equal; indeed, they are intrinsically interdependent on one another.
A person exists only in relation to others. The personal pronouns of
I, you, and s/he exist only as they are parts of the we entity, the oneness.
This relationship applies not only to human society, but to all existing
beings in the universe. Consequently, humankind and nature are co-existent;
one cannot survive without the other. To go against nature or other living
beings is to destroy one’s selfness. This notion of oneness concludes
that the dichotomy between “right” and “wrong”, “good” and “bad”, or
“self” and “other” is an illusion. Although the apparatus of Zen, to
most people, is dyed with mysterious and religious colors; viewing Zen
as a religious sect is probably not as accurate as viewing it as a way
of looking at the world because Zen is about living freely and meaningfully.
What is Zen?
To define Zen would
be as difficult as trying to define the nature of human existence. The
results of such an attempt may vary or contradict one another. In fact,
a complete definition of Zen is not going to help one understand Zen,
but will negate the essence of Zen that lies in the perceptions of the
mind and kinesthetic experiences. Zen devalues rational modes of thinking
and classification, as well as all forms of linguistic presentations.
Thus, no fixed description or verbal construct is able to present the
meaning of Zen. Zen is about experiential. Understanding Zen requires
an essential level of physical engagement. Asking, for instance, what
cappuccino coffee tastes like is not to look for its nutritional ingredients,
but simply to drink it. It is about the quality of the coffee directly
received by the human senses of taste and smell and nothing more. For
people in the modern world, conceptualization is often the conduit to
making sense of the world. Knowing is primarily through the less-experiential/kinesthetic
forms of presentations, such as books, lectures, and television. The
discipline of Zen, like that of aesthetic education, attempts to awaken
the human being to better utilize his or her inborn sensory faculties.
Zen, translated
as meditation in Indian, asserts that enlightenment can be attained through
self-meditation and intuitive insight, rather than through commitment
to scriptural studies. In Buddhism, enlightenment is a blessed state
of mind in which the individual has achieved true wisdom and gone beyond
human desire and suffering. Zen considers that true wisdom fills in the
empty mind and that any person can attain enlightenment. The question
is how to get there. In short, Zen is a form of natural practice for
reaching enlightenment. In the school of Zen, the realization of one’s
humanity is one of the required steps to enlightenment, which cannot
be fulfilled without fully engaging in one’s senses. In Zen training,
the arts play a vital role in awakening Zen pupils to see the inner power
of their senses.
Zen and the Arts
In addition to meditation, Zen
masters routinely employ arts, notably painting, calligraphy, gardening,
architecture design, ceremonial tea drinking, and flower arrangement
to unleash their pupils’ minds, which are imprisoned by modern civilization.
Students of Zen practice the arts (i.e., appreciation and creation) to
gain insight into the nature of human existence. In Zen teachings, aesthetic
experiences are metaphorically soul food used to intensify the self-awakening
process of the students during their training. Zen masters believe that
enlightenment is a blessed state of mind, which cannot be taught by words
or any forms of language, but must be facilitated from mind to mind.
Therefore, various art forms become the indispensable aesthetic sermons
for Zen masters to inspire their followers. Zen teaching is about inspiration.
Inspiration occurs only when there is connection between students and
their sociocultural contexts. Everyday items or encounters hence become
the most employed common subject matter in Zen’s aesthetic practices.
An ordinary household item depicted in an aesthetic creation frequently
entails a deeper meaning. For example, a bamboo drawn in a painting is
not only about the aesthetic elements, e.g., shape and contour, of the
bamboo, but also the bamboo in relation to the human’s being.
In contrast to Western aesthetics,
the aesthetics of Zen discards any logical, scientific, or rational approaches
to looking at the reality. Instead, Zen values the illogical, intuitive,
or spontaneous insight into the perception of reality. An elucidation
of some of the characteristics of Zen aesthetics should be able to address
this point more fully. Before doing so, one should have a basic understanding
of the differences between Western aesthetics and Eastern aesthetics.
Suzuki (1957), a pioneer in delivering Zen to the Western world, suggested
that Western arts portray form while Asian arts depict spirit. In aesthetic
production and appreciation, the former focuses on the execution and
concreteness of what is portrayed whereas the latter emphasizes certain
imagination beyond what is seen or depicted.
Western Aesthetics
Influenced by new discoveries
in physics and psychology, modern/Western arts theorists and philosophers
believe that the arts, like other scientific disciplines, possess a logical
structure aimed at exhibiting perfection, order, and purity. Aesthetics,
which is concerned with the nature of the arts, appears as one of the
scholarly interests resulting from modern civilization. Since the inception
of modernity, the rational or intellectual treatment regarding aesthetics
has mainly dominated the Western art world.
In the West, the discipline
of aesthetics is thus more of an intellectual construct dealing with
abstract concepts and further pursued by scholars working in the philosophical
circle. The three major art theories that have been used to present aesthetics
are mimeticism, emotionalism, and formalism. Mimeticism places a great
emphasis on the quality of realistic appearance depicted in the work
of art, whereas emotionalism gives more weight to the communication of
expressive qualities, such as feelings, moods, and thoughts through the
arts. Formalism believes that form, instead of content, is the ultimate
truth; therefore, the nature of a work of art is determined by the execution
of the elements and principles of design demonstrated in that work of
art. Formalism insists on the notion of art for art’s sake. In general,
Western art theorists/philosophers are more inclined to conceptualize
artwork and its resulted aesthetic experiences, a tendency that has separated
arts from life. Consequently, the arts become inaccessible to the public
and have no, or little if any, relationship to the life of ordinary people.
Under these circumstances, only intellectuals or other small few know
how to appreciate, analyze, interpret, and judge the arts. In addition,
arts pieces are treated as sacred objects displayed and performed in
institutional settings, e.g., museums, galleries, and concert halls.
Eastern Aesthetics
In the East, arts and aesthetics
are integrated into all aspects of everyday life and interpreted in a
much broader sense. The boundary between the art object and the everyday
item is not clearly drawn. An ordinary household item may possess certain
aesthetic quality depending on how the user or viewer approaches it.
Using this view, the scope of the arts includes not only music, poetry,
drama, painting, and calligraphy, but also other unconventional practices,
such as fighting, gardening, flower arrangement, tea drinking, and meditation.
Since aesthetics and arts are embedded in all aspects of everyday life,
living itself can be a form of art. Cultivation of the mind is another
form of art. All facets of life contain, more or less, amounts of aesthetic
qualities.
When looking at Eastern aesthetics,
one must not overlook the influence of Zen. Indeed, Zen aesthetics can
be roughly regarded as Eastern aesthetics. As opposed to intellectual,
linguistic treatment of aesthetics, Eastern aesthetics stresses experiential
understanding derived from the mind and the operation of human senses.
A work of art created without relation to life or utilization is less
likely to be paid attention to, let alone considered for its aesthetic
significance. The essence of the arts in Zen is perceivable, but inexpressible.
Any conceptual treatment of aesthetics is against the essence of the
arts, an essence that lies in the qualitative sphere of sensory engagement.
In the school of Zen, aesthetic experiences play a vital role in enlightenment
acquisition. In the eye of Zen practitioners, daily experiences are all
aesthetic experiences, dependent on the functioning of the mind and human
senses. Performing manual tasks such as painting or drawing, writing
a poem, taking a walk, and washing dishes attentively is regarded as
aesthetic experience. Zen emphasizes the significance of ordinarily kinesthetic
encounters, believing that language can never delineate or present the
ultimate truth. It is the mind, rather than one’s understanding of philosophical
issues, that leads one to the state of enlightenment. Since the state
of enlightenment can never be achieved through linguistic forms or scriptural
studies, active participation in daily affairs becomes important in realizing
one’s consciousness of being. In other words, the essence of a reality
cannot be grasped without physically experiencing that reality. The essence
of a work of art cannot be grasped without physically experiencing that
work of art.
Zen Aesthetics
The influence of Zen is not
solely on the world of Asian religion; it is also on almost every facet
of the sociocultural practice in Asian societies. Instead of looking
at Zen as a religious enterprise, this chapter stresses the implications
of Zen aesthetics for contemporary aesthetic education. For contemporary
aesthetic educators, a basic understanding of Zen is also necessary to
appreciate or interpret the Asian arts. Zen aesthetics is everyday aesthetics.
From the view of Zen practitioners, everyday experiences can be aesthetic
experiences.
So, how does an aesthetic experience
differ from a non-aesthetic experience? The notion of inner time explained
by Greene (1971) is important in understanding the moment of an aesthetic
encounter. An aesthetic moment is the moment of concentration (more of
contemplation) on an object or a phenomenon in one’s inner time; it is
the moment of forgetting one’s outer being. In other words, an aesthetic
experience takes place when one pays particular attention to the essential
features of an experience (be it a thing or an event) in the full stream
of consciousness and afterward has a natural tendency to reflect on that
experience. The aesthetic experience affects one’s mind to contemplate
and reflect while the non-aesthetic experience lacks such possibility.
Unquestionably, artistic engagements are more likely to afford one needed
attention and reflection. In Zen, as in aesthetic education, aesthetic
experiences enhance human sensitivity to comprehend the reality.
Intuitive insight is one of the key concepts in Zen aesthetics. The essence
of Zen aesthetics is unsystematic and suggestive. It is unsystematic in the
sense that the qualities of an aesthetic object or event cannot be understood
simply by analysis or classification; they must be physically experienced
through the human senses. It is suggestive because it integrates the notion
of incompletion into aesthetic creations. A work is not complete without
incorporating the thought of the viewer or user. Asian painters frequently
leave some area unexecuted in their work to allow the viewers/users to fill
it in with their imagination. This technique leads to a renowned feature
of Asian arts -- the empty space is more important than the seen substance.
The idea of less-is-more is manifested in the works of Chinese opera, Asian
ink painting and poetry. In Japan, Wabi-Sabi is the term that refers to the
aesthetics of imperfection, impermanence, and incompletion. The unexecuted
area in an Asian work is often considered the repertoire with natural energy
that keeps the work alive.
Hisamatsu Shinichi (1971) defined
the seven characteristics of Zen aesthetics: asymmetry, simplicity, austere
sublimity, naturalness, profound subtlety, freedom from attachment, and
tranquility. Understanding these characteristics will help arts teachers
interpret Asian arts. Having lived and been taught in the Chinese environment
for over thirty years, I would like to explain my understanding of some
of Shinichi’s characteristics of Zen aesthetics.
Asymmetry, one of the central
design principles in art production, means unevenness. The execution
of asymmetry does not suggest that Asian artists reject the use of balance
in their work completely. Rather, asymmetric balance is used. The balance
of, for instance, a painting may have less to do with what is depicted
in the painting. An artist may draw mountains and rivers on the right
side of the picture plane and still maintain all the components of the
painting in balance. How would the artist be able to do so? It should
be noted that in traditional Asian painting, seals and calligraphies
of poetry are part of the painting. Occasionally, they may be left unnoticed
or treated as a signature; nonetheless, they are often the factors that
keep the painting in asymmetric balance.
Simplicity connotes the absence
of pretense. Simplification is a way to extract the essence of whatever
is conveyed. The painter does not need to draw a fine contour in order
to depict the subtlety of a tree. The director does not need a real horse
on the stage in order to present the presence of the horse. The poet
can describe tranquility without mentioning the word. This idea goes
back to the notion of less-is-more. In other words, a simple act often
indicates more than a simple act. In Chinese classical opera, simplistic
forms of representation or body language are normally used to portray
a number of different settings and characters. A flag painted with a
wheel represents a carriage. The actor’s body language tells the audience
whether the actor is in the kitchen or living room. To make the communication
even clearer, the mood of a character is shown on his or her face, painted
in bold colors to deliver each distinct mood. In poetry, a poem is frequently
composed of four lines with five Chinese characters in each line. This
type of poetry attempts to convey profound meaning within the shortest
possible length. In Zen, to see the truth, one must go back to his or
her original identity, the one that has not influenced by modern civilization.
Simplification is therefore the first step toward seeing one’s true inner
landscape.
The next characteristic - naturalness
- means being genuine in a non-artificial manner. Zen Aesthetics treasures
the beauty of imperfection or incompletion. In Asian ink painting, unintended
strokes or drops are the marks of naturalness that infuse the painting
with an inexpressible feeling of natural comfort. During creation, Asian
ink-painters do not erase any unwanted or mistaken lines or marks. They
draw by primarily following their spontaneous thoughts. This same feeling
of naturalness is embedded in various forms of Asian arts. Naturalness
is normally an expected feeling when one reads the work of Asian poets.
This love of naturalness is attributed to the influence of Daoism. Like
Daoism, Zen aesthetics attempts to unify nature and humanity. Both Zen
and Dao followers believe that human beings cannot control nature; nature
has its own rules by which all sentient (living) beings should abide.
The rules drawn by the human being only lead to catastrophes and disharmonies
shown in constant wars and power struggles. The advancement of technology
and Western civilization is also an indication of controlling nature,
in the vision of Zen, the attempt to control nature is against nature
and meaningless. That is, true power is strengthened or discovered by
acting in accordance with the rules of nature.
Toyo, a 12-year
old, was one of Mokurai’s most advanced students. One evening, he went
to meet with his master Mokurai…. The master said:
“Toyo, show me the sound of two hands clapping.” Toyo clapped his hands.
“Good,” said the master. “Now show me the sound of one hand clapping.”
Toyo was silent. Finally, he bowed and left to consider his problem. The
next
night he returned, and struck the gong with one palm. “That is not right,”
said the
master. The next night Toyo returned, and …. For ten nights, Toyo tried new
sounds. At last, he stopped coming to the master. For a year, he thought
of
every sound, and discarded them all, until finally he reached enlightenment.
He returned respectfully to the master. Without striking the gong, he sat
down
and bowed. “I have heard sound without sound,” he said. (Zen Buddhism, 1959,
p. 25)
Toyo’s scenario
illustrates how a civilized person would attempt to solve when given
a problem. It also illuminates that human beings are able to perceive
the essence of a reality when they have complied with the rules of nature.
The last characteristic
of Zen aesthetics explained here is tranquility. Tranquility stands for
the state of being silent and calm. In Zen meditation, tranquility is
the key to unlocking one’s mind to see his or her inner landscape. Without
the state of a tranquil mind or when the mind is filled with busy signals,
one will be unable to listen to his or her inner self in the full stream
of consciousness. The Zen master Nan-in had a visitor who came to inquire
about Zen, but instead of listening, the visitor kept talking about his
own ideas. After a while, Nan-in served tea which, (then) he kept on
pouring. Finally the visitor could not restrain himself.
“Don’t you see
it’s full?” he said. “You can’t get any more in!”
“Just so,” replied Nan-in, stopping at last. “And like this cup, you are
filled with
your own ideas. How can you expect me to give you Zen unless you offer me
an
empty cup?” (Zen Buddhism, 1959, 30)
Living in the world
of modernization, children, from the moment they are born, are expected
to live with sociocultural expectations. Their minds are gradually being
transformed into somewhere away from tranquility. Until these children
become adults, their bodies and souls are incarcerated in a territory
in which they barely have the opportunity to examine their true selves.
In this case, how can a person self-actualize if he or she has not known
his or her inner identity? The idea of tranquility may seem as simple
as it sounds. However, it requires one’s fully consciousness and involvement
to attain.
Zen and Aesthetic
Cultivation
Wei-ming Tu (1985),
a professor at Harvard University, explained that Zen education is about
“the art of cultivating, perceiving, maintaining, illuminating and calming
the mind” (p.15). In addition to the seven characteristics of Zen aesthetics
drawn by Shinichi (1971), I perceive Tu’s statement as particularly mirroring
the concern of contemporary aesthetic education. Indeed, what arts teachers
do in the classroom is essentially to maintain, cultivate, and illuminate
the minds of their students. In the classroom, there is something more
than writing a poem, making a sketch, performing a play, or playing a
music instrument. As arts teachers, we believe that the arts have an
effect on students either intellectually or emotionally. We do not need
any statistical results or thorough descriptions to convince us that
the arts are able to do so. It is as if we know what love is when we
are in love. Like love, how the arts are able to touch us is inexpressible
and even greater than some logical, expressible description. We know
something special is happening when we instruct our students to play
the piano, mix colors, develop their first poem, or use their bodies
to create meaning.
In the school of Zen, the arts help Zen pupils through different stages of
sensitivity. In fact, they have the same effect as that of meditation in
elevating a Zen practitioner’s mind to the state of emptiness. In Zen, the
empty mind (forgetting one’s outer existence) is the required end to be in
contact with the true inner landscape. During the moment of emptiness, the
mind, though void of any thought, is fully engaged in perceiving its identity
in the highest stream of consciousness. The moment of emptiness is profound
and void; transcendent and tranquil; beyond conceptualization; and beyond
any linguistic forms of explication.
Years of aesthetic
encounters have convinced me that Zen’s concept of emptiness often results
from the moments of appreciating and creating a work of art, i.e., a
poem, a piece of visual art, a performance, or an orchestration. The
moment of emptiness in aesthetic appreciation, for example, is a combined
state of forgetting one’s existence, stillness, concentration, and contemplation
with a full conscious mind in inner time. Aesthetic experiences that
possess the characteristics of asymmetry, simplicity, naturalness, and
tranquility can be the critical agents that enable students to calm,
perceive, maintain, and illuminate their minds. With such aesthetic experiences,
the students will be able to listen, feel, sense, hear, and smell not
only their inner selves, but the phenomena and events around them.
Another Zen central
teaching principle is transmission of the mind through the mind. According
to Zen, words and letters cannot be used to transmit the message from
the mind. Verbal description does not help convey a person’s kindness,
caring, or compassion. Without language, how would teachers be able to
show their educational concerns in the classroom? Zen teachings emphasize
that language forms of transmission mean nothing other than the language
itself when one wants to send a mind-message (e.g., I care about my students).
Human beings, more often than not, have the intuitive faculty to determine
the genuineness of a verbal statement. As far as aesthetic education
is concerned, the notion of transmission of the mind through the mind
has valuable implications for classroom practices. For example, some
teachers often express a high interest in their students; however, the
students do not feel that their concerns are taken seriously. Could the
student perceive a teacher’s caring without the teacher saying so? This
is the circumstance where sensory faculties and the human mind become
important to illustrate their significance. With the operation of the
human mind, a student can know of a teacher by his/her attitudes toward
teaching, levels of instructional involvement, body language, or eye
contact. The human mind may be illogical, intuitive, feeling-oriented,
unscientific, or emotional-filled; nevertheless, its power is beyond
conceptualization. That is, true appreciation is expressed from one mind
and then received by another mind. True love is derived from the mind.
The greatest music cannot be cherished without the presence of the mind.
The painting cannot become a masterpiece without the appreciation of
the mind. The greatest poem cannot move anyone without the emotional
engagement of the mind.
The arts and their
resulted aesthetic experiences play an indispensable role in transmitting
and receiving the messages effected by the mind. Zen recognizes that
the arts are the products of the mind capable of delivering what the
mind intends. In addition to the arts, the presence of one’s sensory
faculties is one of the prerequisites to engage in the process of transmission
from mind to mind. The understanding of what the human mind intends is
sensibly experiential and qualitative in essence. In Zen (and aesthetic
education as well), the purpose of aesthetic cultivation is to realize
one’s innate humanity and the arts stimulate humans to uncover their
forgotten inborn sensitivity, i.e., the abilities to see clearly, feel
strongly, smell deeply, and hear sensibly.
Tao-hsin, a Zen student, sought the way to live freely. One day he came to
his
master Seng-t’san. He asked:
“What is the
method of liberation?”
“Who binds you?” asked Seng-t’san.
“No one binds me,” said the pupil.
“Why then,” said the master, “do you seek liberation?” (Humphreys, 1965,
p. 87)
Mind-centered
Aesthetic Experiences
Derived from Western arts tradition,
conceptual approaches to aesthetic production and appreciation are the
predominant form of classroom pedagogy in the arts profession. The meaning
of the arts is, as practiced by modern arts theorists/ philosophers (e.g.,
Tolstoy, Bradley, Dickie, and Danto), a result of intellectual analysis
and interpretation of the arts. Two of the most influential figures in
the philosophy of art, Edmund Feldman (1994) and Harry Broudy (1987)
respectively developed a well thought-out instrument for arts teachers
to approach aesthetic inquiry. Feldman’s sequential approach to aesthetic
criticism is composed of the four stages of description, analysis, interpretation,
and judgment. Broudy’s “aesthetic scanning” invites the viewer to consider
the sensory, formal, expressive, and technical properties of a work of
art. The systematic or scientific treatment of the properties of the
arts has made the arts an inaccessible domain to most laypeople.
In Homo Aestheticus, Dissanayake (1992) maintained that the arts have always
existed in human surroundings in modes of utility used for living, social,
or religious functions. According to Dissanayake, human beings possess a
naturally aesthetic tendency by making things special or extraordinary. The
arts thus originate from humans’ instinct to create with special care and
involvement. Dissanayake’s view of art can be seen across different cultures
where the arts are employed to fulfill various rituals or living needs. Dissanayake’s
view mirrors the perspective of Zen that the arts are an integral part of
human life, embedded with human emotional, material, and spiritual attachments.
By limiting the arts to the intellectual discourse, arts teachers will block
out children’s sensitivity to see themselves as spiritual living beings.
In Zen, aesthetic experiences
are not derived from one’s proficiency of arts knowledge or intellectual
functioning. Zen implies that the aesthetic experience is an everyday
experience, which occurs when one naturally engages in an ordinary event
aesthetically. Relatively, the human senses are the inherent agents to
perceive of something as aesthetic. As arts teachers or teachers in general,
we are accustomed to analyzing things based on the ways we were taught.
When a visual reproduction is presented to the students, the first question
out of the art teacher’s mouth usually is, “Describe what you are seeing.”
The students then immediately analyze visual threads shown in the reproduction
and then respond to what they know about it as intellectually as possible.
This experience, in fact, is not only happening in the art classroom,
but the educational system as a whole. Aesthetic educators should be
aware that instructing students to approach the arts rationally or scientifically
may deteriorate their aesthetic sensitivities.
My concern here is that arts
teachers have so overwhelmingly treasured the cognitive aspects of the
arts, they have forgotten how the human senses, as a Zen practitioner
would argue, can simply perceive the arts meaningfully. As in the above
scenario, can the art teacher instead invite the students to take a walk
and touch the objects depicted in a two-dimensional picture plane as
a way of recollecting their lived experiences? Can the art teacher invite
the students to listen to what people drawn in the picture are talking
about? If the background of this picture is cornfields, why not invite
the students to smell and pay attention to the surrounding sounds? I
believe that with such imaginative and sensory experiences, students
will start seeing things with full sensitivity whenever they encounter
an object or a daily event. They will begin to recall their innate sensory
capacities to understand any given phenomenon and eventually realize
their worth as human creature. In aesthetic education, the power of simply
seeing without analysis or logical interpretation often goes beyond human
comprehension. How can one use seeing without analysis in, for example,
appreciating a work of art? According to Yanagi (1989), when seeing a
piece of performance or painting, it is the seeing that leads straightly
to one’s heart concretely and honestly. The analysis of either the performance
or the painting will only bury one’s inborn faculty of seeing. The effects
of simply seeing are greater than what the intellect is able to define.
In fact, non-conceptualization is the natural and Zen and humane way
to aesthetic appreciation. This concept is similar to reading a novel
(or a poem) and then being subjected to intense literary analysis of
the novel from pre-determined points of view, rather than simply appreciating
the novel from a humanistic, experiential point of view, following the
story based on the story and the senses that story brings forth in each
reader. Yanagi‘s principles for aesthetic appreciation include:
First, put aside the desire to judge immediately; acquire the habit of just
looking.
Second, do not treat the object as an object for the intellect. Third, just
be ready
to receive, passively, without interposing yourself. If you void your mind
of all
intellectualization, like a clear mirror that simply reflects, all the better.
This non-
conceptualization … may seem to represent a negative attitude, but from it
springs the true ability to contact things directly and positively. (Yanagi,
1989, p.
112)
Though Yanagi’s principles of
seeing are mainly referred to visual art appreciation, they can be generally
applied to every aesthetic discipline in terms of the approach of non-conceptualization
to the arts.
Conclusion
Classroom teachers inherit a
set of educational values and beliefs about what constitutes learning
and how teaching should proceed in the school setting. In order for students
to acquire knowledge, most teachers demand their students to remain silent,
sit still, and pay full attention to what the teachers have to deliver.
In this scenario, classroom order is deemed essential to both teaching
and learning. Social interactions between students are discouraged and
often result in punishment. The question remains: Did what the teacher
delivery in this setting lead to what the students should learn?
Eisner (1994) pointed out the three curricula, i.e., explicit, implicit,
and null curricula that schoolchildren learn. Besides Eisner, many educators
have raised the question that students, more often than not, learn what the
teachers do not teach. This alarm should prompt arts teachers or teachers
in general to re-examine their classroom practices. For example, How do motivate
students to contemplate and reflect a problem spontaneously? How to approach
the notion of transmission of the mind through the mind to teaching? What
are the natural ways of teaching and learning?
Zen implies that an event that is able to stimulate students to respond spontaneously
and attentively is a natural way. Any event that is able to do so must contain
certain aesthetic quality. The quality of aesthetics in a work of art, an
event, a lesson, or an object is perceivable by the simple human mind. Zen
also implies that aesthetic experiences are derived not solely from artistic
practices (i.e., arts creation or appreciation), but from those considered
ordinary in one’s daily life. Such ordinary aesthetic encounter may be from
a mathematics class, a bus ride, or a conversation with friends. All of these
ordinary events are a part of a person’s being.
Living in today’s technocratic
society, humans are forced to give away their natural ways of being (e.g.,
living, learning, and working) and become unaware of what their sensory
systems can contribute to the total fulfillment of their lives. Arts
teachers must realize that ordinarily experiences, if instilled with
aesthetic quality, will have educational values and make significant
contributions to each student’s total enlightenment or self-actualization.
When the Chinese Zen master, Po-chang, was asked to define Zen, he responded, "When
hungry, eat, when tired, sleep." He further stated that searching
for happiness was like riding an ox in search of the ox. Po-chang’s comment
indicates the significance of ordinary experiences in contemporary aesthetic
education, the comment that every art teacher or teacher in general should
pause a minute to think about his or her classroom practices. How to
live one’s life fully, spontaneously, and aesthetically is undoubtedly
a challenge for contemporary people. It is the art teacher’s responsibility
to direct pupils to realize their inborn values through aesthetic encounters.
References
Broudy, H. (1987). The role
of imagery in learning. Los Angeles, CA: The Getty Center for Education
in the Arts.
Dissanayake, E. (1992). Homo
aestheticus: Where art comes from and why. New York: The Free Press.
Eisner, E. (1994). The educational
imagination: On the design and evaluation of school programs. New York:
Macmillan.
Feldman, E. (1994). Practical
art criticism. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Greene, M. (1971). Teaching
for aesthetic experience. In B. Reimer (Ed.), Toward an aesthetic education
(pp. 21-43). Washington, D. C.: Music Educators National
Conference.
Humphreys, C. (1965). Zen: A
way of life. New York: Emerson Books.
Shinichi, H. (1971). Zen and
the fine arts. Tokyo: Kodansha International.
Suzuki, D. T. (1957). Mysticism
Christian and Buddhist. New York: Harper.
Tu, Wei-Ming (1985). Ch’an in
China: A reflective interpretation. In H. Brinker, R.
P. Kramers, & C. Ouwehand (Eds.), Zen in China Japan Eastern art
(pp. 9-27). New York: Peter Lang.
Yanagi, S. (1989). The unknown
craftsman. Tokyo: Kodansha International.
Zen Buddhism: an introduction
to Zen with stories, parables and Koan riddles told by the Zen master;
with cuts from old Chinese ink-paintings (1959). Mt. Vernon, New York:
The Peter Pauper Press.
