Art can be a poison for its audience. In the landfill of abundance called the art world, such examples come into being en masse. Examples of shallow, harmful, unenriching art, which is the fruit of intellectual and emotional laziness of artists or being blinded by artistic freedom, often resulting from low motives. Art infecting the sphere of spirituality understood as the world of human inner sensibility (not associated with any religion by nature). This artistic poison is accompanied by an imbalance between content and form, the effect of which is uncommunicativeness (lack of a distinct influence on the audience’s sensibility, gibberish). An uncommunicative artistic language does not allow to establish an authentic contact with the audience, and at the same time, it indicates a limiting concentration of the artist and art on themselves.
POSTULATES
PURPOSES OF ART
Art, instead of escalating the chaos in our lives, can create a kind of counterbalance to it. The aim of such art is to conduce to the deepening of experience and to pursue rebuilding of the harmony of body, mind and spirit, which is essential to encounter the fullness of humanity. By appropriately combining material and intangible elements an artwork can open us to go beyond the boundaries of everyday experience, stimulate the intellect, feelings and senses, and aid nursing and growth of the spiritual sphere, which is being neglected today. Such art is an expression of sincere care for the other human and strives for making him better.
FORM
This kind of art is based on universalism and balance between content and form – it is an all-human art, created in the context of global culture, and therefore beyond all divisions. So it pursues possibly clear, intuitive, untaught perceiving by purging of a needless narrative. This way, an encounter with an artwork does not require reading it of a viewer, and thus it can occur within any cultural background. The above-mentioned conditions are performed, for example, by the skilfully used language of abstraction.
For fully authentic contact of the audience with the artwork, it is important that the form is relevant to the times of its creation. However, at the same time, the artwork cannot be limited by the constraint of topicality, because it cleanses itself of the layer of strictly topical elements over the years, leaving only timeless ones. Therefore artists should seek broadening horizons, which were discovered by their predecessors, by searching for contemporary forms of expression, nonetheless, being aware that they will also expand the resources of tradition over time. Simultaneously, artists ought to remember the unaging instruction of Wassily Kandinsky (Concerning the Spiritual in Art): every means used in artwork must result from inner necessity.
ARTIST
It is high time to reflect on an artist himself as well. In order for art to be marked by the above qualities, its creator must become aware of his own responsibility – duty to care for others by artistic pursuits – and divest himself of egoism. It is crucial to understand that art does not serve self-expression, “expressing oneself” or defusing emotional tension – artist’s sensibility must be directed towards the other human, and creative work must be based entirely on genuinely significant reasons, pure and sincere intentions and humility.
An artist should shape his life in a responsible and mature way because with its fruits he later feeds his audience. He ought to relate artistic work with intellectual and spiritual effort and pursuit of cognition. In opposing to ubiquitous thoughtlessness and dominant tendencies, he should pay more attention to creating constructive approaches than to criticism itself. Moreover, such an artist is aware, i.e. acts purposely, consistently determining the field of his activity, and responsibly using artistic freedom – while such awareness of artistic attitude does not diminish the value of intuition in the creative process at all.
RESPONSIBLE ART
Therefore, postulated in this manifesto responsible art is oriented on the other human – not treated as a theme or an object, but as a living, sentient being, whom the artist truly cares about. Its purpose is to enrich the inner life of the audience while rising above the limitations of cultural divisions. It can be art belonging to various currents, concerning diverse subjects, characterised by a wide range of forms – they all will be linked by a deeper sense and purpose as well as the artist’s conscious, mature attitude.
For obvious reasons, problems raised in this text have been presented in a simplified manner. Thoughts on particular issues are developed in the cycle of essays Reflections on Art, which I publish >here<.
