Theos-Talk Archives (January 1995 Message tl00208)

"Without music, life would be a mistake." - FWN

The Spectrum of Spirit in Art

An esoteric view of art

Toward a brief restatement of the synthesis of science,
philosophy, religion and ART.

What is art really? To answer this question we will define art
art, not just as product including: painting, music, sculpture,
and literature, but as PROCESS.  All creative acts including
science, religion and philosophy and art point to diversity, but
if looked at more closely point to an underlying unity.  This
unity, HPB called the "Secret Doctrine" or the synthesis of
science, philosophy, and religion.  We will attempt to show that
art should be included in this synthesis.

This is my general thesis which I have developed and hope to
discuss in further posts if people are interested.

Some problems I have had is the lack of much discussion (not use
certainly) of art in primary theosophical works of HPB and
others.

Using the index to the complete works, I found these references
to art by HPB ( I don't have the volume and page before me, but
these and only these are in the index).

Art is referred to as:

1) Ritual - The black arts of the Atlanteans etc..

2) The decadent art of the day which lacked the spiritualy
heights of the Greeks and the divine geometry etc.  of the
ancients.

3) The reference that life like art should not be more beautiful,
but more divine.

I am not talking about the endless talk about symbols, glyphs,
signs, diagrams, pictograms, ideograms, Senzar as circles and
dots etc., I'm talking about our everyday primary idea of art and
the fine arts, the popular arts and the perfoming arts.

Nicholas: You alway seem to come up with a quote by HPB on
practically everything.  Given the constraints of not symbols,
glyphs, signs, etc.  but art in the ususally sense (plus the idea
of creative process), prove me wrong, PLEASE.  I would seriously
like to know her thoughts.

To Daniel of visual semiotics: What is visual semiotics? I have a
guess that it has something to do with interpreting or analysing
signs (semiotics means the study of signs?).  It's largely a
discipline developed by the French ??? I am familiar with the
attempt to form a semiotics of film.  I don't know if people
still deal with this much.  What can you add to the discussion of
art and theosophy???

If you think this is a topic of no importance, add up the amount
of time and money you spend in one year on recorded music,
movies, TV manhours, opera, symphony, ballet tickets, endless
exposure to advertising and the popular arts (think of all those
televisions in the shoe stores in the malls).  Even for the most
introverted hermit-type ascetic, the figure would be staggering.
And think of the spiritual impact art has.  Even bad or "evil"
(pornographic) type materials have major spiritual impact (in the
negative direction in such a case as pornography IMHO).  Has
anyone's life not been changed (transformed, in the sense of the
transformation so many of us desire and only talk about) by a
special poem, novel, piece of music, painting etc) even more so
than by reading a logical explanation.

The universe may be a work of art (a very special type of
illusion, an ordered not chaotic illusion) and we are co-creators
throughout all seven planes through interpretation and
transformation (through Lila, the divine dance).

The spectrum of art can be mapped on the seven planes from
physical form, astral/emotional, kamas-manas, higher manas,
buddhic/intuitional and ultimate/unitive.

Religion "creates" the illusion of a creator god: called Jehovah,
Allah, Zoraster, Jupiter etc..

Philosophy creates the illusion of a structure of meaning (so
many schools and ism's each and every one which disagrees with
one another in some way, but point to each other in the quest for
an "answer").  Science creates a method for testing and verifying
hypotheses (very special illusions) and constantly discards and
updates them becauce they are only illusions (the best we can do
today to understand the natural world), it never proves anything.

Art in the largest sense is the concious process of linking
consciousnesses through form in time and mimics all creation from
the micro, to meso to macrocosm and contains them all.

Also is anyone really familiar with Nicholas and Helena Roerich
(unsure of spelling).  Helena seems to get the fame for her Agni
Yoga, but I am more interested in if Nicholas and if he saw his
paintings as "theosophical" and if so did he say so?

Also someone was interested in Mondrian.  I am starting to
research those artists which may have conciously and publically
been trying to introduce theosophy in their work.  I hear names
like Kandinsky, Scriabin, maybe others? What do you know?

What about the artitists in the early theosophical utopian
communities like Hollywood Krotona, Point Loma etc? I know very
little of this history.

Any ideas?

Namaste

Keith Price