Yes indeed the Jones review and your points reinforce many of the uneasy
Discussions about "art in service of science' and "science in service of art"=
There is a whole range of practices between these two ends of the spectrum
And Jones clearly wants=he says
"Isn't it time we stopped expecting artists to understand the complexities of science?..
This is not a work of art about physics. It is a work of art about how crazy everything is. That's a trivial misunderstanding of what goes on at Cern, surely."
Presumably he would pan the stained glass windows at Chartres as insufficiently
Explanatory , and yes Duchamp the viewer completes the work of art…
Ken you state:" The key issue between these two kinds of discussions is the difference between the ways in which we can understand human beings, how they think, how they behave, and what their behaviour means ― including those forms of human behaviour that include speech acts, and the artefacts of behaviour in the form of written texts and works of art."
Another take on this point comes from" Slingerland's Creating Consilience
Integrating the Sciences and the Humanities" where he argues for a different axis
Of thinking which looks at how we have to shift points of view as we change scale
In space ( nano, mico, mill, km, light year) or time ( pico, milli, year, millennium, billion)
Or group size ( individual, duo, group, community, country, civilization)- the concept
Of the humanities only makes sense at certain scales- just as quantum mechanics is
Not the right frame of the behavior of trees.
So I certainly subscribe to the ways of knowing argument- but its not just
Art or science, it's also an interleaving of different approaches at different scales
And as we know from the sciences of complexity and emergence even
The concept of causality changes
If anyone has seen Ryoji's Ikeda's work it would be great to have a witness
Report !
roger
Dear list,
I have not seen the work (I suspect the piece resembles other pieces by Ikeda I have seen and liked), but a scathing review by Jonathan Jones I would certainly put on my CV...
In my view he is one of these rather surprising cases (opera being another) where it seems that art critics of the Guardian are just not the right people to review anything conceived after the industrial revolution.
not a very thorough response, I admit,
kind regards,
Joost Rekveld
Dear Roger & Fellow Yasminers,
One of the crucial differences between art and science is that art represents and expresses the views of the artist. Art also involves a viewer or receiver. As Duchamp used to say, the viewer completes the work of art. But this isn't merely Duchamp's opinion: this is a fundamental proposition of symbolic interactionism as a method in the social sciences, and this is the core understanding of hermeneutics. For a deeper discussion of these issues, I have posted Herbert Blumer's concise, elegant discussion of the methodological perspective of symbolic interaction in the teaching documents section of my Academia page at URL:
https://swinburne.academia.edu/KenFriedman
The clarity and precision of the natural sciences arises from the fact that the equations and propositions of natural science reflect and represent a world that should be the same to all viewers. While there are often differences of opinion about the truth, correctness, or value of what any one scientist or research team may represent about the physical world, there are also reasonably common standards that permit us to reach a common view over time.
One of Albert Einstein's great papers of 1905 was his paper on Brownian motion. He published this at a time when no one was yet able to physically see an atom. Many scientists doubted the physical reality of atomic theory ― and this included a great many scientists who accepted the hypothetical use of atomic theory for heuristic or didactic purposes while doubting the physical reality of atomism.
Einstein's paper, "On the Motion of Small Particles Suspended in Liquids at Rest Required by the Molecular-Kinetic Theory of Heat"
examined several well-known physical and chemical facts, drawing together well established evidence to demonstrate the physical reality of atoms. As a result, many scientists who had been skeptical about the reality of atoms became convinced that atoms were, in fact, real. You can read the paper (in Satchel 1998: 71-98) for yourself on my Academia page at URL:
https://swinburne.academia.edu/KenFriedman
The key issue between these two kinds of discussions is the difference between the ways in which we can understand human beings, how they think, how they behave, and what their behaviour means ― including those forms of human behaviour that include speech acts, and the artefacts of behaviour in the form of written texts and works of art.
Not only do human actions change over time, but the meanings of human actions change over time. What's more, the understanding of human actions, human artefacts, and their meaning undergo translation by everyone who hears, sees, or participates in any action.
An atom of carbon will be the same as any other atom of carbon in the universe. Gravitation is the same force wherever we can look and wherever we can measure it. Certain predictable factors account for measurable differences ― different isotopes of any element, differences in the strength of gravity on the surface of a large planet as against the force of gravity in space outside the pantry atmosphere.
In contrast, my idea of a good beer may differ to the ideas of those five people at the table next to me. I'll order a bottle of India Pale Ale from the case and not the refrigerator while the next table has five frosty glasses of house lager on tap. Someone may enjoy Aaron Copland's film scores while someone else might prefer Danny Elfman's work, and yet another person might enjoy them equally. One viewer may love Ryoji Ikeda's work and another may not. I am puzzled about the multimillion dollar sums that Jeff Koons's work take at auction when someone can buy a beautiful print by Dieter Roth or a painting by Dick Higgins for a 5-figure sum.
It is for this reason that I read Jonathan Jones's review of Ryoji Ikeda's Supersymmetry installation without too much feeling either way. The artist responded to scientific ideas, but Ikeda's installation is art and not science. It is very much the same thing as a musician composing works to reflect a sense of what early astronomers called "the music of the spheres." Jones's review tells me what Jones thinks ― it doesn't tell me what I think.
I haven't seen the installation for myself, so I have no idea about it from first-hand experience. I did read the review, but the review doesn't seem any more harsh than other kinds of reviews. If you want to read some truly withering criticism, take a look at Nicolas Slonimsky's Lexicon of Musical Invective: Critical Assaults on Composers Since Beethoven's Time. I suppose that a similar collection may exist for visual art, but I haven't seen it. There are two interesting books of rejection letter from publishers and others, however. One is Bill Shapiro's Other People's Rejection Letters: Relationship Enders, Career Killers, and 150 Other Letters You'll Be Glad You Didn't Receive. The other is Rotten Rejections: The Letters That Publishers Wish They'd Never Sent by Andre Bernard.
Duchamp used to say "posterity will be the judge." We'll eventually find out whether Ikeda's work or Jones's opinion prevails.
Yours,
Ken
Ken Friedman, PhD, DSc (hc), FDRS | Editor-in-Chief | 设计 She Ji. The Journal of Design, Economics, and Innovation | Published by Tongji University in Cooperation with Elsevier | URL: http://www.journals.elsevier.com/she-ji-the-journal-of-design-economics-and-innovation/
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