What Cezanne Speaks to Me

                                             




















Paul Cezanne
Still life with skull.


     He had just handed over the down payment of his new studio to the realtor who greedily took his money. He had waited a long time for this moment, when he could finally own a place to call his own, a place where his art could feel safe and at peace. Putting everyone away in their canvas bags and hauling them from place to place had taken it's toll on him; his paintings were his friends; Matisse, Dali, Picasso, O'Keefe, Cezanne. Each had claimed a place in his heart, forever. 
     The walls were bare and the floors dusty. There was no furniture, not even a side table, to occupy the magnificence of those four walls. He looked around and there, to his left, right below the ceiling-kissed window, he saw it: the perfect spot to hang his favorite friend. It was that spot on the musty wall that would forever be the permanent home to Cezanne. Forget furniture, forget cleaning up before the dust claimed his lungs, putting up that picture was the only thing on his mind. 
     As he stood there, admiring the beauty of his creative and awe inspired decision, he could not have come up with a better resting place. It was a depiction of his life, his work, his everything. The death of one that led to the birth of the other. 


     Before I begin my analyses I have to clarify that I am a Creative Writing major and writing a story, of any sort, in 100 words just can't be done. =P


     If we took a formalistic approach, all we would say was that there is no transcendent meaning to the discipline other than the literal content being created. In other words, there is nothing to this painting except the paint, the canvas and the actual picture created. There is no story behind the painting and there is no hidden meaning. Structuralism says otherwise.
     Structuralism is a theory in which human culture and various disciplines within it are analyzed semiotically (meaning they are analyzed as a system of signs and symbols). Structuralism argues that any specific domain of culture may be understood by means of a structure that is distinct both from the organizations of reality and those of ideas or the imagination. The reason for all of this ambiguity is because structuralism is largely known as a meta-thought process, which means it is a thought process behind the initial thought process. What I mean by this is that beneath everything in a certain discipline, the foundation of every system is its structure. For example, Foucault is employing structuralism when he analyzes sex during the Victorian Era as a linguistic function of repression. His main method is genealogy but the method behind that method is structuralism. The same can be said about a painting. 
     When creating a painting, every artist approaches the canvas and their colors differently. No one piece of art is ever the same, even when looking at works from the same artist. They have similar qualities throughout all their work but there is no imitation of one piece in another. They analyze what’s around them: politics, people, actions, thoughts, scenes; everything has been taken into consideration to create a painting. A picture paints a thousand words they say, and an artist does just that when they put all that they have analyzed onto a strip of canvas. However, beneath all that, beneath all the freedom in color, shapes and brush strokes and patterns there is an underlying structure ruling them all. The structure of painting, never fully observed in the colors and shades of the paint in the pictures, takes it’s backseat and lets the driver steer the wheel, or the brush in this case, wherever the artist pleases, but at the same time never leaving the boundaries of what that structure has set forth. With everything good and pleasant, there is an underlying system that sets forth the rules for what can and can’t be done to avoid chaos and in turn, creates beauty.


Word Count: 673

Welcome to the Sublime

"Amazement and wonder exert invincible power and force" (137) 

      Longinus's view on sublimity is that "nature is on the whole a law unto herself in matters of emotion and elevation." (137) He believes that when produced at the right moments, it can tear everything up. Sublimity is the creation, or acknowledgement, of an idea so pure generated from everything around us, that sets us apart and separates us from the standards of awe and transports us into a place of peace. If someone here’s something repeatedly and is left with nothing to reflect upon or does not impose its meaning unto that person, than it is not true sublimity. “Real sublimity contains much food for reflection, is difficult or rather impossible to resist, and makes a strong and ineffaceable impression on the memory.” (138) Longinus believed that the most productive source of sublimity was the power to conceive great thoughts. He wrote elsewhere that “sublimity is the echo of a noble mind” (139). A person with a noble mind is one whose thoughts weigh heavily and are not full of trivial expressions.

           

“Our thoughts often travel beyond the boundaries of our surroundings. If anyone wants to know hat we were born for, let him look around at life and contemplate the splendour, grandeur, and beauty in which it everywhere abounds.” (151)

            In this clip from Walt Disney’s “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”, Dave explains his fascination with his tesla coil experiments. He is physics major and is using the tesla coils to generate plasma. He say’s, “I got so fixated on the technical aspects of it that I almost didn’t notice something kind of beautiful.” Here he demonstrates an aspect of sublimity; he is of noble mind by creating plasma from the high frequency sound waves from the coils. He is nature, with a little help from modern technology, to create a part of nature that is not seen every day. His moment of sublimity arises when he finally sees beyond just the technical aspect of his experiments and notices that the experiment itself is a kind of beauty. He takes a step away from physics and calculations and looks through different eyes at what the coils are doing, creating. “They’re making their own music and it was lost on me. I was never able to appreciate it”.

Word Count: 386

Leitch, Vincent B. The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. 2nd ed. New York: W. W. Norton &, 2010. Print.

“Tesla Coil Scene Sorcerer's Apprentice (Secrets - OneRepublic). Perf. Jay Baruchel. 17 November 2010. YouTube. 20 February 2011.

Bugger, bugger, bugger...

In “The King’s Speech”, Colin Firth plays King George the VI of Britain, who is plagued with a stammer. In this scene, we can use Aristotle’s system of argument (speech) and Aristotle’s theory as to why art is good.

            Aristotle believed that there were three different types of speech; deliberative, forensic and epideictic. Someone who is giving a deliberative speech is good at persuading their audience about what is going to happen in the future. A person who is giving a forensic speech appeals to the past and somehow relates it to what their argument is based on to give it merit. And lastly, a person giving an epideictic speech focuses on the present and appeals to their audiences ethos, pathos and logos; character, emotion and logic, respectively. In this short clip we see a moment in the film where the king is at another speech lesson with his therapist, played by Geoffrey Rush, and he starts throwing expletives left and right to get his anger out and calm his nerves so he can focus on improving his speech.

            For those who haven’t seen the film, or don’t know anything about it, Geoffrey Rush’s character is a commoner, and Colin Firth’s character is the king. And we all know that kings do not interact with commoners, let alone befriend them and ask them for their help. Geoffrey Rush makes a wonderful argument when the king, begrudgingly, comes to him for help. He acts all posh and upper class and like, well, royalty and Geoffrey Rush doesn’t take any of it. He treats the king like any other person, or patient; like family, like a friend. The king, at first is outraged but as the film progresses the two grow a special bond. In this scene, Geoffrey Rush is appealing to the king’s ethos, pathos and logos while giving an epideictic speech. He acts according to the king’s character (ethos) using words and mannerisms that will appeal to him and make him break down his mental walls: that he is here to help him get better at his speech. Rush also uses a tone of voice and tells simple stories and analogies that appeal to the king’s emotional state of mind/character; his pathos. To appeal to his logos, Rush finds ways to be strict with the king but also still friendly so as to not make the king overly upset and turn away, by making him realize that his tantrums will not help him help his improvement in his speech.

            Aristotle also believed that art was very important and important for the people. He believed that art was cathartic, creating a type of cleansing that lead to learning something about one’s self. In an earlier part of the film, (sadly I could not find the clip) Rush makes the king put on a pair of headphones and turns the music up very loud. He tells the king to recite a certain passage from Hamlet while the music is playing. The king complies, again begrudgingly, and begins to recite although not being able to hear himself at all. After becoming exasperated with the exercise he storms off home. Later, he plays the recording from that exercise and hears himself recite the passage with no hint of stammer. As he sits on the couch, he begins to cry as he realizes that there is hope for him after all, the he indeed does have a voice and the capability of speaking without stammering. This is a cathartic moment for the king where he learns something about himself that he didn’t know before, thus proving Aristotle’s belief that art is good for man.


Word Count: 609
"The King's Speech: The F Word Scene." Dir. Tom Hooper. Perf. Colin Firth, Geoffrey Rush. 02 February 2011. YouTube. 14 Feb. 2011. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ka2g2ehdLj0

Try and Persuade Me

     Alright, so today we had a guest speak for the majority of our class period. What did we talk about? The art of persuasion of course. As many people would call it, rhetoric. According to the Greeks, who only had two jobs in life; to fight in combat and risk the only thing they had in order to be a hero, and to open their mouths after working out and talk. Doesn't the latter sound like fun? It does, but only if you're good at it. During this time in the Greek culture you had to be very good at speaking; you're status depended on it. 

     

     Aristotle came up with three different types of genres to rhetoric; deliberative, forensic and epideictic. Future, past and present, respectively. He also came up with the three different appeals to persuasion; ethos, pathos and logos. The ethos distinguishes character or spirit of a person, group or culture. The pathos is the quality or power to arouse pity and the logos is the appeal to logic, the rational principle that governs and develops the universe. He believed that the center of all argument, persuasion, was syllogism; the assembling of sentences such that those sentences create an outcome, or conclusion, that could be generated as the only possible, or plausible, outcome. He also believed, that for those who could not think as critically, that the center of rhetoric was enthymene; shortened syllogisms. 

     When I think about this Aristotalian system of argument, or speech, I think of all the conversations that have been had, the scripts that have been created, topics of discussion that have been generated, and so on. I, honestly, thought I didn't know anything about theory: it seemed like such a foreign part of education to me that I would never come to understand. After hearing this lecture on Aristotle's system of rhetoric, I have realized that everything we do is based on this system; we just didn't know it, or at least I didn't. When we break things down, it's not that hard to realize that we use this system in our everyday conversations. For example: When we want to convince a friend that whatever is going on will turn out okay, we appeal to their logic, we put ourselves into their place and give examples from past experiences, thus appealing to the ethos and then we appeal to their ethos, by minimizing the power or affect of whatever is bothering them. We also go into deliberative speech, telling them what will happen if they do or don't do certain things; forensic, what has happened in the past with whatever given reason or decision and epideictic, whatever is happening to them due to whatever choices or circumstances.


Word Count: 454

Intro the Theory

     Gorgias, in his Encomium of Helen, states that "a man, woman, speech, deed, city or action that is worthy of praise should be honored with acclaim, but the unworthy should be branded with blame." (p 38) He explains the four possible reasons for Helen's departure to Troy: she could have been persuaded by the gods, by force, by love or by speech. He argues that if Helen was indeed persuaded by the gods, then those who blamed her for her crime should blame themselves for the will of the god's cannot be overcome by that of a mortal. Gorgias explains that by nature the strong rule the weak and the gods are the strongest of all beings, therefore they rule over the weak mortals that reside on Earth and Helen should be absolved from her reputation. If, however, it was by force that she left for Troy, then the aggressor should be blamed. If it was by love, then she would again be absolved of her crime because love is a god, and how could any weak mortal reject him? If it was by speech, Gorgias explains that he could clear her name from blame because "speech is a powerful master and achieve the most divine feats with the smallest and least evident body." (p 39)

     According to Plato, everything was imitation. As we saw in the video of Plato's Cave, the images that the prisoners saw was all imitation. They were shown shadows, replicas, of the real thing. This led me to think that, what, throughout all that we've learned, is real and what is fake? Because, whatever is fake, is an imitation of the true thing itself. Have all the things that we have been taught been real? The true things in and of themselves? Then again, what constitutes as real? To each person, something, anything, can be taken and applied to their personal beliefs and ideals to make it real. Give everyone in a classroom one idea, and see how many different forms of that idea are created. This does not mean that the idea is an imitation of the real one because it is not re-stating the exact idea, but turning it around so that it becomes real, genuine, in it's new form. Perhaps, what those prisoners saw in the cave were imitations. What if they were shown the real thing, but not given a name for it? What if, if they were released out into the world and they were to see those same images for themselves, in actuality, would they not give those images a name of their choosing? Each prisoner could give the same image a different name, but the basis that the object they see is the same thing does not change. So who is to stay what is real and what is fake, what is genuine or imitation?


Word Count: 473


Works Cited
Gorgias of Leontini. “Encomium of Helen.” The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism.
W.W. Norton & Company; Second Edition. New York, 2001. Pages 38-41 Print.

Major Critical Theories....sigh.

Well, for starters, my name is Ani, I'm a Creative Writing Major, a Junior, a fairly creative mind and theory, I have to say, kinda scares me. Then again, that's a good thing because if I wasn't scared of it, I wouldn't take the class. (It's a weird way of looking at it, but it makes sense to me.) Anyways, I’m currently enrolled in six English classes and I only have one word for you: No. I have no idea what I was thinking, thinking that I could take all these classes and manage. Apparently, my thought process isn’t all that great, because I’m sailing a ship where the hull looks like Swiss cheese and is mostly sinking, rather than sailing.

I love English. I couldn’t think of any other subject to study (besides Journalism, which is my second major) because it’s just so much fun. I love to read, and my ever growing library in my room is slowly expanding, causing me to upgrade my storage units every other year or so. (My wallet is so not happy with me.) My career goal is to become a copy editor, so I’ll be the first to read new and upcoming books before they hit the shelves. It’s an exciting thought. That being said, I think this class is definitely going to help me see books, and stories, and all types of fiction in a new light that will help with my future career. =)

I’ve never really thought critically and even if I have, I never realized it. If you ask me what it means to think critically, I’m going to give you the only answer I can think of: To think critically is to think philosophically, like Plato and Aristotle and etc, which to me is not that appealing because it’ll hurt my brain. BUT, from what we did in class on our first day, I think I’m going to enjoy this part of English because, come on, we watched a clip from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang: That’s just awesome. Another thing that’s really cool about this class, and this teacher, for me at least is that there are no wrong answers. I can say any response that comes to mind and even if it’s wrong, it’s okay because then we’ll learn from that and figure out why it’s wrong.

The theory that there are no wrong answers in this class is amazing, but when it comes to the actual moment where I want to give my response and not feel like I’m giving the most absurd answer ever heard on the planet, will be the moment of truth. Until then, I will remain a teensy bit skeptical and see how this all plays out. =)


Word Count: 488