Discussion is Extended for Another Week

Hi Everyone,

This discussion has been extraordinarily spirited and wideranging, and despite the obvious impatience some people have with each other, no food fights have erupted. I congratulate all concerned on this. Anyone who looks at other internet discussion boards knows the usual outcome of differences of opinion.

Sophia has graciously agreed to allow the discussion to continue for another week. I think it's a very useful one, and I suspect that all parties are learning a lot about how and what others think even when they don't agree.

I am grateful to Sophia for the time and energy she has put into this Salon (and continues to put into it).

Regards to all,

Steve Price

I wouldn't mind how long this discussion continued if I had the foggiest notion what it's about. It would be nice if somebody could go back and explain, but PLEASE DO SO IN NO MORE THAN ONE SCREENFUL!!!

Regards, Yon

Hi Yon,

Didn't you see the goodmorning posting I made?
What do you see? Wineglasses/Tulips and leafs? Well that's ok, because this is the way most of us look at the design like that. Think Michael had a salon on this design once.
Yes, everybody can see the negative space aren't dragons. But because art isn,t sience, it wont hurt to look at designs from a different perspective.
That's all.
Once we(oops), I had a salon about elongation etc. Couldn't proove anything, but I had hopes in giving the rug art something extra. An extra dimension.
The EE salon was about the same. PROOVE IT! TEST IT! Nothing has to be prooved or tested in art.
What YOU see is what YOU get. And if someone says to you:"Look at it, like this. Do you like it?" and you say "Yes", then it's ok. If you say "No" it's ok.
So, speaking for myself, the more dragons, scorpions, spiders, serpents, Mother Goddesses etc I can find, the more I like it.

Think, Sophia is trying to show us that in the Kaukasus something unique happend. A transformation in design language that doesn't have it's equal in history. Why? That's the question. Where did it come from? How did it survive? And......whatever questions/attributions you and I can come up with, can help her in getting everything in the correct context.
At the end we will find ourselves lost in whatever state of mind, but we've been wasting some time together and that's what art is all about: It's wasting time.
As a dealer I'm constantly wasting my time, day in day out, isn't it beautiful?

Best regards,
Vincent

Hi Vincent,

Although I've emphasized it a couple of times throughout this discussion, nobody has demanded (or requested) proof of anything. Some (including me) have asked for evidence that would support certain assertions. You are correct, art appreciation doesn't need evidence. It's internal. But the focus of the topic is art history. The history presumably reflects real events that happened at certain times and in certain places. Knowing what is most likely to be true about those things calls for evidence, at least to me.

Regards,

Steve Price

Something Unique

Dear All:

Yes - Vincent says it beautifully. In this one place, populated by people from many states and many ethnic groups, "belonging" to this empire or that, and traversed by Mongol horsemen, Kurdish and Turkic nomads, and caravans from China - the people created a unique and beautiful art form: the Caucasian rug.

So - let's keep on truckin'.

WHY did this happen?

What may have caused some of the internal variations we see?

Did religious symbolism play a role?

If this Salon has seemed confusing at times - that's good. Because life is like that and art isn't created by people living in a sterile environment. Yet, we want to look at it from a sterile perspective: OK, now we look at art, in the safety of our homes and with our books by our side, and prove what it's about.

We have to look at art - and history - from a VITAL perspective - from many angles and with many types of vision. And realizing - we may never know the "truth".

For a start, I'd like to propose an exercise. Go to the Dualism thread and print out the image of the Mimbres pot.

Then, copy it. You can leave out the kill hole if you like. But the idea is to get a sense of positive-negative form and how each - the black and the white - can be "true" - each can have a meaning.

In the Mimbres pot this was quite deliberate. And if it looks simple at first: guess again. But you'll see what I mean when you draw it up. It's actually a very subtle, carefully conceived design that APPEARS to be simple but is actually conveying at least three images: the black, the white, and the whole.

Then, if any of you are feeling brave, draw up a carpet design using "guls" made from your sketches of the Mimbres pot. Use your tools in the design thread, and think about what you want to SAY.

Of course - it would be best if you'd post the results! I'll bet each artist comes up with something special.

Hint: graph paper is a Big Help when designing carpets.

And, since we have another week - it would be good to hear from some new people.

Thanks to all!