tang dynasty times

Being embodied with Master Wang (知行合一)

He doesn't know what he doesn't know, said my friend, the Brilliant Master Wang Yangming. He knows nothing about human nature and anyway, The Great Learning shows us what are genuine knowledge and genuine action. It asks us ‘to love the good as we love the beautiful color and to hate the evil as we hate the bad odor.’ Here seeing the beautiful color belongs to knowledge, while loving it belongs to action. However, at the very moment one sees the beautiful color one has already loved it; it is not the case that one decides to love it only after seeing it. Similarly, smelling the bad odor belongs to knowledge, while hating it belongs to action. However, at the very moment one smells the bad odor, one has already hated it; it is not the case that one decides to hate it only after smelling it.” All anyone can really know is the view out the window right in front of them. They may think they know more than that but they don't, do they?

My friend was indeed famous for his unusual epistemology. The unity of knowledge and action (知行合一says in a nutshell, “If you want to know bitterness, you have to eat a bitter melon yourself.” No other knowledge is possible. All we know is what we do. And what we do is all we can know. 

To approach the issue you would, I think, have to work well outside a Cartesian mind-body duality so that knowledge is always something *embodied* and therefore in this radical de-emphasis of the thinking-action divide, all knowledge is-- as embodied-- also an action. So, in this way, as the philosophers over at Warp, Weft and Way suggested, this pushes beyond Ryle's know-that versus the know-how dichotemy, to say that all Confucian knowing is a knowing-to.   

Hence, knowing affects or informs, influences. At the same time, though, this is saying that all we can know is what we do- or what we see. "Vision pours in through the eyes," says Dante, "straight into imagination." Even through our very breath, (or 気) we take inside (内）what is outside (外) and can thereby be affected by osmosis. In such an epistemology, what is then emphasized is a sensitivity or a receptive sensibility to the shared world around us.  

This is a partial rejection of knowledge ex nihilo with a strong emphasis on inter-relational and inter-subjective knowing. Knowing as doing. Doing as being.

Yes, the view out our window as we are in the act of looking.

It reminds me of the Renaissance idea of painting as a window on the world. As Leon Battista Alberti in the 15th century famously declared, painting should be like “a transparent window through which we look out into a section of the visible world.” Yes, the Venetians. In their exquisite subjective "eye-witness style chronicle of daily life," perhaps no one achieved this ideal like Bellini, Giorgione, Titian and Carpaccio. Really, no wonder Ottoman Miniaturist Master Effendi was stunned-- so different were these paintings from what he was accustomed to back home.

The Getty Center in LA has a gorgeous and endlessly fascinating work by Carpaccio, Hunting on the Lagoon.

Painted by Carpaccio at the very same moment that my friend, Master Yangming, was writing down his unusual theory of epstemology on the other side of the world, Hunting on the Lagoon had puzzled art historians for decades. The painting shimmers in atmosphereic effects. Painted in azurite, lead white, ultramarine, with touches of vermilion used for the red on the Moor's jacket, it is one of the great views out a window.  

Hunting on the Lagoon. But, hunting water birds with a bow and arrow?

It was the Ming dynasty and the art of cormorant fishing had already arrived in Venice by that time. In Japan, you can still see this traditional way of fishing, called ukai. We saw it years ago by lamplight at night on boats that ply the Inuyama River, in Gifu Prefecture. The birds are trained to catch fish and deliver them back to their owners, the fisherman on the boats. Looking at the painting, while I spotted the cormorants without any problem, the practice was altered beyond recognition. The most fabulous lagoon in the world, during the Renaissance it must have been jam-packed with fish and mussels and clams and birds and, well, it must have been a wonderful place to spend an afternoon. And, these guys with their bows are clearly no fishermen.

I mean, I almost hate to draw attention to the big white lilies portruding from the water in the foreground of the painting. It surely must have driven art historians nuts for generations.

And, it wasn't until 1962 that a tentative answer to the mystery of the lilies was offered either.

You guessed it. There is another painting that has an empty vase.

An even more famous painting by Carpaccio, it hangs in the Correr Museum in Venice. Two Venetian Ladies  was described by 19th century art collector John Ruskin as, "the best picture in the world." And, until 1962, with that bored look in their eyes and the high wooden clogs tossed in the corner, it was long assumed and insisted upon that these two ladies were courtesans.

But as Brilliant Master Yangming insisted, it is almost impossible to understand the view out the window unless you are the one doing the looking. All your knowledge will be based on rather shaky presuppositions otherwise.

Do you see the pretty majolica vase sitting on the railing of the balcony? Well, finally someone put two and two together. Someone looking at the empty vase surmissed --and then tests later confirmed-- that the lilies of Hunters fit right in that vase. Yes, the two paintings (paintings painted on wooden panels) fit together one on top of the other!

You can see here how it worked.

Talking about a window on the world, these paintings are believed to have been painted on a shutter or panels for a cabinet (the other painting facing this side being missing). Like pieces of a puzzle, looking at the paintings as a set, art historians now believe that these "ladies"-- rather then bored courtesan-- are probably the wives of the "fishermen," who are themselves no longer believed to be fishermen but rather aristocratic Venetians out hunting water fowl for sport on the lagoon.

The ladies, sitting on their elegant altane, are waiting-- waiting for the return of their men.

So this window on a world affords a view of two patrician ladies awaiting--finely clothed and surrounded in luxery, they look extraordinarily bored, don't they? They do not seem interested --though we certainly are-- in the view out their window of the most beautiful lagoon in the world. La Serenissima.

**

See Part 1: View from a Minaret

Highly recommended paper by Rebecca Norris: Hunting on the Lagoon and Two Venetian Ladies: A Vignette; and even better, Yvonne Szafran, 'Carpaccio's “Hunting on the lagoon”, a new perspective', Burlington Magazine, 1995

And "Is there something more than knowing-how and knowing-that?" by Yong Huang.  

Finally, this youtube video Carpaccio Vitorre 

♪♪♪♪♪♪  and if Venice is sinking, I'm going under   ♪♪♪♪♪♪

Sex and the Getty Bronze

Not unlike the story about my favorite Carpaccio painting, it was almost a year ago when he was talking about the exhibition publication of National Gallery of Art's Bellini, Giorgione, Titian, and the Renaissance of Venetian Painting. A huge fan of Renaissance painting, he complained that the authors insisted on seeing sex in many of their scholarly interpretations of Renaissance portraits. For example, discussing the book's take on Titian's Flora, he wrote:

"This question in fact summarizes about 80% of the scholarly writing on Titian’s Flora – and about 50% of all scholarly writing on all Venetian women’s portraits, whether nude or not. The question, in other words, is: did this so-and-so, whoever she was, or did she not, have sex? And — would she have it with me?

Which goes to show you that the art-historian’s mind isn’t very far from the lacrosse players’ locker room. The relevant question is the same: is she easy? Can I have her?

I don’t know, dear friends.

This seems some really, really weird stuff. I mean – is someone – er – frustrated here?

In all the years of looking at these paintings it has never occurred to me to ask whether these women are virtuous or otherwise. (I have always assumed them to be like most women I have known in my life – a little bit of both – virtuous for the most part — and thank heavens for that “most”; what would we do without a little doubt in the more shadowy corners of our lives, ahem). And, in any case, in staring at their beautiful skin, and hair, and into their dreamy eyes it has never occurred to ask myself whether they would sleep with me.

They were paintings; portraits of women dead these 500 years. It seemed – well – just a little irrelevant to ask?"

Irrelevant? Perhaps....

More of note, however, is what I would call the slippery nature of the art historian's occupation. To my mind, more potentially dangerous than their call to interpret, is their will to place value; which, I am afraid, is probably a necessary by-product of what they do. That is to say that through the act of interpreting art, they are affecting the way people understand art and therefore are creating certain values (which over time become institutionalized). Their opinions have been-- and continue to be-- not only influential in the way we see art, but more, are instrumental in what art we see at all (that is, what we even view of as being art).

The entire discussion, in fact, reminded me of the Apollo Belvedere; a statue I would very, very much like to make the long trip to see someday. In Joseph Alsop's unique book, The Rare Art Traditions, Alsop uses the Apollo Belvedere to make the same point: to illustrate the profound way our Western way of looking at art has changed over the past 150 years (in great part-- he explains-- due to the decisions and opinions of art historians and the art market). To make his point, Alsop traces the dramatic rise and fall of the Apollo Belvedere.

It is a fascinating story.

The statue has always been believed to be a Roman-time marble copy of a Greek original bronze made by Alexander the Great's court sculptor Leochares. The Romans of imperial times, had a huge liking for Greek art and there was a thriving industry to make marble copies of the original bronzes to be used as decorations in the villas and gardens of the wealthy. They were used like wallpaper or outdoor decorations, explains Alsop.

Jump ahead a thousand years, and again Italy can be seen turning her lovely head toward the East, as once again the ancient Greeks were held up as the great pinnacle of culture, civilization and art. And as they had in the past, Italians of the Renaissance pined more than anything to own an "ancient souvenir." (For the Han connection see this) Anything at all from classical times was coveted and admired, from ancient books to pieces of classical sculpture. Vasari spoke of the vast collection owned by Lorenzo Ghiberti, who was described as being proud to own a single Greco-Roman bronze leg!

To feed the great hunger of the Italians, Rome was under constant excavation. Although classical pieces were found on almost a weekly basis during the early Renaissance, to uncover an almost completely intact marble-- well, the Apollo Belvedere was destined for high fame! Bought by an art-collecting Pope, the Apollo was practically enshrined in the Vatican's Cortile del Belvedere .

For the next 350 years, the Apollo Belvedere was to remain the "statue of all statues;" and the "most admired sculpture in the world." During Victorian times, it will be remembered, people of means, as part of their overall education, went on tours to visit the great sights of France and Italy. Called "The Grand Tour," these trips abroad were thought to be like the crowning of a fine education; providing real life experience which could not be learned from books (読万巻書，行万里路). The trips were undertaken with the aim of enriching both the mind and the spirit. This was a time when people still believed that a person could cultivate their heart and mind through the aesthetic appreciation of beautiful things, and the Grand Tour was a social practice which grew out of this concept.

Not only was the Apollo Belvedere part of the Tour-- it was the main attraction. Goethe claimed to have been "Swept off his feet" by the sculpture while 18th century archaeologist and classical historian J.J. Winckelman said that the Apollo Belvedere was "the consummation of the best that nature, art, and the human mind can produce." It was indeed the must-see for anyone on a Grand Tour. A description of the wig worn by amateur Cellist Count Mateeuz Wielhorski is described in a book I am reading right now as being "curled a l'Apollo Belvedere." The statue had a profound influence during its day.

What happened? As Alsop says, "Few make the lonely trip out to look at the Apollo Belvedere any longer." And for those that do, what do they see? Are we even capable of really looking at ancient sculpture any more? Are these bronzes and marbles any more accessible to our modern eyes than say a Shang dynasty bronze?

In an age of Asian art and impressionism, JP Getty was stunningly unique in his commitment to classical European art. Well, the museum is unique in 2 ways for which it is most famous: one is the content of its collection but the second is its huge purchasing endowment, which I heard (but have a hard time believing) is equal to the total combined purchasing budget of all the other museums of the world! The Getty has a staggering amount of money to play with and no other museum stands a chance. Because it can literally buy the national treasures of a country right under that country's own nose, the Getty has been involved with many scandals as well.

This brings me to the statue that I cannot get out of my mind. The Getty Bronze. Also, mired in scandal, I think the Getty is still trying to fend off the Italian government over its purchase (almost $4 million to Art Investment fund Artemis).  Called "Victorious Youth," it was a classical bronze that the ancient Romans violently pried off its pedestal to drag back to Rome. The ship that carried my beloved boy then sunk in the Adriatic. Scholars think this happened in the first century AD. or BC.

The Getty Bronze is what scholars refer to as a victor's statue celebrating a youth's win in one of the Greek games. Perhaps he was the son of a wealthy family who wanted to celebrate their golden boy's athletic achievements. People may talk about his hair, but I love his arms, especially the one delicately pointing to the winning garland adorning his perfectly shaped head.

Such a beautiful start. But then the Romans literally ripped his feet off trying to drag him back to Rome (maybe for melting down since so little care was taken to pry him off his pedestal?) Then to sink in the cold waters of the Adriatic. Our boy spent lifetimes down at the bottom of the sea until he was finally pulled up by fisherman in 1964, in the waters of the coast of Fano, Italy. First, the fisherman thought it was a dead body in the water, and then all the barnacles and encrustations had to be pried off. The statue then changed hands several times under murky circumstances until the Getty finally got a hold of him (though the Italians are still laying firm claim to the Victorious Youth). The full story from the LA Times can be read here.

The Getty now keeps him at the Malibu villa. I always try to make it a point to visit him as soon as I get to town. The truth is, I often long to see him when too many months have past. I start to miss him. The experts say that originally his eyes were inlaid with bone and his nipples in contrasting copper. The patina left from all his time beneath the sea is exquisite enough, isn't it? I hate to say it, but-- just like those art historians of Renaiisance art that my friend was complaining about-- I do kind of wonder--- about his love life....

_______________

*I am re-reading Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's book, The Art of Seeing. Utilizing his usual socio-science method, he and his team interview a group of curators and educators in the museum world, and then from those interviews, go on to try and pin down (like a frog in biology class) what exactly is the aesthetic experience of the expert?

His conclusion is that the expert response is based on the following 1) Emotional response (which of course differs hugely between people) is the one trait they all unanimously agree, but what was interesting was the variations on stress put on this by historians in different fields of art history (see below).

2) knowledge (the intellectual skills the viewer brings with them that contributes to their experience; this includes an intellectual appreciation of excellence).

3) Perception was the next and 4) this was followed by something they (not Csikszentmihalyi) termed “communication” and “transformation (which is what they described as being a direct communication or connection they felt with the creator of the piece and the piece itself. That is; how the piece of art "spoke" to them).

Of interest here is that when Csikszentmihalyi broke down which characteristics had the greatest value placed on them by field, it turns out that museum professionals in the field of classical art all placed the intellectual aspect on top. I believe this is due to the reason I hinted-- that classical sculpture has become in many ways inaccessible to us and no longer "speaks to us;" Dreyfus would most likely say, that is because we no longer live in the classical understanding of being.... and because of this background knowledge becomes more essential for aesthetic appreciation. Csikszentmihalyi found this to be in direct contrast to the professionals working in modern art who claimed that direct perception and emotion were the most important aspects of their aesthetic experience. There is much food for thought in the book-- also recommended is, The Victorious Youth by Carol Mattusch

**I also like to follow the fate of my boyfriend here and here.

in epicurus' garden (with caesar)

 

A great friend of this blog, I used to call him Epicurus. Not that I knew all that much about the ancient philosopher; only knowing that Epicurean philosophy was dear to his heart. And as he is dear to my heart, I suppose it was only natural that my friend's interest would become somehow my own. With "my Epicurus" in mind, I have been utterly delighted to read about the ancient philosopher and his Garden School of Philosophy in Robert Harrison's Gardens: An Essay on the Human Condition. 

Many of You may have grown quite tired of my complaining about people who seem to be unable to do anything else but report the news. I like to call it the "what I did last weekend" syndrome. There is a whole lot of reporting, complaining and opinions being stated (but rarely argued)... But what about some old-fashioned storytelling? Sometimes I even begin to doubt whether real conversation even any longer exists....

This is what, of course, first drew me to Caesar-- the way he lingered in delight to tell me about a love affair. Robert Harrison's book too does this: lingering in great delight to tell a story. It meanders in rare sensuality and in great triumph too. And reading it is like being rained on by flowers. 

**

A garden. To achieve this place of aesthetic pleasure and moral cultivation-- Harrison suggest that perhaps more than anything, it is "structure" that is the necessary ingredient. For no matter how natural the garden may aim to be, without some "form" it would never truly become a garden, would it? There must be "katachi" (form, design)-- and this is as true of tea ceremony, theater, dance, the arts, as it is with love, friendship, anything significant that we wish to cultivate in fact requires some kind of form, don't you agree?

So, then, what was the underlying structure of the garden of Epicurean philosophy? Well, rather than virtue or knowledge, Epicurean philosophy posited that the aim of our lives should be happiness or joy. But what is happiness? Epicurus insisted that human happiness is achieved through the attainment of a state of ataraxia (Ἀταραξία): serentity or an absence of anxiety→　安心. This is, a state which-- unlike Buddhist Enlightenment-- is a path with no arrival. And, therefore, it requires, in the words of one French scholar,

“an effort lasting every minute of one’s life"

Gernet, in in these words above, had been referring to the Confucian project and explained that,

"by control of the smallest details of conduct, by observation of the rules of life in society (i), by respect for others and for oneself and by the sense of reciprocity (shu)”

I wonder if something similar couldn't be said of Epicurean philosophy-- that the aim of achieving happiness, or ataraxia, required an effort which would last a lifetime; and demanded the cutivation of certain social virtues which included both the measure or limiting of one's own desires with a profound respect and consideration of others.

Like Confucianism, Epicurean philosophy is very this-worldly. And there was also a strong emphasis on Friendship. Epicurus famously stating that it is better to have someone to eat with than to have something to eat; as if to say that we are nothing without friendship. Friendship.

This below is Robert Harrison telling us about Boccaccio's basic Epicurean morality; Yes, human life is rife with pain and misfortune, and as we strive toward increasing joy as much as we can, we do this not just for ourselves, but rather strive to increase overall joy in the world by bringing both pleasure and support to those around us. This is, says Harrison, the minimal moral imperative according to Boccaccio:

To be human means to vulnerable to misfortune and disaster. It means periodically to find oneself in need of help, comfort, distraction, or edification.Our condition is for the most part an affair of the everyday, not of the heroic, and our minimal ethical responsibility to our neighbor, according to Boccaccio's humanism, consists not in showing him or her the way redemption but in helping him or her get through the day. This help may take modest forms, not the least of which is rendering the sphere of social interactions more pleasurable through wit, decorum, storytelling, fellowship, conversation, courtesy, and socialibility. To add to the pleasure of life: that is the arche, or first principle of Boccacio's humanism, which is not the triumphalist humanism of later eras (which saw humankind as the glory of all creation) but the civil humanism of neighborly love. 

**



 

I have lately been thinking of Cleopatra and her carpet.

Remember when the Egyptian Queen first met the love of her life, Caesar? She was snuck in to his palace hidden in a rolled up carpet?  It is funny that that image of a woman being unfurled from a carpet before an emperor is somehow cross-cultural (ancient Rome, or concubines in Qing dynasty China, etc).

You can see two different Hollywood versions of the scene here and can judge for yourselves. But, I think everything we need to know about their love affair can be glimpsed in that first moment when Caesar pauses and really looks at her. Of course, I say this with the idea that I have been thinking so much about lately of Really Looking at what is right in front of you as the essential factor in virtue.

Tumbling out of the carpet, she landed at his feet and at that precise moment Caesar paused to really looked and listen to the Queen of Egypt. An Epicurean through and through, Caesar would remind her again and again and again that no matter what happened in Egypt-- even in the midst of great confusion or suffering-- one must still strive to find pleasure in daily life. Easier said than done, she thought. But Caesar was a delightful conversationist and had a fairly amusing sense of humor as well. All attributes of Roman suavitas-- and true friendship. To delight in the moment, but not just that-- to be like Caesar, she realized the trick is to enjoy the moment in a refined and measured manner based on the gratitude of all the blessings that one has received in the past; for Epicurean philosophy demands patience for the present, hope for the future based wholly on our ability to feel gratitude for the past: 

The life of the fool is marked by ingratitude and apprehension; the drift of his thought exclusively toward the future-- Epicurus

 

With Epicurus' words echoing in my head (and Caesar's teasing bringing a smile to my face), I realize that for many years now, this has been nothing if not my very own life: the life of the fool. 

 

**

The Villa of Papyri.

It contained one of the great Epicurean libraries of antiquity. Originally owned by Caesar's father-in-law, the villa was centered around an inner atrium. Full of art, books and cultivated vegetables and flower gardens, it was known as the finest villa in the resort town of Herculanean. With its library and spectacular view of the sea, I think it it is safe to say that it must have been a gathering place for the great thinkers and artists of the time. Of course, the life of the villa would end tragically with the volcanic eruption of Vesuvius in 79 a.d.

Fast forward to the 1970s when JP Getty decided to make public his fabulous art collection in 1974, he would do so in a building modeled on the ancient Villa of Papyri. And so, a replica of a roman villa sits atop one of the most beautiful hills in Malibu. Containing one of the finest art collections in America, it harkens back to the days of Rome-- to a villa that itself was full of its own longings for antiquity--looking back toward the glories of ancient Greek. In our future-focused worldview, we often forget that for much of human history, people posited the golden age, not in the promises of the future but as having already existed-- in the past (復古). Therefore, religious thinkers and philosphers looked back into antiquity in search of exemplery models that could be useful to the problems of present-day people. Full of tomes of classical knowledge, the villa received its name for the famed papyrus scrolls kept in its library. The Villa of the Papyrus scrolls.

A few years ago, Robert Harris used the villa in his book Pompeii. Indeed, most of the action of the novel takes place right there in the Villa Papyri. By that time, it had changed hands and belonged to a Roman aristocrat who used it for his holiday retreat. In the final scene of the novel, Harris describes Pliny the Elder, a friend and frequent visitor of the villa, who deciding that the smoke and rumbling of Vesuvius was a sign that the volcano was about to blow, tries to save the library in vain. As the bellowing becomes increasingly deafening, he tries to organize a bold rescue attempt by boat. But as he makes his way toward the villa, the volcano explodes and all is lost.