The Cause of the ArtistHallucination and Response to Henri Michaux Emergences-Resurgences.
“Art goes against inertia”
When speaking of artists, we know them as atmospheres. They create atmospheres around themselves and for others to live in and move within. They create a world made out of what? Maybe out of nothing except imagination and hallucination. I’ve always believed in imagination, magic and in the appearance of anything to change if you merely look at it in a different way. If you change your perspective, maybe stand on the other side of the room, or on the ceiling, or close an eye, it doesn’t matter. If you use a new set of language to describe it, if you make it up – how can you go wrong? You will not go wrong necessarily; at least you will end up somewhere different than where you started. Somewhere new. You must fully understand the idea of artists as atmospheres and the power that they hold within themselves that gives them the necessities to create. The connections they see and the relationships they nourish are directly linked to the way they see everything else in their view and are essential for creating, making new associations. This creates the barrier between themselves and the outside world. The pressure their environment puts on them, and the pressure they force outwards, contributes to the development of the artists’ atmosphere, that which we sense. This makes environment one of the most important pieces in time towards creating a future.
It is our environment that creates our perception in the present, however it is our perception that creates our environment for the future. If you view the world this way, then you will endow yourself the ability to see what you wish the world to look like. You will increase the possibilities in which to see the world. You will see the world the way in which your perceptions privy you to see it. If you accept everything in your environment as is, then you will not create anything new. If you look beyond appearances, then you will see the connections that were made while creating the appearance. Then, as an artist, you have the information and qualification to create change. This type of seeing is the base for resistance, for deviating direction, which is essential for creating an original.
“To paint in order to manipulate the world (its forms), to touch it more closely, more directly”
What exactly does this mean? It is a wish to be so intimate with the world so as to have the ability to change it. Intimacy with your surroundings is essential as an artist, because this closeness, which is experienced when we reach to grab it or it is impressed upon us, is the only way to truly transform or rearrange. To know something as the world, or the pieces that make it up, well enough to change it, by opening your perception, requires more intimacy, more closeness. Only with intimacy will you change, create, drive, advance, perhaps dislocate. This intimacy puts you in a dream or hallucinatory state where you must listen to your surroundings to know them. This is where your environment speaks to you. This is where images are sent to you, and they appear.
It’s important when talking about hallucination and images appearing or being sent to us to discuss where these come from. If sensing is the same as seeing, people sense the appearance of objects and their environment without seeing with their eyes at all. When you look at something, especially a living thing, you have the ability to see beyond the appearance if you listen. If you listen to your sensations and your heart, then you have the ability to see the connecting points behind the facade. Even if you choose not to listen to these sensations, people make connections on their own and formulate ideas without trying, without thinking. The point is that this happens, and as an artist you must be aware of it. To make a precise decision to create movement in a particular direction, you must listen. Everyone has the ability to see new connections and perhaps realities; although reality is an antonym of view. Not everyone recognizes the connections. They have to be in a state where they have the possibility to see them. Maybe they also have to have someone show them how to see connections. This is the role of your language in relationship to your environment and also the role of the artist.
Heightened awareness of your environment is important and could be brought about by breaking open. Artists discuss using language and breaking open language to create new sensations, and this is one way to open our mind’s eyes to see. To play with imagination through language is innate and requires nothing other than thought; it is to stretch your understanding of language and create a new set of rules or associations for yourself or between yourself and others for communicating. This type of communication is inimitable, and this creates intimacy. It will lead us to the dream or sleep state between yourself and those you communicate with, and this dream state naturally brings about creation among the group. It brings light to connection, brings people closer. It is limitless and truly the most foundational aspect of creating. If you see by sensing, this means that sensing a strong connection to something is an indicator that you see something beyond the appearance. Common connections between yourself and others, even strangers, is important for intimacy. It is the connection that puts you in a different world, created by each other and your distinct communication with each other. This is a specific, possibly limiting, perspective to hold which strongly shapes how you make relations to everything around you. This is the base for which your culture is defined.