On Love: Art and Life (Revised)

What is the relationship between art and life? Or more precisely, what is the relationship between art and love? Is art the imitation of life? Whatever it is, the conception of art nevertheless offends the renowned Greek philosopher Plato. According to Plato, there is a world of Forms that bears all the ideal Forms, from the most physical to the most abstract, of everything in the physical world. From a Platonic perspective, the reality as we live in is therefore an imitation of the world of Forms. If art offends Plato, it is perhaps because art is the imitation of imperfection, namely, the illusionary reality, which is deemed destructible. But is art as an imitation of life as commonly supposed?

Out of all artistic movements, what strikes me as one of the most interesting is perhaps Dadaism. Dadaists rebels against all traditional conceptions of art, rather than articulate their hands to exercise their craftsmanship at full force, they draw materials that are usually found in our homes such as a broomstick or toilet, giving them their due place in art museums, hence rendering our aesthetic sensibility vulgar. One of the most celebrated works is Marcel DuChamp's toilet which he fancily calls it "The Fountain".

Confronted by such avant-garde conception of art, it is not surprising to be full of wonder at the display of such an exceptionally normal sanitary system can be compared to the works of masters such as Mondrian's and Matisse's or Rothko's and Klee's. What is so artistic about a toilet?

Contemplating what it meant to be beautiful, we may perhaps be drawn back to Plato's theory of Forms. In the world of Forms, according to Plato, there exists an ideal From of beauty, made up of ideal symmetry between parts. Up to this point, one will be compelled to inquire, "Is "The Fountain" built upon the Greek obsession of the law of the Golden Ratio? Does it offer a necessarily mathematical basis of beauty which ought not to be determined by our subjectively aesthetic mindset?

Perhaps there is something peculiar about DuChamp's conception of beauty. For most of us, the work creates in its aesthetic horror the feel of a tastelessly furnished sanitary system located in a bathroom. If we allow ourselves to follow DuChamp's aesthetic logic, could we equally falsely raise a facet, a bathtub, or even a toothbrush to a status of artistic superiority?

Surprisingly, the Dadaists have as much to offer about art as about the nature of love.

If artists are able to aesthetically distinguish themselves among the lay people, it is because their role lies in opening our eyes, in sensitising our aesthetic sensibility, and inculcate in us an appreciation of objects of initially neglected aesthetic qualities. Dadaists urge us to pay attention to objects of their minutest details, suggesting object even as ordinary as a toilet or a broomstick may detain us for a moment of artistic joy. But it is always hard to notice the details around us, because we are creatures of habit and therefore liable to grow contemptuous of what is familiar.

If we study the history of art in depth, we are likely to be driven to the conclusion that other artists, aside from the Dadaists, follow a similar trajectory. In Monet's painting "Haystacks at Giverny, Summer", rather than attend to us the beauty of a Palace or the usual luxurious goods, he suggests even something as simple and ordinary as a haystack can strike us as beautiful. Mark Ryden's "The Tree Show" urges us to revise our commonly supposed conceptions about trees, to discover the beauty of trees we often neglect, hence attach them to a more "accurate" and "just" value.


So what do the Dadaists wish to tell us? They wish to tell us, through objects that were initially not offered a place in an art museum, that our perception of beauty is not immobile, susceptible to change depending on the lessons artists wish to offer. They sensitise and refine our perception of beauty. They open our eyes to what was initially impossible to appreciate therefore suggest our life is more beautiful than we suppose it to be.

In like manner, when we are in love, we may desire all the small things in us can be appreciated by the ones we love. That all the minutest details within us, however trivial, may be manifested and therefore raised to a status of immense significance. The way our girlfriends brush their hair or the way they arrange their clothes in their wardrobes, the fact that I perceive these trivial details may at one level be silly, but at another level it suggests something justifiable, that I wish to notice and understand everything about them rather than just look, just like appreciating a book by its content rather than by its cover. Do we not wish to be artists when we are in love? Do we not often harbour a wish that our partners can be like Andy Warhol who finds beauty in a can of Campbell soup and therefore raises an ordinary grocery product to a status that demands attention of the world? A close inspection of our beloveds' exceptionally ordinary behaviours makes their insignificant existence take on a certain value, as antidote to cynicism, to which strangers are oblivious.

The analogy we draw from Dadaism for love is that it teaches us to notice rather than look. If our sense of beauty is not immobile, why, then, can't we say the same for love? Dadaists show us what the nature of love should be. They do not just wish to sensitise our sense of love by the virtue of noticing, they also teach us how to separate love and infatuation or love and passion. We may at times marvel at the thoughts whether we are in actually love. How can we be sure our desire for a prostitute is love or obsession? How do we make the distinction between the line of physical desire and amorous desire? Direct physical contact with an object of love does not necessarily grant us amorous possession. If we fail to notice the details in whom we desire, it suggests we are more infatuated with our partner rather than love her, just like opening a bottle of wine and smell the splendour of its aroma without the attempt to drink it.

Oscar Wilde's wisdom seems nearer to the truth as opposed to Plato:

"Life imitates art far more than art imitates life."

All too often we want our romantic relationships can be those depicted in literature, novels, and films. We find in works of art the process of simplification and perfection we often anticipate in our minds. But our reality is always disappointing because artists are responsible for cutting away the periods of difficulties and struggles and trying to persuade us that all problems are deemed solvable by our intelligent minds. Unfortunately, the kisses which most lovers receive are often the vulgar imitations of Rodin's "The Kiss". Little wonder why Oscar Wilde concludes,

"It is through art, and through art only, that we can realise our perfection; through art and art only that we can shield ourselves from the sordid perils of actual existence. "

Art allows us to perceive the world from a wholly different perspective. It enforces us to appreciate something that may be previously offending and refine our original perception of beauty. DuChamp urges us to look at a toilet not from our own eyes but through his eyes.

Perhaps art imitates life as much as life imitates art. But beyond a point, when we too often fall in love, that it has become a habit, the realisation of love ceases. Familiarity breeds contempt. Rather than being aware of the lessons of experience, we further go on to commit the same mistakes, neglecting the nature of love, just like we naively think a camera can automatically assure us the possession of beauty. The merits of artists lie in reminding us of the fact that even falling in love is as common as seeing a tree or riding a bus, it does not mean we can rightfully neglect its beauty and nature. Artists inculcate in us an realisation of neglected qualities of love, an understanding of what love is, so we can become what hope to be.

Until we start appreciating our own bathroom, we will not be able to learn how to love.

W