Anatoly Volynets

“ Culture and Humanity We concluded in the very beginning that every work of real art actually creates a new layer of humanity. Let us list a few points which have been developed thus far and some of the obvious offshoots thereof:
If a work of art represents a new world and this new world speaks to us, then it invokes new feelings, new language to express ourselves, new views on our relations with one another, etc. Thus, artwork creates new layers of the human way of life or, in other words, new insights on humanity itself. ”

“ If we disregard the continuous process of development as an aspect of culture’s nature, all that will remain will be nothing more than complex forms of behavior. Culture and creativity are interrelated and interdependent; they are practically synonymous. Culture is the embodiment of the novelty of human life in all possible dimensions. For example, we noted earlier that an author creates not only a work but also a new alter ego and a new audience. ”

“ We identify with the heroes; we love and hate; we get scared, triumphant, sad, happy, impatient, avenged, etc. It is as if we are living and acting there—we take whatever happens there close to our hearts. Again, their world becomes, in a sense, ours. Second, it is a different and strange world. That is why it is interesting to us.
And so, here we can sum up the first definition of a work of art: it is the paradox of a new, strange world accepted as our own—an alter ego of our world. ”

“ A Work of Art Equals a Message And so, a piece of art addresses an audience, which, in turn, is supposed to understand it. This means that the piece of art bears another duty and, hence, another definition: it is a message to be heard, understood, and responded to, which means, furthermore, that true artwork appears when the artist has something to say. Obviously, this must be something that touches the author personally. ”

“ It is through art that people develop, employ, and reveal creativity and freedom, their most powerful and fundamental abilities.
If we were to go farther back in time to when there was virtually no art, we would find that no human way of life had yet developed. The arts create humanity, amount to it, and vice versa—no humanity emerges beyond the arts. It is noteworthy that humanity is measured in all possible dimensions here: ethics, aesthetics, feelings, thoughts— all that make a human being specifically human. ”

“ These patterns exist and develop only in works of art. While talking about art, we have no substance to look and point at other than works of art. Art does not exist beyond works of art. Art in itself is a paradox, and this paradox is the exact reason that art develops through its own laws. ”

“ What is crucial for our subject is that an author is conversing with his potential audience and other authors.
Obviously, an artwork itself means nothing until somebody sees it, listens to it, etc. A work of art represents culture at the moment that it emerges as the subject of inner or outer dialogue. Remove dialogue, and art becomes a piece of canvas, some ink, a tape, etc.
Interestingly, if we remove art—and thus novelty—from dialogue, it turns into banal, senseless, animal-like communication. ”

“ We can even put it this way: the more talented an author is, the more independently his creation acts. If we agree that an imagined world is, in a sense, a living one, then we see it as independent—independently acting and independently developing. In short, the main rule for a creator is paradoxical: be free to follow your creation!
Creating as Dialogue All right, a talented author allows his creation to live according to its own laws. Now, let us recall that a piece of art is a message. Thus, the talent of a creator consists in allowing his creation to speak for itself. ”

“ Culture appears to be an engine producing works, which, in turn, develop the culture. We revolve within this and other paradoxes of human ways all the time. We can neither avoid it nor change it.
The paradox between culture and its works is analogous to the paradox between thought and speech. Thought and speech are not one and the same, because you may express the same thought in different ways. ”

“ Freedom of inner speech is one of the main conditions required and, at the same time, is the motivation to create. It is another law of the nature of culture! Even if an author creates for some superficial reason, like money, fame, or fear of punishment, these affect him on the surface only. No external reasons add talent to a work of art, but free inner speech or dialogue does. ”

“ This is what happens with a creator. His inner and outer interlocutors are always clandestine coauthors in any work of art. Once more, who owes whom?
The author is as much a contributor as a recipient in both the outer and inner dialogues. In fact, the hidden interlocutor is representative of the audience in general. The author and the audience have equal positions in the creation of the artwork. The more creative a work is, the more it implements others’ ideas. Over and over—who owes whom? Each owes the other.
Creator and Culture So mankind and the creator are on par. ”

“ We concluded that virtual worlds of art are more real in certain respects than the physical world. Virtual worlds and the physical world do interact and influence each other. Real tensions within the physical world instigate creators to reflect them in imagined worlds. These are imagined in new and different ways every time they and an audience interact. This is how works of art promote perceptions and understandings of new ways of life and thus change society. It is up to civilization to accept or deny what culture generates. ”

“ This means that arts bring about new ways of life. In these new ways of life, the arts disseminate ideas which are exclusively human. These ideas are ingrained in material objects and relate to desire, value, interest, hate, affection, encouragement and so forth. Moreover, art foster ideas in an exclusively human way, via aesthetic forms, thus developing the human ability to perceive. The virtual world of an artwork must be recognizably ours and intriguingly strange in order to work for the audience. ”

“ Sometimes I use the terms culture and art interchangeably. This is because the arts are the most typical representation of culture; therefore I use art to explore culture itself; and vice versa, whatever we can say about culture in general, naturally applies to the arts. ”

“ For example, earlier we saw how information in a newspaper may pass unnoticed by the public, yet the art of journalism makes a real event truly realistic. The art of journalism makes a factual event so captivating that we notice and accept it as important, that we become engaged in human-to-human relations with the characters of the article. ”

“ Creators and people of culture have put themselves on the line all throughout history. We saw that people create regardless of reward or punishment. Likewise, people try to attain freedom regardless of reward or punishment. Freedom and creativity, in and of themselves, produce rewards and punishments despite ulterior circumstances. In this sense, culture, creativity, humanity, dialogue, and freedom are all synonyms. ”

“ And while on the outside a new creation invokes new understanding in other people, the same amazing thing happens inside, in the creator’s inner dialogue: all of the author’s inner interlocutors develop an understanding of the new creation. ”

“ Again, the new world is real if it is shaped in a perfect form.
We always recognize a false note when it is played; we always notice when a painter makes a wrong stroke; in general, we feel it when an author breaks the rules of the world he has created. That is, we can always feel it when an aesthetic form is broken, when its perfection is undermined. I remember a very compelling example—The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis. It happened when, I think, Lewis started to worry that his message of Christian love was not clear, so he turned to direct preaching. ”

“ Culture questions civilization. Civilization, in turn, denies what culture brings in. Civilization fight creations in different ways for different reasons. It punishes creators, disseminators of art, and the audience. ”

“ After the creation, the “added culture” spreads into the vernacular, becomes fixed in the written language, rituals, clothes, meals, and so forth and, sooner or later, “fires back”—that is, new works of art appear. These new works reflect the new stage of the group and promote new forms of life. Novelty is a characteristic of culture, and because of that, culture is exclusive purview of humanity.
Once again, culture is born of works of art, and gives birth to works of art but is not the same as the sum of those works. ”

“ Again, the freedom of the author’s inner speech is crucial for the creative process. A creator is as talented as he is free.
Culture: Sum of Works and Beyond We already touched upon the question of whether or not there is an “art” as such, i.e., art beyond works of art. We assumed there must paradoxically exist some generic thought patterns, some ideas representing art. They exist, but one cannot point at such a pattern in reality. They work as engines, producing new elements of humanity such as thoughts, ideas, forms of expression and even new human behavior. ”

“ A work of art develops a new way of free human communication or dialogue and vice versa. Dialogue is a creative process. Many of us can recall times when ideas popped up in a friendly conversation or in an unfriendly quarrel totally unexpectedly, out of nothing. ”

“ All the above definitions of culture lack a most notable point—its development. Development is necessarily “part and parcel” of the very idea of culture and, thus, must be reflected in its definition. For example, “culture is the development of the tastes in art and manners that are favored by a social group” or “culture is the development of the attitudes and behavior that are characteristic of a particular social group or organization” or “culture is the development of a particular society at a particular time and place,” and so forth. ”

“ From ancient Greek tragedy and sculpture to medieval poetry and classical music, the arts have always been developed through a cycle: invention of a canon, development within the canon, offshoot of a new canon. You either learn an existing means of expression, or you invent a new means yourself. But you still have to follow some rules so that your creation will fit into a cultural context. This makes your work readable, visible, understandable, recognizable, and so forth.
The third set of rules is really mysterious. It is concerned with the “dictatorship” of the author’s own work. ”

“ The fact that thinking is actually a dialogue is especially evident when an outer conversation transitions into an inner one. Two people may have a conversation or an argument and continue pondering it long after the conversation is over. ”

“ The arts develop the sense of historical time and universal space, which translates into the sense of the total unity of humankind throughout time and space, particularly beyond national boundaries. It is the arts which develop the basic of all basics of the human way of life—dialogue or free communication. ”

“ You do feel a personal engagement, much like one with other people. It is this human-to-human aspect that makes artwork vital for both individuals and society as a whole.
Form in a Work of Art To return to one of my premises, a piece of art is a message. It travels from the author to the audience and is about the author’s true feelings, ideas, and indispensable inventions. ”

“ The first set of rules is concerned with categories of art (genres, media, etc.) . Obeying these laws is one of the conditions of molding a piece of artwork into a perfect form. Let us take a look at movies based on books. Simply rewriting a book as a script cannot work because things that have to be said in a book can simply be shown in a movie. Inversely, things that can be explained in a book cannot be shown in a movie. ”

“ That is, this set represents a unique world that is implied in every single work of art. No matter what it is—a novel, a short story, a song, a play, a painting, a poem, etc.—it is a whole new and different world. To reiterate, it is new and it is real. Importantly, it becomes real when all its elements play together without a single false note. ”

“ The ancient Romans said, Natura parendo vincitur, that is, “Obeying nature, one wins.” In other words, we get the best fruits of nature if we obey its laws. And nothing but harm comes from trying to impose our wishes on nature, to act against its laws. ”

“ If this novelty were to stop, all the culture that has developed thus far would immediately turn into forms of mere behavior and, as I said, essentially would not differ from some complicated forms of animal life. Likewise, if thinking were to stop, speech would lose any sense and would not differ from animal communication.
We can summarize all the above in a paradoxical way (the only right way to do so) : culture is the creation of culture. ”

“ Even if you want a very certain car, it can be substituted. The Lord of the Rings cannot be substituted. Another book will never be the same to you, in the exact way that a loved one cannot be substituted by just any person. ”

“ One could point out that art-on-order or art-for-hire does exist. Indeed it does, but this changes nothing. The artist’s talent has the capacity for the understanding and empathy that other people could and should truly feel. Otherwise, the outcome does not amount to real art.
People-to-Art Relations So, a work of art is a message. ”