"Thinking - One"
What is Nature?
Q- Define Nature?
A- In a nutshell, everything in the Universe is Nature.
Above: 2 Mass Redshift 3-D Survey of the Universe cataloguing 43,000 galaxies within 380million light years from Earth (Milky Way).
Q- Is a concrete building or an electronic device attributable to Nature?
A- Yes
Q- Why?
A- If a bird builds a nest or a spider builds a web, we consider their efforts Natural. If Nature made Mankind, therefore logically all things made by Mankind is Natural.
Bird Nest (Left)
'Bird Nest' (Right)
Q- But all these things made by Mankind are not Natural. They are not ‘organic’ or produced by Nature.
A- We are taught to think this is the essential premise when considering what is Natural but we do not consider self-awareness part of the equation.
Self-awareness allows us to make moral judgements i.e ‘right from wrong’. Consider this: When a lion fights another lion and wins over a pride of lionesses, the first thing the new Alpha-male lion does is kill all the young. After the lion’s act of ‘Infanticide’, the lionesses will mate with the lion to ensure the survival of their species and thus the strongest genes will be passed on.
Nature does not view ‘Infanticide’ as neither right nor wrong. However Mankind clearly will not practise ‘infanticide’ e.g. men fighting over a woman,then kill her offsprings and reproduce with her.
Therefore logically speaking: Mankind’s self-awareness ironically ‘self condemns’. It differs to Nature because it presides over morality, thus ultimately Mankind judges himself who too is part of the creator: Nature. Hence man sees himself as separate from Nature.
above: Wild flower and landscape
Q- So if this is true, what has this to do with arts?
A- For me, it has to do with composition and arrangements. Nature’s ‘beauty’ is random. Study Nature and you will see everything is NOT composed or arranged because of random events or circumstances. For example looking at a sunrise or landscape, its beauty or aesthetics is never ‘considered, juxtaposed, tweaked’ i.e. each sunrise is unique and due only to random natural effects.
above: City garden
Now consider art works made by Mankind and ‘we’ compose and arrange things according to ‘our’ perspectives of aesthetics. Mankind’s aesthetics theorise, considers and subjectively ‘Photoshops’ which is completely at odds to Nature’s objectivity.
E.g. if we look at landscapes by Mankind, we create these differently to Nature because we 'consider' everything. We compose a bed of red flowers alongside a manicured and trimmed hedge surrounded by evenly cut grass. Nature does no such thing because Nature is wild.
My art works examines aesthetics between Nature’s objective, selflessness and random compositions vs 'New' Nature's subjective, self-aware and considered compositions.