460.02 plato on mimesis, ideals, inspiration

MIMESIS AND THE IDEALPlato on Representation and Beauty

Escher, Relativity

Really?

For every one, as I think, must see that astronomy compels the soul to look upwards and leads us from this world to another.

Plato, Republic

The spangled heavens should be used as a pattern and with a view to that higher knowledge; their beauty is like the beauty of figures or pictures excellently wrought by the hand of Daedalus, or some

other great artist, which we may chance to behold; any geometrician who saw them would appreciate the exquisiteness of their workmanship, but he would never dream of thinking that in

them he could find the true equal or the true double, or the truth of any other proportion.

How do you know? What is real?

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How do you know?

What is real?

illusions, shadows

imaginings

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How do you know?

What is real?

ordinary things

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How do you know?

What is real?

illusions, shadows

The The SunSunThe EyeThe Eye

ordinary things

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How do you know?

What is real?

illusions, shadows

understanding

reasoningproofs

formsgeometric

formsfunctionsformulae


ordinary things

beliefs sensations

imaginings

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How do you know?

What is real?

illusions, shadows

The TrueThe Beautiful

Recognition of:The GoodThe True

The Beautiful

understanding

reasoningproofs

formsgeometric



ordinary things

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How do you know?

What is real?

illusions, shadows

The GoodThe GoodThe MindThe Mind



The Beautiful

understanding

reasoningproofs

formsgeometric



ordinary things

beliefs sensations

imaginings

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How do you know?

What is real?

illusions, shadows

Miguel Balboa

1/30

visible world




The Beautiful

understanding

reasoningproofs

formsgeometric



ordinary things

beliefs sensation

simaginin

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How do you know?

What is real?

illusions, shadows

Intelligible World

visible world




The Beautiful

understanding

reasoningproofs

formsgeometric



ordinary things

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simaginin

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How do you know?

What is real?

illusions, shadows

Intelligible World

visible world




The Beautiful

understanding

reasoningproofs

formsgeometric



ordinary things

beliefs sensations

imaginingsYou k

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that

whic

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hat w

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How do you know?

What is real?

<3 sided figure>

illusions, shadows

<Pythagorean Theorem>

Intelligible World

visible world




The Beautiful

understanding

reasoningproofs

formsgeometric



ordinary things

beliefs sensation

simaginin

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that

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How do you know?

What is real?

<3 sided figure>

illusions, shadows

<Pythagorean Theorem>instantiation

ideals

things

Ideals

Where does art go?

art

According to Plato art copies things which

copies ideals

Mimesis is, according to Plato, a copy of a copy of an ideal, thrice removed from the truth.

Polykleitos: Doryphorus Lysippos: Apoxyomenos

Art from ideals

Polykleitos: Doryphorus: 7:1

Lysippos: Apoxyomenos: 8:1

Leg to Body Ratio

Cultural ideals

Contemporary ideals

Could art manipulate things like shapes to

express ideals?

ideals

art?

Ideals

Where could art go?

Early evidence?

Ideals, with a capital ‘I’, often called Forms are, according to Plato, are what is most real,—they are abstract, intelligible,

eternal and unchanging. There are three Ideals: Goodness, Truth, and Beauty. For Plato, Beauty is abstract it is not apprehended through the

senses.lesser ideals, also abstract and intelligible, participate in

in the Ideals. Examples of lesser ideals, with a small ‘i’,

might be ratios, formulae and geometric forms.

Participation and Instances

Shapes such as those found in architecture, architectonics, perspective, compositional forms

(such as the Platonic Solids—the cube, octahedron, tetrahedron, dodecahedron, and

icosahedron which have identical regular polygons as faces that meet at the same angles) and ratios (such as the Golden Mean and the Unison) in turn

participate in lesser ideals.

PERMUTATIONS OF MIMESIS AND IDEALS

DRAWING FROM SHAPES

Drawing from ideals

Leonardo, Tetrahedron

Leonardo, Dodecahedron

Paolo Ucello, Chalice

Drawing from ideals

EMPIRICAL ASTRONOMY VERSUS TRUE ASTRONOMY

The starry heaven which we behold is wrought upon a visible ground, and therefore, although the fairest and most perfect of visible things, must necessarily be deemed inferior far to the true motions of absolute swiftness and absolute slowness, which are relative to each other, and carry with them that which is contained in them, in the true number and in every true figure. Now, these are to be apprehended by reason and intelligence, but not by sight.

—Plato, The Republic

PERMUTATIONS OF IDEALSArt in the service of knowledge

Knowledge through Art

PERMUTATIONS OF IDEALSA contemporary notion of truth in the fashion of Plato

The statue is on the pedestal.The statue is on the pedestal.

Truth: when a claim matches what isTruth: when a claim matches what isThe

ClaimWhat is: reality

((designates) expresses)((designates) expresses)

((subject) Predicate)((subject) Predicate)


The Claim

What is: reality

<<thing> property><<thing> property>

<<statue> being on the <<statue> being on the pedestal>pedestal>

<<statue> being on the <<statue> being on the pedestal>pedestal>

Truth: when a claim matches what isTruth: when a claim matches what is

((designates) ((designates) expresses(designates))expresses(designates))

((subject) Verb(object))((subject) Verb(object))


The Claim

What is: reality

<<thing> relation<thing>><<thing> relation<thing>>

<<statue> being on <the <<statue> being on <the pedestal>>pedestal>>

<<statue> being on <the <<statue> being on <the pedestal>>pedestal>>

Truth: when a claim matches what isTruth: when a claim matches what is

The Golden Mean is a ratio represented by a The Golden Mean is a ratio represented by a point on a line segment (C) that divides it point on a line segment (C) that divides it

such that the smaller segment (A) stands in such that the smaller segment (A) stands in relation to the larger segment (B) in the relation to the larger segment (B) in the same relation that the larger segment same relation that the larger segment

stands to the whole (A:B = B:C).stands to the whole (A:B = B:C).

<<The Golden Mean> a ratio represented <<The Golden Mean> a ratio represented by a point on a line segment (C) that divides by a point on a line segment (C) that divides it such that the smaller segment (A) stands it such that the smaller segment (A) stands in relation to the larger segment (B) in the in relation to the larger segment (B) in the

same relation that the larger segment same relation that the larger segment stands to the whole (A:B = B:C).>stands to the whole (A:B = B:C).>

=

Truth: when a claim matches what isTruth: when a claim matches what isDoes the thing designated by the subject have the property expressed by

the predicate?Does the thing designated by the subject have the property expressed by

the predicate?

The Claim

What is: reality

AB

C

The Golden Mean is a ratio represented by a The Golden Mean is a ratio represented by a point on a line segment (C) that divides it point on a line segment (C) that divides it

such that the smaller segment (A) stands in such that the smaller segment (A) stands in relation to the larger segment (B) in the relation to the larger segment (B) in the same relation that the larger segment same relation that the larger segment

stands to the whole (A:B = B:C).stands to the whole (A:B = B:C).

<<The Golden Mean> a ratio represented <<The Golden Mean> a ratio represented by a point on a line segment (C) that divides by a point on a line segment (C) that divides it such that the smaller segment (A) stands it such that the smaller segment (A) stands in relation to the larger segment (B) in the in relation to the larger segment (B) in the

same relation that the larger segment same relation that the larger segment stands to the whole (A:B = B:C).>stands to the whole (A:B = B:C).>

=

Truth: when a claim matches what isTruth: when a claim matches what isDoes the thing designated by the subject have the property expressed by

the predicate?Does the thing designated by the subject have the property expressed by

the predicate?

The Claim

What is: reality

A

B

C

((The Parthenon) is exhibits the Golden ((The Parthenon) is exhibits the Golden Mean.)Mean.)

((Subject) predicate)((Subject) predicate)

<<Thing> property><<Thing> property><<Parthenon> exhibiting the Golden Mean><<Parthenon> exhibiting the Golden Mean>≠

Not true False

Falsehood: when a claim fails to match what isFalsehood: when a claim fails to match what isThe

ClaimWhat is: reality

A

B C

Matters of Taste or OpinionMatters of Taste or Opinion

Matters of ConventionMatters of Convention

Matters of FactMatters of Fact

Matters of NecessityMatters of Necessity

What is the difference

between the truth, an honest mistake, and a

lie?

Truthsome preliminaries

Matters of Taste or OpinionMatters of Taste or OpinionMatters of Taste or OpinionMatters of Taste or Opinion

Matters of ConventionMatters of Convention


Matters of NecessityMatters of NecessityThe ocean is prettier than the desert

& the desert is prettier than the woods.Does this exhaust all

truths?

Truthfour types of truth

Can be indexed to

a individuals, places, and

times.

Truthsome claims are true when indexed to the the proper speaker or audience.

some claims are true when indexed to the proper place.

some claims are true when indexed to the proper time.

2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010

Here is Patagonia THere is Patagonia T

Barack Obama is our President TBarack Obama is our President T

Enrique Peña Nieto is our President ⊥Enrique Peña Nieto is our President ⊥

Here is Patagonia ⊥Here is Patagonia ⊥

George W. Bush is President TGeorge W. Bush is President T

George W. Bush is President ⊥George W. Bush is President ⊥

Can be indexed to a register—a convention in culture or

society:According to the music

business, Tupac is gangsta is while My Chemical Romance is

emo.

Does this exhaust all truths?



Matters of ConventionMatters of ConventionMatters of ConventionMatters of Convention



Consider a world without

people or conventions, would there

still be light at the

wavelength we call cyan,

ceteris paribus?

Truth



Matters of FactMatters of FactMatters of FactMatters of Fact


four types of truth

Such truths, often

considered contingent, are

often expressed

ceteris paribus:‘Cyan’ is

identified by R 0, G 255, B

255 all other things being

equal.

Truth





four types of truth

Does this exhaust all truths?

ππ == 3.141592...3.141592...





Matters of NecessityMatters of NecessityMatters of NecessityMatters of Necessity

π needs to have this value for circles to be

round.

ππ == 3.141592...3.141592...





Matters of NecessityMatters of NecessityMatters of NecessityMatters of Necessityartart == ??

In pursuit of truths about art

When preparing to evaluate the truth of a claim, stabilize its truth value by indexing it to speaker and audience, place

and time, state the ceteris paribus, and define key terms by giving one clear meaning.

A rule of thumb for philosophy of art

TOM SHANNON

“I do not mean by beauty of form such beauty as that of animals or pictures, which the many would suppose to be

my meaning; but understand me to mean straight lines and circles, and the plane and solid figures which are formed out

of them by turning lathes and rulers and measures of angles; for these I affirm to be not only relatively beautiful, like other works of art, but they are eternally and abstractly

beautiful.”

–Plato Philebus 51c

IDEALSImplementations through the centuries

Ictinus & Callicrates, Parthenon

Ictinus & Callicrates, Parthenon

A

B

C

A

B CIctinus & Callicrates, Parthenon

Myron, Discobolus

–Vasari

“…sculpture and painting are in truth sisters, born from one father, that is, design, at one and the same birth, and have

no precedence one over the other…” “…design, which is their foundation, nay rather, the very

soul that conceives and nourishes within itself all the parts of man's intellect, was already most perfect before the

creation of all other things, when the Almighty God, having made the great body of the world and having adorned the

heavens with their exceeding bright lights, descended lower with His intellect into the clearness of the air and the solidity

of the earth…”

Paolo Ucello, St George & the Dragon

Paolo Ucello, Battle of San Romano

Leonardo, Vitruvious Man

Leonardo, Tetrahedron

Leonardo, Dodecahedron

Paolo Ucello, Chalice

Raphael,Engagement

Raphael, School of Athens

Massaccio, Trinity

“Perspective is to painting what the bridle is to the horse, the rudder to a ship.”—Leonardo

Massaccio, Trinity—Perspectives

“There are three aspects to perspective. The first has to do with how the size of objects seems to diminish according to distance: the second, the manner in which colors change the farther away they are from the eye; the third defines how objects ought to be finished less carefully the farther away they are.”—Leonardo

Leonardo, Last Supper

Since geometry is the right foundation of all painting, I have decided to teach its rudiments and principles to all youngsters eager for art. —Dürer

Dürer, Melancholia

The new art must be based upon science — in particular, upon mathematics, as the most exact, logical, and graphically constructive of the sciences.—Dürer

There is no man on earth who can give a final judgment on what the most beautiful shape may be. Only God knows.—Dürer

If my rough hammer shapes the obdurate stone

to a human figure, this or that one, say,it’s the wielder’s fist, vision, and mind at

playthat gives it momentum—another’s, not its

own.

But the heavenly hammer working by God’s throne

by itself makes others and self as well. We know

it takes a hammer to make a hammer. Sothe rest derive from that primal tool alone.

–Michelangelo, If My Rough Hammer

Since any stroke is mightier the higherit’s launched from over the forge, one kind

and wisehas lately flown from mine to a loftier

sphere.

My hammer is botched, unfinished in the fire

until God’s workshop help him supervisethe tool of my craft, that alone he trued,

down here.

Cezanne, Still Life

“treat nature by the cylinder, the sphere, the cone…”—Cezanne

Cezanne, Bibemus Quarry


Cezanne, Mt St Victiore


Cezanne, Mt St Victoire


“The fact that for a long time Cubism has not been understood and that even today there are people who cannot see anything in it means nothing. I do not read English, an English book is a blank book to me. This does not mean that the English language does not exist. Why should I blame anyone but myself if I cannot understand what I know nothing about?”—Picasso Picasso, House with Garden

Picasso, Landscape with Bridge

“It is a pity that no one in Paris bothered to quote Coleridge, who wrote, long before cubism, that the true poet is able to reduce 'succession to an instant.' Simultaneity in this sense is the property of all great poetry.—LeRoy C. Breunig

Juan Gris, Still Life with Fruit and Mandolin

DuChamp, Nude Descending a Staircase #2 Braque, Little Harbor in Normandy

Klee, Ancient Sounds

Kandinsky, Composition X Klee, Highways and Byways

The more abstract is form, the more clear and direct its appeal.—Kandinsky

Klee, Ad Parnassum

O ’Keeffe, Blue and Green Music O ’Keeffe, Cross

I found I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn't say any other way - things I had no words for.

—O ’Keeffe

O ’Keeffe, Cross

Wayne Thibaud, Hill

Richard Diebenkorn, Cityscape

Richard Diebenkorn, Seawall

Local form

MAYA LIN

INSPIRATIONPlato on the affects of poetry, music, and performance

For the poet is a light and winged and holy thing…

“For the poet is a light and winged and holy thing, and there is no invention in him until he has been inspired and is out of

his senses, and the mind is no longer in him: when he has not attained to this state, he is powerless and is unable to

utter his oracles.”

–Plato, Ion

“The gift which you possess of speaking excellently about Homer is not an art, but, as I was just saying, an inspiration;

there is a divinity moving you, like that contained in the stone which Euripides calls a magnet, but which is

commonly known as the stone of Heraclea. This stone not only attracts iron rings, but also imparts to them a similar

power of attracting other rings; and sometimes you may see a number of pieces of iron and rings suspended from one another so as to form quite a long chain: and all of them

derive their power of suspension from the original stone. In like manner the Muse first of all inspires men herself; and

from these inspired persons a chain of other persons is suspended, who take the inspiration.”–Plato, Ion

TRIPARTITE SOUL

Plato’s Psychology

Reason

Emotions

Appetites

Rulers

Soldiers

Crafts workers

Wisdom

Courage

Self-controlJustic

e

Plato’s Ideal Polis

Do you know that the spectator is the last of the rings which, as I am saying, receive the power of the original magnet from one another? The rhapsode like yourself and the actor are intermediate links, and the poet himself is the first of them.

Reason

Emotions

Appetites

Reason

Emotions

Appetites

Reason

Emotions

AppetitesReaso

n

Emotions

Appetites

MuseMuse

Artist

Audience

“For all good poets, epic as well as lyric, compose their beautiful poems not by art, but because they are inspired

and possessed. And as the Corybantian revellers when they dance are not in their right mind, so the lyric poets are not in their right mind when they are composing their beautiful

strains: but when falling under the power of music and metre they are inspired and possessed; like Bacchic

maidens who draw milk and honey from the rivers when they are under the influence of Dionysus but not when they are in their right mind. And the soul of the lyric poet does

the same, as they themselves say; for they tell us that they bring songs from honeyed fountains, culling them out of the gardens and dells of the Muses; they, like the bees, winging

their way from flower to flower.”–Plato, Ion

Dürer, Melancholia

GORECKI

II. Lento E Largo - Tranquillissimo

Socrates. Why, does not Homer speak in many passages about arts? For example, about driving; if I can only remember the lines I will repeat them. Ion. I remember, and will repeat them. Socrates. Tell me then, what Nestor says to Antilochus, his son, where he bids him be careful of the turn at the horse-race in honour of Patroclus.

Ion. He says: Bend gently in the polished chariot to the left of them, and urge the horse on the right hand with whip and voice; and slacken the rein. And when you are at the goal, let the left horse draw near, yet so that the nave of the well-wrought wheel may not even seem to touch the extremity; and avoid catching the stone.

Socrates. Enough. Now, Ion, will the charioteer or the physician be the better judge of the propriety of these lines? Ion. The charioteer, clearly. Socrates. And will the reason be that this is his art, or will there be any other reason? Ion. No, that will be the reason.Socrates. Then he who has no knowledge of a particular art will have no right judgment of the sayings and doings of that art? Ion. Very true. Socrates. Then which will be a better judge of the lines which you were reciting from Homer, you or the charioteer? Ion. The charioteer. Socrates. Why, yes, because you are a rhapsode and not a charioteer. Ion. Yes. Socrates. And the art of the rhapsode is different from that of the charioteer? Ion. Yes. Socrates. And if a different knowledge, then a knowledge of different matters? Ion. True.

BEN HUR

460.02 plato on mimesis, ideals, inspiration

Education

beautifulthe true

ideals art

true double

shadowsthe sunthat

compositional forms

express ideals

contemporary ideals

leastthe mind