Comments

• 

  Ed Koffenberger September 29, 2011 at 11:52am

  Les and Judith,

  I can only shout a loud AMEN to your comments below. Although my focus of art is the theatre, I resonate strongly with Les' last image of art being like cultural antibodies, the lack of which allows for a sick society. And if dreams are then to have no value, we are only left to learn from our subsequent illnesses, mental, physical, spiritual, political, and economic.
• 

  Leslie Birleson September 28, 2011 at 5:22pm

  I think the intent to create and the intent to enter into psyche's place/field  of creation, are more or less the same thing.It as a transformative effect on many levels.For example Marcel Duchamp’s”found objects” let’s say his famous bottle drying rack which is now an iconic image.He transformed an everyday object into art with his intent. Of course he recontextualize the object and put it into a new psychic reference but still it was his intent that was the transforming energy.                                                                                                     The collective inherently recognizes on some level that it needs the intent of the artist to help process aspects of the collective shadow. 

  I believe artists or people who do art are like white antibodies for the collective psyche, if they’re too few the collective can fall ill to such diseases like hate, intolerance, prejudice, to name a few. That’s why the process of making art can be so important for everyone.  

  
  
• 

  Judith Harte,Ph.D. September 26, 2011 at 10:40pm

  Oh boy!I'm off and running on this one. the notion of intent as being the defining factor in art, as described by Les, somehow seems oddly connected inside me anyway, to Les' other comment about art and therapy. I've been sculpting for 5 years now and when engaged in a project, I actually feel as if I've entered a zone where everything else is removed other than that relationship between myself and the piece. I'm in a mutual process with the piece I am creating, in much the same way I'm in a mutual process  with an analyst,, when in her midst,, and the same way my patient's are with me when they are in  mine ..Everything disappears except the psychic reality, or field that we've entered.  I'm interested in why the use of the term intent.  Do you mean the intent to create? Or, the intent to enter into  psyche's place/field  of creation.  These are two separate perspectives in theory, but when engaged with one another to me they become one.  To make art is to be therapeutic. Images have  an (intent)ionality, or telos, as does psyche. Psyche makes images. Images make art.
• 

  Leslie Birleson September 26, 2011 at 10:55am

  I might add that Ed's eloquent explanation of the pitfalls a therapist might encounter in relationship to working with highly subjective abstract content clarified for me to quite a degree why Jung had the perspective he did. It is confusing separating effective therapy and art. Especially if you're an artist doing therapy, or a therapist doing art. I guess they're two different perspectives.
• 

  Leslie Birleson September 26, 2011 at 10:32am

  love your two cents, and will add a third one. I had what amounted to be a two-year discussion with a sculptor friend has we worked on a project together. His question, What makes something art? My final conclusion was "intent". That intent is the defining factor.
• 

  Judith Harte,Ph.D. September 25, 2011 at 9:38pm

  I've been following the discussion about what constitutes art and thought I'd add  my two cents.  Clearly  academicians and art historians  have conjectured forever when attempting to answer that question.  So right from the git go I can say that with so many opinion/responses, etc., as possibilities how can there ever be one or for that matter any number of correct, agreed upon  answers?  Art  moves, expresses, reveals, colors, articulates, evokes, conceals, delineates, and  evokes a heightened and/or deepened relationship with and to the many rainbow-colored permutations of body, spirit and soul. And, I don't care what it is? Only... that it is.
• 

  Leslie Birleson September 23, 2011 at 12:08pm

  Gun slinger, shooting from the hip, this sounds more like a shoot out at, the I'm okay you're okay corral. Thank God I'm not a Freudian you can just imagine what that empty gun might sound like. I do see a parallel between the empty sand tray and the fear on the analyst part of too much autonomous psychic content spewing out.I know my own control analyst had a dickens of a time dialoguing about abstract art, and she herself who is a accomplished artist in her own right. "and just published a book of her paintings" could not dialogue about certain forms of art. She was a first generation jungian. "maybe it's a generational thing"? I just finished 10 years of back to back public art projects and only now have the luxury of reading something other than Art Forum. so Ed please leave the 45 at home and just bring the BB gun. I get and understand the importance of recognizable content in constructing controlled workable dialogue. I think You hit the nail on the head with    "I wonder if any product that "forcefully" draws out projections that are not able to be dealt with might concern a psychologist"  thanks for the input and taking the time it really does clarify a large part of my question.    lazy Les
• 

  Mary Fullwood September 22, 2011 at 7:27pm

  Yesssssss......  ; - )  Is that all you intend to say gun slinger?  Mary
• 

  Ed Koffenberger September 22, 2011 at 7:12pm

  MARY!!!!!!!
• 

  Mary Fullwood September 22, 2011 at 5:09pm

  Ed - nice shooting from the hip and blind no less!  Your words are very appreciated!  Warm regards, Mary