Symbols
When I started this blog, my two goals were (a) to draw something every day and (b) to post a scribble the day after I made it. Well, I'm doing pretty well on goal (a). Goal (b) has given me some trouble because of a sketchy internet connection and my unwavering ban on posting anything while I'm at work. Naturally I have a growing backlog of scribbles. There have been a few I haven't posted for a variety of reasons, but I'm not even into my February scribbles yet.
Ah well. This scribble was inspired by The Doors of Perception which Aldous Huxley wrote to describe his mescaline trip made in the name of science. Huxley discussed in a short paragraph the problems of language and communicating experiences and thoughts. Basically, you immediately experience the world but you can only communicate those experiences using symbols, which someone else interprets using their conglomerated understanding of those symbols. So naturally, a lot gets lost (or at least slightly altered) in the translation. I guess it's obvious in a way (what is language besides symbols?), but I definitely paused when I read it and was a little bit awestruck and jealous of his mescaline trip. Even now the idea keeps looping around in the back of my brain.
I know. I ramble way too much for a scribble blog. Anyway, here's the drawing:
Comments
PS. Love the drawing.
His three-eyed eye is one of my favorite parts of this drawing. I didn't consider that it made him look skittish, but I agree (and like) that it does give that impression.
I think you said it much better than I did, but that's exactly what's been running through the back of my head. Here's my math nerd example. If, say, x were always always equal to 3 there'd be no reason for art or for most discussion, really. We would be like robots. Our lives would just be complex algebra problems.
I mean, it seems so obvious on the one hand, but at the same time it's sort of staggering and isolating to consider. I think it is, anyway.
(smile) Yes! Absolutely! I think that's one of the reasons that the idea stuck with me. I just wasn't expecting it. I was in the middle of reading about this mescaline trip, enjoying his beautiful imagery, and all of the sudden I stumble across this idea about art and the challenges of communication. If I had been reading a book about art it would have been much less moving, I think.
I find symbols very fascinating. There is an idea that a society needs to share similar interpretations of symbols. If a person's interpretation differs too widely from the group's "understanding", that person is seen as crazy. So on the one hand, there is no one true meaning of a symbol, but everyone's individual and conglomerated understanding of it still needs to hover around some "median" interpretation.
That's part of the reason I love my scribbley art as much as I do. It's just stripped-down symbols.
P.S. Thank you!