Manifesto on the Occult Art Theory

[F. A. Mortego]

Principia Esoterica, A Manifesto on the Occult Art Theory.

Definition of Art:

Any expression that represents existence as a creative idea in
tangible form.

Definition of Creative Idea:

That which is expressed/realised from beyond current levels of human
experience.

Of Pure Art:

In order to understand exactly what "art" is, we must understand what
it means to be "creative". It has come to our attention over the
recent times, that Art in its purest sense - that is, a means of
representing modes of being in such a way that reveals what is
"unknown" as opposed to what is already clearly apparent. It is
important here, not confuse this with mere abstraction, as "abstract"
in its purest sense, is a word of impracticality...which in art,
attempts to express the ideas of the artist in a less-than-obvious
way, which serves only to isolate the artist from his or her fellows
in idea and feeling. True Art should always bring forth its message
with clarity and brevity. It is not realistic to place an object for
full public view, with the hope that those public will then react to
that object in an abstract way, and not find one meaning but several.
Such a thing only serves to confuse and irritate.

In an allegorical context, suppose we were to place a piece of paper
on the wall of some gallery and call this piece of paper our "work of
abstract art".
Suppose then, we were to have people visit the gallery and see our
little piece of paper on the wall. How would those people react to it?
Obviously, it will mean different things to different people...and all
we have succeeded in saying, in a sense is this: You can find anything
in anything if you look hard enough.

Thus, in pure terms, Art should bring forth a clear and definate
message to Humanity as a whole, and the nature of that message should
always be Creative. The method by which this message is expressed
however, is what we will term "Tangible Form"...for example, in
music...the tangible form is the "piece", which is composed of
"sounds". In visual arts, the tangible form is the "visual object(s)".

We hold, therefore, that Art be creative and constructive for the
benefit of Humanity, and it is not enough to simply slap-together a
few things to imply an opinion or feeling and call it Art.

Of Art as Idea and Form,

We have previously stated, that Art be creative in its idea. Does
this also mean that its form must therefore follow suit and also be
creative? surely it must, but how? - It is true, especially concerning
the schools of music, that the composers are less concerned with
results, and more concerned with methods. So where is the Art to be
found - in the method, or the resulting form? The answer is most
likely to be both, as so long as the method be creative, then the
resulting form must be creative as of consequence, and the process may
be termed as Art.
However, the same applies with uncreative methods, which will render
the resulting form to be also uncreative, and not therefore Art...ie:
Garbage in, Garbage out. Now here there is a crucial point to make,
and that is, unless the method be Creative, then the result will have
no significant meaning at all...and what does that mean?
What else but this:
"Because that process was carried out, the resulting form is this." A
bare skeleton of the process of expression!

Let us now explore such pieces of work as they result when bereft of
meaning:

There are two basic types of work that have no meaning, one is Mental,
and the other is Emotional.
Emotional qualities may be grouped into two catagories; Sensual, and
Sensuous. Sensual, is a term that implies a degree of feeling that is
sexual of nature, and concerned with the Lower plane of "Emotional
Sensation", in the work, Sense appeals are re-worked and re-iterated
needlessly, and the work usually full of unimportant details.
Sensuous, is a higher degree, and is a term that implies a degree of
feeling that is more profound and refined of nature, and is concerned
with the Higher plane of "Pure Emotion". The Mental may also be
grouped into two catagories; Universal Thought/Concept, and Image.
Image is a term that implies a mere form, and a Lower degree of
understanding that goes no further than the "appearance" of that
form, and thus Old Principles are re-iterated. Thought/Concept implies
a form that is on a Higher degree, with a level of mental
understanding that sees beyond mere appearances, and into the deeper,
occult/esoteric knowing.

Here then, we have two types of work that operate on Lower levels,
which we believe are without meaning, and we shall explore in depth at
a later part, the Emotional and Mental types of working, and how they
apply to Occultism. But to summerise, the Lower Emotional Art will be
seen to manifest as Sensationalism. And the Lower Mental Art will be
seen to manifest as Scholasticism.
On this note, it would do no harm to take the time to read the little
book "Art as Will and Idea" by C. Jinarajadasa, which may be procured
from the Theosophical Society, who goes into what I have mentioned
above in more depth.

The Art of the Occultist usually can't be put into a better term
than "Divine Inspiration", however, most of us are at a loss as to
exactly what "Divine Inspiration" is, and is in itself somewhat a
tautology, as all that is "divine" is inspired, and all that is
"inspired" is from the "divine". In more wholistic words, the whole
Universe, as the Occultist knows, is a projection of idea from the
Mind of the All (Divine), and just what the All is, and why the All
creates Universes is forever beyond human knowledge..but anyhow, we
can assume from the above, that if everything be a projection from the
mind of the All, then everything must therefore be Divinly
Inspired..and we enter a state of confusion....what is the purpose of
working Occult Art as a means of "Divine Expression" when everything
is already a Divine Expression? And we here I shall rule a very thick
line between Occult Art as being mere "Expression" and being a tool
for the Evolution of the Soul...the Soul is the vehicle for the Self,
which is Spiritual in its nature..and to clarify what
"spirit/spiritual" is, I shall quote a passage
from the Occult Diary of Fr. A.:

"The Inner Power projects itself, or a seeming extension of itself as
a space, and fills that space with forms of energy whose combination
constitutes the body of the universe. The nature of this energy is
mental, and its substance may be termed as "spirit", and is all
conceived as a mental image in the subconscious part of the Infinate
Mind. What projects this and manifests this is the conscious part of
the Mind. Thus all the universe is part of the same consciousness."

Time and Space:

But a question remains: "Why are we evolving?" and the answer to that,
is that the universe is in a constant state of becoming, the Mind of
the Infinate (It is not in the best interests of Occultism to attempt
to personify the Highest State of Being, however for the convienience
of the reader, the terms "All" and "Infinate" is used to designate
that which is "UNKNOWABLE") is in an ever-present state. There is no
past, only memories that are, effectively, mental images that are not
in a conscious state of being...they are only a subconscious
recollection of what "has been" being re-acted in the Present. There
is no future, as the future is never here, and is/are, respectively,
mental images that are not in a conscious state of being, only
subconscious collections of images that "will be".
The future always manifests itself consciously as PRESENT CONDITIONS,
and likewise does the past. This whole mystery of time is one subject
that can be written and spoken of to great length, and there are many
books on the subject worth reading...however, the question of Time
plays an important part in Occult Art, and its primary role is to
express what was concieved in the mind of the artist. But it goes
deeper than that...and the Artist becomes a Magician, and when the
Magician speaks, s/he creates. The future is no more, it is a reality
existing in the Now. The Occult Artist goes to great length to express
higher levels of being, and on those higher levels, Time and Space
exist all at once. Everything exists in the same place at the same
time. Just like a canvas with nothing on it, like a piece of music
with no sounds....then this Void of indeterminancy gives way to
determination, the indefinate gives way to defination, thought becomes
form, and the empty space gives way to that form. And that form
evolves, grows, decays, and is returned into void. As in the Mind of
the All, so in the mind of the Artist,

"As Above, so Below..as Below, so Above" that is the key. And the
hardest part is grasping hold of that key.
A piece of music begins as silence and its end is silence, and its end
is the start of a new beginning. A piece of art such as a sculpture
or painting begins without form, and ends without form...from these
two analogies, one can speculate that there was no beginning, nor is
there an end. Beginning and End are two ends of a Pole which are
different only by degree...as are all opposites....to tell where the
beginning is and where the end is, could be likened to pointing out on
a thermometer where Hot finishes and where Cold commences.
The Art of the Occultist can begin or end at:
1. any point in space, and any point in time,
2. many spaces at many times,
3. at all spaces in all times
4. no space at no time.

And yet it neither begins or ends.

Occult Art in Practice:

The practical occultist will do practical art. And by practical, it
is implied that the art be purposeful, meaningful, educational and
creative in a spiritual sense. This is not to be confused with
Religious Art, which is romantic in the sense that it "yearns" for
"God". Occult Art does not yearn for "God", since its expression is
purely creative in its nature...it is an expression of God itself, not
the work of some incompetent fool trying to give an expression of
themselves to an image that they call "God".
Techniques employed in Occult Art more or less run along the lines of
meditation, rising on the planes, astrology, ritual, clairvoyance,
clairaudience, automatic writing (bastardised by the Surrealist
movement), the use of Superconscious expression, the common
techniques and understandings of the Theosophists, symbolic
representation of various archetypes of being - and how they relate,
&tc &tc. Basically, the Occultist will attune themselves to a
particular plane(s) of understanding/being, and bring forth an
expression of them/it in some tangible form.

A basic example of this can be seen in lower forms of Art..assuming I
saw a particular natural setting and it made me feel "happy", and so I
write a piece of music that expresses that feeling. Or I may see the
same natural setting, and it made it me think "that", and so I write a
piece of music that expresses that setting as it is. The problem here,
is that everyone knows <sic> what happy is, and everyone knows what,
say, a tree looks like...so from that example, we can see that the Art
has no real purpose other than expressing the obvious, and I may
therefore call it meaningless crap. There is much to express that is
fresh, new and vital to our fulfillment, if it could only be seen, and
it can only be seen, when the Human will stop spinning that cocoon of
selfness...nobody will ever agree to anything unless it fits in with
their thinking. Thinking stops when Art has completed its goal.

Occult Art from an Astrological View:

The time is right for Art, with Neptune just entering Aquarius, we can
see ourselves in the things around us. It has been a long time since
Neptune was in Aquarius..to be precise, it takes 146 years for Neptune
to do a complete cycle through the signs. Neptune was last in this
position in 1852. Aquarius is about the individual, it is also about
liberation, freedom, humanitarianism, independence, and new ways of
approaching old problems. Neptune rules Pisces, is exalted in Leo, its
power is in detriment in Virgo, and is in Fall in Aquarius...Neptune
can be called the Planet of the Occult...its associations are artistic
ability, intuition, psychism, spirituality, idealism,
imagination..drugs, gases and toxins, neurology and so on. In
Aquarius, there is a danger here of carelessness, and belief in false
values. Artistically, this is a powerful position, and it is likely
that there will be a generation of artists dedicated to exploring the
deeper values of things, and how they affect humanity as a whole. This
combinated with Pluto in Sagittarius gives an emphasis on the higher
mind, and the value of understanding what is going on around us...the
key word here is usefulness, but it must not be selfish. The other
thing that goes with this placement, is the understanding of different
types of people, and misapplication of the creative power, so that ir
becomes deceitful, and serves to "use" these people to gain prestige
and money...such are the influences of capricorn still in effect
here...Capricorn is mainly about material matters, practicality and
steady ambition. How true is this when we see that when Neptune was in
Capricorn...sly, decietful money-spinning artistic ventures that
swayed the masses became evident in the early 80's, and was in
full-power at about 1990-96...Ironically, Neptune entered Capricorn in
1984, and started moving into Aquarius at the end of 1997. Because
Neptune is has only just entered Aquarius, we still feel some of the
effects of Capricorn, as well as Aquarius...not only this, but we will
unfortunately feel those Capricorn aspects for a while longer, since
in May, Neptune will turn Retrograde, and start heading back to
Capricorn, before it returns to its direct motion in November,
Neptune will in fact not have made much progress at all since last
year, and will not be significantly within Aqaurius until the 1st
decade of the millenium.

It is very interesting to consider what Neptune/Aquarius might
imply. Looking back into 1852, we can get a hint on what it means
artistically when we see the work of Richard Wagner at that
time...such as The Ring Cycle - very meaningful and purposeful to
humanity (aquarius), and Tristan und Isolde...the first opera has the
idea of and old corrupt world being destroyed and replaced by a new
one....and Tristan und Isolde is centered on the Schopenhaur's ideas
that bliss can only be found through the negation of selfish will and
desire!

The occult/esoteric qualities of Wagner's music is well-written about,
and is worth reading into....for example, in The Ring, we have
Siegfried returning "the ring" to the Rhinemaidens as the "old" world
is then "cleansed" by Fire and Water....this is so blatantly obvious
an Occult reference as to be a joke...Fire and Water symbolises the
Union of Opposites, the 2 becomes 1, Spirit and Matter are the same
thing, and the two triangles of the ancient Hexagram or star of David
symbolise this..the hexagram is about perfection, or re-creation. Thus
the "old world" is become a "new world" through the power of the
hexagram.

Thus the Neptune/Aquarius expression was very clearly
evident...especially if we consider also the number of revolutions and
crys for liberation at that time. Brahms only started becoming active
in the 1850's, Bizet won the prix-de-rome, Liszt was the talk of
Europe, and at the height of Neptune's reign, Debussy and Mahler were
born, as were most of the Impressionists and Expressionists...both of
whom were interested in the nature of the world around them, and what
it meant on a different level than previously known. However, the
Neptune/Aquarius happening at the moment, is on a slightly different
level, for one, we have an aspect to Saturn, and this means that the
Art of today will be more controlled, restricted and organised...since
the aspect is a difficult aspect...there may be tendency for the
Artist to dwell on the "negative" or "darker" subjects....in Aquarius
this will probably be focussed at the "negative" aspects of society,
which may easily give way into melodrama. This aspect will last until
next year, so expect more neurotic material from students.

[siri wala]

F. A. Mortego wrote:

> Principia Esoterica, A Manifesto on the Occult Art Theory.
>
> Definition of Art:
>
> Any expression that represents existence as a creative idea in
> tangible form.
>
> Definition of Creative Idea:
>
> That which is expressed/realised from beyond current levels of human
> experience.

Scuse me but I'm having difficulty transcending my own experiences as a
human on this planet.

>
>
> Of Pure Art:
>
> In order to understand exactly what "art" is, we must understand what
> it means to be "creative".

> It has come to our attention over the
> recent times, that Art in its purest sense - that is, a means of
> representing modes of being in such a way that reveals what is
> "unknown" as opposed to what is already clearly apparent.

> It is
> important here, not confuse this with mere abstraction, as "abstract"
> in its purest sense, is a word of impracticality...which in art,
> attempts to express the ideas of the artist in a less-than-obvious
> way, which serves only to isolate the artist from his or her fellows
> in idea and feeling.

Abstract art, if you read your art history, was not created with the
express purposes of alienating the audience. Abstract Expressionism
marked the beginning of "pure art" for arts sake. In this sense it
focused on conceptually exploring itself.

> True Art should always bring forth its message
> with clarity and brevity. It is not realistic to place an object for
> full public view, with the hope that those public will then react to
> that object in an abstract way, and not find one meaning but several.
> Such a thing only serves to confuse and irritate.

Name me one ultimate and undeniable truth expressed in a work of art, or
any belief system for that matter. By the way you might like to look at
some of the work of the German Expressionists, also read Marx.

>
>
> In an allegorical context, suppose we were to place a piece of paper
> on the wall of some gallery and call this piece of paper our "work of
> abstract art".
> Suppose then, we were to have people visit the gallery and see our
> little piece of paper on the wall. How would those people react to it?
> Obviously, it will mean different things to different people...and all
> we have succeeded in saying, in a sense is this: You can find anything
> in anything if you look hard enough.
>

Sometimes we don't even have to look hard to find an answer that pleases
us. Be conscious of what your saying unconsciously.

> Thus, in pure terms, Art should bring forth a clear and definate
> message to Humanity as a whole, and the nature of that message should
> always be Creative. The method by which this message is expressed
> however, is what we will term "Tangible Form"...for example, in
> music...the tangible form is the "piece", which is composed of
> "sounds". In visual arts, the tangible form is the "visual object(s)".

I would define creativity also, as the process in which ideas/concepts
are expressed. The "finished product" is always an interpretation of the
original idea anyway.

>
>
> We hold, therefore, that Art be creative and constructive for the
> benefit of Humanity, and it is not enough to simply slap-together a
> few things to imply an opinion or feeling and call it Art.

Is it enough to speak for all of humanity?

>
>
> Of Art as Idea and Form,
>
> We have previously stated, that Art be creative in its idea. Does
> this also mean that its form must therefore follow suit and also be
> creative? surely it must, but how? - It is true, especially concerning
> the schools of music, that the composers are less concerned with
> results, and more concerned with methods. So where is the Art to be
> found - in the method, or the resulting form? The answer is most
> likely to be both, as so long as the method be creative, then the
> resulting form must be creative as of consequence, and the process may
> be termed as Art.

Even if my grand designs for imparting wisdom to the people were
contained in the space of a piece of paper tacked to the wall? Hot darn!
Am I allowed to call it Art now?

> However, the same applies with uncreative methods, which will render
> the resulting form to be also uncreative, and not therefore Art...ie:
> Garbage in, Garbage out.

> Now here there is a crucial point to make,
> and that is, unless the method be Creative, then the result will have
> no significant meaning at all...and what does that mean?
> What else but this:

Your theory: Art=creativity=significant (immediately understood on all
levels) meaning=creativity=art ?

So If you do not understand something it therefore has no creative merit
and thus cannot be categorized as 'Art'.

> Let us now explore such pieces of work as they result when bereft of
> meaning:

< tearing on dotted line>

>
>
> .The Art of the Occultist usually can't be put into a better term
> than "Divine Inspiration",

> can assume from the above, that if everything be a projection from the
> mind of the All, then everything must therefore be Divinly
> Inspired..and we enter a state of confusion....what is the purpose of
> working Occult Art as a means of "Divine Expression" when everything
> is already a Divine Expression? And we here I shall rule a very thick
> line between Occult Art as being mere "Expression" and being a tool
> for the Evolution of the Soul.

You may also like to look at the Modernist artists appropriation of
'primitive art ' from other cultures. The Modernists thought they were
rescuing this great source of spiritual and formal imagery from those who
could not 'creatively' comprehend it. The Modernists thought that they
were valid in speaking such a 'universal language' to themselves.

They were after all contributing to the universal evolution of Culture
and thus the progress of humanity.
< tearing neatly along line>

Might comment on the rest at some later stage

Siri* (who loves her art)

>