Page 33 - Studio International - January 1972

Towards a as a separate entity apart from himself. The actually of itself, although 'in its own proper
becomes guilty of objectivity, of seeing nature
domain' (that is, in its own terms) nature can
minimal art important part of mystical thinking. Jacob prove its own rationality, although this is done
need to re-establish unity between the two is an
unconsciously by 'eternal Wisdom'."
Boehme believes that 'thinking upon terrestrial The form of spirit is nature, but its opposite
Simon Pugh things and ... attending to that which is is matter. For Hegel, matter exhibits the quality
without'7 imprisons man in a material existence. of 'gravity' because of 'its tendency towards a
Ironically, the captor is not nature itself (like central point'; it is composite because its parts
most mystics Boehme respected nature as the `exclude each other' searching for unity outside
manifestation of God upon earth) but man itself; it is also self-destructive because it
himself who is unable to transcend his environ- inclines towards its opposite." Both Malevich
ment and himself. The evolution of man in the and Soloviev agree with Hegel's description of
act of transcending himself is at the centre of matter. Malevich defines it as 'immutable'20

Hegel's philosophy as well : in his original and insensible to life; Soloviev as inert and
state, man is an integral part of nature, but impenetrable, 'the direct opposite of the Idea
because he knows he is only a part, he possesses as a positive all-penetrability or all-unity'. 21
potentially at least 'self-conscious inward The disorganized and self-destructive quality
intelligence' which can 'free him from immedi- of matter inclines Soloviev to regard beauty as a
The publication of Malevich's essays on art in ate' (i.e. intuitive) `existence'.8 In The Non- `transfiguration of matter through the incarna-
19681 allows a more detailed examination of the Objective World, Malevich agrees that what tion in it of another, a super-material principle'.22
background to Suprematism. The diversity of distinguishes man from his environment is that Since matter is disunified, in unity it could exist
these writings appears superficially to confuse `he possesses a consciousness of which his ideally—in other words, beauty can only be
ideas put forward with some clarity in The Non- environment (nature) cannot boast'.9 The achieved outside material properties. Since the
Objective World of 192y.2 However it is disputation between man and nature comes unity of matter lies outside itself, beauty can
possible to speculate on Malevich's aesthetics. about because man is unable to 'feel' himself only be realized by transcending the material
Joost Baljeu published an article in 19653 part of the totality of nature, for nature is an and resorting to the idea. Beauty is not the
discussing briefly the idealist background inherent `inert, insensible "something" of matter'" presentation of the content of nature, but the
in Malevich, indicating connections with mystical while he, man, is active spirit. This separation idea of that content (therefore art could hardly
writers like Jacob Boehme, V. S. Soloviev and destroys that pantheistic feeling of confidence portray beauty by imitation—a point that
N. A. Berdyaev and philosophers like Plato and which is the basis of Worringer's empathic Soloviev does not take up, although both Hegel
Hegel. Although Malevich had a primitive art. Instead, abstraction is the outcome of a and Malevich do23).
upbringing4 it would have been surprising had he `great inner unrest' and corresponds to Matter cannot be taken as a basis for any
not been affected by the interest in German religious transcendentalism." kind of investigation. Hegel's view that matter
transcendentalism that was a feature of the last two For Hegel, the factor that finally divides is composite is reiterated in Soloviev's 'Eighth
decades of nineteenth-century Russia and radically man from nature is 'thought' which 'distin- Lecture on Godmanhood' when he questions
influenced the Russian symbolist movement. The guishes us from brutes'." This 'thought' gives the structure of the material world and finds it
two following articles (Pt. 2 will appear in Studio rise to a caricatured knowledge of nature which, `a multitude of elementary entities' that are
International in March) suggest connections for Malevich as well, inhibits the apprehension `divisible to infinity'. 24 Similarly, Malevich
between Malevich and other idealist thinkers, of reality. It is this mistrust of 'thought' that describes how matter disintegrates 'into a large
indicating how Malevich attempts to reconcile his causes Malevich to 'reject reason'," putting his number of component parts which are fully
position with the social doctrines of the Revolution faith instead in 'feeling' or 'stimulus', just as independent' so that things do not exist but
and, finally, how a consistent aesthetic evolves. Worringer inclines towards 'purely instinctive only the sum of their entities. L5 It is not
creation'14 rather than ratiocination as the surprising that at a time when the disintegration
Part I : Background basis of abstraction. of the atom was affecting both science and
I Both Hegel and Malevich describe man positivistic thinking, aesthetics should strive
Malevich's work is an attempt to understand moving gradually towards a new reality to for the super-material which could give both
the human environment, and to discover how experience again 'unshakeable perfection'.15 unity, and sense, to matter. On no other basis
man may transcend that environment and But the interim is a hopeless compromise could matter be established as a basis for reality,
apprehend a 'real' world. In Suprematism between the ideal principle and a material for on investigation it disintegrated, and reality
Malevich describes a world that is no longer environment that cannot be reconciled. For, as does not consist of 'an accumulation of separate
encumbered by physical distinctions, a world the late nineteenth-century Russian mystic units existing side by side without connection'26
that is felt through the ideal rather than the V. S. Soloviev states in Hegelian fashion, 'when but in unity.
actual, a world that is perfect and at rest, and a the ideal is fully realized there will be an end Kandinsky also attacks materialism in favour
world through which man can experience to all compromise, but it will also be an end of of the era of the 'great spiritual'. Sixten
totality with nature again. history and the whole world process'.16 Ringbom points out in The Sounding Cosmos
This transcendentalism is partly the result of The world process is then the transcendence that whereas scientists saw new discoveries as a
a crisis experienced during the first years of the of the unconscious (nature) by the self-conscious broadening of human knowledge, Kandinsky
twentieth century when certain artists came to (spirit). Spirit contains 'energy' (Malevich calls could perceive only the disintegration of a
feel, as Wilhelm Worringer puts it in Abstraction it 'stimulus') 'enabling it to realize itself'.17 chaotic world.27 If Rutherford's theory of 1902
and Empathy, 'a kind of spiritual agoraphobia Man's evolution and renaissance is achieved had indicated to positivistic science that matter
in the face of the motley disorder and caprice through the medium of spirit. Like nature, was capable of dissolution, to art it could only
of the phenomenal world'.5 Malevich would spirit is conditioned by universal laws that do emphasize even more the need for an art that
agree with Worringer that the basis of art is a not change and the reason which underlies transcended materialism for 'since matter was
disputation of man with nature,6 and like a these laws is 'actually accomplished in the disappearing anyway, the time had come for
mystic Malevich would believe the fault lies domain of existent, active spirit, as well as in pure composition and abstraction'.28 Worringer
with man who is unable to perceive the inherent that of mere nature'. Therefore both spirit and emphasizes that 'abstract forms are the highest
order and perfection in nature and who thus nature possess potentially what spirit can make in which man can rest from the confusion of
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