Page 35 - Studio International - January 1972

overcome by actively creating a new reality. towards a state of rest and perfection. Both the Malevich, Kasimir, Essays on Art, 2 vols, ed. Troels
For Hegel, this activity makes man intellectually artist and the technocrat are faced with an equal Andersen, 1968.
'This is because The Non-Objective World was edited
self-conscious; for Marx, work makes man problem: to overcome the unknown through from several works while Malevich was in Germany
contemplate a world made by himself—in both production, for factories and industrial plants in 1927 and translated to form a Bauhausbuch. It is
cases man has become a stranger to the world `only exist because there lies hidden in nature therefore not surprising that the work maintains a
consistent appearance.
around him and as he struggles for fulfilment an unknown perfection which they' (the 3 The Lugano Review, 1965, I, pp 305-24, 'The
he attempts to overcome a situation that was of technocrats) 'are trying to collect together in Problem of Reality with Suprematism, Proun,
his own doing. The solution lies in activity and their technical machine'44 just as the artist Constructivism, Neoplasticism and Elementarism'.
4 See 'From I/42 Notes', from Essays on Art, ibid.
work, whether through self-consciousness, or strives to realize the 'actual reality' of nature Vol. 2.
through the means of production, or the creation that he is blind to. The main difference between 5 Worringer, Wilhelm, Abstraction and Empathy,
of an art work. In fact, it is this very activity art and technology is that artistic creation 1908, translated by Michael Bullock, 1963, p 129.
6 ibid, p 12.
that is the means of ascertaining reality. produces 'enduring values' while 'out of the 7 Boehme, Jacob, The Supersensual Life, 16 24
Worringer quotes the German aesthetician scientific (productive-technical) creation (William Law translation, 1781).
Lipps to establish this point : 'It is a funda- proceed relative transitory values'.45 It is 8 Hegel, G. W. F., Introduction to the Philosophy of
Fine Art, tr. B. Bosanquet, 1886.
mental fact of all psychology and most certainly difficult to determine whether this attack on Malevich, K., The Non-Objective World, 1927 (tr.
of all aesthetics, that a "sensuously given Gershenzon is a necessary concession to Dearstyne, Chicago, 1959), p 18.
object", precisely understood, is an unreality, materialist philosophy at a crucial stage in
"Abstraction and Empathy, ibid, p 15.
something that does not, and cannot, exist. In Russian history, but certainly Malevich's 12Hegel, G. W. F., Philosophy of History, tr. Sibree,
that it exists for me—and such objects alone admiration for Futurist art could not allow him 1956, p 8.
come into question—it is permeated by my to deny the work of the technocrat. His 'The 13 Malevich, K., 'Secret Vices of the Academicians'
1916, from Essay On Art, ibid. Compare with:
activity, by my inner life'.39 question of Imitative Art' of 1920 is a serious `Reason cannot understand anything and intelligence
In Introduction to the Philosophy of Fine Art, attempt to regard art as a part of the whole cannot judge anything, for there is nothing in nature
Hegel describes the process of gradual self- revolutionary structure rather than as an un- that can be judged, understood, or examined', from
`God is not cast down', from Essays on Art, ibid.
conscious awareness as 'a practical activity, co-ordinated activity. He divides the 'new world' 14 Abstraction and Empathy, ibid, p 19.
inasmuch as man has the impulse, in the medium into the destructive revolutionary 'activity' and 15 The Non-Objective World, ibid, p 20.
which is directly given him ... to produce himself, the creative 'army' which includes both artist 16 Soloviev, V. S., 'Collapse of the mediaeval world-
conception', Moscow Psychological Society, 1891,
and therein at the same time to recognize and technocrat. Boldly he asserts that 'creativity from S. L. Frank, A Soloviev Anthology, 1950.
himself '.4° Man does this by 'modification' of changes in the same way as the party's revolu- 17 Philosophy of History, ibid, p 15.
the external reality upon which he 'impresses tionary attitude'," understanding Communism 18ibid.
12 ibid, p 17.
the seal of his inner being' and then discovers to be a force that unifies in a 'utilitarian' way '° The Non-Objective World, ibid, p 18.
himself within it. He does this, Hegel continues, what the artist unifies 'ideally'. He sees both 21 Soloviev, V. S., 'Beauty in Nature', 1889, from
`to strip the outer world of its foreign stubborn- art and communism attempting to overcome A Soloviev Anthology, ibid.
22 ibid.
ness' and create in the outer world a reality the division and separation of the material 23 The question of imitative art is discussed more
which contains himself. This is the beginning of world for 'humanity contains the idea of unity, fully in part II of this article.
his attempt to discover his totality with nature and this is its being'.47 Malevich seems to 24 Soloviev, V. S., Lectures on Godmanhood, 1877- 84,
introduced by P. P. Zouboff, 1948.
again. Marx interprets this activity as the regard humanity like Hegelian matter : it is the 25 Malevich, K., 'God is not cast down', ibid.
practical labour of man living within society, task of the artist and technocrat to provide a 26Fischer, Ernst, The Necessity of Art, 1959 (tr. A.
but he especially admired Hegel's idea of self- unity, a unity that is smashed, as Musil points Bostock 1963).
27Ringbom, Sixten, The Sounding Cosmos, 1970, p 35.
creation which indicated a true understanding out, like 'the great undivided life-force into 28 Kandinsky, Wassily, quoted from The Sounding
of labour which has as its object man. In effect, innumerable fragments' by the division of Cosmos, ibid, p 35.
however, Hegel's process of sublimation through labour.48 For Worringer as well, the fortuitous- " Abstraction and Empathy, ibid, p
134.
30 Malevich's obsession with death, and the signifi-
which alienation is duly subdued is exclusively ness of humanity merely intensifies the urge to cance, will be discussed in part II of this article.
abstract and leaves unchanged all forms of artistic abstraction." But Malevich, caught in 31 Abstraction and Empathy, ibid, p 18.
society. Marx accepts that man could separate the wave of social and artistic change after 1917, 32 Huysmans, Joris-Karl, Against Nature, tr. R.
Baldrick, p 92.
himself from nature with the help of conscious- far from trying to seek deliverance from such " The Sounding Cosmos, ibid, p 41.
ness, religion or anything else, but he could fortuitousness, talks of achieving unity through 34 `8th Lecture on Godmanhood', ibid.
only distinguish himself from nature when he revolutionary activity — 'I have to forge a way 35 Marx, Karl, `Afterword to 2nd. German Edition of
Capital', from D. Caute, The Essential Writings of
begins to produce his means of subsistence. through and smash various obstacles'50 —to Karl Marx, 1967.
Alienation is overcome by 'socialized mankind' recreate the order in humanity which has been 36 The Sounding Cosmos, ibid, p 35.
who bring nature 'under their common control lost through alienation. He talks also of 37 Abstraction and Empathy, ibid, p 130.
38 `God is not cast down', ibid.
instead of being ruled by it as by some blind `collecting all the lives that have been scattered 39 Quoted in Abstraction and Empathy, ibid, p 6-7.
power'.41 in the chaos of nature's' into a self-conscious Theodor Lipps formulated the theory of empathy,
In a similar way, Malevich believes man can social unit; he talks of the masses taking part in especially in Aesthetik of 1903-6, from which this
quotation comes.
reach perfection 'through all he produces' so `the development of every creative thought that
"Introduction to the Philosophy of Fine Art, ibid.
that he can achieve 'a state of rest' and act 'no appears' so that people may achieve creativity 41 Marx, K., Capital III, 1893-4 (tr. Untermann,
longer as a man but as God'.42 Through his themselves instead of 'fabricating the ideas of a 1959).
42 'God is not cast down', ibid.
products man moves towards the absolute, single inventor'.52 In communism, Malevich 43Andersen, Troels, 'Introduction', Essays on Art,
liberating himself from physical reality. Troels sees the success of the practical activity side by ibid.
Andersen explains" that 'God is not cast side with the new reality of the Suprematist 44 `God is not cast down', ibid.
45 The Non-Objective World, ibid.
down' of 1922 is in part an answer to, or artist. It was not until late in the 192os that he 46Malevich, K., 'The Question of Imitative Art',
criticism of, M. 0. Gershenzon's Three Faces comes to see the 'influence of economic, from Essays on Art, ibid.
of Perfection (1918) in which creation and pro- political, religious and utilitarian phenomena on 47 ibid.
48Quoted from The Necessity of Art, ibid, p. 83.
duction are seen in opposition. While creation art as the disease of art',53 and he turns instead
49 Abstraction and Empathy, ibid, p 23-4.
leads to a state of rest, production, Gershenzon to the creation of 'constant objects' that owe less "The Question of Imitative Art', ibid.
argues, aims to destroy nature's identity. In to his philosophical ideas and appear a 51 ibid.
52 ibid.
answer, Malevich states that philosophy, retrogressive step after his minimal work around
53 Malevich, K., 'Painting and the Problem of Archi-
technology and artistic creativity all move 192o. q [To be continued] tecture', 1928-30, from Essays on Art, ibid.
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