Thank you for this excellent rumination. And, thanks too for giving me a name for a sensation that I have been experiencing of late: museum fatigue. Coincidentally, it maxed out in the very same place - the Vatican Museum, in June of this year. The feeling carried through into our week at Rome, as a whole. So much to absorb from one city alone - history, architecture, art. It was overwhelming.
This is so wonderful! Thank you. Especially appreciated this:
To give or pay attention to a work of art—or anything for that matter—involves one’s eyes, mind, memory, and heart—powers of analysis, comparison, appreciation, and evaluation. Our attention doesn’t merely connect us to the world. It extends our sense of self into the world: It can be deep or broad, penetrating or subtle, acute or profound, specific or nuanced. When we don’t pay attention—when we don’t notice all the teeming things—it’s our selves failing to show up fully.
To see everything as art—whether it’s Raphael’s Academy, a steep cliff stretching out into the Balearic Sea, or your very own life—means to create the conditions to pay attention and to really notice. And often that’s simply giving yourself the time, space, freedom, and solitude to do so.
Beautiful piece.
Thank you for this excellent rumination. And, thanks too for giving me a name for a sensation that I have been experiencing of late: museum fatigue. Coincidentally, it maxed out in the very same place - the Vatican Museum, in June of this year. The feeling carried through into our week at Rome, as a whole. So much to absorb from one city alone - history, architecture, art. It was overwhelming.
This is so wonderful! Thank you. Especially appreciated this:
To give or pay attention to a work of art—or anything for that matter—involves one’s eyes, mind, memory, and heart—powers of analysis, comparison, appreciation, and evaluation. Our attention doesn’t merely connect us to the world. It extends our sense of self into the world: It can be deep or broad, penetrating or subtle, acute or profound, specific or nuanced. When we don’t pay attention—when we don’t notice all the teeming things—it’s our selves failing to show up fully.
To see everything as art—whether it’s Raphael’s Academy, a steep cliff stretching out into the Balearic Sea, or your very own life—means to create the conditions to pay attention and to really notice. And often that’s simply giving yourself the time, space, freedom, and solitude to do so.
Bertell Ollman's Alienation: Marx's Conception of Man in Capitalist Society speaks of a requisite 'philosophy of internal relations' that provides the sole reliable pathway toward nuanced knowledge and clear consciousness. <https://hickeyj.substack.com/i/140295057/odd-beginnings-new-endingsa-biosocial-golden-rule-were-all-cousins-after-all>.