The Advaita of Art

Libro arrivato precisamente nel giorno indicato e in condizioni ottime. Credo sia un validissimo strumento di studio e riflessione per chi scrive e anche per chi studia filosofia ed estetica, non trascurando l'apporto fondamentale dell'Oriente.

This book is a remarkable and deeply penetrating study of the aesthetic theories of India, which places emphasis on the aesthete or spectator in having a meaningful and potentially transcendent experience of an artwork. I must first of all commend the author for his tremendous scholarship and sincerity, as the content covered in this book has profound implications for artists and aesthetes everywhere, and the ideas in this book demands an author with both aesthetic scholarship and deep sensitivity, with which Dehejia is amply equipped. He discusses the rasa-dhvani theories of Abhinavagupta, the sphota and linguistic construction theories of Mammata, the various levels of meaning within a work of art, the language of myth and symbolism, the necessity for spiritual sensitivity for aesthetes, the creative process of both artists and poets, and the imaginative process of the aesthete.The author, Dehejia, follows in a tradition of aestheticians laid down by the great Mammata, Abhinavagupta, Coomaraswamy, and Tagore, who each placed their interest in uncovering the rich and timeless approach to art that the ancient aestheticians of India left behind. He posits along with the Indian tradition that in a transcendent experience of art, the divisions between artist, artwork, and aesthete melt away, and that one is swept into a pure contemplation that is identical to a divine gnosis, thereby exalting art to a priestly stature, and art as a form of yoga. Reading this work, or the essays of Coomaraswamy, it becomes obvious that for India the role of the artist is a sacred one; but artists are not expected to give expression to every egotistical whim and fancy, or give in to passing fads, as is the case in so much of modern art, but were expected to express universal ideas using traditional forms, imbuing their work with a fragrance of timelessness and revelation. For Indian artists and aesthetes, the imagination is a spiritual tool, a means of communing with the divine. As Dehejia states in the book, "the creative energy of the artist is put to use, not for mere individual self-expression, but to attain insights into the nature of Reality and to heighten consciousness."As a practicing poet and musician myself, I can attest that this book is a profound set of ideas for artists and aesthetes alike.