I left the University of Utah in 2008 with a Bachelors degree, $20k in student loans, and one book that I never checked out, and never returned: Art as Experience by John Dewey.
I fell in love with Art As Experience by John Dewey during an undergraduate course in Critical Theory, while I was also studying linguistics, theoretical physics, and Butoh at the University of Utah. The yellowed pages and broken binding of the eighth edition of this book, printed in 1934, are heavily tabbed, annotated, and underlined (with pencil of course). Between the hardback covers one finds 355 pages of Dewey’s most brilliant criticism of museums – which remove art as far as possible from it’s original context, i.e., the primary inspiration for the artistic reflex of a human in response to her time, culture, language, and proclivities.
And yet, this book goes beyond a dry criticism of museums, and brings the responsibility back to the individual – every single individual human (that would be YOU!) to appreciate all experiences as more than potentially aesthetic, no – every moment is literally saturated with creative impulse by the very fact of your awareness of it.
“The sources of art in human experience will be learned by him who sees how the tense grace of the ball-player infects the onlooking crowd; who notes the delight of the housewife in tending her plants, and the intent interest of her goodman in tending the patch of green in front of the house; the zest of the spectator in poking the wood burning on the hearth and in watching the darting flames and crumbling coals.
These people, if qustioned as to the reason for their actions, would doubtless return reasonable answers. The man who poked the sticks of burning wood would say he did it to make the fire burn better; but he is none the less fascinated by the colorful drama of change enacted before his eyes and imaginatively partakes in it. He does not remain a cold spectator.
What Coleridge said of the reader of poetry is true in its way of all who are happily absorbed in their activities of mind and body: ‘The reader should be carried forward, not merely or chiefly by the mechanical impulse of curiosity, not by a restless desire to arrive at the final solution, but by the pleasurable activity of the journey itself.”
Art As Experience by John Dewey, pg 5
Dewey goes on to critique the capitalization of art, as if all creation had a mechanistic or predestined purpose to fulfill in order to have intrinsic value. Do you hear me in your heart, dear reader? There is no purpose, therefore all things are imbued with intrinsic value: you, me, and everything inbetween.
Have I jumped to conclusions, or would you like more examples? Every artist from every walk of life should read this book deeply, and slowly, savoring Dewey’s unabashed optimism for the invinite wellspring of creative energy that is the birthright of all creation.
Finding this book in the dusty caverns of a univeristy library, and rediscovering it after many years of wandering renews my confidence in my emerging art! What would it be like to live a life of perpetual inspiration? Discover your own inner wisdom with me on my Patreon page: patreon.com/thesavageshaman
One response to “The only book I ever stole…”
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