Existentialism in Relation to the Nature of Mind

Existentialism in Relation to the Nature of Mind

A dissertation presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the
B.A (hons) degree

Benjamin Alexis Johnson

January 2006

Table of Contents

Review of Research 2-3
Introduction 4-5
Chapter I: The Origins of Existentialism 6-11
Chapter II: The Existential Master Giacometti 12-17
Chapter III: The Nature of Mind 17-22
Satori 22-23
Conclusion 23-25
Bibliography 26-28
Internet Resource 29-30
Illustrations 31-39

Review of Research

The original purpose of this dissertation was to gather a sufficient amount of evidence to prove or disprove the idea that most contemporary art contains existential elements. A questionnaire giving a basic definition of existentialism was submitted to various galleries in and around Leeds and York and also handed out in artists studios. The questionnaire was meant to be used as a guide to fathom whether artists young and old felt that the idea of existentialism had relevance within their own practice; it didn’t matter if they had never heard of certain key existential artists and literary figures such as Alberto Giacometti and Jean Paul Sartre and their work could be created in any medium.

However, there wasn’t enough data and relevant information regarding this area of investigation to come up with any logical conclusion as to whether this select group of contemporary artists felt existentialism is still relevant, with regards to creative thought. So this idea backfired; it would have been more conclusive if a broader definition of existentialism was provided and posted on the internet, then promoted as an ideas forum for artists living anywhere in the world. This way I might have been able to prove in some kind of way that an eclectic mix of working artists felt that existentialism is still alive. It seemed like an almost impossible task.

I had to be very specific and focus in on an artist who exemplified and was regarded as producing work which was existential; in this case it was Giacometti. So, literary exponents of existentialism such as Albert Camus, Samuel Beckett and Jean-Paul Sartre haven’t been written about in any real depth. This was also due to the limitations of the word count.

Much of the information needed to write the bulk of the text was obtained through books I actually own and email correspondence I had with practicing Buddhists, Transpersonal Psychologists and Cognitive Behavioural Therapists. The internet was a valuable resource but couldn’t be entirely relied upon, as much of the text on there isn’t the concrete truth due to the fact it can be distorted, overly opinionated and too subjective.

Introduction

Existentialism is a philosophy that emphasizes the uniqueness and isolation of the individual experience in a hostile or indifferent universe, regards human existence as unexplainable, and stresses freedom of choice and responsibility for the consequences of one's acts. (www.dictionary.com, 2005)

What existentialism actually means is very hard to define, as there are so many differing points of view on the subject. The present day opinion seems to be that it has ceased to be a modern day part of the world outlook and is no longer fashionable as an idea (www.reference.com, 2006); existential thought has been relegated to the past. Although the numerous atrocious acts of violence portrayed through the media are permanently lingering within the collective memory; confirming the evil man is truly capable of. One would think that many members of society have evaluated and questioned the value of their lives and what it means to be a living breathing human being. So it seemed appropriate to attempt to re-examine and define this seemingly lost theory.

It was important to include when the term existentialism was actually conceived, so its origins have been traced in the first chapter. This dissertation also seeks to give some insight into why artists such as Giacometti (Fig 1) externalised their thoughts in a specific way; this can be reviewed in the second chapter. The Nature of Mind (third chapter) feeds into this line of inquiry. In fact much of the text reads like a philosophical and psychoanalytical discussion on the nature of our own existence and the creative mind. So while it is about the theory of existentialism, the lines get blurred at times and the text falls into a debate on ‘why we are the way we are’ which relates to the main topic.

Giacometti is the artist of choice when it comes to existentialism as he’s the creative force most associated with and popularised by the term. He didn’t like being interviewed (Klemm, 2001) so it’s difficult to truly know what made him tick, although many of his writings were published in a diverse range of magazines (Klemm, 2001). Through the examination of topics such as Jungian Spirituality and bringing into question the journey an artist embarks on in order to visualize conscious thought; a clearer picture of this elusive man may come into focus, although it should be noted that the third chapter doesn’t have to strictly apply to this one artist. The representational painter Jenny Saville is mentioned in the third chapter.

Chapter I: The Origins of Existentialism

One idea of existential thought is that we are all burning flames fighting to stay alight in the vastness of an inhospitable universe (Johnson, 2005). This thought would suggest that existentialism is a philosophy but it cannot rightly be called this, as the root originators conflicted in terms of how existentialism could be defined (Head, 2005). For example Soren Kierkegaard (Fig 2) was a devout Christian where as the 19th century German Philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (Fig 3) was a strong supporter of atheism and upheld the idea that God doesn’t exist. Kierkegaard is considered to be the first philosopher to actually write about existentialism, his earliest major work Either/Or (1843) questioned how human life ought to be lived. Although it’s believed that the 17th century French philosopher Blaise Pascal (Fig 4) was the first to anticipate the idea of existential thought (Head, 2005). He saw life in terms of paradoxes, emphasizing that the human self, combining mind and body is a total contradiction.

This quote is featured in Either/Or: Equilibrium between the Aesthetic and the Ethical in the Development of Personality.
Now, if a man could constantly balance on the tip of the moment of choice, if he could stop being a person, if in his inmost being he were only an empty thought, if personality meant no more than to be a goblin which, while going through the motions, remained nevertheless unchanged, if that was how it was , it would be foolish to say it might be too late for a man to choose, for in a deeper sense there could be no question of choice. Choice itself is decisive for a personality’s content; in choice personality immerses itself in what is chosen, and when it does not choose it wastes consumptively away. (Kierkegaard in Higgin (Editor), 1999, p.156)

Kierkegaard suggested in this writing that people have to make a choice between two ‘spheres of existence.’ These two spheres were called the ‘aesthetic’ and the ‘ethical.’ Most creative people would surely put themselves in the aesthetic category, although Kierkegaard proposed that a life lead in this way was one in search of hedonistic pleasure and fleeting romanticism and that this would lead to frustration and boredom and ultimately self destruction (age-of-the-sage.org, 2005). This is a stereotype of artists in general and also the idea of existential thought; the romantic type who wastes away the years in pursuit of meaning and a heightened sense of reality. On the other hand, to lead an ethical life would mean having a sense of duty with a set goal in mind to strive towards. This very much ties in with the existential idea that man is responsible for his actions and the eventual outcome of his life. Although an ethical life would be one of compromise and a man’s very integrity could be brought into question if the wrong path was taken.

Neither of the ‘existence spheres’ identified by Kierkegaard appeared to offer a satisfactory life experience, so in his later works he introduce a third ‘sphere’ which was based around religious principles. The belief was that people could ‘live in the truth’ or at least the truth that Kierkegaard believed in. There was a feeling of belonging if people accepted they were ‘individual before the eternal.’ (age-of-the-sage.org, 2005). In this sense a person with these set of principles could in theory relate to someone in a unified way. In order to live a life which he found valid, this ‘sphere’ was accepted. Interestingly, this idea predates the spiritual psychologist Carl Jung’s (Fig 5) theory of the ‘collective unconscious’ by many years; his theories are analyzed in chapter three of this dissertation: The Nature of Mind.

So basically do we have a moral obligation to choose an objective? Existentialists have argued that there is no objective or even rational basis for making decisions (Klemm, 2001). Individualism is more important when searching for ones own truth which in many philosophers eyes such as Jean Paul Sartre (Fig 6); the truth is ambiguous and absurd. Friedrich Nietzsche connected with this absurdity and denounced that ‘God is dead’ thus rejecting the value system of the time (age-of-the-sage.org, 2005). He was influenced by Dostoyevsky (Fig 7) and Kierkegaard although his ideas were far more radical and controversial. In his mind Christianity was the arch-enemy of all reason, this is exemplified in his work Thus Spoke Zarathustra which includes an analysis of the origins of faith. ‘Weariness that wants to reach the ultimate with one leap…this created all gods and afterworlds.’ (Head, 2005) Many artists have to reject the traditional values of the masses in order to convey their inner mind, it is Nietzsche’s ‘superman’ who would do just this; rising above mankind and focusing on his present existence instead of leaning on the hope that there is life after death.

One thing is needful: To ‘give style’ to one’s character – a great and rare art! It is practiced by those who survey all the strengths and weaknesses of their nature and then fit them into an artistic plan until every one of them appears as art and reason and even weaknesses delight the eye…In the end, when the work is finished, it becomes evident how the constraint of a single taste governed and formed everything large and small. Whether this taste was good or bad is less important than one might suppose, if only it was a single taste!
…For one thing is needful: that a human being should attain satisfaction with himself, whether it by means of this or that poetry or art; only then is a human being at all tolerable to behold. (Nietzsche in Higgin (Editor), 1999, p.162)

What a man is begins to betray itself when his talent decreases – when he stops showing what he can do. Talent, too, is finery; finery, too, is a hiding place. (Nietzsche in Higgin (Editor), 1999, p.162)

There’s an idea that the only way to become whole and discover the true sense of self, one has to go through tragedy in order to become reborn. Shamans go through an initiation process which involves turning inward to free themselves from the unconscious control of what Carl Jung called the Shadow and Anima/Animus. This journey strips away the false layers of the personality and through this transformation one becomes unified. (Johnson, 2005)

Surely artists experience this kind of transformation by externalizing their thought process. This relates to the ancient maxim ‘as above, so below’ which means that whatever takes place in the microcosm of the psyche is projected on to the macrocosm of the universe (Stein, 2003). So in a sense we all have this responsibility to contribute to society something worthwhile and to live a meaningful existence. However the existential point of view suggests that life is, or has, meaning and meaninglessness; it is a mixture of absurd contradictions. (Johnson, 2005)

Existentialism only really became truly relevant in 1945 after the Second World War (Klemm, 2001). The aftermath and dreadful atrocities which were committed left Europe’s and perhaps the entire world’s population re-evaluating the meaning of their existence. Jean-Paul Sartre introduced a contemporary approach to existential thinking; greatly influenced by past philosophers such as Martin Heidegger and Soren Kierkergaard; his first existential text called ‘Being and Nothingness’ was published in 1943.

Many artists creative approach had to be re-evaluated, particularly in France where surrealism had been popular (Klemm, 2001). The ‘degenerate’ art exhibitions organised by the Nazi party (Fig 8) were a form of propaganda to manipulate society’s perception as to what could be considered an acceptable mode of expression. After the world was free of this tyranny a new beginning was called for, encompassing the arts and existential literature.

Certainly we cannot say that this man (a young student of Sartre’s who in 1940 had to choose between going to England to join the Free French Forces or staying in occupied France to care for his mother, who depended on him), in choosing to remain with his mother – that is, in taking sentiment, personal devotion and concrete charity as his moral foundations – would be making an irresponsible choice, nor could we do so if he preferred the sacrifice of going away to England. Man makes himself; he is not found ready-made; he makes himself by the choice of his morality, and he cannot but choose a morality, such is the pressure of circumstances upon him. We define man only in relation to his commitments; it is therefore absurd to reproach us for irresponsibility in our choice. (Sartre in Higgin (Editor), 1999, p.202)

The following quotes by Sartre give insight into the question of free will:

Atheistic existentialism, of which I am a representative, declares with greater consistency that if God does not exist there is at least one being whose existence comes before its essence, a being which exists before it can be defined by any conception of it. That being is man…What do we mean by saying that existence precedes essence? We mean that man first of all exists, encounters himself, surges up in the world – and defines himself afterwards. If man as the existentialist sees him as not definable, it is because to begin with he is nothing. He will not be anything until later, and then he will be what he makes of himself. Thus, there is no human nature, because there is no God to have a conception of it. Man simply is. (Sartre in Higgin (Editor), 1999, p.202)

Dostoyevsky once wrote ‘If God did not exist, everything would be permitted’; and that, for existentialism, is the starting point. Everything is indeed permitted if God does not exist, and man is in consequence forlorn, for he cannot find anything to depend upon either within or outside himself. He discovers forthwith that he is without excuse. For if indeed existence precedes essence, one will never be able to explain one’s action by reference to a given and specified human nature: in other words, there is no determinism – man is free, man is freedom. (Sartre in Higgin (Editor), 1999, p.202)

I cannot make liberty my aim unless I make that of others equally my aim. (Sartre in Higgin (Editor), 1999, p.202)

Life is nothing until it is lived; but it is yours to make sense of, and the value of it is nothing else but the sense that you choose.
(Sartre in Higgin (Editor), 1999, p.202)


Chapter II: The Existential Master Giacometti

A common misconception associated with Existentialists is that they see the world in ten shades of grey and feel a sense of hopelessness and despair due to the sense of alienation felt through their environment. This couldn’t be further from the truth; existentialism isn’t a negative idea, it encompasses a wide range of issues including the nature of god, fate and responsibility. It could be said that people can change their lives anytime they want and set off in a new direction, this brings into question the nature of free will and how we see our lives in relation to other peoples. (Johnson, 2005)

The very act of being creative and in this case applying paint to canvas is in itself a healing act in which the artist often struggles to come to terms with his or her own environment and inner-space. The painter and sculpture Alberto Giacometti had the label Existentialist applied to him after the post-war period especially when he reached his ‘mature’ period (1947-51). In 1934 he attempted a last Surrealist figure, as he belonged to a Surrealist collective up until this point. It was a tall hollow cone with the inscription ‘1 + 1 = 3.’ Later on in the same year, whilst in Paris, Giacometti began to construct realistic heads, both with and without life-models (Rita Gueffier, a professional model and his brother Diego.) The Surrealists believed this transition to representation to be a total betrayal of their doctrines (Klemm, 2001, p.284), so Giacometti the renegade, walked away and moved towards his destiny as a figurative artist.

After his abandonment of Surrealism he began to develop his own unique style. This way of working can be seen as early as 1932 in the portrait of the artist’s father (Fig 9) although it was in its infancy. The thin spare line seen in later works was being used in this painting and the gaze of the sitter looks hollow and distant. The colour palette is very minimal and the work appears to have been completed in a short amount of time, contradicting Giacometti’s often lengthy journey in his later works, to capture the very essence of time itself.

Giacometti was lumped into the Existentialist category possibly due to the fashions of post-war Paris. It was a culture and a way of life among academic philosophers and writers of journalism, novels, plays, films and essays. In his later years, he recounted the body of work he’d produced as a total failure; it was if he could never meet his own high expectations. These expectations could be defined not by the possibility of success but by the possibility of having insight into the reasons for this supposed failure. An analogy exists with the philosophies of failure expressed by Jean-Paul Sartre, Albert Camus and Samuel Beckett. Giacometti actually knew these three men personally and this seemed to be another justification for applying the Existentialist tag. Apparently there’s nothing in his writings or recorded conversations to suggest that he believed himself to be an Existentialist (Klemm, 2001, p.31-2). Failure and self-criticism could have been regarded as a successful tool for motivation and reflection.

Giacometti was searching for an art form to express the reality of existence, or as he stated, to embrace ‘the totality of life.’ This could suggest that every facet of his existence should be explored to its fullest potential. He had no idea at the beginning of this quest how he might come up with a solution and the search would in fact last a dozen years. Cubism (Fig 10) and Egyptian art were strong influences on his earlier output (Klemm, 2001). The Cubist theory maintains that many different moments in time can be captured in a single picture, much like the Futurists (Fig 19) attempts at capturing motion through a static image. The idea that many different angles and points of view could be captured in one image must have appealed to Giacometti although he maintained his own unique way of working and seeing.

‘The Artist’s Mother’ from 1937 (Fig 11) could be considered to be one of Giacometti’s earliest existential paintings. The face is built up with a mesh of thin linear line and the figure appears to be hovering in space, there’s an intense scrutiny to the way Giacometti’s mother has been portrayed. It’s hard to know if he painted how he actually felt about the person and this may never be known due to art’s subjective nature; meaning that a work of art can have multiple meanings depending on the viewer. Thoughts and emotions which are conjured up when looking at a work of art take place within the mind. Certain factors have to be taken into account when these feelings are experienced; such as the person’s upbringing, life experience and aesthetic sensibilities.

There appears to be a rapid transition from Giacometti’s Surrealist style and tribal influences to the mode of working he is most associated with. ‘Apple on the Sideboard’ is another work from 1937 (Fig 12). The main focus is the apple itself and this appears to have been worked on with great care and perhaps a near obsession, the mark making is tight and intricate. The idea may have been to perfectly recreate an object frozen in time, there’s a sense of loneliness about this painting. The space around the apple appears animated and alive, whilst the apple itself sits in still solitude, reminding one that there’s no such thing as the future; everything is firmly rooted in the present it exists in.

Giacometti’s drawings from around 1936-7 appear to retain the cubist influence (Fig 13) and don’t have the same intense desperation of his later sketches. He also experimented with Automatism (Fig 14) later on in his life (Klemm, 2001), the idea that the hand is guided by the unconscious; whatever comes out on the page can never be predicted: the resulting image is mainly achieved through an involuntary reflex reaction.

It was shortly after the end of the Second World War that Giacometti arrived at his trademark way of working. Perhaps the despair and anguish generated from such atrocities compelled him to convey his secret internal dialogue in such a way. This can be seen in his ‘Small Figure on a Pedestal’ (Fig 15) completed during a five year period (1940-45) The representation of a human figure appears to have been chipped away so it appears almost detached from existence. Perhaps this was done to focus the eye on what actually isn’t there, to let the mind fill in the blanks and make the sculpture all the more powerful due to the vastness of the space around it. Looking at this tiny figure on a pedestal you can almost sense the weight of the world around it, forcing its way in.

The space seen around many of Giacometti’s drawings and paintings could be seen as rudimentary indications of space to form a compositional element. It also applies to the existential idea of isolation and being ‘trapped within an enclosed space.’ Almost as if we all have invisible boundaries which cannot be crossed, these can force us into a certain mindset. These boundaries are the accepted summary of past experience and they can often be shielded, particularly by people who struggle to conceive an original creative idea. (Bono, 1996, p.48)

The lattice of marks used in say ‘Annette at Stampa’ from 1950 (Fig 16) appear almost like visible ‘cosmic string.’ The dull colour palette could have been used to make us focus more intently on the matrix like forms built up through the line. It’s almost as if all emotion has been drained from the palette equipping Giacometti to create an inner image of what he sees in reality.

‘Man Falling’ from 1950 (Fig 17) was to become a central icon in the Existentialist view of his work. This sculpture, one of his slenderest most fragile figures, seems about to topple from its small cylindrical pedestal. Yet it stands firm and grounded by throwing the head back in an ecstatic fashion; perhaps a cue was taken from Sartre’s ‘Nausea’ in an extreme moment where the ground appears to open to the choice of life or death (Klemm, 2001, p.184). This brings into question the notion of transcendence and destiny.

‘Walking Man II’ from 1960 (Fig 18) is isolated and exposed.
Man -- and man alone -- reduced to a thread -- in the dilapidation and misery of the world -- who searches for himself -- starting from nothing.... The pathos of extreme emaciation, the individual reduced to a thread.... Man on a pavement like burning iron; who cannot lift his heavy feet.... They drip around him, his values, his fat; to feed the flames! It is not only that Man has nothing more; but he is nothing more, than this I. (Harrison and Wood, 1993, p.615)

Giacometti was once run over by a car and remembered falling into a lucid fate; he realized that at last, something was happening to him; that he was alive. (Linklater, 2001)

Chapter III: The Nature of Mind

Thorough research has been carried out regarding how creative types and in particular fine artists activate different parts of their mind when producing an art object out of their ‘inner space.’ Recent studies indicate that artists activate the front part of their brain when being creative; this is the amygdala and is associated with emotion and complex levels of thought. Non-creative types tend to access the rear of the brain more, this is the area which is used to process and take in visual information. (www.braintypes.com, 2005)

The figurative representational painter Jenny Saville (Fig 20) has said in interviews, that the closer she gets to one of her paintings, the closer she gets to her childhood. (Johnson, 2005). Perhaps this belief comes about due to the fact that when we are young we haven’t fully developed emotions such as empathy for our fellow man and can’t encompass the whole picture; everything seems blurred and out of focus. We don’t have the necessary experience at that age to really comprehend the complex issues that life presents. However, we are all at the centre of our own universe; we’ve no real comprehension of how others experience life.

Saville has taken up to 18 months to realize a painting before (Johnson, 2005) and she associates the process with the way a composer writes, building up the representation measure by measure across the canvas. So every artist has their own method and way of communicating with their inner self in order to produce something concrete and grounded in reality; it is the painters own truth which is spread across a canvas.

The journey itself could be seen as being more important than the finished object as the artist learns more about their inner states of being through the process of action and deep reflection, the end result can never truly be represented in the mind’s eye, this is why it’s often a good idea to let go of all expectation.

The journey to visualise conscious thought can be long and arduous for an artist. Many of these thoughts and decisions can be transient but also extremely healing; painting in itself could be seen as an act of meditation, where one attempts to use intuition and bring forward repressed memories hidden inside the unconscious. Carl Jung argued that the unconscious is intuitive and is more receptive than the conscious mind; it contains knowledge of which we are not consciously aware. (Stein, 2003)

One theory of art, albeit the pretentious one, is that it is a subconscious projection of a heightened state of reality. An interpretation of this is that artists tap into areas of the brain which are not usually used. A work of art is basically an externalisation of ones thought processes; artists put themselves on display in an often exposing and honest manner (Johnson, 2005). The viewer often has positive or negative feelings about a work of art or at least has some kind of emotional connection with the work which can reflect back onto the creator; this relates to Carl Jung’s theories about the collective unconscious. The late comedian Bill Hicks (Fig 21) said that we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively (Hicks, 2004, p.135), we all have an immediate recognition of certain symbols and this could be understood as being the sudden conjunction of our outer reality and the inner reality of the collective unconscious.

One definition of what Jung called an ‘archetype’ is: An innate potential pattern of imagination, thought, or behaviour that can be found among human beings in all times and places. So in a sense, archetypes are basic pictures that each of us hold deep within our subconscious; they could be seen as being ‘psychic’ or seemingly otherworldly blueprints. These innate blueprints hold the key to perfection or at least society’s perception of what it means to be perfect but they can become warped by socialisation, childhood experiences and even parental experience. (Stein, 2003)

So are these archetypes specific to gender? In Jungian psychology, one of the archetypes; the anima refers to personality traits regarded as feminine that are often repressed into the unconscious of males while the animus refers to traits regarded as masculine that are often repressed into the unconsciousness of females. Although suppressed from conscious awareness, the anima/animus influences our behaviour in powerful ways. In most individuals, it is projected onto people of the opposite sex and accounts for the experience of falling in love with someone we hardly know. As the unconscious pole of the self, the counter-ego represented by the anima/animus can also be a guide to one's own unconscious realm. It is often experienced as the guiding female (if you're male) or male (if you're female) presence in dreams. (toolshed.down.net/faq, 2005)

The human mind is skilled at self-deception. Jung felt that most of us are not what we think we are (the Ego); let alone what we pretend to be (the Persona). The vast majority of people hide behind social ‘masks’; especially politicians and celebrities. Our Ego is made up of those parts of ourselves which we can accept and the parts which we dislike are pushed into the unconscious; these do not match our self-image. This disharmonic part of the mind Jung called the ‘Shadow.’ Self-transformation can be attainable but the human capacity for selfish, aggressive and anti-social behaviour is infinite (Crowley, 1998, p.23). For Jung, the key to change was acceptance of the Shadow. The Shadow will become stronger the less aware of it we are. Although, many repressed negative qualities can become positive if given the proper outlet. Art therapy is especially engaging for people who are trapped within their own mind. Depression and disappointment with our life’s achievements can make us lethargic and apathetic about things we used to get great pleasure from. These emotions are often hidden and we turn inward. This energy has to go somewhere, so it’s only when we channel it into creative thought and pro-action, that life situations can be changed. (Aspinal, 2005)

The culmination of Jung’s theories was called ‘synchronicity’ (Stein, 2003, p.200) and it speaks of the profound hidden order and unity among all that exists. Objective events are sometimes arranged in definite patterns, this can also be seen as the notion of ‘cause and effect.’ This pattern seems to come about by pure chance; are these events random or is there another meaning? An artist can come to a sudden conclusion when everything seems to fit together. How can one explain the patterns that are not created by known causes? Jung argued that if a person takes an important event from their life and can understand it’s meaning, the moments leading up to the event and the aftermath, then synchronicity will be achieved. This could also be seen as a heightened state of awareness which would involve using all four functions of the personality; thinking, feeling, sensation and intuition, in an appropriate way. (Crowley, 1998, p.142)

Savikalpa samadhi is the ecstatic experience of the archetypes. Nirvikalpa samadhi goes beyond this into the realm of the spirit, where there are no symbols. It’s a direct experience of Universal Mind. All dualities and images are totally and cleanly removed, and one no longer contemplates or contacts reality – one becomes reality. (Rowan, 2003, p.41-42)

The Spirit (often now called the Self with a capital S) goes beyond superconscious activities (the transpersonal.)

To have a true experience of the Self, however, it is necessary to disidentify also with the superconscious. This is very difficult because superconscious states can be so joyous and meaningful that we easily become attached to and identified with them. (Whitmore, 1991, p.116)

The living spirit grows and even outgrows its earlier forms of expression; it freely chooses the men who proclaim it and in whom it lives. This living spirit is eternally renewed and pursues its goal in manifold and inconceivable ways throughout the history of mankind. Measured against it, the names and forms which men have given it mean very little; they are only the changing leaves and blossoms on the stem of the eternal tree. (Crowley, 1998, p.128-129)

This quote is from the Hindu scripture of the Bhagavad Gita where the God Krishna says:

By whatever path a man seek me,
even so do I welcome him,
for the paths men take from every side are mine.
(Campbell, 1955, p.xvi)

Jung believed that for people to blossom into psychologically mature individuals they need not only to work out their emotional complexities but also to encounter something beyond the everyday world: authentic spiritual experience. This is not to say he wanted all of society to become reclusive mystics, he was a man ahead of his time; on a mission to find answers as to how we can live in the world today. Turning inward one may examine repressed desires, motives, drives, hidden ambitions and the wealth of channelled energy that unconsciously controls and manipulates our lives. (Crowley, 1998, p.134)

Satori

Satori is the spiritual goal of Zen Buddhism and is considered beyond ordinary comprehension (Fig 22). Here is a Satori experience:

I entered. I lost the boundary of my physical body. I had my skin, of course, but I felt I was standing in the centre of the cosmos… I saw people coming toward me, but all were the same man. All were myself. I had never known this world before. I had believed that I was created; I was the cosmos; no individual…existed. (Smith, 1958, p.132)

Satori roughly translates into ‘Individual Enlightenment’ or ‘a flash of sudden awareness.’ The only way to ‘attain’ Satori is through personal experience and deep meditation; the existential element of this is in realising the true sense of Self. The world would not be perceived in the same way if Enlightenment were achieved; an objective Self would be created with a powerful feeling of joy that overrides any other feelings of joy or sorrow. The feeling of Satori is said to be that of infinite space but total Enlightenment can not come until many Satoris of different depths have taken place; in some cases this can take a lifetime depending on the length of training and the receptiveness of the individual. (Yates, 2005)

Conclusion

The often absurd nature of life is fascinating and full of challenges; the responsibility of facing up to these becomes stronger with experience.
Nausea, nihilism, angst, loss of meaning: these thoughts spring to mind when confronted with the common, yet misguided, existential definition.

The theory of existentialism is a rather contentious issue and the true definition of this somewhat ambiguous idea is still open to debate. By pulling together elements from Jungian psychoanalytical theory, examining the work of Giacometti and the culture that surrounded him, I hope to have provided some meaningful insight as to why often sensitive, deeply thoughtful individuals get labelled as being Existentialists.

By studying the inner workings of the human mind and abstract concepts such as ‘Who am I?’, ‘What is my purpose in life?’ and ‘Does life have any intrinsic value?’ one can get closer to revealing the answers. Although the answers will of course be completely different for each individual; we’re all unique but through the process of self discovery and existential thought, we could connect with others and communicate on a deeper level.

The argument that artists aim to fulfil their creative destinies in order to give meaning and purpose to their lives is inconclusive, as there’s a whole multitude of different reasons why certain paths are taken and others are not. Do you have to be an existential thinker to produce existential art? Giacometti began producing existential art before the term was widely used; perhaps it was a word fabricated simply to categorise a certain way of perceiving the world, of which others had no understanding? There’s a calm stillness and spatial depth to many of Giacometti’s artworks (this relates to the Buddhist practice of clearing the mind of all thoughts and just letting go), although it’s unlikely that this particular artist ever felt truly elevated due to his temperament and over-ambition; we may never know.

In order to produce perfect art do you have to make yourself perfect? The innate blueprints which Jung believed hold the key to this perfection can become clouded by conflicting emotions. Although many people are too logical and rigid in their way of thinking, Jung’s lifework could be disregarded as being completely nonsensical. After all, it’s just one man’s ideas and these can’t be accepted as the total truth; although Jungian analytical theory has been used successfully in areas such as the treatment of mental health. Jung wrote of himself near the end of his life:
I am satisfied with the course my life has taken…I am astonished, disappointed, pleased with myself. I am distressed, depressed, rapturous. I am all these things at once, and cannot add up the sum…In spite of all uncertainties, I feel a solidity underlying all existence and a continuity in my mode of being…Life is – or has – meaning and meaninglessness. I cherish the anxious hope that meaning will preponderate and win the battle.
(Crowley, 1998, p.145)

It’s difficult to prove exactly how the theory of existentialism ties in with the nature of the human mind. Do people feel existential due to some kind of spiritual revelation? Do personalities fluctuate due to the neural chemistry in the brain? Like existentialism, the human spirit is hard to define.

…at a certain point in our lives, we lose control of what’s happening to us, and our lives become controlled by fate. That’s the world’s greatest lie.
(Coelho, 1999, p.18)

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Christian Klemm, Alberto Giacometti, 2001