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Social Sculpture Shaped By A New Consciousness What “Everyone Is An Artist” Actually Means What did Joseph Beuys mean when he said, “Everyone Is An Artist”? When you hear the word art, you may conjure up images of an exclusive show. You may think of people ambling about an air-conditioned art gallery with wine glasses in hand for the grand opening of a solo show. In view of these images, we wouldn't understand or accept Beuys's message. We wouldn't accept ourselves as artists or even creatives. We were already told who we are from school, college, or the job title we worked hard to gain. What Joseph Beuys was speaking of was potential as reality. The unique creative faculties present within each individual can be discovered and developed to reshape society as a whole in any setting and role. By “artist” he didn't mean something traditional, but an inborn, unique inner flame. Every individual has the potential to form society using their own set of tools. “Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do.” –Goethe. The expansion of art begins in the thought forms of great personalities. They come to fruition to answer a need in the world. Reforming, creative deeds performed on the world stage have a ripple effect. Public actions can serve the individual by holding regenerative space for transformation. The Walker Centre continued reforestation efforts inspired by Beuys's 7000 Oaks. Among many initiatives, Rudolf Steiner's spiritual philosophy started the worldwide Waldorf School movement. Businesses are taking on a performative approach to self-development. The social problem escalated into a crisis after the devastation of World War II. Humanity suffered a moral blow from the war. Which was succeeded by a safe, but empty, corporate-consumer culture. Numbing modern lifestyle which continues up to this day. It is expressed as meaninglessness of existence in forms of anti-art. Humans began to believe the illusion that meaning can be bought instead of created. In addition, many people work to survive rather than live out their true purpose. Keeping them unfree and miserable in a life that feels like a cage. With comfort and the obligation to focus on survival, the higher nature is muted. Its voice is muffled.
Self-actualization needs the warmth of social life with individual creativity. How can each person be the creator of his or her reality, rather than a consumer? Life's purpose should be at the forefront of personal and the collective consciousness. But often becomes no more than a background whisper. Joseph Beuys was inspired by social reformer, architect, and esotericist Rudolf Steiner and his ideas for social renewal. Steiner envisaged a threefold social order to realize this cultural need of human beings is to self-actualize in three spheres of culture, law, or economy. Beuys also drew inspiration from nature observation. Particularly the beehive’s structure and movement, its warmth of collaboration: “fraternity, which contains the concept of warmth within it.” (1) The ideas and materials juxtaposed in social sculpture evolving organically from the human spirit into society. Beuys's public actions were performances for lasting social change. Joseph Beuys saw art everywhere he went. His deeper seeing enabled his socially regenerative art, which celebrates the individual's capacity for social renewal. Wherever a creative individual goes, is where culture follows. Art is not confined to specific life paths, settings, and media, but can appear anywhere. In as much as a lawyer or economist has culture (creative ideas), they are also artists. Art provides the process of giving birth to one's higher nature in a Threefold Society. Anthropocracy, Bellia's Innovative Contribution To Social Sculpture Italian inventor, mathematician, and social reformer, Nicolò G. Bellia, further elaborated the social question. He drew attention to our current thinking around the nature of work. The State posits the right to work, when it's the right to life that, Bellia suggests, should be prioritized. Through a reformation involving several social reforms. Bellia used his creative genius to solve the economic puzzle and enable society to thrive as a whole. People can uphold the right to life of every human being through Bellia's idea of “unconditional basic income.” This frees their time to pursue their life purpose in collaboration with and of benefit to society. “Whoever has a moral, cultural, or spiritual desire will do anything to pursue her goals and her voice will be as powerful as thunder. Nowadays, that voice is simply a lament because the main concerns of the individual are related to surviving (…) How can the individual pursue any other goal if the first thing she has to think about is her own survival?” (2) Anthropocracy’s Four Pillars 1. General unconditional basic income as right to life 2. Monetary mass monthly deduction, so that money stops being a means of power over others and starts circulating abundantly in society. 3. Election of judges, right to justice, and safety. 4. Digital currency. Abstract money without a physical basis. But based on the economic production of the country.
Joseph Beuys's 7000 Oaks: Healing Forest Monuments Beuys conceived of 7000 Oaks as an act of societal and environmental healing. The project was titled “Stadtverwaldung statt Stadtverwaltung” ("City Forestation Instead of City Administration"). It was a direct critique of a sterile, bureaucratic system. Planting trees was a literal and symbolic act. It injected life, oxygen, and ecological health back into a wounded urban and social environment. Beuys explains the three stages of comparing the stone and the tree side by side. Stone first dominates the six and seven-year-old oaks. After a few years they are balanced. Finally, the stone sits at the foot of the oak after twenty to thirty years’ time. He states, “My point with these seven thousand trees was that each would be a monument, consisting of a living part, the live tree, changing all the time, and a crystalline mass, maintaining its shape, size, and weight. This stone can be transformed only by taking from it, when a piece splinters off, say, never by growing. By placing these two objects side by side, the proportionality of the monument's two parts will never be the same.” (3) Symbolically, the monument is designed to enliven human consciousness. The project is an inspiring image - replicable around the world - invoking real social change.
Art Observation of Joseph Beuys's “7000 Oaks,” 1982, in 4 Stages Physical Characteristics The monument consists of a living and lifeless object placed side by side. The one has color, is cylindrical, tall, extending vertically and horizontally, has organic texture and lines. The lines are thick to thin. The other object is a light gray, rectangular, and vertical
References
1. Joseph Beuys The Expanded Concept of Art: Heiner Stachelhaus https://www.neugraphic.com/beuys/beuys-text8.html 2. Share The Wealth, Anthropocracy, Bellia https://masternewmedia.com/share-the-wealth-utopia-or-opportunity-anthropocracy-an-interview-with-nicol-c3-b2-bellia-238db6cb5fa9 3. 7000 Oaks Essay by Lynne Cooke with statements by Joseph Beuys https://web.archive.org/web/20090408043007/http://www.diacenter.org/ltproj/7000/essay.html 4. https://www.stazioneceleste.it/insight/antropocrazia/Bellia_Verso-l-Antropocrazia.pdf 5. https://www.amazon.com/Verso-la-Antropocrazia/dp/B0DS9WQL4B |
