Art and Artist (v) + Bodies and Artifacts (v)

Otto Rank
Art and Artist
trans. Charles Francis Atkinson
(1932/1989)

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[11] Primitive religion, as a belief in souls (as we know it), is originally so abstract that it has been called irreligious by comparison with higher religions, in which the gods have already assumed concrete form. But from a study of these abstract preliminary stages of religion, which are a matter of spirits and demons, we see also that the urge for abstaction in primitives is rooted in the soul-belief that, in the intellectualized form of the East, culminates in the absolute abstract of the soul. Compared with the idea of the soul or its primitive predecessors even the abstractest form of art is concrete, just as on the other hand the most
[12]
definite naturalism in art is abstract when compared with nature.

Good point, re: relative qualities. Naturalist artists are trapped in abstraction much as Satanists are trapped in Christianity.

But the origins-of-religion stuff is hard to follow. If the gods have already assumed concrete form in higher religions , did the "lower" religions not project the god-force onto very concrete beings and objects? The omniscient Christian god seems ultimately abstract compared to myriad snake-gods whose abstract being may at least inhabit real snakes periodically.

Rank—Art and Artist (iii)—The Psychological Ideology of Art

Otto Rank
Art and Artist
trans. Charles Francis Atkinson
(1932/1989)

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[xiii]

AUTHOR'S PREFACE

...

[xiv] On the one hand, the individual urge to create is by no means the only specific quality of the artist; equally, on the other hand, canons of style, evolved from the collective consciousness, can by no means be regarded as the true essence of artistic creation; the one individual factor represents merely the motive-power, while the other, collective, element provides the forms that are suited in the circumstances to its activity and utterance.

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[xxiii] in The Trauma of Birth I discerned the fact, which I later developed theoretically, that the creative impulse, which leads to the liberation and forming of the individual personality—and likewise determines its artistic creativeness—has something positively antisexual in its yearning for independence of organic conditions. Correspondingly, my conception of repression differed from Freud's; for to him it is the result of outward frustration, while I trace it to an inward necessity, which is no less inherent in the dualistic individual than the satisfying of the impulse itself.

...

[xxiv] if the neurotic type, who fails to synthesize his dualistic conflict, be studied from the therapeutic angle, the impression received is that of individuals who (psychologically speaking) represent the artist-type without ever having produced a work of art. ... In short, it would seem that the creatively disposed and gifted type has to have something in addition

[xxv]

before it can become a really productive artist, while on the other hand the work of the productive individual must also be added to before it can rank as a genuine work of art.

Neither the cultural and scientific history of art nor the aesthetic psychology of the artist has so far provided a satisfactory answer to this central question of the whole problem of art: namely, what constitutes the correlation between artist-type and the art-product; that is to say, the artistic creativeness and the art-form? And although it may seem evident that this common factor in the artist and the art product must be a super-individual, collective element, so obvious a conclusion at once raises a series of questions, the mere meaning of which is enough to show that they but make the real problem more acute. The first among such questions is likely to be: what does this collective factor, both generally and particularly in the creative individual, mean? Following directly upon this comes the next question: what is the characteristic which distinguishes the specific, artistic collectivity—subjective or objective—from others, such as religious, social, or national? In other words, why does the individual, endowed with this mysterious collective force, become now a popular leader, now the founder of a religion, and now an artist?

Karen Offen—Defining Feminism

Karen Offen
"Defining Feminism: A Comparative Historical Approach" (1988)
Signs 14/1 pp. 119-157

pp. 134-135—"relational" and "individualist" modes

Viewed historically, arguments in the relational feminist tradition proposed a gender-based but egalitarian vision of social organization. They featured the primacy of a compassionate, non-hierarchical, male-female couple as the basic unit of society, whereas individualist arguments posited the individual, irrespective of sex or gender, as the basic unit. Relational feminism emphasized women's rights as women (defined principally by their childbearing and/or nurturing capacities) in relation to men. It insisted on women's distinctive contributions in these roles to the broader society and made claims on the commonwealth on the basis of these contributions. By contrast, the individualist feminist tradition of argumentation emphasized more abstract concepts of individual human rights and celebrated the quest for personal independence (or autonomy) in all aspects of life, while downplaying, deprecating, or dismissing as insignificant all socially defined roles and minimizing discussion of sex-linked qualities or contributions, including childbearing and its attendant responsibilities. (135-136)

Thirty or so years on, the phrase that jumps off the page here is, "...made claims on the commonwealth on the basis of these contributions." (136) Indeed, it is only by the logic of what might less charitably be called a sort of genteel difference feminism that a particular "social organization" and/or family structure could be thought so unimpeachable as to entitle its adepts to "claims on the commonwealth." Hence KO's taxonomy here is apt for drawing attention to the profoundly anti-individualistic nature of this orientation, which, even without yet wading into questions of valuation, lays bare the bald-faced contradiction typically committed by today's most simple-minded liberals. I wonder if this cognitive dissonance could ultimately become a stumbling block on the road to UBI of even vaster dimensions than various conservative/right-wing objections, so thorougly ingrained (many on both sides would say organically arising/essential) is the ideal of kids-house-job-car. Concurrently, let's hope that the questioning of the ongoing utility of the rights orientation from within its own tradition might at some point engender a modicum of respect for the myriad non-procreative, non-economic contributions of the willingly childless on behalf of both relationalists and individualists.

Even in Anglo-American thought prior to the twentieth century, these two modes of argument were not always as analytically distinct as I am portraying them here... In earlier centuries, evidence of both these modes can often be located in the utterances of a single individual, or among members of a particular group, exemplifying perhaps that not uncommon human desire to have things both ways. (136)

A very astute conjecture, I think, the missing piece being that such self-contradiction from a psychologistic perspective quite ofen betrays that the utterer is very aware of their own inconsistency.

Lest it be thought that the two approaches I am invoking here represent simply another sorry instance of the much-criticized binary logic endemic to Western thought, or a form of reductionism, let me suggest that there are important sociological reasons for positing two and only two categories rather than "varieties" or "relative degrees" of feminism. These two modes of argument certainly reflect the self/other dualism characteristic of Western thought, but they continue to be meaningful because they also reflect profound differences of opinion that have long existed within Western discourse about basic structural questions of social organization and, specifically, about the relationship of individuals and family groups to society and the state. Both modes must be accounted for if one is to understand feminism historically.

If I might further paraphrase/interpret, the tension between individualism and collectivism IS the essential Feminist issue, of which Feminism's various internal debates can all be understood as proxies. Absolute as it sounds when put so bluntly, there is much to recommend this view, starting with the unfortunate practical political reality that myriad social and political actors' inability/charlatanry vis-a-vis locating themselves and/or their worldview/constituency in this scheme is itself a nearly catastrophic source of friction in the day-to-day functioning of ostensibly democratic institutions. e.g. There seems to me to be some serious cognitive dissonance (or, in the case of groups, unresolved tension) surrounding conceptions of child-rearing as collectivistic ([name of ex-gf redacted]—it's "our obligation" to raise the next, better generation) vs. individualistic (i.e. as the most power the powerless can readily wield; and with that, autonomy in this task of shaping the future according to their views). And yes, it is true that some degree of such confusion is inevitable on account of the ultimate untenability of hard and fast dichotomies; but IMHO, using that as an excuse not to tease out the endpoints of the dialogue seems to me akin to giving up outright.

[from a notebook, 2017 or 2018]