The Gardner

The Gardner

Lost
in this beautiful mystery
of life
my spirit
is nourished
by the silent earth,
my heart quiet in the world
of an unknown
slow, gentle presence
growing
in your loving hands
faithfully, eternally

Mr pickle's time space

...same time jump from this time space to Mr pickle's time space where we can ponder on population potentials, product supply potentials, demographic energy, time accessibility and the like

some practical thought:

demographic dimensions of thought in action

An experimental thought X action recipe:

Traditionally a thought was, strictly speaking, an action, but nowadays it's far more likely to turn a thought into thought in itself.

5 oz symbol (175 g)
5 oz reference (175 g)
3 size 1 idea, understood
6 oz issues (175 g)
8 oz criteria (225 g)
2 oz (50 g) topic, subject, concept
finely woven fact into reality
2 oz deconstructed philosophy
1 level
0 answer
3 questions
Then for the results check which direction the wind blows
12 oz sieved solutions
3 size 1 material
2 cups of tea
approx 1 discussion
100% relaxation
1 small action

Pre-think the thought to mark 2 (300*F) (150*C)

One 8 inch (20 cm) thought form brushed with melted ideas then lined with concept proof mixed with referenced also brushed with ideas and sometimes feelings.

Sieve the deconstructed bowl of philosophy, then have a cup of tea and enjoy life until the feeling of being in itself is experienced. In a separate space and time think about the possibilities of a question that may not have an answer! Together then, make up and add a new result of thought processing until, little by little, you start realizing, relaxing whenever you feel like. When all the thoughts are thought, take time off to do what you want to do. Now change your routine to find new time and space to review whatever seems 'normal', there may be in fact some aspects quite funny. Mix the thought alternately till you find everything quiet and peaceful. This helps reconfigure other dimensions of thought that may not have seemed apparent!

Just be around for a while.

Combine 12 oz (350 g) of sieved solutions with 6 oz (175 g) of criteria in a new frame of mind, and mix them thoroughly together. Then in a different thought 2 oz (50 g) topic, subject, concept finely weave fact into reality. Stir this, and be stirred by it. Notice symbols. Think of essence. Now take one third of 5 oz symbol (175 g) and half 5 oz reference (175 g) placing the rest in a safe place in your unconscious. You do not need to look for any results - giving it quarter diameter (using silence approximately 6 inches (15 cm) in time per milli second. Very gently level it out for about 2 1/2 - 3 hours until you feel better.

Leave your self behind in the thought to cool for 15 minutes before starting to proceed. This helps in altering some pre-conceived ideas of self. When you feel easy and calm about this relax and maybe make a cup of tea if you like or any other refreshment. Generally this helps you to connect to the world. Visit friends. Find new and interesting ideas to think about. As much as possible free yourself from who you think you are. Possibly discover something new about life!

Note: the experiment of this practical thought has been explored by people who like 3 1/2 inch square discussions in the future. This recipe can be replaced by infinite number of other recipes, eternally for that matter, without too much thought! - but this is not a thought I usually bother with. I just like it.

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Some thoughts...

aspect of all interactive environments... especially environments in which 'learning' becomes the objective, or more specially, the situation of relationship of different individuals co-ordinating and co-existing within a specific environment becomes a space and time for experience. I found the concept of 'transition' actually very interesting. Thinking about the way of entering and exiting into spaces as transitional, or that of eating, or starting to work on something new, or ending ... going from place to place, or even seeing! listening and so on. My understanding of this is more towards a way of connecting moments of experience in our everyday life to those experiences which change and form deeper impressions in our sense of being in a place - situation. Transitional moments of experiences are understood as those that characterize incidents that occur to form a more complex and meaningful inter-relationship to other experiences. What may be distinctive of transitional experiences is the way of recognising specific elements that change our ways of relating to the world around us... different, in a sense from what we were experiencing or relating to before the transition actually takes place. I was remembering the ideas of 'threshold'. Possibly threshold and transitional space - time situations have something in common. This led me further to reflect on the theme of action as being a kind of transitional space and time process. Action becomes a threshold towards a deeper interiorizing process of experience in the world of being within the place and time we share. This led me to think of how the action becomes an expression through our visual, tactile, auditory and physical relationship to those who we share within the moment. I like the relationship too of the way forms of human gesture in the action become symbolic and representative of an inner world of experience. How in this way, our body as a physical body, unfolds and becomes a vehicle of transformation... and hence a means of transition.
I guess for me all these ideas truly become meaningful in the context of reflecting in art the way we experience. Forms of art as transitional and hence transformative, I feel, is a new threshold into our imagination towards the beautiful variabilities of transitional situations that we try to explore through seeing, listening, touching, gestures, interactions and most generally in all circumstances in our daily life. These processes become part of our everyday experience. I feel art possibly 'brings to light' by revealing the imminent presence of forms of transition in our everyday experiences. This is possibly also a way of realising interior forms of grace and beauty that we express and relate to each other in our lives.


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...reflection on the 'imagination of material' ... on the way materials as substances are transformed in the work of art ... especially in rituals that become sacramental. How do we creatively engage in the imaginative world within, through feelings and sensing a presence of life and spirit in inanimate things? I feel this is possibly a very symbolic aspect of art in it's most materialistic way of understanding. Art is made of substance in the same way our bodies are substances, and at a deeper reflective level the meaning and experience of the substance; material world, their lies an experience of joy and sorrow, of love and grief... of emotions that are not innately present in the materials themselves, but become a way of experience through our body. I feel this element of art lies hidden ... and therefore sometimes becomes a crucial element of art that is not touched upon. Is it possible for us to engage through 'lived bodily encounters of material' ways of perceiving the world within which we exist? Is it possible for us to understand the way we experience the world, as in: come to realize the makings of perception through our bodily organs through those material substances that we identify and classify as objects and things? I was remembering this as one of David Bohms understanding in a book that he writes called 'thought as system'. In this book D.Bohm tries to articulate the possible hypothesis that our perceptions of the world is based on our imaginative concepts and ideas of what the world is. This perception is easily shaped, changed and altered depending on how we choose to view the world within which we exist. Therefore he proposes that what essentially science attempts to do in society and to the human way of perceiving the world is based on how we prioritize certain ways of perceiving the world which could be a particular way of choosing to understand what phenomena is and not the absolute way of perception. Theoretically all scientific perceptions is symbolic to how we choose to understand the world.
Well, anyway... I found the relationship of materials to the transformative world of the imagination very interesting. I feel what art tries to do to our imaginative way of perceiving is to creatively engage our inner world to explore and be open to new ways of reflection, different understandings of the way we experience the world around us and within us. How can we become more sensitive to our inner feelings and emotions that shape and form our inner spiritual life? Materials themselves can become metaphors and representations of our imaginative interior mind.

I was reflecting about the dimension of dreaming in relation to the aspect of hope. Dreaming is also a way of hope.

Creativity of hope

Forms and substances
constellations of the imagination
in search of the hidden
new spirit of freedom -

Vision of the world:self
an extension into
Experiments of transformation
- to make visible
invisible realms
of life, of matter, things, words
Creator, being
of the physical world -
you nourish our soul
Initiating a healing process;
expressing an inner condition
representing a new experience
a necessity
a way of living

Transformer of substances
through concrete processes
Contact with material
broken, informed
inner regenerations
forming a new organisation;
an order of givinig, of sharing,
a dialogue:recreation

Creating a bridge between
invisibility
of body and world
of substance and spirit
Impulses of evolution
improvisations
in the embodiment of thought
into the reality of mind

To be silent now, listening
slow. In harmony, growing
Discovering and exploring
expressions that lie beyond
what is expressible
To find the wayless way
To heal wounds of the Universe; inner body
Unknown to you and me, beyond self and matter
To share in union, eternally
infinitely
in sufferings and joy
To love in honesty, in beautiful hope.


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A work of art

Matter can transform to become sign, symbol and word. A sign can transform to become an idea in the same way symbols and words put together interpret reality. Art belongs to the magical alchemical realm of imaginative transformation within the person and community who respond to material, structure and content of art. This transformation of reality into the imagination, I understand as similar to those transformations of the imagination into reality of an engineer, a medical doctor, a scientist, an agriculturalist, a tailor, a cook... the list can go on, who act upon matter to invent a new way of creative living. What is common to the artist and everyone is the simple magical transformation that is experienced in all our imaginative processes of that reality to which we respond to and enter in to a reality of the inner mind. This experience at times can appear in dreams or through real objects and processes of art.

A work of art I propose, is that which we as a human culture have nurtured to bridge the unknown shores of our inner imaginative reality. A scientist bridges an idea into reality by discovering what could be in one example; energy. A doctor practices to cross this bridge by healing and bringing to life those who are close to death. Similarly an artist bridges the way form, colour, material and processes transform the viewers experience of matter in to a new realm of reality; in to a new dimension of mind and matter.

A work of art is there by a product of the imagination.

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A transparent art gallery

The entry into this gallery is like any other entry i.e. the pavement alighting the ground floor. A large transparent frame for the door invites the viewers to enter in to sub-consciously the gallery arena. There are no planks on this door that conceal the inside from the outside. The floor is beautifully carpeted by the grey concrete floor pavement. As you enter towards the right there is the invisible reception table. Where no body sits. Towards the left there is a railing and further beyond a public toilet. There are signs showing to the left, right and center to different invisible galleries. Altogether there are infinite gallery spaces for different exhibitions that can happen simultaneously when necessary, although usually exhibitions that happen in this gallery are inclined to choose not more than what the viewer chooses to see an artist at work, exhibiting at the same time in the same place. This is because it makes sense to both the gallery viewers as well as for the artists exhibiting.

The walls in this gallery are transparent as you may have guessed. What you see in the inside of the gallery are essentially works of art that are existing in the environment that surround the gallery space i.e. the context that positions the viewer to view a certain object or landscape created that exists outside the gallery space. This gives ample opportunity for viewers to interpret the works of art displayed in multiple choice perspectives and narratives. Ultimately the excitement that can be noticed gradually welling in the viewers experience is the non-distinguish-ability of art and reality. Art is reality as perceived by the viewer in this instant.

The exhibition continues where there are Cafe's on either side of the road that can be entered into by viewers who notice the close-nit-connection between art and reality. The experience of the viewers reality; becomes a way of perceiving and hence experiencing art at one and the same time as one and the same thing. These various Cafe's are friendly and not too expensive. Many interesting stories can be heard by listening to the silent walls and forgotten conversations of other viewers who have passed by these streets, to sit down or stand or walk by and feel the presence of now. Here and there shops can also be accessed by the viewer who may choose to wear garments, shoes, buy food provisions and other useful things. I like the places most of all where I go with my love, sometimes by the river side.


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on 'reduction' and the shift between time and space

the concept of mind and body, one could say... essentially is the idea of reduction; this is also to do with the inter-connections made through by the physical eye and 'the minds eye', as in, to the way the physical body relates to the senses, or the mind to the the body.

Living here is everything in relation to the interior sensory reality of the mind perception and thought; being reality. Being in itself is the mind-body. This was very much Merleuy-Ponty's understanding in his book 'the Phenomenology of Perception', I think almost similar to the kind of discourse that the Jain monastic traditions had regarding the physical senses and that of the psychological inner way of perceiving (the mind). I find this a truly fascinating dimension of how we as human beings live in these different world dimensions... and create within our life a world of multiple sense systems of existence.

Thoughts regarding the way we experience art... art is another dimension of the way we live our lives... and yes, it is analogues to the way we relate to people and the environment within which we interact. Art in this sense is another thought system; a reality that partakes in our experiences of time and space.

Thinking and reflecting about time and space, I found the concept that time in a sense is actually nothing but being... similar to the experience we have of space! What in effect we experience as time and space is essentially the idea we share of an existent reality... a sense of being in the moment. I guess that time is no different from place... this is a thought... i.e. time is place.


On the question of “Time” and Eckhart’s view (claimed as parallel to reducing awakening to instantaneous) that the birth of the Word in the ground of the mind must accomplish itself in an instant, in “the eternal now”, on the question of "Isness” the only thing that burns in Hell is the part of you that won't let go of your life; your memories, your attachments. They burn 'em all away. But they're not punishing you, he said. They're freeing your soul. ... If you're frightened of dying and holding on, you'll see devils tearing your life away. But if you've made your peace then the devils are really angels, freeing you from the Earth".

Whatever that means

ad infinitum

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Thinking of -
map and the city
a way of representation, a guideline
but not the actual thing in itself
- the map is not the city
in the same way; the object is not the spirit
The object becomes a representation of
our imagination; takes the object as a process of formative cause,
by creating a dialogue -
through interactions between material and the way of perception
- objects create processes of perception

The observer is changed by the way of forms
making coherent
qualities of substance
- changing into characters of information, by interventions
through experiencing substances and processes as metaphors -
as conditions of the interior imaginative being

The object becomes the subject
inter-related by sensory perceptual exchange
implicitly, creating within each person a part of the whole
meaning : transition
to go beyond the material substance
into the unknown realm of our bodies
in silent
emptiness

A threshold of
inner transformation
being, becoming
a shadow with shadow
Seeing within, forms
sensing, inner images

A cave, my heart
space within space
dark, silent and empty
passages hidden
losing sight of self

A womb
with no dimensions
entering into eternal time
darkness becomes visible
into that memory
where identity no more shapes
our life - illuminating in our spirit

A light, a revelation, a place
that we are present in darkness
yet, to be created
within


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I find the idea of 'improvisation' appealing; in the sense, of discovering how form and colour... possibly, material and texture, or even text and narrative, become a part of how we explore and express through various media, our inner world. Abstract art, in the way that we define 'abstract', is a way of beginning from one could say, 'the unknown'. We do not know what lies in the abstract; art becomes a process of discovering in our interactions with material and symbol, to explore and 'represent' that which lies hidden from our visible ... apparent world within which we live. So in this sense, all art is 'abstract'; in that all art derives firstly from an exploration ... 'a journey' into the inner world of our mind and body, into the world of the imagination. Art facilitates a discovery into realizing a deeper realm of our reality that is hidden, a reality of the spirit within us, the ephemeral present in all things through which we perceive with our mind and body.

Art, in this sense for me, is a way of touching the infinite, unknown, eternal spirit that is present in all that we experience as matter, as things, as symbols, as words. I think art catalyzes our inner world of the imagination; to discover and explore a hidden mystery. What I understand as 'transformation in art'... is that alchemical process of art between mind and body, matter and ephemeral, towards an experience of realization in our inner perceptual reality, the mind... a reality that is embodied through our living bodily experience; of the environment we live in - both internally and externally. Art, as I understand, is a medium, a process, an experience of our embodiment into the world of life and matter.

Possibly, unconsciously, this is what Kandinsky and Mondrian discovered in their art. A sense of the 'abstract' in art, was essentially a discovery of a physical realisation, or what Merleuy- Ponty would understand, as a phenomenological insight into reality, through the body; of a reality that transcends materiality. A form of experience that we as a human community can relate to, can share with, and dialogue into - a reality that is present, a reality that we intuit as existing beyond the material world of cognition; that appeals and inspires an inner spirit to be 'enlightened', to be touched, and to transcend the physical body into a spiritual realm of the mind. This is the mind that imagines, that grasps the infinite, eternal reality of creation. This is the mind that wonders, reflects, recognizes cyclical pattern of change and evolution in nature.

'Improvisations' are temperamental, specific evolutions of our re-creation in nature, in our own bodily perceptions of growth and coming to life within the moment of a particular time and place. Form and colour become compositional elements that inter-relate with each other to bring into play the imaginative freedom of spirit beyond order, beyond structure, beyond things and beyond material.

In my mind, patterns in art connect to those patterns we can observe in nature. Art is a inner process of configuring inter-relationships in our imagination. Pattens in nature become a part of the growth, and potentially the evolution of any substance that is in a process of forming, apparent naturally, primarily in our own way of perceiving nature. Possibly, what we appreciate in patterns is a sense of 'stillness', of 'silence' and harmony. Of aesthetic beauty. A process of inter-relationship that can be perceived within and extending to, a greater or minuscule level, such as in the atom and the Cosmos. This is, in a sense, how we as in our human nature and culture, have through centuries observed, recorded and appreciate the magnificence of the Universe we live in. We have invented new techniques and mechanisms to enter into the depth and breadth of the Universe, that in early times we would not have believed existed. I am thinking of the advancements of science and technology, that have through the years become more and more specialized, in the developments of devising and recognising that which lies beyond our physical perceptual field. New technologies enable us to explore and discover many realms of reality, of phenomena. These insights into matter and life have opened new horizons into our imagination that have become as in the past, new forms of hidden insight into deeper questions as to the workings and causation of our living environment. Deeper insight has been presented to the world of our cultures regarding how our psychology - as in the imagination, in dreams; the workings of the brain and nervous system, have intuited deeper forms of reality, i.e. the abstract and ephemeral realities. Are these realms of our mental cognition a simulated reality of what we think we have found to be present beyond appearances of different bodily and material phenomenology? In the course of the years through rationalization and logical conclusion we have reasoned out through 'scientific equipments of technology', that reality is 'complex' and most often un-explainable to its logical conclusion as absolutely comprhensible through data basis. Science has enabled our thinking ability to anticipate and charge probable hypothesis, but in the end these are still probabilities and to some degree uncertainities.

Possibly this is how Islamic spiritual leaders intuited too; it became apparent that reality is infinite and unknown. It could have been this insight into the realm of reality that is 'un-explainable' that goes beyond appearences into the abstract that in some ways is closer to reality then the reality that we perceive through our bodies. It is possibly this that the Islamic artist has over the centuries tried to explore and discover in pure abstract form!

Touched upon by the essence of the spirit; there lies hidden in all forms, both in nature and in the imagination of the artist and the viewer an intuition of the 'unknown'!

In principle, abstract art can not be over-ruled from figurative art, as being superior or closer to the spirit or to the unknown, eternal presence of being. Beautiful figurative forms of art with narratives and illustrations from real life events, have wonderfully informed and transcended the viewers physical and literal perception of reality in to deeper and profound levels of insight of the mysteries of the spirit. Though what I have greatly apprecited in these forms of art, is the intuition that we can share with abstract art ... that reality exists to a greater deeper realm of experience then what the minds eye or the perceptual body can devise. Art, I think in this context, attempts to reach and touch these abstract resources of materiality and spirit through our body and mind.


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.... If art does not go beyond it's meaning, i.e. the meaning we try to make out of a work of art - then it is no more art!


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Recently I have been thinking over a concept that was an event in London; of a flock of sheep that were driven across the London Millennium bridge (2006). This was to mark and remember old droving rights; where practices of historic drover routes were outlined by Freemen in the City of London. This reminded me again of a dream I had a long time ago (2004), of a battle between a herd of buffalo's and a flock of sheep... where the sheep die because they all have daggers hidden under their woolen coats... like a wolf in sheep skin, though this time, in my dream, the sheep were the ones who were hiding these daggers under their wool, that ultimately led to their death, because the daggers pierced the sheep in the whole confusion of the war against the buffalo's! Later in real life, i.e. this is not part of the dream anymore, I went hunting for sheep skin in the slaughter houses down pottery town in Bangalore. I found this really ghastly sight of a drain dripping with blood and sheep heads stacked up in a pile. I decided to stop pursuing this interest in the slaughter houses and never managed to get any sheep skin; that would somehow heal and potentially redeem my inner conscience of the death of the clever sheep who died because of their own folly and trickery.

Recently when I was in B'lore (2009) this image struck me again particularly; where literally thousands and thousands of sheep and goats and cattle and even camel are driven through the city towards the slaughter houses. In fact, this time I noticed special police vans parked near the slaughter houses because there is quite a strong lobby against this kind of mass killing of animals. Shepherds walking through a city with there flock is a common sight during all times of the year. In my reflections, I wondered whether such an activity could be done in a different light; by connecting peoples lives with animals, animals in the city, especially in the city :) Could we imagine a situation where people appreciate the journeys of animals through cities as a way of sharing urban space, a way of living in connection within the animal kingdom? What is the image of animals walking through streets of a big city like London ? Well, anyhow, I thought of sharing this with you just as a thought that struck me last night. I did not know that there are special drover rights that allow people to walk animals through cities!

There is a funny story I always remember of a Mahoot who is driving his elephant along a busy street in Ahmedabad, in India. As a qualified Mahoot, you are allowed to 'drive' an elephant in the city. The story goes, that this Mahoot was stopped by a traffic policeman and was asked for his licence. The Mahoot apologised to the policeman and said 'if you hold on to my elephant, I can run back home and find it'. This was not what the policeman expected and cursed the Mahoot, telling him to take his blessed elephant and himself out of this traffic as quick as possible! 'and watch out that the elephant does not get in to a rage!'.