KNOWLEDGE…is an elephant observed by three blind men.

I think the reader should know that I had a special

relationship with this elephant in that she told me things about myself, her mahout, and the animal kingdoms generally that was essential knowledge.

by

Paul Henrickson,. Ph.D. ©2008 tm .

Recently, very recently, in fact it was yesterday a friend in British Columbia sent me a notice he
serendipitously found in his internet searches which he believed related to my work. It does, and while
his sense of it is correct, that is, in the right direction, I don’t suppose he truly understood the ways in
which the “New Science” announcement that Marina de Tommaso has discovered how “beauty”
appears to diminish one’s awareness of pain.

This is where the elephant comes in, that is, NOT my elephant, But the one surrounded by three blind
men, none of whom, the story tells us, can agree as to what it (the elephant) is. Ms. Tommaso
approaches the problem in a scientifically “experimental” way, that is, her subjects determine, apriori,
what is beauty. Now, whether they determined as a group what was beautiful and what was ugly, that
is, the determination represented a consensus (a very unlikely spontaneous event, and unreasonable as well
although it does on occasion take place when the pressures of peer agreement are sufficiently great what is “ugly”
will be “beautiful” if it gets you into the country club or invited to the prom), or care was taken to determine
ahead of time what each subject had determined was “beautiful” and what was “ugly” and why they
determined it.

Pictures they found ugly included works by Pablo Picasso, the Italian 20th century artist Antonio Bueno and Columbian Fernando Botero. One of the problems with the study for those

wishing to reduce pain is the subjective nature of beauty. Edvard Munch's The Scream was deemed by some people as beautiful. "These people were not art experts
so some of the pictures they found ugly would be considered masterpieces by the art world," said Professor deTommaso If Munch’s “Scream” were considered “beautiful” it may have
been so because it beautifully illustrates a “scream arising out of spcial frustration”, say I.

Poor Fernando Botero is one of the real victims of this report in that

his work together with that of Antonio Bueno has been singled out by the
subjects chosen by Marina (one might drown in there)deTammaso as being “ugly” and other
victim of this report, though an
occult one…a victim through neglect…
is myself. I can tell the reader this
much at this point and that is that
after nearly 8 decades of
misunderstanding, suspicion and
ridicule I am still unaccustomed to
this massive and malicious
withdrawal of consensual
validation.

Jesus understood, apparently, that

forgiveness was the only choice he
had with respect to those who
were about the nail him to the
cross since, it seemed, they were
beyond “knowing” what they were
doing. It seems as though the only
virtue of being ignorant is that it allows one to escape consequences of disobedience. If you
are ignorant the law doesn’t apply. This tells me that the students in the Guam Public School
system to whom the SAT scores of 2006 apply might very well have known what they were
doing when they were reported as being dumber after 12 years of schooling than they were
when they began…and being so might avoid civil responsibilities. That is one way of opting
out of the system.

As for the creative efforts of Fernando Botero, I think it only fair, to ourselves, that we check
it out again.
Let us accept, for the time being, that Botero is interested in organizing the world around
what is “round”, as well as voluminous. soft and pushy. Botero is not alone. There are

others interested in things round such as: Paul Brach; Pablo

Picasso; Stanton MacDonald-Wright;

anonymous; Paul Henrickson; Paul Henrickson;

Paul Henrickson uncertain Sigariya maiden

Gaston Lachaise; Gaston Lachaise

Goddess ?
NB: I have elshere detailed my opinion of Paul Brach’s creative contributions and refer the reader to my essays indexed at
“SCRIBD.COM”

I hope that these illustrations indicate that the concept of roundness is subject to
elaboration and that one could continue expanding elaboration on the subject of
“roundness” for quite awhile. Botero, even in his confined use of “roundness” offers his
audience more than Paul Brach whose work is considerably more narrow, but more
pretensious. On the subject of roundness it may be that Bradford Hansen-Smith offers more
than the average.
A concern for “roundness” excludes the consideration of what may be “beautiful” or “ugly” which are affective
positions. The concern for “roundness” is a formal concern, uninvolved with liking [beautiful]or disliking [ugly] but very
much concerned with how well organized [out of chaos] the work might be. Viewing something which one considers
from the emotional level as “beautiful” or “ugly” could well correlate to any experience of pain or pleasure if it [the
experience of viewing]were either organized or disorganized appropriately, the experience of pain might well be either
increased or decreased. In short, what may be functioning in the case of the “ugly” Botero is simply the operations
of a particular society’s concept of “the beautiful” and that these judgements are based on social convention as
opposed to observed organization. As a friend of mine who was a fireman and was responsible for attending to
victims of accidents involving potential explotions, a person may be mortally wounded but unaware of it and
continues functioning on a physical level UNTIL he recognizes he should be dead…he then dies. A sort of parallel to
that is the one time very active social phenomenon that were one to speak approvingly of Pablo Picasso’s work
social exile would result. Conventional agreement on what is a value and what is not seems essential .

In terms of this experiment, however, the source of the “ugliness” remains undetermined. It may be social, erotic,
organizational or whatever. What seems to be important here is that what the subjects of the experiment
considered beautiful, or ugly at the moment and no lastingly significant label need be applied to Botero’s work.

But, in addition to this sort of concerned support for Botero it would be appropriate to remember that while it may
be true Botero may have limitations in his technical skills, he is making use of what he has to make a statement
concerning his anxiety regarding man’s inhumanity to man. I find it a dissatisfying simplification to call his work
“ugly” most especially when there is no attempt to justify the description. Conventional thought is no justification. It
is also perfectly comprehensible why Botero , or anyone else, might consider torture to be “ugly”. I understand that
a book on Botero’s work relative to Abu Ghraib is selling well in the United States

Someone called Terry Taggart, who now lives in Albuquerque, whom I know as well as I care to, has subscribed,
(and continues to do so) to the superficial view that there are no, (nor should there be), any standards by which
legitimacy of effort is determined. Taggart’s present value lies in the fact his published point of view (see below)
demonstrates my still evolving thesis that the artist, by every mark he makes, reveals who he is. Two of Taggart’s

works are illustrated here, one early, one later.

ART is anything you can get away with as long as you can SEE it. That is the challenge and the problem. Maybe that’s
why we call it the visual arts…Terry Taggart
To his credit, Taggart has verbally clarified his approach, and his understanding, of his position within the tradition of manipulating visual symbols which
is what all graphic artist’s do (but he does very little indeed) and it seems to be similar to that of one who has become a parent by accidental bewilderment
and has disowned the produce…I knew one like that some many years ago who, having given birth, abandoned the infant in a bus station locker. Taggart
has gone into the negative direction even deeper when he doesn’t produce the photograph he mutilates, but smears the effort of someone else. Not
unlike the very popular German, Gerhard Richter. In the case of Richter,
however, it might be noted that he seems to move back into the area of creation where Taggart simply seems to
titter at the clown’s funny hat and red nose and fails to make something else of it.
The impulse to mimic has been a characteristic of the visual, and often the musical artist. But usually when this is done it is done with great respect for
the original model. In Taggart’s case the attitude is one of ridicule of someone else’s effort. He doesn’t take the effort a step further in any direction.

The matter of a person being unable to produce something uncharacteristic of himself is again raised with considerable interest for it was forty years ago
when I first saw Taggart’s work when he was a faculty member at The University of Guam along with someone called Marvin Montvel-Cohen who later
spawned Evan Montvel-Cohen an arch deceiver of note. For a faculty exhibition of sorts Taggart produced the heavy outlines of a cloud in a blue sky and
Marvin the paper mache remains of a cow suffering diarrhea which he had painted a bright red and yellow. The looks on their faces when they presented
these to me as their respective contributions told me clearly who they were…and clarified for me the significance of the errors in judgment I had made in
hiring them.

Now, as for “beauty”, which this “New Science” report tells us is a part of the research of Marina de Tommaso work
at The University of Bary ( Italy), I have an additional problem for in the report available to me I was unable to
determine the specific dimensions of “beauty” as determined by de Tammaso’s subjects. We have, perhaps, such a

range as suggested by the French artist below, or Vargas’ concept of the beautiful which is more
convincingly supported by the Marlene Dietrich’s amusing interpretation which you might see here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_1ByUHUtsQ

One of the major interests in my research behavior is to check out the relationship between what an artist does and how he does it
in relation to what may be his major concerns. I stumbled upon this interest when I forced myself to study on greater depth the
work of Caravaggio which had not been the focus of any strong admiration either by my early teachers or others in my near vicinity.
The end result of this scholarly penance was, indeed, a truer admiration for the creative process than anyone could ever have
taught me. The work of Caravaggio, Paul Cezanne and Albert Pinkham Ryder, among a few others, have continued to fascinate me
and, I believe, to demonstrate the complexity of creativity in the arts beyond the superficial involvement of a learned technician
such as Jacques Louis David.
Marina de Tammaso’s research, as reported, does not provide the details of her procedure which might have been informative as to where her
thinking, and the choices made based on that thinking may have been. I have tried to suggest, as per the art approach above, that decisions as to
the degree of beauty and or ugliness one associates with a particular work of art lack the conviction of valid choices mainly, in part, due to the
intense complexity of those decisions. In general, the mood of the decider, his physical comfort, his emotional state, to say nothing of his
affective reactions to a whole host of visual images as well as his associations with them or how they may be modified as aspects of those images
change. A graphic example of how affective responses can change in a flash was beautifully demonstrated in the film “Cabaret” with the song
“Tomorrow Belongs to Me”. At first we hear the first musical bars off screen and we move from the somewhat intimate scene between two men having wine to the face of
a beautiful; boy singing with excited joy on his face, his blond hair, his smooth face, and red full lips entice us until the camera pans down to the political patch on his
arm and the mood changes drastically, at least for an American, if not for a 1938 German Nazi, to one of horror and despair. Here it is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EdM8PDu6VMg.
One of the most serious complaints I have of much of what passes for art criticism is nothing more than public
relations hype and, as a teacher, I resent that approach very much for it stresses the superficial, the commonplace
and it degrades both intelligence and sensibility. It will, eventually, if it hasn’t already, cause compassion to
disappear. It is for reasons such as these that I am unable to tolerate without expressions of the strongest
disapproval the arrogant and prideful display of ignorance preying on stupidity. I believe I am fully aware of how
that statement might apply to the present political situations found in many a developed country and nearly all so-
called third-world nations.
The only benefit from such an unpromising political development may be that the present definition of nationality
might give way to a new and better functioning one such as “nation” giving way to “menschion”
I have no argument with deTommaso regarding what she supposes to be a cause and effect relation between the
lessening of pain and the perception of beauty and it may well be that what I have read has not truly represented
her work, but, as it stands, and as it has been reported, the structural framework of the conception is superficial.
Any mother can tell you, and even some fathers, that children’s emotions and experiences of fright can be
displaced by competing experiences. And, it is likely, that is, that the displacement of anxiety on a distressing
problem that might well allow for the emergence of a solution. And it is this sort of activity that the three artists
mentioned above (Caravaggio, Cezanne and Ryder) seemed to have concerned themselves with in their search for
appropriate graphic compositions, that is to say that out of their original chaotic perceptions they reach for the
creation of order….for me this is the pivotal difference distinguishing a creative artist from any other and it may be,
that with de Tomasso’s subjects that the perceived order, as determined by their concepts of beauty and the ugly,
assisted them in experiencing less discomfort.
Note: My original correspondent sent me a more informed abstract of the Marina de Tomasso study on the effect of
Our results provide evidence that
perceived aesthetic beauty on the awareness of pain. It is here.
pain may be modulated at cortical level by the aesthetic content of the distracting
stimuli.

To which I would offer the following possible clarification.

Note: This comment is launched from the highlighted phrase above “aesthetic content”. This study indicated that the selected da Vinci work was
found to be “beautiful”. Here we have three examples of da Vinci’s work. On the left da Vinci’s solution to the problem of how one changes a square
into a circle, the second is a portrait of a young woman, and the third that of a man (?) of indeterminate age.
On might, logically enough, make the assumption that these drawings might, in terms of the de Tomasso study, be labeled and described in terms of
aesthetics as “neutral”, “beautiful” and “ugly” only if one considered the subject matter alone as distinct from the technical treatment. The point being
that one should try to avoid confusing subject content from aesthetic response.
I maintain that our critical vocabularies, as customarily used, are insufficient to describe minute differences in analytical perception and that the phrase
“aesthetic content” does not effectively tell us the writer is not talking about a young, attractive woman with an involved hair style and
demure attitude, or would keep a third party from being thought “mad” were he to describe the third drawing as “beautiful”.
In short, how does this study distinguish the levels of aware observational levels of sophistication which presumably exist among any group of
subjects?
This is not to mean I disapprove of Marina de Tomasso’s interest in the question. On the contrary, I very much approve of it for it is my belief that art,
both the observation and the practice of it, are beneficial and therapeutic to both the individual and the society as a unit. Without such
applicable distinctions I would be unable to say that the work of Taggart does not approach the aesthetic level of Gaston Lachaise.
Terry Taggart Gaston Lachaise