CYCLE FORTY-TWO

1. The decadence of abstract art, the art style par excellence of the twentieth century, inexorably led to the 'cosmic paganism' of light art ... as phenomenal materialism was eclipsed by noumenal naturalism, and even by idealism.

2. One could argue that whereas noumenal naturalism is, by and large, encased in transparent bulbs and/or tubes, noumenal idealism is free of casing in the 'cosmic' purism of laser beams.

3. It could also be argued that whereas phenomenal realism is encased in picture frames, phenomenal materialism, its representational and even non-representational antithesis, is largely free from casing in the painterly purism of canvas.

4. There is about picture frames a sculptural connotation which harmonizes with the phenomenal realism of figurative sculpture.

5. Like painting, sculpture also became abstract, or non-figurative, prior to being eclipsed by the noumenal naturalism and even idealism of light sculpture - the former encased in tubes and the latter free-standing in either laser or holographic configurations.

6. Since phenomenal materialism inevitably tends back, if it doesn't stagnate in the pseudo-noumenal mode ... of non-representational painting, towards noumenal naturalism, it should follow that phenomenal realism will tend towards noumenal idealism, as in the context of holography, most of which, to-date, is comparatively figurative.

7. It seems paradoxical to speak of humanism, nonconformism, fundamentalism, and transcendentalism in connection with art, and yet art can be subjective as well as objective, gravitating from phenomenal nonconformism to noumenal fundamentalism on the one hand, and from phenomenal humanism to noumenal transcendentalism on the other hand.

8. One could speak of a progression or, rather, positive regression from representational knowledge, in phenomenal nonconformism, to non-representational power, in noumenal fundamentalism, and of a progression from figurative beauty, in phenomenal humanism, to non-figurative truth, in noumenal transcendentalism.

9. Just as light replaces paint in the supersession of materialism by naturalism and of realism by idealism, so air replaces hair in the supersession of nonconformism by fundamentalism and of humanism by transcendentalism. For with the former contexts, which are usually scientific or economic, it is the objectivity of the medium used in the execution of the art work which is paramount, whereas with the latter contexts, which are usually political or religious, it is the subjectivity of the means used in the execution of the art work which is paramount.

10. Hence for the subjective artist it is not paint or light which is the governing factor, but his use of brush and/or airbrush, which is an extension of his self, whether phenomenally, as in humanism and (to a lesser extent) nonconformism, or noumenally, as in fundamentalism and (to a greater extent) transcendentalism.

11. Nonconformism and fundamentalism, being less genuinely subjective than their political and religious counterparts, tend to emphasize, in their respective ways, content at the expense of form, whereas humanism and transcendentalism emphasize, in their respective ways, form at the expense of content - the former pair on representational/non-representational terms, and the latter pair on figurative/non-figurative terms.

12. This same dichotomy between form and content also applies to objective art, with realism and idealism emphasizing, on account of their less genuinely objective status, form at the expense of content, but materialism and naturalism emphasizing content at the expense of form, albeit, in each case, 'form' and 'content' are rather more negative than positive, thereby correlating with the 'antiforms' and 'anticontents' of 'anti-art' - the scientific and/or economic basis of which panders, in particles, to aggressive individualism.