CYCLE NINETY-FOUR

1. Appearance precedes essence, and thus art, which is rooted in objectivity, precedes music, which, when true, is centred in subjectivity. Art is considerably older than music and achieved its 'classical' perfection not in painting but in drawing, the most objective mode of art. By contrast, music began in a comparatively objective mode, as rhythm, and proceeded to evolve away from this paradoxical situation towards a pitch-oriented subjectivity which, cultural and regional exceptions notwithstanding, has still to achieve a universal perfection.

2. Thus it could be argued that whereas art devolves from its apparent 'perfection' in the most objective mode of art, viz. drawing, music evolves towards its essential perfection in the most subjective mode of music, viz. piping, which is the omega of music, beyond which no further progress is possible. Art arises in the light and declines thereafter, whereas music culminates in the air, which is a divine redemption from its lower and variously 'bovaryized' manifestations. Fundamentally, art is a description of appearances, music, by contrast, a definition of essences. Art exists in concreto, like an upper-class power, as the canvas on the wall, whereas music is invisible to the sight, a spiritual presence which comes and goes on the wings of the airwaves which carry it, like a classless salvation, 'beyond the pale' of concrete verification. Art is for the Damned, music for the Saved.

3. Between the Devil and God, man and woman run their phenomenal course, the former relatively saved by literature and the latter relatively damned by sculpture. Absolute salvation and damnation in the Arts are only possible through music and art respectively. Indeed, the more culturally damned one was, the less would one have to do with music, while, conversely, the more culturally saved one was, the less would one have to do with art. Art is effectively 'beneath the pale' of the cultural saint, just as, conversely, music is 'beyond the pale' of the cultural sinner.

4. He who has not died to art has not begun to live in the spirit of true music. Even airbrush art is essentially 'the best of a bad job', and therefore less a guide to the spirit than the adoption of spiritual means, viz. air, to an apparent end, which is nothing less than a subversion of spirituality, a sort of diabolical usurpation. The truly spiritual person avoids art, for it does not and cannot intimate of essence, even when abstract, but remains resolutely rooted to its objective origins, as though a child of the sun and/or some cosmic galaxy. In fact, abstract art is even more objective than so-called representational art, and only a fool would claim to see essence there, as though essence were something to be looked at from the outside rather than experienced from within!

5. Intimations of immortality are far better achieved through music, and I fancy that even the worst and most 'objective' music would more serve this purpose than the best of the so-called 'subjective' paintings which paradoxically lay claim to spiritual guidance. That which is not music and contrary to it isn't just another approach to the Divine. On the contrary, it stems from a completely different tradition which, fundamentally, has no bearing on the Divine whatsoever! One wouldn't trust the Devil to lead one to God. Neither should one trust art to lead one to music, which is the cultural equivalent of God. A person who has truly found God has little time for the Devil. Art becomes for him a tedious and possibly subversive irrelevance. He is beyond it. Saved from it by the purest music.