Let’s try to unveil the beauty a little bit.
Aesthetics, as the science of art and beauty, is a relatively new term that has been used since Kant and Hegel, although it’s actually older. It is a traditional philosophical discipline, a quest and dedication to studying art as a relationship with the divine, beauty, truth, and goodness. It is the study of the sensual rather than the study of reason.
Plato defines beauty as the principle of harmony with which the Demiurge filled the universe. Beauty is an archetypal principle that should be connected with justice and goodness. Art is, therefore, an expression through forms, a sensory representation of intuitive perception of beauty as sublime harmony.
Beauty is thus imagined as the greatest inspiration of art.
There are different paths of knowledge and development, and each of these paths interprets the world through its own tonality and language. If a mathematician were to define the divine, cause, principle, and mover of the universe in terms of science, they would describe it as The true Mathematician, as a Geometer who created the cosmos with numbers. If defined by a mystic, they would speak of God as the Supreme Good, the Supreme Love. A politician might associate God with Justice, Law. But how could an artist conceive of God? An artist would identify God with Supreme Beauty. Therefore, they do not speak of different things, nor do they exclude each other, but in different languages they actually speak of the same, of the most sublime, of the greatest inspiration as a symbol of perfection. Platon imagines this search for Beauty as the path to the divine, and he speaks about it in a beautiful fragment of his work Symposium, where Diotima says to Socrates: “So the one who is on the right path towards that goal should, like a young man, begin by pursuing beautiful bodies and first, if his guide leads him correctly, he should love one beautiful body and then give birth to beautiful words, and then realize that the beauty of one body is the sister of the beauty of any other body, so if necessary, one should pursue It is a great folly to think that beauty is the same on all bodies; understanding this, one should become a lover of all beautiful bodies and refrain from holding onto one body after despising and belittling it completely; after that, one should value beauty in the soul as more precious than that in the body, so that if someone has a virtuous soul but a weak physical appearance, it should be enough to love them, care for them, speak kindly to them, and seek out those who will make them better. This way, one will be forced to see beauty in morality and laws, and realize that it is all connected in order to understand the insignificance of physical beauty. After establishing moral principles, one should turn to knowledge and once again discern the beauty of science. Now, looking at this abundance of beauty, one should not serve it like a servant, satisfying oneself with the beauty of children or superficial actions, and thereby becoming petty and narrow-minded. Instead, one should turn towards the wide horizon of beauty and observe it, embracing numerous beautiful thoughts. and majestic ideas are born in inexhaustible wisdom until there, strengthened and grown, it sees a unique science that relates to beauty, and in such a way. ‘And now,’ said Diotima, ‘try to follow what I’m saying as carefully as possible. Whoever is introduced to love matters up to this point, systematically and orderly observing the beautiful, when they come to the very end of the secrets of love, will suddenly see something unexpectedly beautiful by nature, namely, Socrates, that which all previous efforts have served, that which is always first and neither arises nor perishes, neither grows nor withers, neither is partly beautiful nor partly ugly, neither is now, nor is not, neither is beautiful in relation to something, and ugly in relation to something else, neither is beautiful here, ugly there, as if it is beautiful for some and ugly for others, nor will that beautiful appearance be seen in it again as a face or a hand or any other part of the body, nor as a word or knowledge, neither somewhere else like on a living being or in the earth or in the sky, but only as The One itself, always uniform, while everything else beautifully participates in it, in such a way that while everything else comes into being and perishes, it neither becomes bigger nor smaller, nor does anything happen to it. So, when someone, by means of true love for boys, rises above all these subspecies and begins to contemplate beauty, then they are close to the true goal. That is precisely what it means to go towards love in the right way or to be guided by someone else, starting from those beautiful objects and constantly ascending like on steps from one to two and from two to all beautiful bodies, then from beautiful bodies to beautiful activities, then from activities to beautiful sciences, and finally to reach that science which is not a science about anything else but about beauty itself, and to finally understand what beauty is. …
The idea of winged beauty will reappear in the Renaissance, starting from the fact that bodies do not create it, but it is “placed in them”, becoming a beautiful object that has succeeded in “capturing” beauty. Beauty is it is not found in matter, but much higher above it. The artist ascends to dimensions of pure beauty, contemplates it and interprets it within themselves in order to embody it in forms and bodies through the process of creation and reshaping of matter.
This is done so that art becomes a real aspiration towards the beautiful that will not be an end in itself and will not create anything other than good and just in those beings capable of contemplating it. Therefore, this unattainable, untouchable, and subtle beauty is the artist’s greatest inspiration.
Art thus transforms into a path to the realization of ultimate beauty, a guide of consciousness towards the sublime realms where archetypes reside. The rush of consciousness through intuition enables the study, remembrance, and affirmation of the reality of one’s own winged being.
Matter, through beauty, participates in the divine mind, in the boundless, immeasurable, and immortal, and through it, man also to some extent fulfills his need for immortality.
Our creative Aesthetic ability is directly related to our ability to admire. We discover hidden beauty in small things, we have a predisposition that allows us to appreciate the secret harmony; we learn in every moment and comprehend the great as well as the small mystery we call God. For an artist and art lover, an inclination towards the simply beautiful presupposes a true source of spirituality.
Beauty captivates the mind that observes it, ecstatic without understanding its mystery. That instinctive feeling of wonder and admiration, which can be created by an object or music, transcends the reasoning that reveals beauty.
Rational analysis of an artwork destroys it and kills it. Only contemplation of unity shows us the life expressed in certain forms. Art, like life, offers us its mystery, independent of our understanding. Art is a form of receiving the essential unity of the universe, the divinity that manifests in everything that exists.
Therefore, beauty would be one form of experiencing this essential unity. The manifestations of the Logos in nature are the regulating Intelligence that moves the stars.
In the same way, every work of art is a harmonious dance, a play of opposites through which the artist’s logos creates a universe, an objective cosmos.
Empty – full, light – darkness, sound – silence, visible – invisible, their different states fertilize the expressions and nuances that give life to the being of a work of art.
Light, sound, ideas are the foundation of the work, the primordial chaos which nourishes the artist’s mind.
Artistic creation is an imitation of divine creation and, if the artist has developed a heart-mind in tune with the archetypes of life, they will reveal to us its mystery and essential unity. Once again, the importance of the human heart is shown, whose language becomes the language of art.
In order to ensure consistency and unity in the human being, in order to fulfill the sublime ideals that it conceives in its life and time, in order to unite action and thought – there must be a heart that opens the path to understanding. This is the emotion Enchantment, a sublime feeling, enthusiasm that breaks the barriers of inertia and opens the doors leading to understanding and immediate experience. Theoretically, a cold approach does not convey wisdom or experience. It is not in vain that the word philosophy is composed of two terms: philo, love, and sophia, wisdom.
Art nurtures sensibility and emotions, elevates feelings. If we do not awaken the ability to fall in love with things, beings, or life itself, we will hardly come to the realization of a part of the mystery behind earthly existence, let alone live fully.
Art, like a gentle balm, softens the hardened parts and strengthens the softened parts of our character, giving it elasticity and depth so that the personality becomes a material transmitter of the sublime soul.
From the book Art and Beauty