beauty and perception

Tradition and Revolition(J. Krishnamurti KFI) 중에서














BEAUTY AND PERCEPTON

Dialogue 11


P: Where is the resting place of beauty? Where does beauty
reside? Obviously, the outer manifestations of beauty are observ-
able in the right relatonship between space, form and colour, and
between human beings. But what is the essence of beauty? In
Sanskrit texts three factors are equated-the True, the Good and
the Beautiful as satyam, sivam, sundaram.

K: What are you trying to find out? Do you want to find the nature
of beauty? What do the professionals say?

P: Traditionalists would say: satyam, sivam, sundaram. The artist
today would not differentiate between the seemingly ugly and the
seemingly beautful, but would regard the creative act as the
expression‎ of a moment, of a perception that gets transformed
wthin the individual and which finds expression‎ in the action of
the artist.

K: You are asking: What is beauty, what is the expression‎ of
beauty, and how does the individual fulfil himself through beauty?
What is beauty? If you atarted as though you knew nothing about
it, what would your reation be? This is a universal problem: it was
a problem for the Greeks, for the Romans, and it is still a problem
for people today. So what is beauty? Does beauty lie in the sunset,
in a lovly moring, in human relationsships--between mother and
child, husban and wife, man and woman? Does beauty lie in the
extraodinarily subtle movement of thought and in clear percep-
tion? Is that what you call beauty?

P: Can there be beauty also in the terrible, the ugly?

K: In murder, in butchery, in throwing bombs, in violence, in
mutilation, torture, anger, in the brutal, violent, aggressive pursuit
of an idea. in wanting to be greater than somebody--is there
beauty in that? Where is beauty if a man hiits another?

P: In all these acts there is no beauty, but isn't there beauty in the


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creative act od the artist who interprets the terrible, like Pcasso's
Guernca?

K: So we have to ask: What is expression‎, what is creativity? You
ask: What is beauty? Does it lie in a sunset, in the clear light of the
morning, the light on the water, in relatiionship? And does beauty
lie in any form of violence, including competitive achievement? Is
there beauty per se, or does it lie in how the artist expresses
himself? A child tortured can be expressed by an artist, but is that
beauty?

P: Beauty s a relatve thing.

K: The 'I' which sees, which is conditioned and which demands
self-fulfilment is relative.

Now, is beauty good taste? Or, does beauty have nothing in
common with it, but lies in the artist's expression‎ and, therefore,
in his fulfillment? The artist says: I must fulfil myself through
expression‎. The artist would be lost without expression‎, which is
part of his sense of beauty and his self-fulfilment. We ourselves try
to find beauty in other people's expression‎, in architecture and in
beautful bridge--like the Golden Gate Bridge, or the bridges
over the Seine--in modern buildiings of glass and steel and in the
gentleness of a fountain. We seek beauty in museums, and in a
symphony.

What is amiss in the man who is seeking beauty? So, can we ask
what is the inwardness, the feeling, the subtlety in the word
'beauty', so that beauty is truth and truth s beauty?

P: The expressions of other people are the only sources of beauty
that are available to us.

K: What does that mean?

P: In seeing the bridge a certain quality arises within me which I
call beauty. It is only in the perception of somethng beautiful that
the quality of beauty arises n many indiviuals.

K: I understand that. I am asking: Does beauty lie in self-
expression‎?

P: One has to start with what exists.

K: Which is other people's expresson. Not having the perceptive


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eye, the stange inward feelng of beauty, I say: How beautiful that
picture is, how beautiful that poem is, that symphony. Remove all
that, and the indivdual knows no beauty. Therefore he relies, for
his appreciation of beauty, on expression‎, on objects--on a bridge
or a good chair. Does beauty demand expression‎, especially self-
expresson?

P: Can it exist independent of expression‎?

K: Perception of beauty is its expression‎; the two are not separate.
Perceiving is expressing; there is no time interval at all. Seeing is
doing. acting; there is no gap between seeing and doing.

I want to observe the mind that sees, where seeing is acting; I want
to observe the nature of the mind that this quality of seeing and
doing. What is this mind? It is essentially not concetned wiith
expression‎. Expression‎ may come, but it is not concerned. Ex-
pression takes time--to build a bridge, to write a poem. But to the
mind which sees, the mind to which perceving is doing, there is no
time at all. Such a mind is a sensitve mind; such a mind is the most
intelligent mnd. And wthout that ntelligence, is there beauty?

P: What is the place of the heart in this?

K: Do you mean the feeling of love?

P: The word 'love' is a loaded term. If you are still, there is a
strange feeling, a movement which takes place from this region of
the heart. what is this? Is this necessary or, is it a hindrance?

K: This is the most essential part of it. There is no perception
without that; mere intellectual perception is no perception. The
action of intellectual perception is fragmentary, whereas intelli-
gence implies affection, the heart. Otherwise you are not sensitive;
you cannot possibly perceive. Perceiving is acting. Perceiving,
acting without time is beauty.

P: Do the eyes and the heart operate at the same time in the act of
perception?

K: Perception implies complete attention. The nerves, the cars,
the brain, the heart--everything is at the highest quality. Other-
wise there is no perceiving.

P: Is the fragmentary qualiity of sensory action due to the fact that
the whole organism does not operate at the same time?

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K: The brain, the heart, nerves, eyes, ears are never completely in
attention and, as they are not, you cannot perceive.

So what is beauty? Does t lie in expression‎, in fragmentary
action? I may be an artist, an engineer, a poet; poets, engineers,
artists and scientists are fragmentary human beings. One fragment
becomes extraordinarily perceptive, sensitive and its action may
express something marvellous, but it is still a fragmentary action.

P: what is that state when the organism percevies violence, terror
or ugliness?

K: Let us take violence in its multifarious forms--but why are you
asking that question?

P: It is necessary to investiigate this.

K: Is violence part of beauty? Is that what you are asking?

P: I will not put it that way.

K: You see violence. What is the response of a perceptive mind, in
the sense in which we are using the word 'perceptive', to various
forms of destruction, which is part of violence?(pause)

I've got it. Is violence a fragmentary act or is it an act of a totally
harmonious perception??

P: No.

K: So you are saying that it is a fragmentary action. Fragmentary
action must deny beauty.

P: You have nverted the sitution.

K: What is the response of a perceptive mind when it sees
violence? It looks at it, investigates t and sees it a fragmentary
action; and therefore it is not an act of beauty. What happens to a
perceptive mind when it sees a violent act? It sees 'what is'.

P: To you the nature of the mind does not change as such?

K: Why should it change? It sees 'what is'. Go a step futher.

P: Does the perceiving mind, observing violence which is frag-
mentary, and seeing 'what is', act on violence? And, in the very act
of seeing, does it change ts nature?

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K: Wait a mnute. You are asking: What is the effect of the
perceiving mind when it observes violence?

P: You said: It sees 'what is'. Does it alter 'what is'? Does the
perceiving mind, in the very observing of violence and seeing
'what is', act on violence and change its nature?

K: Are you asking whether the perceiving mind, in seeing 'what
is', that is, the act of violence, asks: What shall I do? Is that it?

P: Such a mind does not do that, but there must be some action
from the perceiving mind which changes the violence in the other.

K: The perceiving mind sees a violent act. Such an act is frag-
mentary. What action can there be on the part of the perceving
mind?

P: The perceiving mind sees violence on the part of x; seeing is
acting.

K: But what can it do?

P: If the perceiving mind acts, it must change the violence in x.

K: Let us get this clear. The perceiving mind sees another acting
violently. To the perceiving mind, the very seeing is the doing.
That is a fact; perception is action. The perceiving mind sees x in
violence. What is the action involved in that seeing?--the
stopping of violence?

P: All those are peripheral actions. I am saying that when a
perceiving mind is confronted with an act of violence, the very act
of perceiving will alter the action of violence.

K: Several things are involved here. The perceiving mind sees an
act of violence; the man who is acting violently may respond non-
violently, beause the perceving mind is near him, close to
him--and suddenly this happens.

P: One comes to you with a problem, say of jealousy. What
happens in an interview with you when a confused person comes to
you? In the very act of perceiving, the confusion is not.

K: Obviously that happens because of contact. You have taken the
trouble to discuss violence, and something happens because of a
direct sharing of the problem--there is communication. That is

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simple. You see a man far away acting with violence. What is the
action of the perceiving mind there?

P: There must be tremendous energy from a perceiving mind, that
must have some action.

K: It may act. You cannot be as certain of that as you can be in
close proximity. The other may wake up in the middle of the night;
he may become aware of the strange response later, depending
upon his sensitivity. This may or may not be due to the perceiving
mind and its impact; whereas this close communication is dif-
ferent. It does bring about change.

Let us come back. You were asking what beauty is. I think we
can say that the mind which is not fragmentary in itself, which is
not broken up, has this beauty.

P: Has it any relationship to sensory perception? If you close your
eyes, your ears--

K: Even when you close your ears and eyes, because there is no
fragmentation, the mind has this quality of beauty, of sensitivity. It
mind in the middle of the noisiest city, what takes place? Phy-
sically it gets affected, but the quality of the mind that is not
fragmented, is not affected. It is independent of the surroundings,
therefore it does not concern itself with expression‎.

P: That is the aloneness of it.

K: Therefore beauty is aloneness. Why is there this craving for
self-expression‎? Is that craving part of beauty--whether it is the
craving of a woman for a baby, of a husband for sex in the moment
of tenderness, or of the artist craving for expression‎? Does the
perceptive mind demand any form of expression‎? It does not,
because perceiving is expressing, is doing. The artist, the painter,
the builder finds self-expression‎. It is fragmentary; and therefore
its expression‎ is not beauty.

A mind that is conditioned, that is fragmentary, expresses the
feeling of beauty, but it is conditioned. Is that beauty? Therefore,
the self which is the conditioned mind can never see beauty, and
whatever it expresses must be of its quality.

P: You have still not answered one aspect of the question. There is



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such a thing as creative talent, the ability to put together things in a
manner which gives joy.

K: The housewife baking bread, but not 'in order to' -- not
because of something else. The moment you do that you are lost.
The speaker does not sit on the platform and speak because it
gives him joy. The source of water is never empty; it is always
bubbling. Whether there is pollution or the worship of water, it is
bubbling; it is there.

Most peole who are concerned with self-expr
ession have self-
interest. The artist, famous or otherwise, belongs to that category.
It is the self which makes for fragmentaion. In the absence of the
self, there is perception. Perception is doing, and that is beauty.

I am sure that the sculptor who carved the Mahesamurti at
Elephanta created it out of his meditation. Before you put
your hand to a stone or a poem, there be a state of
meditation; the inspiration must not be from the self.

P: The tradition of the Indian sculptor was that.

K: Beauty is total self-abandonment; and with the total absence of
the self there is that. We are trying to catch that without the
absence of the self; creation then becomes a tawdry affair.


New Delhi
29 December, 1970