Daniel Quall King

We pass through the world and the world passes through us; we are a part of it and it is a part of us.  Constantly things occur.  We participate in them; they participate in us.  We observe what happens, we reflect on it, and we try to see whether or not we can make sense of it.

Much of the time our perceptions are concerned with such things as similarities and differences.  Our predisposition to perceive something in one way or the other is partly conditioned by our needs and desires; partly by what we acquire through our various cognitive processes; and partly by the interplay of both.

Often, not all of an individual’s sensibilities are equally developed, or at least equally responsive.  Our more acute sensibilities respond strongly to those occurrences in our world to which they are especially receptive; and we can recognise when our responses are different, out of the ordinary, stronger than usual.  We attend.

Our attention, our awareness, can be given to what we can call the activity of the creative imagination.  In exercising it, our perceptions of such things as similarities and differences can be corrected, heightened, made more balanced.  We can relate to what occurred in different ways from before.  Our tendency to generalise correctly can be nourished.  Correct generalisations enable us to relate ourselves to the world and the world to ourselves more effectively.  Under conditions of strong need, this process can be a particularly sharp or deep form of learning.

The net effect upon us of our most acute responses may be either positive or negative in feeling, but it is possible for both results to be put to useful purposes.  If the net effect of either is one of increase, we have gained.  Having gained, we can share.  In one of their aspects, the fine arts exist in order to enable us to share our gain through disciplines of articulation.  We can call these languages.

What we can share and the ways we can share, together, can provide occasions when the active attention of others can be given to their particular ways of being responsive and imaginative.  Their perceptions can be heightened.  They may relate to various occurrences in different ways from before.  Their inclination to generalise correctly can be nourished … and so forth.

The value of this process is that it is self-evidently adaptive, and it requires no other explanation, substantiation, or justification.

It would be interesting to test certain experiences of art and to try to answer in their own terms certain questions implied by these observations, insofar as it might help to elucidate both the experiences and the viewpoint.

Perceiving similarities and differences clearly is only one of our crucial activities.  Some others are:

• Becoming aware of when we place unnecessary restrictions or constraints upon ourselves by bringing to a situation preconceptions which are not necessarily appropriate to it;
• Recognising the potential usefulness of fortuitous circumstances when they arise;
• Making sense of conflicting or ambiguous messages;
• Recognising the relative importance of the various elements of a situation, and being able to prioritise in an optimal way;
• Making new ideas by putting old ideas together in new ways;
• Trying to do things differently next time.