Calm weather was as undesirable to them as a hurricane. They knew that the whole point of the exercise was to get just the right measure. This is what present-day sail gliders and hang-gliders also know, who enjoy snaking their silent course through the downdraughts and up currents of the wind.
Over the past 130 years, the invention of a slew of different engines has brought forth ships, vehicles and planes which move under their own power, independently of the wind and controllable by humankind – as long as we accept the basic laws of physics.
And yet the wind has lost nothing of its power and importance. It tends to the reproduction of plants by carrying grains of pollen in its currents. It refreshes us as a cool shoreline breeze. It blows through our hair and caresses our skin on warm summer days. It blows through the trees, producing a marvellous rustling sound in their leaves. It brings tears to our eyes when its icy blast blows in our face in wintertime. It literally shakes us when our plane passes through turbulence. It whips the waves into a surging storm tide, chases the clouds across the sky and drives the flames of burning forests before it. And when it reaches land as a hurricane and howls across villages, towns and cities, this is the moment when we have direct experience of its deadly devastating strength.
The power of the wind is an expression of dynamic complexity. Complexity is one of the central issues to which OUBEY devoted his whole life, both as a scientific inquirer and an artist. The dynamic interplay of chaos and order – in the cosmos just as on Earth – was a constant source of interest and fascination to him. From galaxies of truly staggering dimensions in our universe to the crystalline beauty of tiny ephemeral snowflakes. In a short 3 minute video you can see how complexity is expressed in OUBEYs art.
In their dynamic complexity, winds, whirlpools and turbulence follow the laws of physics which we might understand but cannot control. They are natural phenomena and as such for us humans they form part of the primeval environment in which we exist. But also as such they are our mentors for what we have increasingly forgotten and repressed over the last decades and centuries in our mad rush to gain control and dominance – respect and humility before nature of which we are a part.
I was pleased to read this news because one thing is very clear to me – art is good for us! Art has a beneficial soothing effect than can be balm for the soul. To be moved by art is something very special. If we are to believe the latest research, our Stone Age ancestors were also fascinated by the magic effects art can produce – whether in the sounds and rhythms of early music or paintings on the walls of caves.
And it’s the same with me today: whenever I hear particular pieces of music or get the opportunity to see certain paintings in the original, such as van Gogh´s “Church at Auvers” or Manet´s “Olympia” in the Musée d’Orsay in Paris. Even when I can’t explain it, looking at these pictures has a very deep effect on me which produces a feeling of real happiness.
Feelings of happiness
Now you might find this strange or a bit over the top? Perhaps because you’ve never had such a reaction standing in front of a painting. But just think of a piece of music you love. A ballad makes us sad, an aria awakens longing in us, the right rhythm makes us want to dance and sing, liberates the soul.
Music makes us cry, makes us laugh, makes us freak out, makes us thoughtful. On YouTube you can find countless numbers of videos of babies who can’t yet walk but are still wiggling around excitedly in their diapers in blissful response to music. Art awakens something that lies very deep inside us.
A species of art lovers
Even very small babies can often react quite ecstatically when shown bright and colourful paintings. This is what I have found with OUBEYs paintings. The babies thrash around and squeak in an excess of pure joy and enthusiasm at the view of certain pictures. It was truly wonderful to see! This in itself would be proof enough for me that art is not merely an intellectual game but has a great deal to do with our energies and feelings as a species – and has been so ever since our species first existed.
Art is simply good for us. Art is vital for our well-being and our soul. Art awakens emotions that would otherwise remain hidden in our day-to-day lives. At this juncture OUBEY would probably play Tchaikovsky’s Pathétique symphony; for my part I would prefer his piano concerto No. 1 in B minor. But as I’m now thinking of Brian Wilson´s album “Imagination”, I shall now put that on and listen to it once more. Good art is never boring. You can look at it and listen to it again and again, and again and again it never fails in its magical effects. Marvellous effects that I wish every person in this world to have – even on prescription.
Metabolic processes run through everything that exists in the cosmos and thus also on this Earth. This is no new finding but it is illuminating. And as a finding it is by no means as widely known as its importance might suggest. The first time I came across this subject was in 2003 when OUBEY and I visited the Metabolism exhibition at the ZKM Center for Art and Media in Karlsruhe (https://zkm.de/de/event/2003/05/Bankett). And ever since then I have read and thought about it.
Everything that we humans consume is broken down and processed by the metabolism of our bodies. What we cannot use we finally excrete. This is what happens to everything that lives and exists. We feed on plants and animals which in turn feed on plants, animals and nutrients which themselves are the result of metabolic processes. Such is the cycle of physical existence.
This cycle brings forth life and death, connecting the two organically in a way of which we are generally not conscious in our everyday lives. Yet given our evolutionary history, it is probable clear to all live forms on an unconscious level. And the unconscious is a powerful force.
From a metabolic perspective there is no beginning and no end but rather an uninterrupted process of becoming and passing away, life and death. Death is a necessary condition for the metabolism because it makes life possible. Acknowledgement of the co-existence of life and death is a key to understanding the whole interconnectivity of our being – if we consider it from a purely bodily material perspective. The outward manifestation of an existence – be it a leaf, the flower of a plant, a fish, a bird, a mammal or a human being – is transient. Yet its spirit is not.
Because the spirit is free of time. “The spirit cannot be destroyed by time” said Erwin Schrödinger. And according to the Second Law of Thermodynamics no energy is lost in space. Spirit is energy. But if energy cannot be lost in space, does it then exist over and beyond all forms of metabolism? Is there such a thing as a spiritual metabolism in the universe? This is an intriguing question whose answer we will only know – if we get to know it at all – when our eternal sprit has separated itself from our ephemeral bodies.
When is a person young? When is a person old?
Ludmilla Larusso, who by now is over 50, appeared youthful as she stood on the stage and sang. How come? It was her vibrant personality, her voice but above all else the tangible joy and passion she put into what she was doing. Compared to her many another candidate seemed truly “aged” even though several decades younger than she was. How can this be?
For me age is much more than just the sum total of the number of years you’ve been living. The question of age has a lot more to do with the question of what mental attitude you hold. And it’s this outlook compounded of curiosity and sheer zest for life and the knowledge that it’s never too late to make new discoveries that creates the energy that makes people young – whether they’re 15 or 50.
But what about the hard facts of biology, you might quite rightly object. Sure, they also play a part, and with creeping age there are many things that you can’t do as well and easily as when you were 20 or 30. Fortunately, however, we humans are also individuals and as such capable of encountering hard biology with a mental attitude which means that our lives are not necessarily over and done with when we reach 50 or 70.
An invitation to curiosity
Some people – even though still young in years – have already planned out their whole lives through to retirement and reject everything that doesn’t fit into their plan. Now you might think that this shows great purpose and is a perfectly sensible thing to do and shouldn’t be criticised.
To avoid any misunderstanding let me say that I am not criticising it. Everybody can and should live as they see fit in a way that makes them content as long as they do not hurt other people. And yet I think that this is a road which if followed can deprive us of a few wonderful opportunities which make life eventful and full of surprises. What otherwise remains is often enough just the surprises with which life confronts us and to which we often react helplessly when they torpedo all our carefully laid plans.
For me, trying something new and surprising myself has been a vital constant factor in my life. Naturally, you always have to first step back and see that what you want to do really is within your grasp, and that you really do want to do it. But when that is the case, then you should simply go ahead and do it. And if you don’t succeed, at least you can say you’ve tried. As far as possible at the end of my life I want to avoid asking myself why I never made any use of the great opportunities that came my way. This is why I’ve always given myself the liberty to tackle something new when the right opportunity arrived, and so far have never once regretted it.
An empty canvas is a call to new discoveries
And I like people who act in the same way. To some extent an artist must “begin afresh” with every new picture. Some artists might paint whole series yet again and again each empty canvas calls up something new. This is what I’ve seen personally in living together with OUBEY for over twenty one years. If OUBEY hadn’t been ready and capable of continually striking out in new directions as an artist, the body of work that he left behind would never have been as interesting and wide ranging as it is and would certainly never now fascinate and thrill such a great number of people across the whole globe. Each answer for OUBEY only called forth the next question. Nearly all people have this attitude during childhood. Only when they grow up they tend to shed it because they believe they know all the answers – at least the most important ones. This is an error because nobody ever knows all the answers. Wonder and discovery are just as important as knowledge.
Seeing with the heart
And so it is that a certain Ludmilla Larusso on The Voice of Germany managed to bring the enthusiastic audience to its feet and the attentive coaches as well. Perhaps it helped her that in this show they sit with their backs to the stage and cannot see how old or young, big or little, fat or thin, pretty or less pretty a candidate is. They don’t know what this person looks like, they just hear the song. And Ludmilla touched people’s hearts with her song. It’s a wonderful example of how right Antoine de Saint-Exupéry was when he once said “It is only with the heart that one can see rightly”.
Age is not the result of adding up the years. Age is a question of vigour, openness and curiosity – in the heart and in the mind. There is always still time to learn, experience, and discover something new. Curiosity is an elixir that creates zest for life and by so doing keeps you young.
And yet recently for the very first time a painting generated by algorithms has been sold – for no less than 432,000 dollars. A painting generated by the pictorial data of various famous paintings by a Parisian group that goes by the name of “Obvious Art”. The result is a nebulous indefinite article presented in a classical frame that could have come from the 19th century. The sales price is the result of some individual’s phantasy of increasing value and has nothing to do with the quality of the work. The point of the exercise was to invest superfluous capital in the first painting produced by artificial intelligence. This has absolutely nothing to do with art. This at least is how Peter Kruse would probably have put it, following his line of argument in the statement he delivered on the 5th Anniversary of the MINDKISS Project.
Banksy´s coup just two weeks ago of his Girl with Balloon picture that self-destructed the moment it was sold at auction is a brilliant coup that plainly reveals the absurdity of the commercialised art world and one that hopefully will help change the ways the public think about art and the art world. Not only was the already absurd sales price of 1.4 million in any way negated by the destruction of the painting but actually increased to over 2 million. The buyer has every reason to thank their lucky stars. And we too are fortunate in having such a figure as Banksy who can show us all that the workings of the art market mirror those of the stock exchange. It’s not about art but about speculation and profit.
And this is precisely the point where Banksy shows himself to be such a brilliant debunker – because in such a system is a shredded picture necessarily a worthless picture? This case shows that the very contrary is true – it increases, even substantially increases, in value. And so the shredded picture becomes a kind of magnifying glass through which we can view the absurdities of the commercial art market close-up and as they happen.
To fully appreciate this you have to know that Banksy is a street artist who attaches great importance to the impact that his graffiti and art performances have yet who refuses to take part in the speculative games of the art market. His independence is much more important to him than fame and riches.
When he does make an exception and sell, then the transaction becomes enveloped in a kind of aurora of enlightenment. Take, for instance the time when an anonymous seller at a stand in New York’s Central Park sold passers-by original Banksy works for 60 dollars. Whoever bought a picture by an unknown artist from this stall did so not because they were buying a “Banksy with expectations of a rapid increase in its value” but because they were buying a picture they liked. Banksy taped this action and published the video – much to the chagrin of all art dealers who had missed this unique opportunity to make a killing. Unquestionably, they would have dearly loved to resell these works at a vast profit.
Banksy´s coup was perfect. In its unique way it is a clear demonstration of how the market functions, how it twists and turns, adapts to circumstances and eventually triumphs. Whether you find this good or bad is another question. But it’s clear that this is how it is. The goal which was to reveal this has been achieved. The whole world is talking about this stunt and it won’t be forgotten so quickly.
Apparently such forces were not as strong as the magnetic attraction of the art market on which the picture became yet another item for auction. Just who will profit from the sale of pictures produced by artificial intelligence is a completely new question in this system. Because at the moment there is always human intelligence behind artificial intelligence, human intelligence that programs the whole show and thus is its prime originator.
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The header pic shows an excerpt of the signature of this very first AI-painting
Another brilliant coup by the artist Banksy in which he succeeds yet again in laying bare the absurd mechanisms of the commercial art market for all to see. To fully appreciate this you have to know that Banksy is a street artist who attaches great importance to the impact that his graffiti and art performances have yet who refuses to take part in the speculative games of the art market. His independence is much more important to him than fame and riches.
So it’s even more astonishing that his Girl with Balloon has now been put up for sale at Sotheby´s auction house and at the very moment that the picture was bought by the highest bidder it self-destructed and so became worthless. But this is exactly where Banksy shows himself to be such a brilliant debunker – because in such a system is a shredded picture necessarily a worthless picture? This case shows that the very contrary is true – it increases, even substantially increases, in value. And so the shredded picture becomes a kind of magnifying glass through which we can view the absurdities of the commercial art market close-up and as they happen.
Girl with Ballon – a test balloon?
As an artist as soon as you engage in this speculative art market system, you can hardly avoid becoming entangled in its coils, and run the danger of gradually exchanging your inner freedom for money. This is the reason why I don’t sell OUBEYs pictures. They were created in the greatest possible spiritual freedom. And I wish to conserve this freedom for them and also for myself in what I do. They don’t need to have any material value put on them in order to assert their value as works of art. Naturally, the position taken by Banksy and the intelligent consequences of his actions are a deep source of pleasure for me. He too has set his sights not on sales but on impact and public perception.
When he does sell, the transaction becomes enveloped in a kind of aurora of enlightenment. Take, for instance the time when an anonymous seller at a stand in New York’s Central Park sold passers-by original Banksy works for 60 dollars. Whoever bought a picture by an unknown artist from this stall did so not because they were buying a “Banksy with expectations of a rapid increase in its value” but because they were buying a picture they liked. Banksy taped this action and published the video – much to the chagrin of all art dealers who had missed this unique opportunity to make a killing. Unquestionably, they would have dearly loved to resell these works at a vast profit.
It would even seem that Banksy had given away his Girl with Ballon with the proviso that the receiver would never put it up for sale. A test balloon to show how strong the counterforces need to be to withstand the blandishments of the art market. Counterforces such as “respect for the wishes of the artist”; “appreciation of the mark of trust shown in bestowing this gift”; or simply “love of art”.
Apparently such forces were not as strong as the magnetic attraction of the art market on which the picture became yet another item for auction.
Higher value through destruction
Despite the very different character of his work – in their free spirit, their need for autonomy and the marked distance they keep from the art market, OUBEY and Banksy are very similar. Both of them have resisted the powerful attraction of the art world. OUBEY mainly did this to paint the pictures that sprang up in his head without being in the slightest influenced by expectations from the outside. Banksy does it so that his works might debunk, demystify, and criticise but also bring his art to that place where he thinks it truly belongs: among people who cannot afford expensive art.
Whoever believes that the higher value of Girl with Balloon after the picture self-destructed means that Banksy’s action has missed the mark or even achieved the contrary effect, is quite wrong.
Because it’s precisely this increase in value that shows just how strong the power of speculation is, and that the spotlight here is not fixed on art. Rather it’s the market that annexes art just as it pleases. Even when that art is destroyed.
Banksy´s coup was perfect. In its unique way it is a clear demonstration of how the market functions, how it twists and turns, adapts to circumstances and eventually triumphs. Whether you find this good or bad is another question. But it’s clear that this is how it is. The goal which was to reveal this has been achieved. The whole world is talking about this stunt and it won’t be forgotten so quickly.
Beauty as the epitome of outer uniformity
This principle is in accord with the building regulations in Alpach and is precisely what distinguishes this place from all the other villages in Austria. And it’s paradoxical because it’s the rigorous uniformity in the facades that gives the place its special character. Alpach is different because everything there is the same. It’s the uniqueness of the place that has made it famous and that draws in huge crowds of visitors.
But what about individuality in all thus unreal outward beauty? The individuality of the people who live in these houses can only be expressed behind the scenes. A strange world which somehow reminded me of the artificiality of the attractions in Disneyland.
Beauty as a deviation from never-ending sameness
Then I walked through the little cemetery of the village and I could hardly believe my eyes. It was like a thicket of elaborate wrought iron crosses each one the exact replica of the last. All the same height and the same width – only the names and photos of the deceased were different. Outward uniformity even in death.
But then I came across a grave that wasn’t quite the same. It was the grave of the Austrian Nobel Prize winner Erwin Schrödinger, one of the greatest scientists of the 20th century whose work has always inspired both OUBEY and me and filled us with enthusiasm. And I found it rather moving in such a place to see that a respectful homage had been paid to such an extraordinary genius as Erwin Schrödinger by allowing his grave to deviate from the otherwise strict uniformity. Even in Alpbach an exception had been made for a man of such outstanding calibre. In that moment beauty for me was an opening onto the possibility of individuality.
Beauty as a mark of respect
Outward homogeneity can be seen as beautiful but can also take on an unappealing or even ugly form. Compared with the grim depressing facades of many modern apartment blocks and purpose built constructions in our cities, the outward conformity of the houses in Alpbach seem like a soothing benediction for the eye. Conversely, something is not automatically beautiful just because it’s individual or deviates from the norm.
So what is beauty? This is a question that much cleverer people than I have asked across the ages. Aspects of what constitutes beauty have been defined by aesthetics, by the natural sciences and geometry and also by manifold findings of psychology. What someone subjectively finds beautiful adheres to some extent to these definitions yet always remains a subjective perception. What you might find beautiful someone else might well find anything but beautiful. And this is how it should be because it’s an expression of human individuality.
In the Alpbach cemetery the principle of absolute conformity was bent to honour the extraordinary individuality of one single man and make an exception for him. And in this very moment it flashed on me once more that respect for the individual is the precondition for the creation of a beauty based on diversity. And such respect – it should go without saying – belongs to each and every person and not just a world famous Nobel Prize winner.
If architects, urban planners, landscape artists and designers of all strips would whole heartedly embrace this basic principle instead of following the dogma of bare functionality and minimal costs for maximum efficiency, the living circumstances of many people today would certainly be at least a lot less unattractive than they now are.
The brilliant design artist Stefan Sagmeister, who also created the award-winning MINDKISS book on OUBEYs art, will soon be opening a major exhibition in Vienna on the theme of Beauty. I certainly intend to see this. And perhaps I will gain some fresh perspectives there which I shall be glad to share with you on the social web or in this blog.
VR, AR and other new high tech (OR and the like)
The Buddha statues were reconstructed in their full size using 3D printing technology. Yet another technology makes it possible for you, me and those who come after us to see the ancient cultural sites in a totally new manner – in GIF animations! With new technologies we can view the most famous buildings in the history of the world stone by stone and pillar by pillar. The original structures have been awoken to new life even though in some cases hardly any basis for reconstruction could be found. And lo and behold many of the buildings appear quite different to what history has taught us to think.
Augmented reality (AR) really can give us the opportunity to admire the ancient ruins in their former splendour on our smartphones! I think this is an awesome development! Probably many of us are still not fully aware of what amazing new opportunities 3D printers, virtual reality (VR) and other new high tech offer us. But what is certain is that the New World doesn’t just create new things but also brings the old world back to life.
New spheres
The old gasworks in Pforzheim, for instance, will be hosting the exhibition ROME 312 up to the end of the year. The world’s biggest 360 degree panorama gives you an in-depth view how the ancient world’s most splendid capital must have been in the year 312 AD.
Researchers are now equipped with 360 degree cameras which they take on their expeditions, bringing back breath-taking views and clips the like of which we’ve never seen before. Perhaps you’ve heard of the Clockwork Ocean project? The findings of the expedition around the eddies in the ocean were captured in a panoramic film experience that makes the highly complex but deeply fascinating subject matter understandable to non-experts, entertaining and utterly compelling. In this case the technology of the New World takes us on a trip through the astonishing depths and vistas of the living ocean.
Synergies for eternity
Now there are certainly people who are relatively indifferent to the monuments of the ancient world and who can get along perfectly well without a pulse-racing immersive trip through the ocean. “What’s this got to do with me?” they might well ask themselves or more pointedly “Who cares?”
Obviously the past is over and done with in the sense that it cannot be repeated. And yet I am convinced that the past isn’t over and done with in the sense that the past constantly exerts its influence over our present. Past and present are fused and blended with one another in synergies. It is this interconnection that allows us to build on the discoveries and knowledge of our ancestors, use them and continue to extend our present-day body of knowledge. It was the ancient Greeks who more than 2,000 years ago first discovered the Golden Ratio, aesthetic proportions, basic mathematical formulae and even regularity of movement among heavenly bodies – all of which is knowledge we are still using today. I think that such achievements by our ancestors deserve respect! The past deserves respect!
Still so many undiscovered worlds
The GIFs of world-famous cultural sites are just one small example which shows how much more is out there waiting to be discovered. We can and we should use these opportunities to continue to educate ourselves and to grow – because we should not stand still. I am delighted to be living in times of such progress and I hope that I yet may discover a little bit more of our world.
PS: If you haven’t seen these GIFs, please take a look here: http://www.openculture.com/2018/04/watch-seven-ancient-ruins-get-restored-to-their-glorious-original-state-with-animated-gifs.html
So how would it be, I asked myself one day, if people other than scientists dealing on the theoretical level with the power of waves and the interplay of chaos and order in the universe, were to encounter one of OUBEYs paintings. How would it be, for instance, if a Giant Wave Surfer, who had direct physical and mental experience of the tremendous power of ocean waves in interplay with his extreme and hazardous sport were to encounter a painting by OUBEY that in its own manner was the expression of a spiritual reckoning with the stupendous power of such waves.
Up to that point it was mainly scientists, researchers, philosophers and artists in other disciplines who had agreed to encounter one of OUBEYs paintings they had never seen before in front of running cameras. With the German Giant Wave Surfer Robby Seeger, who had moved to Maui on Hawaii at the age of 15 to ride its giant waves and had lived there for over twenty years living out his passion, a totally new perspective came into play.
It took a while for me to find the right painting to bring to Maui and show to Robby Seeger. My choice hit on a large blue “wave painting” and if I was so hesitant this was because I feared it might be a little too apparent in its subject matter for an encounter with a Giant Wave Surfer. It was the largest of OUBEYs paintings I had ever taken on a journey round the world and I had to commission a new transport crate big enough for the dimensions of the painting to have it flown to Hawaii.
Robby Seeger´s encounter with this painting was singularly intensive – for me too. On the one hand because he kept searching for his own particular point of physical entry to the painting, finally finding it in an oblique side view perspective. This astonished me but it isn’t really surprising when you consider that a surfer always glides along the inside of a wave at an oblique angle deriving a feeling of peace as Robby Seeger himself puts it in the encounter. And on the other hand because this encounter also touches on the relationship between the human and the natural force of the ocean right through to questions of life and death.
At the end of the Encounter Robby Seeger stated that the whole experience had been “a little bit of magic” for him. “OUBEY succeeds in locking energies in his paintings that go far beyond himself and speak to other people, other beings.” OUBEY would certainly have been delighted to hear this. And this time too, like so many before, it was a great pity that these two men were never granted the opportunity to meet one another during OUBEYs lifetime.
Even today I still feel a glow of happiness in thinking that this extraordinary Encounter with Robby Seeger actually happened and that I myself personally met him accompanied by one of OUBEYs paintings.
Click here to view the video of this Encounter: https://www.mindkiss.com/project/encounters/robby-seeger/.
At the end of the evening I saw myself confirmed in my own view that learning and innovation are only possible if we allow for and accept imperfection and error. Because perfection is not always and everywhere the optimal solution for everything.
How come, you might well ask. After all, perfection is something we aspire to while mistakes are bad and therefore should be avoided. This is something we all have drummed into us at school where mistakes are marked with the red pencil and make for a poor grade. The message is clear: everything must be correct and perfect. Whether such a message is actually useful is quite another question.
What’s good about not being perfect
Nobody’s perfect and even our brain makes mistakes – a really surprising number of mistakes in fact – but this is just as it should be. In fact it’s absolutely marvellous! Our brain is no computer with a hard drive and a memory in which everything we learn, know and experience is stored in a fixed form and can be recalled at any time in exactly this form. Our brain is in continual action, linking and networking what we have permanently stored with what is new. Our memories don’t work like a “photo album” of our personal histories but rather help us to deal well and successfully with what’s new in our present. In this process our memories also forget a great deal that could afflict or impede us in our present lives without us being in the least aware of this or indeed able to influence it. Our brains continually act and react to what they find interesting. If our brains don’t find it interesting, they don’t pay attention because whatever else they are not programmed for boredom. In order to develop they love and need an incessant stream of new impulses and indeed they themselves can bring forth the new, creating new ideas and innovations.
We never see everything
It should be very obvious that mistakes happen in such a process. As an instance of this Henning Beck cited in the Markus Lanz programme an example from a film which I came across many years ago and have always used to illustrate that the seeming weakness of our perceptions are in fact one of their main strengths. This instance is known as the “Gorilla-Study“ in which the psychologists Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons showed a group of test persons a film of six basketball players running about and passing two balls to members of their group. Three of them were wearing white t-shirts, the other three black. The exercise the test persons were asked to do was to count the number of passes made by the players in white. At some point in the film an actor dressed in a gorilla costume runs across the court – an eye-catching apparition you might think simply couldn’t be missed. Yet most of the test persons failed to notice him as did the guests and the audience in the Markus Lanz programme when they were shown the film.
A strong focus is just as much of a strength as it is a weakness
Why do so many people fail to see this unmissable gorilla? Because they are so intent on counting the number of ball passes between the players wearing white t-shirts that they blend everything else out, even the gorilla. Some people do indeed recognise and watch the gorilla but by so doing are no longer capable of counting the number of passes and at the end have no idea of how many passes the players wearing white have actually made.
Our brains are incapable of focusing on both events at the same time. The attention of our brain is always directed at something particular. In terms of this something particular it may well be that the brain is perfect. And that’s an essential quality. But in terms of the overall scene, our brain is far from perfect. This is why two people looking at one and the same thing are not necessarily really seeing the same object. Knowing this and accepting this is very important not just for our understanding of what it means to be human but also for our understanding of ourselves as social beings in interaction with others and for our understanding of the world.
Mistakes help us learn, progress and innovate
How we can constructively avoid mistakes and by doing so accomplish astonishing things has been shown to us for many years now by Silicon Valley. “You can’t be innovative if you don’t experiment and keep falling flat on your face” is a defining moment of Silicon Valley culture. Each single useful outcome is marked by a great number of failures and setbacks. Get those behind you and then go on to achieve the best possible, the perfect result. Space X and Hyperloop are impressive examples of this kind of mindset.
For the future I would like to see not just a widespread dissemination of these insights but also their practical application to nurture new forms of action – in children’s education in the family, in schools and universities as well as in organisations and enterprise. The more people understand and accept them, the more chances and opportunities will open up bringing with them totally new solutions to meet the challenges of our times. I really believe this will happen.
So what’s actually stopping us from opening up such possibilities ourselves?
Even an unspectacular plan like spending a quiet evening curled up on the sofa with a book can come unstuck if somebody knocks at the door or phones me demanding my attention. You can’t plan for life! So why bother making plans?
Life time is valuable
Now perhaps you might object that it’s important not to float through the day without a single plan in mind because time is valuable and shouldn’t be wasted. And I would completely agree with you. This is why I believe it’s vital that we do turn our thoughts to how we spend our time and what we want to accomplish with it. And this sometimes includes planning ahead. Even so, we should never forget that the main characteristic of the future is that it is never predictable and thus can never be really planned. Nobody knows what the next day or even the next hour will bring. Life always holds some surprises for us in store – wonderful moments of happiness or terrible blows of fate. They can knock us off our course but as challenges they can also reveal unexpected opportunities.
Life is stronger than any plan
In my own life from earliest childhood there’ve been a whole series of surprises, both positive and negative, which I’ve learnt to accept as part of the fabric of life. One of the most tumultuous for me was to witness as a child how the building of the Berlin Wall and the establishment of the “death strip” on the frontier between East and West Germany could drastically change the lives of millions of people from one day to the next.
In Berlin at that time, from one minute to the next, people decided to jump from the third floor window of a building with nothing but the clothes they wore into a blanket that people down below were holding – to jump into a new and totally unknown life in the West. Others stayed behind and for decades remained separated from their friends and relations in the other part of the city and the country. For my father, who came from Berlin, this meant the loss of the family home. The house which he and his parents had built many years ago in the eastern part of the city and in which I had spent so many unforgettably wonderful summer holidays with my grandmother was now gone.
YOLO – You only live once
To see how families and friends were violently torn apart and how a whole country was divided was a deeply shocking unsettling experience for me. Is there anything that’s certain and safe? This was precisely the question I asked myself back then. How can someone deal with, come to terms with such a drastic change? People in other countries and continents are confronted with such circumstances much more frequently than we are, again and yet again when they are caught up in wars or stricken by natural catastrophes: extreme realities created by life through no fault of their own and which no plan can possibly prevent.
Now obviously, we can’t go around with this kind of awareness permanently at the front of our minds. Even so, I still find it important that we don’t get lulled by the supposed security of a plannable future of the kind we’ve seemingly become accustomed to over the past decades of prosperity and peace. Because, after all, insecurity is part and parcel of what we call life! This is why it’s advisable to have your own personal compass which helps you navigate the waves of unpredictability in the ocean of life. Because it’s precisely this life and no other which we can only live once.
Kubrick wasn’t only one of the film directors OUBEY most warmly admired: his idea of “twined existences” also deeply fascinated him. So it was only natural that at some point I should ask myself whether OUBEY could have had his own twin in this world and if so who this twin could have been. And in pondering this question two names always came to the forefront and interestingly enough, both are musicians. One of them died a couple of hundred years ago, young, famous and yet a pauper. The other is a man of our own age, even though he gave one of his first solo albums the title “I Just Wasn´t Made for These Times”: Brian Wilson – a melody-maker, composer, arranger, musician and song writer of genius, and also the co-lead vocalist and de facto leader of the Beach Boys. Today’s blog is dedicated to him and the spiritual affinity that I see between him and OUBEY. Now I am well aware that some people might regard my drawing such a comparison as strange, far-fetched, absurd or even downright presumptuous. Yet I still want to make it. And I have my reasons for doing so.
The germ of the idea was born over twenty five years ago, triggered by OUBEYs reaction to a documentary about the Beach Boys in which the story of Brian Wilson figured largely. The way had been prepared by OUBEYs late discovery of his music and its incredible richness. What lay behind the seemingly superficial “Surf- Dance-Fun” sound of the songs was a revelation. OUBEY became completely absorbed in the music, constantly amazed by the sheer genius of what Brian Wilson had created, and deeply moved by his personal life story. What must be the most personal song that Brian Wilson ever wrote and published is entitled “’Til I Die“. It’s the only song for which Brian Wilson himself wrote the lyrics. OUBEY was so moved by the song that he dedicated a drawing to it.
The cosmic harmonies that Brian Wilson has given this world are fantastic and beyond compare. A musical expression of complexity wrought on the very highest level. Harmonies that can make you feel good and love life, harmonies that can also create moods of melancholy. Harmonies that can kiss your soul and embrace you in moments of sadness, moments when you’re feeling lost and lonely.
Even today the Pet Sounds album from 1966, which Wilson composed and orchestrated himself while the band was touring with their old songs, is still cited as one of the all-time greats of pop music. He didn’t want to go on tour with the rest of the band, he didn’t want to go on stage. He wanted to realise what was going on in his head and, much more than that, what was moving in the spirit of the times. It‘s extraordinary how consummately well he succeeded in turning what up to then had only existed and vibrated in the inner world of his mind into music that each of us can hear and experience. Some tracks consist of twelve musical sections each of which makes its own contribution to the brilliant architecture of the harmonics, including numerous polyphonic sections. Equally extraordinary was the way in which he succeeded in fighting down all the opposition he encountered, in gaining the services of an orchestra of top musicians for the project, and finally in persuading the Beach Boys, now returned from their tour, to add their voices to the album – despite all their misgivings that the album would prove a flop. And as it turned out on its initial release Pet Sounds was no runaway success like the previous albums of the Beach Boys. A man as stubborn and strong as he was sensitive and vulnerable. He was ahead of his time. A maverick whose transgression of frontiers not only nearly robbed him of his reason but nearly cost him his life. “God Only Knows“ is one of his masterworks on this album.
There is a very marked kinship between what OUBEY working alone on his art expressed of the complexity and harmony of the universe in his multi-layered paintings and what Brian Wilson brought to fruition in his musical compositions and arrangement. Free spirits who understand, see and hear more in their own minds than all others, who are committed to bringing this to expression, in their own particular ways as best they can. People who encounter OUBEYs paintings often speak of tone paintings that they not only can see but hear. Perhaps these two men really are twins in the sense that Stanley Kubrick intended.
One year ago when I had the opportunity and the privilege of meeting Brian Wilson personally before his concert and exchanging a few insights and ideas with him, it became clear to me that there really was a special affinity at work here – through me travelling back to OUBEY. And I also know that Brian Wilson recognized this affinity at that moment. It was a hallowed moment for which I shall always be grateful. In the concert that followed, together with the ten exceptional musicians and singers who accompanied him, he succeeded in delivering a live performance of the entire Pet Sounds album that was every bit as good as the original technology-assisted studio recording.
PS: At the end of last year when I was searching around for a totally new concept for the internet launch of the MINDKISS Project, I had a particular “harmonic triad” very much in mind. To show the others in the team what I had in mind and what my general idea was, I used two videos which documented how the song “Good Vibrations” came to be written and produced – a track that narrowly missed being included in the Pet Sounds album but which turned out to be a smash hit.
My analogy went like this: OUBEYs artwork gives the base tone, the core and the basic rhythm. Over this comes the filigree instrumental sounds and harmonies of the MINDKISS Project. And finally we now can hear, for the first time in many years, the polyphonic sound of human voices, my own included. To my great joy everybody immediately understood what I was talking about.
If you would like to follow the story of how “Good Vibrations” came to be created in these two documentary videos, here are the links:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVlSVkzbJDA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QVwVURYxu8w
For animals of the first generation, brought in from the wild to one of this world’s zoos, the loss of their liberty must surely have been a dreadful thing to bear. Yet even animals of the second and third generations who were born in zoos still carry within them this gene of liberty.
The gene of liberty is not exclusive to wild animals. OUBEYs art too, in a certain manner, also bears its imprint.
Not a circus
OUBEYs pictures are expressions of his indomitable free spirit. Unimpressed and unmoved by the rules of the art market, he only ever did what seemed important to him and right so that in a figurative sense you can say that this free spirit lives on in his paintings. And when I was wondering what would be the best way bring OUBEYs paintings to public attention after his early death, one thing became evident very quickly – that they had no place in the circus of the art world. Their proper place was much more “out in the wild” where they could enjoy the kind of freedom that was their birth right and display themselves in public free of and unrestrained by all the common modes of perception. This is why I brought the paintings to settings where art is not usually found – like an international management conference.
Museum or cloakroom
The annual conference of the Peter Drucker Society in Vienna examines social and economic issues of management. Art is not usually high on its agenda. Yet when the president of the Society heard of my ENCOUNTER Tour, he suggested that OUBEYs art should be shown at the next conference focussed on “Managing Complexity” – in a context lightyears away from any museum, and stripped of any kind of explanation or even explicit reference to the paintings. In other words, a context where they could be discovered and explored in a kind of natural “out in the wild” habitat. The topic chosen for the conference was a happy chance because “complexity” is of central importance to OUBEYs art. I gladly accepted his offer. And so in November 2013 two of his paintings were suspended in the space between two giant classical pillars while four other paintings found their place in a narrow corridor on the aluminium doors of cloakroom lockers. What do you think happened?
Managers and art = a strong force of attraction
At first all the people at the conference were largely involved in discussing the concerns that had led them to the conference in the first place. However, the conference covered two and a half days and, gradually, without any prompting, more and more people appeared in the corridor where the pictures were hung to look at them, put on the headphones and watched the Encounter Videos. Even though no effort was made to attract visitors, the level of interest steadily rose – as did the readiness to encounter a previously unknown painting in front of running cameras. Such Open Encounters are an integral part of each stopover of the Global Encounter Tour and are especially fascinating. By the end of the conference in Vienna there was such a queue of people waiting to take part in an Open Encounter that we had to organise an extra shift. Who knows what would have happened on a third day …
Free and without pre-conceptions or favour
This extraordinary opening was also an opportunity for me to see what a strong appeal OUBEYs art held for these people. This really impressed me and also reassured me that my decision to show his art “out in the wild” had been the correct one. Because even if museums do play a major role in ensuring the conservation and accessibility of art and display art in optimal settings, it’s still a marvellous opportunity to experience art finally freed of this context in the setting of a cloakroom corridor where you can view it close-up and directly and form your own personal opinion.
A blend of cinema and art
Such a novel exhibition concept is undoubtedly geared to the ways of perception now common to our media-driven age. To claim that museums and other exhibition centres must move with the times and walk the cutting edge might just sound like blatant opportunism. And yet there’s a grain of truth to it. To ward off the spectre of dwindling numbers of visitors to museums, operators and curators need to think afresh and open up to new ideas. Obviously, as critics quite rightly say, a video projection can never hope to reach the quality of the original work. After all, this is why I travelled with OUBEYs original works to encounter people across the whole world, not with video projections of these paintings.
However, the exhibition in the Alte Münze certainly wasn’t seeking to offer some sort of second-rate substitute to an encounter with the original works. What they were rather intending to do was to use simple and relatively inexpensive means to gather the works of all these great artists together in one spot and present them in an unusual and highly entertaining manner. Cinema and art mix and mingle to create an unprecedented viewing experience in which static paintings begin to move. The accompanying music soundtrack was certainly an integral part of the presentation even though at times I found it an unnecessary distraction to the actual viewing experience.
Even so, the other people in the room were obviously taking immense pleasure in this show. They let the whole thing simply flow over them – nobody asked for explanations and nobody gave them.
Analogue and digital worlds in playful interaction
I was particularly surprised at the large numbers of young people there whom you wouldn’t normally rate as enthusiastic visitors to art exhibitions. They spread themselves out on the large beanbags in the middle of the room, lay back and watched the play of colours across the walls, occasionally passing whispered comments to one another which nobody minded at all. Had this exhibition concept perhaps found a way to make the art of the past 150 years appealing to today’s young generation?
The grown-ups too were obviously enjoying this relaxed unconstrained atmosphere and kept changing their places to get a fresh angle on the art on the walls. What the whole show might have lacked in deeper intellectual substance, it more than made up for in the immediate sensuality of pure enjoyment.
When classical painting from the analogue world can be transferred to the digital world in such a spectacularly successful manner, then seriousness and entertainment no longer stand in contradiction but embrace and complement each other. And when such an approach leads to more people finding interest and taking pleasure in art then the venture has certainly fulfilled its purpose. At the end of the day the way will always lead back to the original works and this, I think, is just as it should be.
So when I was faced with the task of bringing his hitherto unknown legacy into the light of public attention, I was faced with rather a sticky situation because on the one hand I certainly didn’t want to fall into the role of becoming the one who – because of having some privileged access to his art – awakening the impression that I held the right keys to its interpretation. Yet on the other hand, naturally, I wanted to act in a way that OUBEY would have approved of and I wanted to remain faithful to his spirit. In short, I wasn’t the slightest interested in furnishing explanations. What did keenly interest me though was how I could succeed in placing his pictures in a high-quality process of discovery from a manifold variety of alluring perspectives. Would the opinions held by an art expert or another artist be conducive to such a process?
My considered response to this question is NO! What I did do was to travel with his paintings to meet people whose professional lives were concerned with dealing with much the same themes and issues as OUBEY: astronomers, astrophysicists, biologists, mathematicians, quantum and complexity researchers, musicians, philosophers, and composers. Throughout his life OUBEY had always engaged with the findings of these disciplines on a very high level. And as these encounters progressed I came to realize how right I had been in my decision to take this particular course.
An unfiltered experience of art
“I have to warn you. I know absolutely nothing about art” – this was often the first thing people said as they prepared themselves to encounter an unknown work of OUBEYs in front of a running camera. And in each and every case my honest answer was always the same, “That’s great. This is exactly the reason why I’m with you here today with this painting.”
“The sense of immediacy is the decisive factor for my paintings“ OUBEY once said. Immediacy springs from the direct unfiltered emotional encounter between the painting and its viewer. This is exactly the hallmark of the “Encounters“ with OUBEY, that can be seen online as a video documentary. They show an exceptionally broad and enormously variegated spectrum of insightful and spontaneous resonance – free of any of the claims and pretensions of art expertise.
Music has a different way of working
When we talk about art, we mainly think of painting. However, let’s think about music, for instance, and the myriad possibilities people now have of listening to music whenever they want and as often as they want. This doesn’t work with painting. I can certainly look at paintings in my home or online or as illustrations in a book on art – yet it’s pretty difficult for me to do so whilst riding a bike or walking or taking part in some other activity, all of which are situations where it’s perfectly possible to listen to music.
Music reaches people in a much more direct and simple way than any other form of art. This doesn’t just apply to music delivered by media: live concerts have their own particular quality and emotional dynamics which are worlds apart from those of an art exhibition. Yet the music business too naturally has the filter function of expertise which is similar to the art expertise of art experts in galleries or on the art market.
Even so, ever since people have been able to post their own musical presentations online on YouTube, a type of freedom has been established, a type of democratization that was unknown just a few years back. Everybody can upload, everybody can download. Views, likes, shares and downloads are expressions of immediate reactions to things heard or seen by a broad worldwide audience.
Obviously you could now object that all this is nothing more than just “the tastes of the masses”. Yet you might do well to remind yourself that behind every single one of these reactions stands an individual who likes or doesn’t like what they hear or see. This is indeed not at all easy to transfer over to painting. Yet the experiences I have made so far in using the internet to broadcast OUBEYs art have only strengthened me in my resolve to continue using this exceptional and innovative conduit and to gradually broaden the resonance space thus created.
In art, emotion is a really good point of entry
Sure, it’s something fine and important when art experts voice their opinion on works of art. Yet it’s equally fine and important that you first form your own opinion. This makes it all the more interesting when you subsequently listen to what the experts have to say and can compare their opinion with your own. And often enough, we shouldn’t forget, different experts can have wildly differing opinions on the same art work.
This is why I find it good that people going to museums first take the time and freedom to contemplate the exhibits and then ask themselves “What kind of thoughts and feelings does this picture trigger in me? What do I personally read and see in this picture?” Because no matter what kind of intellectual considerations may play a role in such a process, it’s first and foremost always an emotional reaction that connects us to a work of art.