When the being is the-state-of-the-art
Whosoever paints, writes,
sings, dances, works in the field of science or mathematics may be a painter,
writer, singer or dancer, a scientist or a mathematician but may not
essentially be an artist. On the other
hand, one who doesn’t do any of the mentioned things may very well be an
artist. Actually what it takes to be an artist is difficult to define.
Occupation is not a determiner in this case.
Perhaps it is the attitude
towards life with its tidbits, its good and bad, negatives and positives, its
turn and twists, tears and joy, success and failures which distinguish an
artist. Art concerns the entirety of life and also its breakups. To me, Jesus,
Buddha, Sri Ramakrishna were artists followed by, say a rag-picker in a
dilapidated slum who could not give any material help to his ailing neighbor
but ran up to the church, temple or mosque and sat there the whole day and
night praying for the sick who may have been a habitual critic of the
rag-picker all his life. Isn’t the poor soul an artist?
Nothing, none is perfect
in this world. It’s a misnomer. An artist is an artist for he never spends time
in pursuit of perfection. Rather he only does his job but with total, truthful
sincerity, absolute attention and employs his best common sense and peripheral
knowledge he has acquired from life. Even if he doesn’t find the thing
interesting yet he submits to the work like a hungry man submits himself to the
job of eating whatever he is given to eat. The hunger for action, an action
that is an add-on to the life and its continuation, is a profile of an artist.
An artist transcends
himself and reaches a state of creativity in thoughts and practice, in approach
and habit, in deliverance or even non-deliverance. Didn’t the rag-picker
transcend? Apparently he may not have delivered anything perceptible to senses
but what about the vibrations his prayer created? That is where he performed
like an artist. Creating vibes for life is another profile of artist.
Someone is listening to
Mozart or Michael Jackson, Pandit Bhimsen Joshi or Pandit Ravi Shankar or any other of
their likes and for that moment has forgotten the world. Someone is witnessing,
say a Husain or a Picasso and has forgotten to respond to the urgent call of
nature. Someone is praying with tears rolling down his cheeks and never knows a
snake has climbed up to his shoulder and gone down the other side. All these
three are artists.
One who loses one’s own
self even for a brief while to a work of art including a scientific or
technological marvel is for that brief period of time an artist. He necessarily
is the closet relation of the tribe of artists who have lost themselves in what
they create and what were created by the predecessors. That is what is called
enlivening the-state-of-art.
