Februari 24, 2010

The Concept of Aesthetics in Art and Life

The previous concept of art was valued as stuffs of aesthetics which only showed gracious among the production of art itself. Beside that, the existence of art in the past was seen as something trashy. The famous philosophers, just called Plato, Aristotle, and Socrates, have quite similar perspective for the art conception. They stated that art-made was the imitation of the ‘nature’, and it’s not originally made by their pure instinct of human being. This notion will then emerge some figures who encountered against their perspectives toward art which see aesthetics value as their own taste and their own interpretation. In its development, art today is more than just a stuff of aesthetics that express every little thing in gracious or even beautiful ways, but all works of art, no matter it is about the madness of something, an evil side of human race or even the goodness of them, they will be always considered as the aesthetics part of art.

However, what I am going to explain deeper in this journal is that about my lecturer notion about aesthetics, “The aesthetics value should be taught since we were kids, and adult may not give a limitation to the growth of the kids. Let their expression through art grows freely”.

Well, what my lectures was trying to say is that, she tried to comparing the way kids express their self through art between American and Indonesian style. She said that kids in Indonesia are prone to be limited by some unwritten rules and any judgment in expressing art. We can make an example from the drawing point of view; kids will be set that the picture of scenery is always about the view of mountain, rice field and the road in the middle of it. However, kids are the phase of human’s life which is unshaped and still abstract in creativity. They will freely draw something beyond their own imagination, and without some regulations about how is the right one to draw something that could limit their freedom, but unfortunately she said, Indonesian people tend to give the limit to kids in expressing their imagination by giving the correct information what the drawing should be. For instance, kids draw the sun under the mountain meanwhile the correct place for it is on the sky. If we people find out the case like this, we will directly tell the correct place where the sun should be placed to our kids. Furthermore, in contrast, American people are freely let the kids make anything based on their imagination, no matter it is right or wrong, kids won’t be judged and limited, but they will get praise for their works. The differences have shaped people among these two countries far different. My lecturer said that it will be better if Indonesian people could imitate American style in giving a freedom of expressing. Actually, I disagree with her opinion about it. In my point of view, Indonesia and America stand as two different countries with different historical and cultural background. We cannot easily implement American style into Indonesian people because it won’t be appropriate for us; moreover the mental of our people is different with them. Beside that, being a kid is the phase of personality-shaped of human’s life. The way how they will live in the future represents how their childhood is, so if since they were kids, they were given a freedom to do something that is not right, they will get accustomed with the mistakes without knowing the truth of it. Then, when they are getting older, and they have to be bounded by some rules, it will shocks them, and the worse is that they will try to ignore the rules and being so much rebel. This is what I am afraid of implementing American style in Indonesia because as the matter of facts, Indonesia is the country that is covered with lot of moral values that cannot be easily ignored or even let it away meanwhile America lives beyond the liberalism concept. Well, although, it starts from the simplest thing, which is art expression, but this is the starting point that will determine the other steps of human’s phase of life. It’s better introduce the values and rules of life sooner rather than late because analogically, kids are just like a blank paper, and what is going to be written there is based on how we were shaped. This is why, when kids are getting older, they have already known which is right and wrong, and it will be their right to choose which ways they will take then.

Briefly, aesthetics is the value, whether it is in art point of view or our life, it is not as rigid as it was. Aesthetics value cannot be judged from one point of view, but it shows more than we know.