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TABLE OF CONTENTS
PLAGIARISM............................................................................................................... i
ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................. ii
ÖZET ........................................................................................................................... iv
ACKNOWLEDGMENT ............................................................................................ vi
TABLE OF CONTENTS ........................................................................................ viii
LIST OF FIGURES .................................................................................................. xii
LIST OF TABLES .................................................................................................... xix
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ................................................................................... xx
1.INTRODUCTION..................................................................................................... 1
2.ARTS AND HEALTH .............................................................................................. 7
2.1.History of Arts and Health .................................. 9
2.1.1. Healer Cultures .......................................................................................... 11
2.1.2. Paleolithic Period ....................................................................................... 17
2.1.3. Antic Civilizations ..................................................................................... 21
2.1.3.i. Egyptian Civilization ........................................................................... 21
2.1.3.ii. Greek Civilization ............................................................................... 25
2.1.3.iii. Roman Civilization ............................................................................ 30
2.1.3.iv. Far Eastern Belief Systems and Arts ................................................. 31
2.1.4. Middle Ages ............................................................................................... 37
2.1.4.i. Islamic Golden Ages, 11-13th Centuries ............................................. 37
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2.1.4.ii. Arts and Health in Anatolian Seljuks ................................................. 48
2.1.4.iii. Arts and Health in Europe ................................................................. 60
2.1.5. Renaissance Period 15th- 16th Century ..................................................... 69
2.1.5.i. Arts and Health in Europe ................................................................... 69
2.1.5. ii. Arts and Health in Ottoman Empire .................................................. 76
2.1.6. From the Age of Enlightenment to the Beginning of XXth Century ......... 89
2.2.Selected Artists Inspired from Healer Cultures and New Age Belief Systems ......................................... 95
2.3.The Benefits of Arts to Individual Healing .......... 126
2.3.1.Arts and Psychological Healing ................................................................ 127
2.3.1.i. Mandalas and Myths .......................................................................... 128
2.3.1. ii. Gestalt Theory ................................................................................. 129
2.3.1.iii. Person Centered Therapy, Carl Rogers ........................................... 130
2.3.1.iv. Emptiness, Loneliness, Anxiety....................................................... 132
2.3.1.v. Psycho-neuro Immunology, Robert Ader, Nicholas Cohen ............. 138
2.3.2. Arts and Physiological Healing ................................................................ 140
2.3.3. Arts and Mental Healing .......................................................................... 145
2.3.3.i. The Psychology of Optimum Experience .......................................... 145
2.3.3.ii Relaxation Response .......................................................................... 154
2.3.3.iii. Mindfullness Based Cognitive Therapy .......................................... 157
2.4.Selected Contemporary Researches on Arts and Health ………………………………………………………………163
2.4.1. The Connection Between Arts, Healing and Public Health: A Review of Current Literature (NCBI) 2010 ....................................................................... 165
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2.4.2. How Arts Change Your Brain: Differential Effects of Visual Art Production & Cognitive Art Evaluation (NCBI) Anne Baldwirk, Jessica Mack-Andrick, Christian Maihöfner, Nurenberg National Museum, Nürenberg, Erlangen University, Erlangen, 2011 ................................................................................ 167
2.4.3 What is The Evidences on The Role of The Arts in Improving Health and Well – Being? A Scoping Review. 2011-2019 (Researchgate) Daisy Fancourt, Saoirse Finn, University College London .......................................................... 170
2.4.4. Effect of clay art therapy on quality of life and depression symptoms in patients with chronic neurological disorders, April, 2018 (Morressier) ............ 175
3. PARTICIPATORY ARTS .................................................................................. 177
3.1.Definition of Participatory Art ......................... 177
3.2.Historical Development of Participatory Art ........ 183
3.2.1.Dada Movement (1913-1923) ................................................................... 183
3.2.2.Happenings ............................................................................................... 196
3.2.3.Conceptual Art .......................................................................................... 215
3.2.4. Fluxus ....................................................................................................... 219
3.2.5.Selected Contemporary Art Works ........................................................... 241
3.2.6 Media Art .................................................................................................. 251
3.3.Participatory Art Practices Implied By The Writer 257
3.3.1 İstanbul 2010 European Capital of Culture Project, Boğaziçi University BUPERC“Sculpture Workshop and Peace Education” ..................................... 257
3.3.2. Taksim Gaziosmanpaşa Education and Research Hospital 2017 ............ 260
3.3.3. A Participatory Art Practice, EKAV Arts Gallery,2020 ......................... 263
CONCLUSION ........................................................................................................ 266
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BIBLIOGRAPHY .................................................................................................... 270
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LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1 .Senufo mask, Kpeliye’e, Ivory Coast, Africa............................................... 12
Figure 2. Healing Wheel, Native American, North America ..................................... 13
Figure 3. Sand Painting Ritual, Navajo Tribe .............................................................. 14
Figure 4 .Shaman Gown and Drum, Middle Asia ....................................................... 16
Figure 5. Cave Painting, Las Geel ............................................................................... 18
Figure 6 .Wall Paintings, Çatalhöyük, Turkey ............................................................ 18
Figure 7 .Wall Paintings, Ubirr, North Australia ......................................................... 19
Figure 8. God Anubis watching the heart of a dead person to be weighed, God Thoth registers ........................................................................................................................ 22
Figure 9 .The Eye Of Horus ......................................................................................... 24
Figure 10 .Guardian Figures on Wangs ....................................................................... 24
Figure 11. Asklepios and his daughter Hygieia, Archeological Museum, Istanbul .... 26
Figure 12 .Dioskorides, De Materia Medica ................................................................ 29
Figure 13. Bhaishajyaguru, Medicine Budha, Zhu Haogu, XVth century .................. 31
Figure 14.Lotus Sutra, Parable of The Medicinal Herbs, 12th Century ...................... 32
Figure 15. Traditional Chinese Medicinal Practice ..................................................... 33
Figure 16. Instructions for feeling the pulse ................................................................ 33
Figure 17. Eight Trigram ............................................................................................. 34
Figure 18. Hexagram ................................................................................................... 34
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Figure 19. Enso Paintings, Japan ................................................................................. 36
Figure 20. Mudras, 11-12th Century, Japan ................................................................ 36
Figure 21. Avicenna, Canon,book cover no:5 ............................................................ 39
Figure 22. Avicenna, Canon of Medicine, Aga Khan Museum Collection, Canada ... 39
Figure 23. Melancholy treatment, Ibn-i Sina, Islamic Hand Writings Museum, İstanbul...................................................................................................................................... 41
Figure 24. Ibn-i Sina, Topkapı Palace, Treasure Collection, İstanbul ........................ 42
Figure 25. Kitab-Al Diryaq, Al-Fath, Metropolitan Museum, NY, USA .................... 42
Figure 26. Kitab-Al Diryaq, Al-Fath, Metropolitan Museum collection, NY, USA ... 43
Figure 27. De Materia Medica, Dioscorides, 1229, Topkapı Palace Library, İstanbul44
Figure 28. De matteria Medica, Potion preparing doctor. ........................................... 45
Figure 29. De Materia Medica, Preparing medicine from honey, Bagdat, 1224 ......... 45
Figure 30. Doctor Bereket examining Sultan Melikshah, Topkapı Palace, Treasures Collection ..................................................................................................................... 47
Figure 31. Gevher Nesibe Hospital, Kayseri, Turkey .................................................. 49
Figure 32. İzzettin Keykavus Hospital, Sivas, Turkey ................................................ 50
Figure 33. Sivas Ulu Mosque and Hospital 1228-29 ................................................... 51
Figure 34. Medicine Symbol, Snake, Anatolian Seljuks ............................................. 52
Figure 35. Contemporary Turkish Medicine Logo ...................................................... 53
Figure 36. Mewlana Celaleddin Rumi, whirling (Sevakıb-I Menakıb, TSM R.1479) 57
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Figure 37. M. Celaleddin Rumi, whirling with the rhythmic sound of the goldbeater's hammer ........................................................................................................................ 58
Figure 38. Eibingen Monastry, Hesse, Germany ......................................................... 61
Figure 39. Scivias, Cosmos and Humanity, Part 1, Vision 3 ....................................... 63
Figure 40 Scivias, Choros of Angels, Part 1, Vision 6 ................................................ 64
Figure 41. Ibn-i Sina, Canon of Medicine, translated in Latin 15th century ............... 65
Figure 42 Ibn-i Sina, Canon of Medicine, Translated in Hebrew, 15th century .......... 65
Figure 43 Coton MS Vitellius C III, f. 27r Colored drawings of herbs,11th Century . 66
Figure 44. Tourneu City Citizens Burying Dead,, Pierart Dou Tielt, 1353 ................. 67
Figure 45. Giacomo Borlone de Burchis, Oratorio del Disciplini Frescos, Clusone, Italy...................................................................................................................................... 68
Figure 46. Pieter Bruegel the Elder, The Triumph of Death, 1632, Prado Museum, Madrid .......................................................................................................................... 69
Figure 47. Vitruvius Man ............................................................................................. 72
Figure 48. Leonardo Da Vinci, Skull Drawings .......................................................... 74
Figure 49. Leonardo da Vinci, Anatomical drawings .................................................. 75
Figure 50. Rembrandt, Anatomy lesson of Dr Nicholas Tulp, 1632 ........................... 76
Figure 51. Cerrahhiyyetü’l Haniyye II.Volume facsimile ........................................... 79
Figure 52. The doctor controlling the patient’s tongue, Cerrahhiyet-ül Haniyye ........ 80
Figure 53. Cerrahhiyetü-l Hanniyye, Şerefeddin Sabuncuoğlu ................................... 81
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Figure 54. II. Beyazıt Complex, Edirne, Turkey ......................................................... 82
Figure 55. Hipokrat and Simurg, Falname, Topkapı Palace Museum, H.1703 ........... 85
Figure 56. Vazir-i Azam, learning about the health status of the princes from the head of surgeons in front of the mansion, Surname, Levni .................................................. 86
Figure 57. Whirling Derwishes at Galata Mevlevihanesi (Tek minyatür, Philedelphia Freer Library) ............................................................................................................... 88
Figure 58. Doctor’s Consulting Room, 17th Century, Süheyl Ünver .......................... 95
Figure 59. Kandinsky, “Little Pleasures, 1911”, Guggenheim Museumi .................... 97
Figure 60. Kandinsky “Composition 8”, 1923, Guggenheim Museum ....................... 98
Figure 61. Composition IV, Theo Van Doesburg, 1917 each 286.5x56.6cm .............. 99
Figure 62. Evolution, Mondrian, 1911, MOMA ........................................................ 100
Figure 63. Key to The Meaning of the Colors, Mme Blavatsky................................ 101
Figure 64. Yellow, Red, Blue Composition, Piet Mondrian, 1937-42 ...................... 102
Figure 65. The Black Square, Kazimir Malevich, 1913 ............................................ 103
Figure 66. Broken Obelisk, Barnett Newman, 1970 .................................................. 104
Figure 67. Mark Rothko,14 Black Paintings, 1964-67 .............................................. 105
Figure 68. Gurdjieff Movements ............................................................................... 107
Figure 69. Guggenheim Museum, NY, USA ............................................................. 109
Figure 70. Guggenheim Museum, Main Hall, NY, USA .......................................... 109
Figure 71. Goetheanum, Dornach, Basel, Switzerland .............................................. 111
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Figure 72. Eurorhythm, Rudolph Steiner, Goetheanum, Dornach, Basel, Switzerland.................................................................................................................................... 113
Figure 73. Joseph Beuys, Chief, Fluxus Song, 1964, Berlin ..................................... 115
Figure 74. Joseph Beuys, How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare, 1965 ................ 116
Figure 75. Coyote, I Love America, America Loves Me, 1974 ................................ 117
Figure 76. VITRIOL, Seven Stages of Alchemy ....................................................... 120
Figure 77. John Cage 4’:33” Concert Poster ............................................................ 123
Figure 78. Etching, John Cage ................................................................................... 123
Figure 79. Etching, John Cage ................................................................................... 124
Figure 80. Etching, John Cage ................................................................................... 125
Figure 81. Carl Jung, First Mandala, “Systema Mundi Totius, 1916” ...................... 129
Figure 82. Berlin Dada, International DADA Art Show, 1920 ................................. 186
Figure 83. Great DADA Season, Saint Julien le Pouvre Church, April, 1921 .......... 189
Figure 84. Kurt Schwitters, Merzbau, 1933 ............................................................... 191
Figure 85. Life in Bauhaus, 1928, Anni Albers, woven studio ................................. 195
Figure 86. Turkish Village Institutes, Farming Course ............................................. 199
Figure 87. Village Institute, String Courses............................................................... 201
Figure 88. Village Institute, Beekeeping Courses ..................................................... 203
Figure 89“Anonymous” Activity Plan, Black Mountain College, 1952 ................... 205
Figure 90. National Arts Foundation Gallery, Washington DC.,John Cage 1966..... 206
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Figure 91. Fluids, Allan Kaprow, 1967 ..................................................................... 210
Figure 92. Lgyia Clark “Air and Stone” 1966 MOMA ............................................. 224
Figure 93. Lgyia Clark, “Breathe With Me”, 1966, MOMA ..................................... 225
Figure 94.Helio Oiticica, TATE, Parangoles Exhibition Opening ........................... 227
Figure 95.Helio Oiticica, Tropicalia Exhibition, TATE ............................................ 229
Figure 96. Joseph Beuys, planting the first oak tree, 7000 Oaks ............................... 232
Figure 97. 7000 Oaks, Joseph Beuys, Kassel, Documenta VII, 1982 ....................... 234
Figure 98. Wish Tree,Yoko Ono, 1996, Maalba, Buonos Aires ................................ 235
Figure 99. Gülbahar Karaduman, Memory Tree, Sinopale 2, 2008 .......................... 240
Figure 100. Beste Durmuş, “The Hatred of Sinop”, Sinopale II, 2008 ..................... 240
Figure 101.Rirkrit Tiravanija “Cooking and Drawing” ART BASEL 2011 ............. 244
Figure 102. Rirkrit Travanija, Cooking and Drawing” ART BASEL 2011 .............. 245
Figure 103.Thomas Hischhorn, Flamme Eternelle, Palais de Tokyo, 2011 .............. 247
Figure 104. Guerilla Girls, Complaint Department 2016, TATE Museum, London,England ......................................................................................................... 249
Figure 105.Jennifer Allora, Guellimo Calzadilla, “Chalk”, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis,2019....................................................................................................... 250
Figure 106. Jennifer Allora & Guellimo Calzadilla, “Chalk”, Los Caudillos Meydanı, 2016............................................................................................................................ 250
Figure 107. CALC and Johannes Gees, Communimage, 1994. . . ............................ 254
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Figure 108. Harrell Fletcher and Miranda July “Learning to Love You More”, 2002-2009............................................................................................................................ 255
Figure 109. Harrell Fletcher and Miranda July “Learning to Love You More”, 2002-2009............................................................................................................................ 256
Figure 110. Boğaziçi University, BEUAM sculpture workshop, Fall Term 2010 .... 259
Figure 111. Boğaziçi University, BEUAM sculpture workshop the last meeting ..... 260
Figure 112. Taksim Gaziosmanpaşa Research and ve Education Hospital, July, 2017.................................................................................................................................... 261
Figure 113. Dried, hardened, colored clay figure ...................................................... 261
Figure 114. Sculpture and Photography Exhibition, Poster 2017 .............................. 263
Figure 115. EKAV Arts Gallery, Mindful Walking Meditation, 20.02.2020 ............ 264
Figure 116. EKAV Arts Gallery, (The Writers Collection) ....................................... 265
Figure 117. EKAV Arts Gallery Invitation Poster (EKAV Arts Gallery Archive) ... 265
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LIST OF TABLES
Table 1. Details of Visual Art Studies Reviewed ..................................................... 166
Table 2. fMRI Covariant analysis ............................................................................. 168
Table 3. fMRI fuctional connectivity, visual productivity group ............................. 169
Table 4. Psychological Resilience ............................................................................ 170
Table 5. Arts and Health ........................................................................................... 171
Table 6. Beck Depression and SF36 chart ................................................................ 176
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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
USA: United States of America
BUPERC: Boğaziçi University Peace Education and Research Center
BMC: Black Mountain College
EKAV: Eğitim Kültür Araştırma Vakfı (Education Culture Research Foundation)
FMRI: Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging
LP: Long Play
MOMA: Museum of Modern Art
SI: Situationist International
SEM: Standart Error of Measurement
TİEM: (Türk İslam Eserleri Müzesi) Turkish Islamic Museum
TSM: (Topkapı Sarayı Müzesi) Topkapı Palace Museum
WHO: World Health Organisation
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1. INTRODUCTION
Herbert Read in his book Art and Society defines the universal and eternally existing art as the most distinctive form of expression that humanity has reached, and emphasizes that art is a mode of knowledge. He states that the world of art is a system of knowledge as valuable to humanity as the world of philosophy or science. (Read, Sanat ve Toplum, 2018, p. 26)
Throughout the history of civilization, despite the constantly changing cultures, the characteristics that determine the existence of human beings are constant. The most important of these may be summarized as the instinct of survival, the instinct of escaping and avoiding pain, and the pursuit of well-being and happiness.
“But art in the strict sense begins with definition - with the passage from vagueness to outline.” (Read, Sanatin Anlami, 2014, s. 25)
Herbert Read, in his The Meaning of Art, expresses the effect of art on people as follows; “When, therefore, he creates a work of art, as an act of magic propitiation, he escapes from the otherwise prevailing arbitrariness of his existence, and creates what is for him a visible expression of the absolute. For a moment he has arrested the flux of existence and has made a solid and stable object; out of time he has created space, and he has defined this space with an outline, and under the stress of his emotion this outline has taken on an expressive shape; has become an order, a unity, a formal equivalent to his emotion.” (Read, Sanatın Anlamı, 2014, p. 38) Furthermore, Read states that art evolves in parallel with man’s emotional attitude towards the universe. (Read, Sanatın Anlamı, 2014, p. 39)
According to the definition of World Health Organization, health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of any disease or infirmity. In this frame, the healing power of art, known throughout history, combined
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with modern technology, led to the formation of new contemporary interdisciplinary fields and brought new responsibilities to sociologists, psychologists, neuro-immunologists as well as artists.
It is a fact that, in many countries, inter-disciplinary arts in medicine practices are placed systematically in health institutions for the benefit of the patients. This thesis will examine whether participatory art practices improve the health of the participant's body, mind, and emotional states where the efforts to bring art to life are most evident. Furthermore, it aimed to focus on the effects of arts in protecting individual health and wellbeing by stating the findings from the selected research samples.
The second chapter of the thesis investigates how art and health coexist, with the examples of the periods when religion was dominant in healing cultures throughout human history, with examples from Anatolia and the Ottoman Empire period starting with the Islamic Golden Age, and with the examples of the works of artists of the early 20th century inspired by esoteric societies. It tries to reveal how important multidisciplinary art works are for human health.
In addition to the social, economic, and political changes at the beginning of the 20th century, developing a modern oculist mentality, putting forward brand new arguments for the spirituality, with its holistic approach by blending Eastern and Western theological and esoteric knowledge affected public and also appealed to the well-known artists of the period. The Spiritual leaders, Mme Blavatsky, George Ivanovich Gurdjieff, and Rudolph Steiner come to the fore with their influence on Kandinsky, Arnold Schoenberg, Mondrian, Theo van Doesburg, Luigi Russolo, Mark Rothko, Bennett Newman, Joseph Beuys, and John Cage and many others.
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Kandinsky, in his book On Spiritual in Art, says that Art is the harmony of the whole.
When the continuity of art practices is ensured, its positive effects on physical, emotional and mental health have been demonstrated by scientific research of the recent years. Art and art applications, for every stage of human life from the young ages to the old are the main factors that strengthen the immune system, improve the quality of life and distract the individual from stress-based anxiety.
The third part of the second chapter examines the psychological, physiological, and mental health benefits of art. The creation process helps to establish the harmony of spirit, body and mind, and the general well-being of individuals, as well as social and environmental health, and for this purpose it is health protective. Moreover, art is used as a positive factor in healing during the convalescence period and treatment processes in health institutions.
Research of the twenty-first century have discovered that the brain changes developmentally not only in the first years of life, but also in adulthood when faced with different situations caused by environmental influences, behaviors, thoughts, emotions and meditations, and the change continues throughout life. The brain’s ability to adapt, the ability of its cells to change, is called neuroplasticity. Especially with the ability to see how the brain works in real time thanks to the advanced imaging technology and to visualize the complex connections between different brain regions that tell us how we think and behave, it is demonstrated by the results of neuroplasticity studies that this change has important effects on healthy development, learning, memory, and repair of brain damage. It was demonstrated by the findings obtained through the joint studies of art and neuroplasticity researchers that art applications are extremely beneficial for physical, psychological, and mental health. The second chapter presents four research summaries on the benefits of art to recovery today.
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The third chapter includes examples of artists and art movements focused on the historical formation of Participatory Art and the healing of art. The physical, emotional and mental benefits of the individual’s participation in art, especially by actively participating in social, community-based, participatory art practices, as well as the fact that it replicates the sense of unity, increases communication skills, and therefore has positive effects on language and memory development due to thought development and, depending on the development of thought, in the development of language and memory and formed the basis of this thesis for the examination of individual improvement in participatory art. Participatory Art, which is one of the types of contemporary art, mainly puts the participant at the forefront in the creative process. It is one of the self-liberation practices of creative art. In the creative process, the artist gives clues about the subject he plans to create with the participant and leaves the creation to the participant’s interpretation, making the viewer an art producer in a way. What the result will be is determined by the flow of the process and continues to form like a growing avalanche without being fully formed until the final production moment.
In this process, almost all authority is transferred to the participant, and the work produced is under the responsibility of the participant. The artist manipulates the sensory encounter of the participant in the creation process and facilitates the association of their creations with the message they want to convey by connecting with their emotions. The artist often leaves control of the creation to the participant. It allows the creation formed by the experience of the participant to become the object or even the subject of the work occurring at that moment. In this respect, the Participatory Art artist is in the position of coordinating and organizing the project.
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In Participatory Art; There are interdisciplinary formations such as audience presentation relationship, ready space, sound, music, fragrance use, and cooperation of the visual art and stage art. These works represent intangible experiences without physical presence.
The aesthetics of Participatory Art is revealed by the suitability of the individual and/or the community with the work of art formed through causal and relational experiences. As well as individual aspect, the sociological and political aspects of Participatory Art are inseparable elements. In any case, physical participation is a basic prerequisite. Participatory Art requires individuals and a group that are willing to actively participate, and necessarily be there at that specific moment. In order to ensure the activity, happen with sincerity and openness, a participation-oriented, participation-conscious participant is required. For the most part, in participatory art practices, there is no audience or observer. In the process, everyone works by sharing the same purpose at the same time. It contains pleasurable experiences as well as allowing the revelation of disturbing ones. Claire Bishop (2018), in p.305, says that a mediator is needed to unlock this potential, which could be an image, object, story or even a show. Collaborative creativity in participatory art develops from a non-hierarchical, more positive social model, as well as being riskier and more unpredictable in terms of aesthetic benefit. These art practices are in no way capable of repetition, correction or rehearsal and create a space of participation as an extension of social consciousness. It demands active and continuous participation from the non-artist group in the construction of a new relationship act. The manipulation and control of the individual who participates without knowing exactly what he will encounter and how the experience will result, by the users of the study, and the formation of different collective consciousness throughout the process contains communicativeness.
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Participatory Art includes crisis and collective responsibilities perceived in society. Thus, it restores the social bond through the collective care attributed to meaning. The part that embraces collective creativity and relinquishes authority is constructive and curative. (Bishop C. , Participation, 2006, p. 11) One of the main characters of Participatory Art, perhaps the most important, is the desire to be actively part of a larger whole. The main force behind it is the collective care given to meaning and the restoration and strengthening of the social bond through it.
The last part of the third chapter includes the participatory art practices of the author; the applications that he exemplified in three different fields, namely university, hospital, and gallery. To bring art into life is necessary for individual health and social welfare; art critic Claire Bishop writes in her book Artificial Hells that we need to be able to view art as a form of experimental activities that overlap with the world. (Bishop, Claire, Yapay Cehennemler, 2018, p. 304)
This thesis draws the outline and the definition of participatory art and its historical and theoritical development and scans the research on its benefits for individual healing. In addition it gives examples from participatory art installations, exhibitions and practices that individual healing involved. The main questions are; what is the primary aim of participatory arts? and Is participatory art beneficial for individual healing?
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2. ARTS AND HEALTH
According to the definition of the World Health Organization, health is a state of complete physical mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease and infirmity. In this context, the healing power of art, known throughout history, combines with today’s modern technology to create new contemporary interdisciplinary spaces and bring new responsibilities to sociologists, psychologists, neuro-immunologists as well as artists.
“The suffering caused by pain on our body and our desire to get rid of it make us feel the need for the existence of the phenomenon of “medicine”. Medicine is as much a struggle to relieve pain and suffering as it is lifesaving. This phenomenon can be created by our instinctive action as living creatures. An action, behavior, or orientation that ends or reduces pain is instinctive expression for it is spontaneous. In other words, in the presence of such a phenomenon, we witness the existence of an instinctive medical action. Since the model of instinctive behavior takes us away from pain, it becomes clear that we are facing a medical aid event, regardless of the point of origin. This medical aid is an aid that can be realized by the human being himself with our biological instincts”. (Aydın E. , Dünya ve Türk Tıp Tarihi, 2006, p. 5)
The most apparent and instinctive behavior type known can be cited as the efforts of mothers to feed and protect their children from ensuring the existence and continuity of humankind on earth. Instinctive, empirical, magical, philosophical, and scientific phases of medicine are the phases that developed in parallel with the history of humanity. These phases have emerged in history as transformations that complement each other and added to each other. Today, it is possible to find applications of all these phases in different layers of society. “Instinctive medicine exists in every human being as well as in every living being, empirical practices still exist, and many people
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continue to believe in magical medicine and similar practices whether we like it or not.” (Aydın E. , Dünya ve Türk Tıp Tarihi, 2006, p. 2)
Since the beginning of human history, art and creativity have been used in different disciplines, in the daily lives of civilizations, to depict experiences, overcome the fear of nature, reach the divine, and add meaning to life in general. It has taken its place as an inseparable part of rituals. Herbert Read, in his work Meaning of Art, expresses the effect of art on people as follows; “When, therefore, he creates a work of art, as an act of magic propitiation, he escapes from the otherwise prevailing arbitrariness of his existence, and creates what is for him a visible expression of the absolute. For a moment, he has arrested flux of existence and made a solid, stable object; out of time he has created space, and he has defined this space with an outline, and under the stress of his emotion, this outline has taken on an expressive shape; has become an order, a unity, a formal equivalent to his emotion.” (Read, Sanatin Anlami, 2014, s. 38) Furthermore, Read states that art evolves in parallel with man’s emotional attitude towards the universe. (Read, Sanatın Anlamı, 2014, p. 39)
“Art expands the psychological boundaries, has spiritual, physical and psychological benefits, enables different centers of the brain to work simultaneously, creates a bridge between the conscious and subconscious, increases consciousness, it is social, emphasizes cultural differences, takes part in rituals and cultural formation, bears the traces of social change.” (Demirok, Sağlık Sektöründe Sanatın Uygulamaları ve Faydaları, 2017, p. 6)
As there are radical artistic developments in the processes of radical social change, the pioneering, motivating, and activist attitude of art can easily be observed in the historical process as a part of reconstructions.
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2.1. History of Arts and Health
The chapter includes the periods the disciplines of art and health intersected in the historical process and some artists who lived in those periods and used the healing aspect of art. Art and health were inseparable elements of life in ancient civilizations and shamans. The health system that developed with the Seljuks in Anatolia experienced a very different dimension with the dervish lodge culture and the application of Islamic medicine. The miniatures left by the physicians for archiving purposes allowed us the opportunity to reach the real applications of the period with visual determinations.
In Medieval Europe, Hildegard von Bingen’s visions, compositions, and herbal treatment recipes expressed by mandalas are curative. During the Renaissance, the disciplines of art and health were enriched and convergent through the anatomical works of Leonardo da Vinci and his contemporaries.
In the five hundred years of the Ottoman Empire period, daruşsifa1 and dervish lodges had a special place in art and health practices. Starting from the time of the Anatolian Seljuks, an ongoing education and training system with the master-apprentice relationship reveals a health and education system that holistically approaches patients. The books, of Şerefeddin Sabuncuoğlu, the chief physician in Amasya Darussifası, including his miniatures, are the valuable findings from the 15th century.
At the beginning of the 20th century, one of the most valuable Turkish scientists and art persons who received his share of this holistic education was Professor Ordinarius Suheyl Ünver. He shed light on those periods with his researches and books on the history of medicine of the Anatolian Seljuks and the Ottoman Empire. In addition to his health studies, he taught Turkish miniature and decoration at the Academy of Fine
1 Means Hospital in Seljukian and Ottoman Turkish. Hereinafter referred to as “hospital.”
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Arts, re-established the five hundred years Topkapı Museum Nakkaşhane,2 and trained many students.
In the 18-19th century, the rapid change in the religion-oriented socio-cultural structure, the prominence of scientific discoveries and inventions, social modernization reflected on art, and a severe detailing, specialization, and breaking occurred in the disciplines of art and health along with technical innovations. In the late 19th century and early 20th century, the influence of esoteric and occult-based societies increased in Europe. Many artists were influenced by theosophy and inspired by abstract art, surrealism, Neoplasticism (De Stijl), occult and esoteric knowledge.
This chapter examines the Theosophical Society and its founder Mme Blavatsky, the founder of The Fourth Way doctrine Gurdjieff, the Anthroposophical Society and its founder Rudolph Steiner. The chapter includes the works of Kandinsky, Piet Mondrian, Malevich, Mark Rothko, and Barnett Newman, who has esoterism and occultism in their works. Constantine Brancusi, Marcel Duchamp, Picabia, and Man Ray attended the meetings of G. I. Gurdjieff, and the famous American architect Frank Lloyd Wright included theosophical and esoteric symbols in his architectural works.
On the other hand, Joseph Beuys was influenced by Goethe’s philosophy of natural science, and as a member of the Anthroposophical Society, he used certain esoteric symbols in his installations, performance art examples and ecological studies. The most important project he created as an example of environmental and remedial participatory art is the 7000 Oak Project (II.1.4). Another significant artist of the 20th century who produced interdisciplinary works is the American composer and artist John Cage, who participated in the meetings of the Theosophical Society, improved
2 Miniature atelier
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the eastern religions, lifestyle and art, and broke new ground with his compositions and original prints.
The first half of the 20th century witnessed radical innovations in health apart from the political, social, and industrial changes of the countries. The period, in which value judgments differed with the two world wars, religion became insignificant, and traditional social and political structures cracked, also hosted many scientific discoveries, such as Mme Curi’s radium, Albert Einstein’s concept of relativity, the quantum theory of light and the mass-energy connection. In psychology, the approaches that emphasized the importance of dreams and symbols in human psychology, such as neurologist Sigmund Freud’s theory of self and his colleague Carl Jung’s collective unconscious, subconscious and conscious, came to the fore.
These two theorists, who brought innovations to human psychology with their different analytical methods, profoundly influenced the field of psychology, and the whole 20th century thought, from art to education.
2.1.1. Healer Cultures
Imagination is the primary ability of the adventure of self-seeking, which distinguishes humans from other living things. Throughout the history of humanity, different disciplines of art used to cope with pain and to express joy. The American philosopher and educational theorist John Dewey states that art is essential for coping with reality, for intention and perception. (Dewey, Art As Experience, 2005, p. 1934) Today, colors, forms, and patterns are carefully used in the materials used in healing and initiation ceremonies, clothing, unique masks, and elaborate sculptures in African tribes.
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Figure 1.
Senufo mask, Kpeliye’e, Ivory Coast, Africa
Note. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/310803 reached onJanuary.28.2022
“African tribes have vibrant examples of using healing and art together and benefiting from both. African culture is full of long-established healing rituals. Tribes living in Africa have wealthy examples of healing and art together and benefiting from both. African cultures are full of structured healing rituals. These cultures are based on belief systems with diverse rules that believe that everything in the universe is animated and has a soul.” (Demirok, Sağlık Sektöründe Sanatın Uygulamaları ve Faydaları, 2017, p. 14) Today, Vodou flags painted in Haiti still are believed to evoke the spirit of love and security. Yoruba women in Africa sing and dance to please the fertility god Orishas (Demirok, Sağlık Sektöründe Sanatın Uygulamaları ve Faydaları, 2017, p. 13)
In history, the sand painting rituals of The Native Americans are a remarkable example of process-oriented, meticulously created traditions. In particular, the prepared healing wheels have been widely used, from the smallest size for individuals to the most oversized land art. “Healing wheels are four-way wheels used by the Native Americans. They advocate the necessity of mental, spiritual, emotional, and physical states to be in harmony and balance. Four directions; can be spring, autumn, winter,
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summer, eagles, bears, wolves, and buffaloes, or depending on the content of the ceremony, can be related to plants. In North America, besides drawings and paintings to keep harmony and balance indoors, there are wheels made of stones for outdoors with the taste of land art.” (Demirok,2017;24)
Figure 2.
Healing Wheel, Native American, North America
Note. https://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-americas/mysteries-native-american-medicine-wheel-healing-rituals-and-astronomical-020888 reached on June.13.2021
“Although there are differences between the healing rituals and daily lives of these tribes, they carry almost the same meaning. These rituals occupy a great place in the traditions of the tribes as the essential part of life. The essence of these values is to harmonize with mother nature and the spirit world besides being in balance for spiritual development (Csordas, Body, Meaning, Healing, 2002). The disease may occur when an evil spirit takes over the individual or when the harmony and balance with mother nature and the spirit world are lost.” (Demirok, Sağlık Sektöründe Sanatın Uygulamaları ve Faydaları, 2017, s. 20)
In his book on Navaho Symbols of Healing: A Jungian Exploration of Ritual, Image, and Medicine, Psychiatrist Donald Sandner stated that the Navaho tribe uses sand painting for their healing ceremonies. It is a kind of mandala-making ritual with
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complex symmetric symbolic striking figures that could create harmony "with the whole gamut of natural and supernatural forces around it.".” (Sandner, 1991, p. 3)
Figure 3.
Sand Painting Ritual, Navajo Tribe
Note. https://www.moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/2998/installation_images/13261reached on January, 28.2022
Shamanism never manifesting itself in a religious structure is a ritual practice that develops within the framework of its unique meaning; Although there are similar features between a shaman and a witch doctor, such as the ability to cure diseases and reveal some miracles, the shaman also has the qualities of being a priest, mystic, and bards. Furthermore, the shaman has a unique method for accessing and directing spirits. “In other words, the concept of shaman has its characteristics and a historical identity.” (Aydın E. , 2006, s. 15)
Shamanism is a belief culture very typically unique to Siberia and Central Asia. The term shaman itself comes from Tunguz through Russian. In Central Asia, there are women shamans in Yakuts and Altaians, while they are called bügü, böğü and udagan in Mongolian, Kam in Turkish-Tatar, baksı, bakşı in Kyrgyz and Kazakh.
(Aydın E. , 2006, s. 17)
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Asian shamans used art in healing ceremonies with unique patterns, forms, and figures they drew on their clothes, headdresses, and drums. In his book Shamanism, Yusuf Ziya Yörükan states that there is a belief that a wise, supreme shaman spirit-Kam protects, patronizes, and even leads the Kam’s act as the representative on earth. Even according to the will of the spirit-Kam, the dress and drum of the Kam are formed. Emphasizing that Kam drew and created all the shapes, patterns, and forms on the clothing and the drum by following this rule, Yörükan says that the amount of Kam’s strength measured by the multiplicity of decorations such as magic lines, dance landscapes, animal and tree paintings like goose, frog, wolf, rabbit paintings and the size of the drums, as well as the use of sacred shapes such as sun, moon, and stars in their clothes and drums. “These paintings on the drum and the dress consist of some magic lines, dance landscapes, animal and tree paintings, in short, goose, frog, wolf, rabbit paintings. This drum is called (töngür) in Altai.” (Yörükan, 2016, s. 76) The robe from top to bottom embroidered with such figures like snakes, beings so forth, like the other items, these are sacred possessions that not everyone has permission to touch. Most of the drum sticks are of sacred trees like juniper or beech. Rarely, where there is no drum, Kam performs the ceremony with a wand (drum stick).” (Yörükan, 2016, s. 77)
“The drum has an essential role in shamanic ceremonies in Asia. The fact that the shell of his drum is from the actual wood of Cosmic Tree, shaman, through drumming, magically projected the vicinity of the Tree; he is projected to the “Center of the World,” and thus can ascend to the sky. (Eliade M. , 1999, s. 222). Mircea Eliade on his book Shamanism emphasizes that the drum and the gown are sacred and symbolize microcosmos. (Eliade M. , 1999, s. 197)
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Figure 4.
Shaman Gown and Drum, Middle Asia
Note.https://www.britannica.com/topic/shamanism/Dress-and-equipment reached in January 29. 2022
In the pre-Islamic period, health and medicine had a unique place in the belief system of Turks in Central Asia. As in almost all ancient societies, medical activities started from the religious-magical theme in the ancient Turks and extended to empirical applications. Pre-Islamic Central Asian Turkish medicine was in the hands of herbalists and shamans. While the herbalists focused on herbs, shamans tried to cure the disease by communicating with the spirits. Today, this system, called folk medicine, gives examples of steppe belief systems and medical practices.
“According to the cult, which is still valid today, childless women tie cloths to trees and pray; a fire called scorch is carried around the newborn children and the mother; the lead was poured to water to repel evil eye to ward off diseases. On the other hand, unlike shamans, herbalists treated their patients using herbal, animal, and mineral-based drugs.” (Öztürk L. , İslâm Tıp Tarihi Üzerine İncelemeler, 2013, s. 334)
Altai Turks were used to place a wrapped black veil spear in front of the tent of the sick. No one other than the person caring for the patient would enter that tent. In her book Whole Person Healthcare, Ilene Serin says that according to the African tribal saying the treatment of the whole village is necessary to heal a sick child by
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emphasizing that the more the individual benefits from the healing rituals, the more the society will benefit.
2.1.2. Paleolithic Period
Cave paintings and handprints from the Paleolithic Age, which is considered the beginning of human history, show the cultural similarities of the nomadic communities that supposedly have no communication with each other. Caves such as Blombos and Klipdrift in South Africa, Castillo and Altamira in Spain, Las Manos in Argentina, Sulawesi in Indonesia, and Las Geel complex in Somalia, from 100,000-75,000 BC, seen as cultural manifestations of their era.
“Since there is no separation of spirit and matter in nature religions, “form” and “essence” are not distinguished from each other, and the description (depiction) and self of an entity is reasoned to be the same. Therefore, pagan (idol worshipping, pagan) worshipped the depiction of a man of the world and believed that he could gain spiritual power with it.” (Tez, Yasaklı Sanat Olarak Minyatür, Resim ve Gravür Tarihi, 2018, s. 7) İsmail Gezgin indicates that “These are the oldest myths,” in his book Art Mythology; “This was not a simple hunting scene. Yes, it was a symbolization related to hunting, but it was a hunt where the hunter turned into the hunt.” He states that the ancient man reflected his subconscious fears and anxieties on the walls of the caves.
“Nature is too vast for a man to cope with, and it evokes death as well as fertility. However, on the other hand, death is the undefeatable enemy that exists forever” and “It is the common enemy, common symbolic language. So it is clear that these paintings also bring a social psychological relief; It is a social therapy, a means of excretion.” (Gezgin, 2014, s. 29) “Even though art was used from the beginning of human history to illustrate individual and social experiences, increase consciousness,
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and reach the divine, the first civilization that defined art as a discipline was ancient Greek Civilization.” (Demirok, Sağlık Sektöründe Sanatın Uygulamaları ve Faydaları, 2017, s. 11) The art critic Herbert Read pointed out that “by the symbolical representation of an event, primitive man thinks he can secure the actual occurrence of that event. The desire for progeny, death of an enemy, survival after death, or the exorcism or propitiation of an evil spirit, is the motive for the creation of an adequate symbol” (Read, Sanatın Anlamı, 2014, s. 37)
Figure 5.
Cave Painting, Las Geel
Note.https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/82/Laas_Geel_cow_and_human.jpg reached on May.15.2021
Figure 6.
Wall Paintings, Çatalhöyük, Turkey
Note: https://worldarkeoloji.blogspot.com/2016/02/catalhoyuk.html reached on June. 07.2021
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“The murals uncovered at Çatalhöyük show that this myth has remained unchanged for thousands of years. (…) Hunting is one of the most important means of survival, obtaining food. It symbolizes resistance to death. Survival is to resist death.” (Gezgin, 2014, s. 31)
The purpose of bringing the bones of the hunted wild animals to their homes might be to add the strength of that animal to them. These are the valuable documents that have survived to the present day, demonstrating that these nomadic communities acted to leave a trace, find strength from each other, connect with their beliefs and convey their experiences.
“Ubirr site in Kakadu National Park in Northern Territory, Australia rock paintings dating from three distinct periods, going back to c. 40.000 BC. Unusually, they were re-painted by successive generations of Aborigines over the centuries. The rich, oral Aboriginal tradition and belief system have made their spiritual purpose clean. Most of the paintings were in rituals performed to increase the animal population, although in some cases they are secular paintings were created purely for visual pleasure.”
(Farthing, Sanatın Tüm Öyküsü, 2014, s. 16)
Figure 7.
Wall Paintings, Ubirr, North Australia
Note. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubirr#/media/File:Ubirr_rock_art.JPG reached on May.15.2021
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“Their meaning remains unknown, although they may have had a religious or magical purpose.”
(Farthing, Sanatın Tüm Öyküsü, 2014, s. 17)
The forefront of the characteristics that determine the existence of human beings is the urge to survive, avoid pain, and pursuit of well-being, happiness, and love. Dr. Erdem Aydin, in his book Dünya ve Türk Tıp Tarihi, stated that “While trying to find the causes of diseases they try to reveal therapeutic forces from the movements of nature, such as the sun, the moon, sea, thunder, and lightning, heat, sunlight, water, or herbs.
Nature offered new opportunities to heal pain and wounds and soothe their suffering throughout the search. Many beings and formations in nature have proven themselves to humankind as effective in healing over the centuries. It has been learned one by one by humans that plants can be a source of healing, that animals can be benefitted, and that even minerals can be a factor in healing.” (Aydın E. , 2006, s. 7)
The early humans were both physicians and pharmacists of their own. In the relationship between arts and health, starting with traditional rituals, it is easy to find the intense use of nature and various arts disciplines. Today, Hunting gathering cultures are trying to continue their primitive life habits using their ancestral information from thousands of years ago.
(Aydın E. , 2006, s. 2)
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2.1.3. Antic Civilizations
2.1.3.i. Egyptian Civilization
“In history, Egyptian, Greek, and Roman civilizations used art in healing even more prominently. There are medical books from Egyptian civilization that survived until today, containing information about gynecology and surgeries, herbal medicines and treatments, also healing rituals based on the spirit realm. “The Papyrus Ebers” is one of the oldest known.” (Demirok, Sağlık Sektöründe Sanatın Uygulamaları ve Faydaları, 2017, s. 28)
“According to the rich and early written sources found in Egypt, applying medicine was regarded as a kind of art, and physicians had to come from a family of physicians. Ancient Greeks adopted the same system of medicine. The palace and the priest physicians had to examine their patients attentively by not giving them poisonous drugs. There were female physicians too.” (Öztürk L. , İslâm Tıp Tarihi Üzerine İncelemeler, 2013, s. 304)
“Thoth, the god of wisdom, balance, magic, and writing, is at the core and center of Egyptian healing. The Thoth is to be the most powerful magician on earth. In addition to these treatments associated with the spiritual realm, specialist doctors also played a role in the treatment. During their discipleship, doctors named Swnw followed Sekhmet, the lion-headed god of healing and warriors, and the wise Thoth. It was a belief that Sekhmet taught them the energy meridians and chakras, and Thoth taught them sounds, herbs, and stones to use.” (Demirok, Sağlık Sektöründe Sanatın Uygulamaları ve Faydaları, 2017, s. 30)
“The goddess Isis was mother Earth and was worshipped as a healing goddess” (Aydın, 2006:43)
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In the Egyptian civilization, there are medical books that have survived until today, including information about gynecology and surgeries, drugs, and treatments, besides healing rituals based on the spirit realm. ‘The Papyrus Ebers’ and ‘The Papyrus Smith’ are the oldest known of them. Like the modern physician, the ancient physician also tried to identify physical causes but with less knowledge and understanding of human body his diagnoses mainly were supernatural or nonphysical. David Mininberg, in his essay on ‘The Legacy Of Ancient Egyptian Medicine’, says that, “Magic in ancient Egypt was associative. For the Egyptians, even plain water could acquire curative properties merely by coming contact with appropriately evocative symbols.” (Allen & Mininberg, 2006, s. 14)
Figure 8.
God Anubis watching the heart of a dead person to be weighed, God Thoth registers
Note. Gombrich,1999, p.65
The Edwin Smith Papyrus, one of only two complete medical texts from ancient Egypt survived until today, deals with surgical interventions and the original manuscript and is in the New York Academy of Medicine collection.
Smith found this papyrus in 1862 in Thebes. The papyrus mentions 48 surgical cases. Twenty-seven head wounds and twenty-one neck wounds are included in this papyrus,
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and the whole treatment process from the beginning of the diseases is explained. “High temperature and pulse weakness are mentioned in non-healing head injuries.”
(Ünver S. , Tıp Tarihi, 1943, s. 39)
“The Egyptians were aware of the difference between observable findings and supernatural causes and separately examining them — Smith Papyrus, case 8 clearly distinguishes between the two—Besides in case 9 both practical and supernatural prescriptions were given for a successful treatment. Accordingly, Case 9 of the Smith Papyrus prescribes not only a practical remedy but a magic spell as well.” (Allen & Mininberg, 2006, s. 10)
In Egyptian art, the main themes of the ancient Egyptian Civilization medicine appear in the hieroglyphic translation of the Smith papyrus, expressed in more than sixty objects such as preventive medicine, childhood, birth, and injuries.
In the exhibition, The Art of Medicine in Ancient Egypt, organized by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2005, the masterpieces of Egyptian art were also for the preservation and restoration of health. The accessories, which were on display, such as the gold necklaces, wangs with figures of gods, and protective animals, are to be carried on the body for protection are one of the most valuable examples of the use of art for medical purposes in Ancient Egypt.
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Figure 9.
The Eye Of Horus
Note. Allen, Miniberg, 2006, p.26
Figure 10.
Guardian Figures on Wangs
Note. Allen, Miniberg, 2006, p.29
“The Egyptians put on an ointment made of a lion, hippopotamus, goose, snake, and crocodile fat to encourage them.” (Ünver S. , Tıp Tarihi, 1943, s. 41)
On pages 61 and 117 of the book on Medicine and Society in Ptolemaic Egypt, the fundamental medical drugs used are honey, propolis, milk, animal fat, and vinegar, and that the mixture of honey and oil as an antibiotic. It is another medical information that has survived from the manuscripts that besides herbal drugs, onion was used as medicine to cool and dry the wound in bodily injuries. (Majno, 1975, s. 143)
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Imhotep, one of the patron architects of ancient Egypt and a priest, a judge, and physician, was also named patron of script and wisdom from the time of the new kingdom and was later treated equated by the Greeks with their god of medicine, Asclepios, famous for treating disease and infertility. (Allen & Mininberg, 2006, s. 69)
Medicine was not in the hands of priests in Ancient Greece though Greek medicine was influenced and benefited by Egyptian civilization. “Imhotep of ancient Egypt is the inventor of science and medicine and alchemy, which is the basis of chemistry. Hermes is in the mythology of many nations. The Arabs call him Idris Aleyhussalam. Trita in ancient Persia and Asclepios in Ancient Greece are the same people.” (Ünver S. , Tıp Tarihi, 1943, s. 43)
In Ancient Egyptian Civilization, healing temples were usually located in the center of the cities. On the contrary, Ancient Greek Asclepios temples were built in sanctuaries in pleasant, rural locations close to spring waters, which are believed to be essential for healing and used for bathing, cleaning, and purification purposes.
2.1.3.ii. Greek Civilization
When we mention the medical thought and practices of the pre-Hippocratic period in Ancient Greece, the cult of Asclepios, the Greek philosophical thought system, and the medical practice of that period, and the results it created in medicine are understood. The pre-Hippocratic period is a period that prepares “Hippocratic Medicine” both in his personality and of the Greek cultural world.
(Aydın E. , 2006, s. 55) Hippocratic medicine has been applied additionally to improvements and treatments in the temples of Asclepios.
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Figure 11.
Asklepios and his daughter Hygieia, Archeological Museum, Istanbul
Note. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Asclepius_and_hygieia_relief.jpg reached on May.25.2021
Holistic healing methods that deal with the integrity of the body, soul, and mind applied in the temples of Asklepios, which were built in the name of the god of medicine Asclepios, the son of Apollo, in the Ancient Greek civilization, whose traces are found in the Aegean region of Turkey and Greek islands today. In ancient Greece, it was believed that diseases were sent by Zeus due to the gods’ treaties with mortals, or by the bad spirits called Damon. Gods are responsible for sickness and death, as well as for the healing of patients and diseases.
Apollo and his son Asclepios are the gods of medicine. Asclepios is depicted with his daughter Hygiea (hygiene) on the reliefs, holding a wand decorated with a snake. In the ancient Greek healing ceremonies, non-venomous snakes spend the night in the same room with the patients, helping to heal. The doctors of the period were people who could develop the art of drama. They prescribe Greek theater to their patients. The tragedy is suggested for manic patients and comedy for depressive patients for
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therapeutic purposes. “Greek tragedy was a ritual of purification and adaptation” (Dissanayake, 2002, s. 80)
Beside being the god of nature and wine, Dionysus is the only god associated with fertility, revival, and creativity, and therefore also known as the god of art. Dionysus festivals held in the spring are ceremonies aimed at blessing the rebirth of nature and trying to understand the secrets of nature.
Erdem Aydın, MD, in his book on Dünya ve Türk Tıp Tarihi, said that Hippocrates (460-370 BC), who is known as the patron of modern medicine, was educated in the temples of Asklepion and later formed his new philosophy, which argued that not gods or spirits, but natural and physical reasons cause diseases. “In ancient Greek cities, the transfer of medical knowledge to future generations was possible through the family and some members of the aristocracy.
In the island of Kos, medical education is inherited from father to son within the family of Asclepiades. (…) As a member of the Asclepiades family, Hippocrates also learned medicine from his father, Heraclites, and his grandfather, who was also named Hippocrates with his philosophy Hippocrates separated medicine from magic, truth from fairy tales, stories from lies, healing from philosophy, and gods from human beings.”(Aydın E. , 2006, s. 68-69) Arts flourished through religion and magic culture, for the first time experienced as an aesthetic discipline.
Greek philosophers argued that by changing the proportions of the four elements, a substance could be obtained “While the first substance was water for Thales (624-546 BC), it was air for Anaximenes (585-525 BC) and fire for Heraclitus (535-475 BC). Furthermore, for Empedocles (495-435 BC), it was fire, air, earth, water.”
(Öndin N. , Rönesans ve Simya, 2017, s. 33)
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Thales argued that every being is full of experiential, tangible, visible, divine powers, which means that everything has a soul. For Heraclitus, the first substance that is constantly burning and changeable is fire.
Empedocles argues that all beings are of these four elements. Additionally, he defined the power that activates the substance with the principles of love and Strife, which are proportionally different and create variability in the matter.
“In the system of Empedocles, the four elements, when love prevailed, combined in perfect harmony to form the perfect state of ‘Sphairos’. In the state of ‘Sphairos’, which is a spherical shape, four elements are connected tightly in harmony. Every principle falls apart as hatred takes over. Thus, the formation of the universe takes place through the fierce struggle of both cosmic forces.” (Öndin N. , Rönesans ve Simya, 2017, s. 35). The four-element theory in Empedocles’ natural philosophy; With Hippocrates, turns into the theory of four humors in human body(elements) therefore Hippocrates’ physiology is revealed.
On the other hand, the imbalance between the four humors in the human body and the changes in their qualities are considered physio-pathological changes that cause diseases. (Aydın E. , 2006, s. 72)
Hippocrates believes that when any disorder in the universe (macrocosm) occurs, natural laws act and balance, and a disorder, disease (Natura Mediatrix) that occurs in the human body, will be healed by the therapeutic nature. Thus, he examines the patient as a whole and argues that the healing aspect of nature will cure the disease and that physicians should not apply any practice that will interfere with nature. For centuries this principle has become the ethical principle for physicians “(primum non nocere) First, do no harm”.
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The structure and functioning between the microcosm (man) and the macrocosm (universe) is a whole that reflects each other. Every entity is in constant change and interaction as a part of the order, in harmony with the universe. He argues that the power that connects these parts and creates the whole is the power of the ‘love bond’ as in the system of Empedocles. “With the identification between the physical world and the human being, and the relationships between physical phenomena such as air, water, climate, geology, geography, and human health, medical conclusions are achieved” (Aydın E. , 2006, s. 71)
Emphasizing that the physician should be the helper and servant of nature, “in Hippocratic Medicine, the physician is primarily concerned with the patient, not just with the disease, and the patient is treated not only as body organs but also psychosomatically and holistically.” (Aydın E. , 2006, s. 70)
Figure 12.
Dioskorides, De Materia Medica
Note. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedanius_Dioscorides reached on June.14.2021
Dioscorides Pedanius is a first-century physician. He studied medicine in Alexandria and Athens and served in Roman armies. His Greek book on phytology, medicinal plants, and pharmacology was translated into Latin and Arabic. As a result, Materia
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Medica is the oldest surviving written source on medicinal plants and flora of Anatolia and the Mediterranean region.
2.1.3.iii. Roman Civilization
Claudius Galen (known as Calinos in Islamic medicine) was a medical scholar who lived between 130-200 AD. He worked as a Roman court physician and was rewarded by the emperor for this duty. “The perception of medicine based on objective reasons, observation, that is rational, practical and freed from religious-magical influences that Hippocrates put forward, continued with him and disappeared in the West almost until the Renaissance. After Galen, Western medicine mixed with the religious beliefs of Christianity and became the interest of the church” (Aydın E. , 2006, s. 83)
Galen was the first to write the information about physical exercises as a program, which is still valid today. For him, movements that do not change the rhythm of the breath cannot be called exercise. In order to define something as an exercise, it is necessary to use a specific power that creates a change in breathing. Like Hippocrates, he defended humoral therapy, that is, diseases occur with the deterioration of the fluid balance in the human body. The Humoral theory emerged in Ancient Greece and then continued to exist in Islamic medicine by translating Greek medical books into Arabic. The name of the Roman physician Galen is mentioned as a healer scientist in the poem of the Sufi poet Yunus Emre, and in Mathawi, the famous book of the Sufi philosopher Mawlana Celaleddin Rumi, both lived13th century, the same period. (Gölpınarlı, 1990, s. 46-47)
Medical books written by Arabic philosopher and physicians Ibn-i Sina and Zekeria Razi were translated into Latin so that innovative medical theories and knowledge were accepted continued to develop exponentially in Europe.
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2.1.3.iv. Far Eastern Belief Systems and Arts
Brahmanism, Buddhism, Zen Buddhism belief systems have guided the society in the Far East. These belief systems include herbal treatments as well as ayurvedic and acupuncture treatments. In the ceremonies of Buddhist monks, the different disciplines of art have taken the place they deserve. Therefore, students of Buddhist medicine must diligently study and learn the 79 painted images and 8,000 shapes for healing in the Buddhist medical tradition. Pictures and figures were the key symbols of body and mind, spirit, growth, healing, and development.
Figure 13.
Bhaishajyaguru, Medicine Budha, Zhu Haogu, XVth century
Note. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/42716 reached on June19.2021
Physical and spiritual healing practices played an essential role spread of Buddhism in Asia. The Medicine Buddha is in the center with his red robe in this mural. He is with his 12 warriors symbolizing their readiness to help others, as well as the Bodhisattva (helpers) holding discs, representing the moon and the sun on both sides. There are
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divine figures on both sides of the head of the Medicine Buddha. The work belongs to the Chinese painter Zhu Haogu, known for his Buddhist and Taoist works, is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY.
Figure 14.
Lotus Sutra, Parable of The Medicinal Herbs, 12th Century
Note. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/45624 reached on June.27.2021
“The present scroll represents a portion of the Lotus Sutra’s fifth chapter, “Parable of the Medicinal Herbs” (Japanese: Yakusōyu). This chapter describes three kinds of grasses and two kinds of trees that all receive the same amount of rainfall from the clouds, a metaphor for five different beings to whom the Buddha gives identical teachings.”
(Metropolitan, https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/45624 )
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Figure 15.
Traditional Chinese Medicinal Practice
Note.https://theconversation.com/this-ancient-chinese-anatomical-atlas-changes-what-we-know-about-acupuncture-and-medical-history-140506 reached on June 20.2021
Figure 16.
Instructions for feeling the pulse
Note. Majno, 1975, p.246
Guido Majno says, “If the translation is correct, one can visualize the yang holding the wrist, closing his eyes, and trying to decide whether the throbbing beneath his fingers felt like any one of the items listed above, or even like the colors red, white, green, yellow, or black.” (Majno, 1975, s. 246)
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Figure 17.
Eight Trigram
Note. Majno, 1975, p.234
“Each trigram has a name and correlates with a season, a cardinal point, and many other notions (note that the south, Chinese style, is at the top).” (Majno, 1975, s. 233)
Figure 18.
Hexagram
Note. Majno, 1975, p.234
These mandalas, consisting of sixty-four hexagrams obtained by the double and triple arrangement of the trigrams, are included in the Book of Changes. The Book of Changes includes an explanatory chapter for each hexagram and hexagram; We can say that Tao philosophy and Yin/Yang balance method are described with images.
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This world-famous divination book has been used in Chinese civilization since ancient times and has also been the subject of scientific studies. Western readers have been interested in Zen Buddhism throughout history, as it is a book full of high ethical implications and is one of the oldest Chinese classical texts about how changes in the universe can guide human life and events. The reader, the practitioner, is directed to reach his solution with this method. The method can give direct answers to questions and was a guide for protection and prevention purposes. It was used by the famous psychoanalyst Carl Gustav Jung at the beginning of the 20th century as a technique to reach the subconscious. It was used by the American artist John Cage to find answers to problems in his daily life besides his artistic productions. John Cage consciously used the I-ching book of hexagrams in his original print productions and compositions and even became a pioneer in the computer programming of I-ching production.
There is the balance of Yin and Yang at the heart of Tao philosophy, which expresses infinite cycle and change. Yin corresponds to the female, moist principle, night, moon, and dark colors, while Yang corresponds to the day, sun, dryness, male, light colors. Contrasts move at the same time and together. There is always Yang in Yin, Yin in Yang, so they complement each other. (Majno, 1975)
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Figure 19.
Enso Paintings, Japan
Note. https://museum.cornell.edu/collections/asian-pacific/japan/enso reached on October. 06.2021
Enso is a circle drawn with one or two brush strokes to express a moment when the mind is free to let the body create; It symbolizes absolute enlightenment, power, grace, the universe, and emptiness. Tools are ink, brush, and Japanese paper that are similar to Sumi-e, the traditional Japanese calligraphy art.
Figure 20.
Mudras, 11-12th Century, Japan
Note:https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/45614?searchField=All&sortBy=Relevance&ft=esoteric+budism+mandalas&offset=40&rpp=20&pos=48reached on June 20.2021
“This handscroll depicts hand gestures known as mudras in Sanskrit, in which many early esoteric Buddhist texts were written. In Japan, the gestures are called insō, the Japanese term for a Chinese word that combines the characters for “seal” and “form.” In Esoteric Buddhism, mudras are physical enactments of ultimate truths revealed
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through the buddhas and other deities. Practitioners of Esoteric Buddhism in Japan form mudras during meditation and rituals and use them to interpret the meaning of painted and sculpted Buddhist images. The scroll was from the Kyoto temple Shōren-in, a Tendai School temple traditionally administrated by imperial princes who had taken religious vows.” (Metmuseum, 2021)
2.1.4. Middle Ages
2.1.4.i. Islamic Golden Ages, 11-13th Centuries
Islamic Medicine is the product of the countries within the Islamic civilization, even including Greek medicine and traditional medicine practices of nations in the Islamic world. The first organized hospital was built during the Abbasid period. There were separate sections for patients with mental disorders and male and female patients in these hospitals. Hospitals also had pharmacies that were established by sultans called wineries and had warehouses. “There were staff working in these hospitals for the care of patients in hospitals, preparation of meals and medicines and for the maintenance of the beds and cleaning.” (Aydın E. , 2006, s. 152)
It is stated in the book Dünya ve Türk Tıp Tarihi that there are specialist physicians, ophthalmologists, and surgeons in hospitals, where their chiefs are at the head of each unit, and that there are specialized places where patients are diagnosed and treated.
Zakariya al-Razi (854-932), as famous as Ibn-I Sina was born in Khorasan. He studied medicine in Baghdad and became the hospital director named after its founder al-Muʿtaḍid. Razi worked on Hippocrates and Galen and combined Hippocrates’ practice with Galen’s theory. “He was also called the Galen of the Arabs since he explained Galen’s obscure works.” (Yurdakök, Türk Çocuk Hekimliği Tarihi, 1984, p. 23) Kitab Al-Hawi Fit-Tıbb(The Virtuous Life), also known as Continens Liber, is a twenty-
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three volumes encyclopedia of medicine and surgery in which he wrote his views is among his books known in the West. In addition, Kitab al-Mansouri (Liber ad Almansorem), which he wrote for the Emir of the city of Rayy, is an extended summary of Greek medicine. “Known as "Practica Puorerum" in the West, the pediatrics booklet (booklet, monograph) is the first collective pediatrics book known today.” (Yurdakök, Türk Çocuk Hekimliği Tarihi, 1984, p. 24) Zakariya al-Razi, the father of pediatricians, also stated his definitions and findings of Smallpox and Measles diseases in his medical works. In addition, he made innovations with his pharmacological studies. Many of his works were translated into Latin and Hebrew.
Ibn Sina (980-1037) is a philosopher and physician who became famous for his contributions to the world of medicine after Hippocrates and Galen. His studies in medicine and chemistry, including his experiments and observations, applying the medical knowledge he learned in theory on patients, giving lectures to medical students at the bedside of the patients, reaching new findings and information in surgery, using mercury vapor as a medicine in humans are among the things he has accomplished in medicine.
He is known as “Avicenna” by the Western World as the father of modern medieval science, the leader of physicians, and the physician who wrote about two hundred books on medicine and philosophy and different fields.
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Figure 21.
Avicenna, Canon,book cover no:5
Note. https://www.aspetar.com/journal/upload/PDF/2014123103937.pdf reached on January.10.2022
His book, Qanun Fi’t-Tibb, The Canon of Medicine, was the core source in medicine for seven centuries, was used as a reference book in European universities until the mid-17th century.
Figure 22.
Avicenna, Canon of Medicine, Aga Khan Museum Collection, Canada
Note.https://www.agakhanmuseum.org/collection/artifact/qanun-fi-l-tibb-canon-medicine-volume-5-akm510 reached on June.20.2021
“This manuscript is part of a text called the “Canon,” a handbook of medicine. It is the work of the Iranian scholar Ibn Sina (980–1037), known as Avicenna in the Western
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world. Often described as the “Father of Early Modern Medicine,” Ibn Sina was among the most famous and influential philosopher-scientists of the Islamic Golden Age. He wrote the Canon of Medicine in five volumes, including observations on wide-ranging topics: anatomy, temperament, disease, pathology, drugs, and pharmaceuticals. The Aga Khan Museum collection has volumes 4 and 5 of the Canon. Separated by 22 years, these volumes are likely from the two different copies of the manuscript. Nevertheless, both are most certainly among the earliest copies of the Canon, as they were published only 15 to 36 years after Ibn Sina’s death.” (Museum G. , 2021)
In the second volume of Qanun Fi’t-Tibb, Avicenna classified the plants according to their structure and effect and explained that the compositions prepared mainly consisted of mixing the four elements, fire, water, air, and earth. Among these four elements, “water cools fire; fire boils water, air moistens the soil; soil dries the air. Thus, the feature of each of the four element is reduced by the effect of the element with the opposite feature. Elements interacting in this way come into equilibrium at a certain level; they even become so equal that they acquire a moderate structure. (…)
When a composition is prepared from the elements, a new temperament formed after the temperament of the prepared composition comes together is called the ‘genuine temperament’.” (Kahya, El Kanun Fi’t-Tıbb, İbn-I Sina, 2003, p. 3) In the second article of the book, Ibn Sina states that the strength of drugs can be learned by comparison and experience. In the sixth article of the second volume translated into Turkish by Professor Esin Kahya, the information given about the mixtures prepared by rose and the ratios and benefits of these mixtures, while writing the structure of the rose, he refers to Galen’s knowledge about rose in his book and notes “Galanos says that the rose is not cold compared to the human body and it must be cold in the first degree” (Kahya, El Kanun Fi’t-Tıbb, İbn-I Sina, 2003, p. 216)
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He detailed the effects of rose on the organs, wrote that smelling rose water awakes from fainting, that rose water steam is good for headaches, that rose seed has a reinforcing effect on the gingiva, that mouthwash made with boiled rose water is good for earaches. (Kahya, El Kanun Fi’t-Tıbb, İbn-I Sina, 2003, p. 217) One of the sections includes children’s health and diseases in the Canon book, listed the treatments for infant care, nutrition, and diseases also carry the effect of physicians of Al-Radi Period and Antiquity. (Yurdakök, Türk Çocuk Hekimliği Tarihi, 1984, p. 30) He also states that the newborn baby should be washed immediately with salted water and says that it is even better and valuable to add various herbs to the bathwater. This tradition continued later in the Anatolian Seljuk period and the period of Anatolian principalities.
Figure 23.
Melancholy treatment, Ibn-i Sina, Islamic Hand Writings Museum, İstanbul
Note. (Ünver,1943, p.227), Tıp Tarihi, İstanbul Üni., Yayınları
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Figure 24.
Ibn-i Sina, Topkapı Palace, Treasure Collection, İstanbul
Note. Ünver, 1943, p.225, Tıp Tarihi, İstanbul Üni., Yayınları
Figure 25.
Kitab-Al Diryaq, Al-Fath, Metropolitan Museum, NY, USA
Note. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/642359 reached on June.27.2021
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Kitab Al Diryaq was written by Mohammed Ibn Abi Al Fath in 1198-99 and said to be based on information provided by Galen. The antidote book on the website of the Metropolitan Museum of Art dictates, “The text was based on the Greek physician Galen’s book on remedies for snake bites and poisoning. Between inscriptions identifying the scribe and patron, seated figures hold a crescent moon within a roundel formed of two intertwined dragons, and winged figures occupy the four corners. The dragons symbolize pseudo-planets believed to cause lunar and solar eclipses. As the cures described in the manuscript neutralize snake venom, the central figure and four angels keep the cosmos under control,”
Figure 26.
Kitab-Al Diryaq, Al-Fath, Metropolitan Museum collection, NY, USA
Note. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/642359 reached on June.27.2021
Ibn al-Baytar (1197-1248), who was born in Malaga, Andalusian Spain, inside the borders of the Islamic civilization, was interested in pharmacology. He is famous for his work in the field of botany. In addition, he included the findings of previous
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authors' notes that he collected and Arabic and Greek names of the herbs and the features, effects, and places of use.“Ibn al-Baytar also traveled in Anatolia is a significant source for the plants of Turkey.” (Aydın E. , 2006, s. 156)
“Anatolia, the heart of the Ottoman homeland, acts as a bridge between the flora of southwest Asia and Southern Europe. The richness of its climate and topography further enriches the diversity of its flora and fauna. The horticultural science developed here is highly influential, and Anatolia, with its 14,000-native species, has long been the source of flowers and plants that travel to Europe.” (Uluç & Atasoy, 2012, s. 151)
The commentary book, in which Ibn al-Baytar collects herbal and pharmacological definitions mentioned by Dioscorides ‘Tafsir Kitab Diasquridus’, was closely examined and applied with the increasing importance of herbal medicines of the Middle Ages.
Figure 27.
De Materia Medica, Dioscorides, 1229, Topkapı Palace Library, İstanbul
Note. Ettinhausen, 2001, p.259
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Figure 28.
De matteria Medica, Potion preparing doctor.
Note. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/446288 reached on January.10.2022
Figure 29.
De Materia Medica, Preparing medicine from honey, Bagdat, 1224
Note. Core Timken Brunett collection, (Welch, 2000, p.35)
“One of the most influential medical analyses transmitted to Muslims was De Materia Medica in the first century BC, by the Greek physician, Dioscorides. It was translated by the Andalusian physician Ibn al-Baytar in Cilicia (Southern Anatolia). It was about
46
making medicine from honey and water, which was prescribed to treat weakness and loss of appetite. A doctor holds a gold cup while stirring the boiling honey and water in a cauldron as he prepares to scoop it up for the seated patient. The architectural setting suggests that drugs produced in a pharmacy, like those attached to hospitals in the Seljuq lands. In the illustration on the right, a doctor and his assistant or patient stand on either side of a sieve through which grapes are pressed and then combined with brine and an onion-like herb to produce a medicine to cure digestive disorders.” (Metropolitan)
As the Western world, some scientists in the Islamic world were also interested in alchemy, other than medicine and pharmacology. They believed that a living thing consists of a soul and a body and that these two form a whole. Moreover, based on the relationship between the universe (macrocosm) and man (microcosm), they thought all living and non-living things were based on the same principle. Therefore, they established a connection between the birth, growth, and measurement processes of living things and the chemical relations of the metals, to which they attributed some mystical qualities. (Aydın E. , Dünya ve Türk Tıp Tarihi, 2006, p. 156)
“Places providing health services in the Islamic world can be listed as tents, mobile tents that will turn into mobile hospitals serving in wars, monasteries, palaces of khalifs and state officials, physicians’ houses, shops of physicians, houses of patients, and baths and streets for the traveling physicians.” (Öztürk L. , 2018, p. 61)
The oldest Turkish medical history information is the work of Kutadgu Bilig (Power of the Knowledge), written by Yusuf Khass Hajib Balasaguni. In his book, Dünya ve Türk Tıp Tarihi, Prof. Aydın states that Kutadgu Bilig explains the differences between physicians and magicians, that physicians treat people with medicine, whereas the magicians try to treat with praying and he notes that the two groups do not like each
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other. “He warns that physicians are healers for all diseases, that they are indispensable help for everyone, that they have drugs and medicines for the patients examined so that the physicians should be protected well, that they are the needed men, and that all men should take care of them and pay them what they owe.” (Ünver S. , 1935) As Prof. Dr. Süheyl Ünver states in his books, Türkiye’de Tababet (1935) ve Hıfzıssıhha Tarihi Hakkında ve Selçuk Tababeti 11-14. Asırlar (1940) that Turks who lived during the Great Seljuk Empire established hospitals in the 10th-11th centuries and paid attention to physicians who will serve the patients. Sultan Malik-Shah I allocates ten camels to the mobile hospital while going to wars.
Figure 30.
Doctor Bereket examining Sultan Melikshah, Topkapı Palace, Treasures Collection
Note. Ünver,1943, p.246, Tıp Tarihi, İstanbul Üni., Yayınları
During the Great Seljuk Empire period, “Morality of the physician and the acumen of the physician were prioritized, and the examination of pulses was deemed necessary for diagnosis and treatment. The considerations about the range of diseases were crucial in those centuries. The physician's need to strengthen his spirit in front of a patient’s serious illness and his sensitivity about the ailments are precious.” (Ünver S. , 1940)
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As the extension of their culture and civilization, Turks, medical knowledge and physicians, established hospitals in Mosul, Damascus, Aleppo, Egypt, and Cairo during the transition period from Central Asia to Anatolia (8th-13th century) and helped their management. Süheyl Ünver, in his book Selçuklu Tababeti, states that the Turks built baths, hospitals, fountains, and caravanserais in the places they conquered, and poor patients benefited from all health services for free. He also expressed that patients with mental disorders were treated with water and music in special departments of hospitals in history.
“In the Islamic world, the health institutions where patients are treated are called ‘darüşşifa’. In the Middle Ages, names such as Darüssıhha, Darül’afiye, Darül’raha, Darül’tıp, Maristan, Bimarhane, Nekahathane used for the word hospital. Later madrasas for medical education, were also opened beside the darüşşifas established for the benefit of the public, based on the structure of foundations in Islam. (Güreşsever, 1982, p. 101)
2.1.4.ii. Arts and Health in Anatolian Seljuks
The most important hospital built in this period is Gevher Nesibe Hatun Darüşşifası in Kayseri (1205-1206). The Gevher Nesibe Hospital and Medicine Madrasa in Kayseri was built by the Anatolian Seljuk Ruler, Ghiyath ad-din Kaykhusraw I, in the name of Gevher Nesibe Sultan, to honor his sister who died of tuberculosis. Hospitals were also built in Sivas, Kastamonu and Konya.
In the 13th century, during the Anatolian Seljuk Empire period, medical science was highly valued, and the necessity of cleaning was emphasized for treatments and even for the prevention of diseases. The healing spring waters also were used for treatments.
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Figure 31.
Gevher Nesibe Hospital, Kayseri, Turkey
Note. http://www.selcuklumirasi.com/architecture-detail/giyasiye-medresesi-kumbeti-ve-gevher-nesibe-sifahanesi reached on May 22.2021
“It is claimed that physicians trained in the Gevher Nesibe hospital, which was established in Kayseri in 1206. It is stated that while theoretical lectures were provided in the madrasah next to the hospital, students take practical lessons at the hospital.” (Aydın E. , Dünya ve Türk Tıp Tarihi, 2006, p. 173) It is stated in Dünya ve Türk Tıp Tarihi that it was an education that consists of a master-apprentice relationship rather than a systematic education.
“Çifte Madrasah (60x40m.) in Kayseri, which is the first Anatolian Seljuk Empire structure, is a simple structure with four iwans (602/1205), consisting of the Medicine Madrasah of Kaykhusraw I and his sister Gevher Nesibe’s Darüşşifa (hospital) (32x40m.). A corridor adjoins the two buildings. There is a pyramid cupola inside the madrasah for the first time, which may have belonged to the sister. The lion figure on the right side of the portal may point to the memory of their father, Kilij Arslan I. It is significant since it is the oldest hospital structure in Anatolia.” (Aslanapa, Türk Sanatı, 1989, s. 144)
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“The inscription of the Gevher Nesibe’s Darüşşifa is as follows: May the sultanate of Great Sultan Kaykhusraw I, son of Kilij Arslan I, be eternal. This hospital was built in 1206, upon the will of Gevher Nesibe Sultan, the name of the world and religion, the daughter of Kilij Arslan I.” According to the inscription, it is understood that the Gevher Nesibe’s Hospital and Madrasah is one of the oldest medical buildings. The unique feature of Gevher Nesibe Hospital compared to other institutions is that it was founded on a woman's name. The hospital, which is among the oldest medical facilities globally with a solid architectural structure, has survived until today. There is a snake emblem on top of the hospital door, a lion relief right side of the door. These figures are among the features found in Seljuk hospitals.” (Atak, 2019, s. 19) Among the hospitals built during the Anatolian Seljuk Empire period, it is one of the earliest hospitals that has survived until today. Sivas Şifahiye Madrasah and Divriği Darüşşifası are among the prominent ones.
Figure 32.
İzzettin Keykavus Hospital, Sivas, Turkey
Note. http://arkeolojidia.blogspot.com/2015/07/sivas-izzettin-keykavus-darussifas.html reached on June.20.2021
“Sultan Kaykaus I had the largest Seljukian Hospital (48x68m) built-in Sivas. (1217-18) 614 Rooms with hearths and long dormitories lined up around the courtyard surrounded by four iwans and porticoes.” (Aslanapa, Türk Sanatı, 1989, s. 144) It is also known as Şifahiye Madrasah and Darüssıhha.
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Aslanapa writes as follows for the Sivas complex in his book Türk Sanatı; “The hospital and the tomb are the most monumental works of the tile mosaic technique mixed with brick, and the geometric interlacing and stars, braided moldings with blue, white, turquoise and dark blue colors are very eye-catching.” (Aslanapa, Türk Sanatı, 1989, s. 145)
Figure 33.
Sivas Ulu Mosque and Hospital 1228-29
Note. (Ettinghausen, 2001, s. 234), Islamic Art and Architecture, Yale Uni., Press
Sivas, Divriği The Great Mosque and Darüşşifası (1228-29) was built by Ahmet Shah and his wife Turan Melik during the House of Mengüjek period. It is on the UNESCO World Heritage list with rich samples of traditional Anatolian stonework. There were always madrasahs for medical education and hospitals for treatment next to these complexes. This situation was maintained with the same sensitivity until the 19th century. The symbol of medicine in the Seljuk Empire is the symbol we obtained from the findings in the Çankırı Atabey Cemaleddin Ferruh Darüşşifası in 1235. Today's medical badge has the same symbol.
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Figure 34.
Medicine Symbol, Snake, Anatolian Seljuks
Note. (Ünver S. , 1943, s. 247) , Tıp Tarihi, İstanbul Üniversitesi, yayınları
The founder of the Ahi organization in the Anatolian Seljuk Empire period, Kırşehirli Ahi Evran Sheikh Nasiruddin Mahmud of Kırşehir, is one of the famous physicians of his period. He also has a work on anatomy called “İlm-üd Teşrih”. It is understood from his works that he was a surgeon. It is understood from Ahi Evran that the snake had an essential effect on the medical life in Anatolia at that time. His work also mentions that an antidote is obtained from the snake. In addition, the double snake emblem in the hospital in Çankırı, the reason why hospitals are called “Maristan” (snake place) in the Islamic world, and the patient is called Bi-mar (snake-free, ill), can be attributed to the place of the snake in the medical life.” (Aydın E. , Dünya ve Türk Tıp Tarihi, 2006, p. 172)
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Figure 35.
Contemporary Turkish Medicine Logo
Note. (Ünver S. , 1943, s. 249) , Tıp Tarihi, İstanbul Üni., Yayınları.
Istanbul University Faculty of Medicine emblem and the medical badge was designed by Prof. Dr. Ahmet Süheyl Ünver, who was inspired by the double snake motif at the entrance of the hospital, which was built in 1235 by Cemalettin Ferruh, the ancestor of Kayqubad I, the Anatolian Seljuk Emperor.
“This emblem was created by depicting the double serpent intertwining on the chain of happiness in ancient Turks. According to the research of Dr. Rebii Barkın, this intertwining is one of the oldest examples of Turkish Art. It is also a very appropriate emblem for today's Turkish medicine, to commemorate the old Turkish medicine that has found perfection in an ancient and fundamental civilization. This figure demonstrates to us that Turks in history, although they established many states in several provinces far from one another with different geographical conditions have common meanings in their civilizations. This knitting pattern, which expresses blessing, has been used numerous times and found in Anatolia not by chance, but consciously for its nature.” (Ünver S. , 1935, p. 9)
“Medicine in Anatolian Seljuks shows the civilized level rooted in Anatolia with the support given by the Seljuk Sultans to science and the hospitals that have survived to
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the present day. The opening of hospitals under the name of darüşşifa and free treatment in almost every city is the most significant indicators of the achieved high level.” (Öztürk L. , 2013, p. 334) During the Anatolian principalities, Arabic medical books were translated into Turkish.
“Both the Seljuks and the Ottomans never tolerated those trying to perform as doctors who did not study medicine and even inspected physicians and hospitals” (Ünver S. , 1940, p. 42)
During the Anatolian Seljuk period, Sufis treated the sick in dervish lodges. Prof Kucuk states, Sufis treat not only mental and spiritual, but also physical diseases. “Some of the methods used for both types of diseases are as follows; Treatment according to the theory of four humors, treatment with the Qur’an and prayer, treatment with a beautiful voice, poetry and music, treatment through diet, treatment with water, herbal treatment.” (Küçük & Yegin, Tasaffuf ve Tıp (Selim Kalbin Fizyolojisi), 2016, p. 169)
These treatment methods are applications based on Hippocrates’ theory of four humors/liquids. According to this theory, everything in the universe consists of four essential substances: water, air, earth, fire. Fluids are corresponding to these four elements in the human body, and health is protected through their balance. These are blood, yellow bile, black bile, and phlegm. It occurs in the body as heat, cold, humidity, and dryness. Prof. Küçük, who states that the balance of these four elements protects the body’s health; when the balance is disturbed, disease occurs and continues that today, the discovery of hormones and the immune system has brought this theory back to the agenda.” (Küçük & Yegin, Tasaffuf ve Tıp (Selim Kalbin Fizyolojisi), 2016, p. 170)
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“As a matter of fact, in ancient times, physicians chose the path of treatment with beautiful sounds such as music and the whirling for some special diseases, they listened to some musical instruments, they recommended walking around in beautiful places where they could hear various flowers, water sounds, nightingale, and live if possible.” (Küçük & Yegin, Tasaffuf ve Tıp (Selim Kalbin Fizyolojisi), 2016, p. 181)
“Islamic mysticism is the system of thought and action that man follows in order to reach the depths of his inner world and the secrets of the outer world by feeling the pleasure of God's unity in his whole being, which is mainly about creation, and the way of thoughts and belief on life and the life after death.” (Ayverdi, 2006, s. 3040).
Mawlana Jalaluddin Rumi, the great Turkish mystic Sufi who lived in the 13th century, wrote six-volume Persian verses Mathnawi one of the most influential works of Sufism.
The 24th couplet of his work Mathnavi, he says;
“He (alone) whose garment is rent by a (mighty) love is purged of covetousness and all defects.
Hail, O love that bringest us good gain—thou that art, the physician of all our ills,
The remedy of our pride and vainglory, our Plato and our Galen!” (Gölpınarlı, Mesnevî Tercemesi ve Şerhi, I-II cilt, 1990, p. 23)
The fact that Rumi emphasizes the names of Plato, a student of Socrates and teacher of Aristotle, and Greek physician Galen (known as Calinos in Islamic Medicine), who was also a palace physician in the Roman Empire, demonstrates that he believes that they had served humanity to treat spiritual and physical illnesses. According to Rumi, true love can beat self-ambition, selfishness, and ego.
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“Plato and Galen, two great Greek judges, were also physicians. They tried to find a cure for humanity's material and spiritual problems. Rumi believed that both Plato and Galen had served spiritually to humanity on this mean.” (Rıfai, 2000, s. 9)
13th-century Anatolian Sufi and folk poet, mystic Yunus Emre, in a couplet of his poem “God Gave Me a Heart, Soul says;
“One moment, remains in ignorance
Does not know a thing
One moment, delves into the sagacity
And becomes Luqman, Câlînus the wise
…”
(Tatçı, Yunus Emre Divanı, Cilt 1, 1997, p. 171)
In his poem, while emphasizing the states of being human and experiencing these states, Yunus Emre says that a person who dives into the ocean of wisdom can become a healer like Luqman and Galen.
Galen has hundreds of works, including a 16-volume anatomy book, in which he developed Hippocratic medicine and revealed ancient medical treatments. Although he is not Christian, it is stated in the medical history books that he believed in only one God and argued that the body was an instrument of the soul, and therefore his books and findings were accepted by Jews, Christians and Muslims.
In different sects and dervish lodges established in Anatolia starting from the Anatolian Seljuks period, arts disciplines such as calligraphy, ornamentation, learning playing musical instruments, whirling, and singing were some of the mandatory parts of training to raise self-sufficient, healthy individuals.
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Figure 36.
Mewlana Celaleddin Rumi, whirling (Sevakıb-I Menakıb, TSM R.1479)
Note. (And M. , 2007, s. 405) , Minyatürlerle Osmanlı Mitologyası, YKY
In the book Minyatürlerle Osmanlı-İslam Mitologyası, it is emphasized that the sama (whirling) dervishes chose the color of earth and blue on purpose, that the brown represents the earth, the blue the sky, and the fact that as they are whirling, one of the palms is raised up and the other points down represent getting from the sky and giving to the earth. These symbols have been expressed almost in the same way in healer cultures.
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Figure 37.
M. Celaleddin Rumi, whirling with the rhythmic sound of the goldbeater's hammer
Note. (And M. , 2007, s. 418) , Minyatürlerle Osmanlı Mitologyası, YKY
Ahmad Aflaki, one of the dervishes of Horasan who lived in Konya during the Karamanids period, was born in Turkistan (?-1360). Aflaki, a student of Arif Calabi, grandson of Rumi, is a scholar of religion and astronomy. His Persian book, Menâḳıbü'l-ʿârifîn, with extensive information about Rumi and the Mevlevi Order, is one of his most essential books of him.
Although it is mostly compilation, it is seen that in Menâḳıbü'l-ʿârifîn (The Feats of the Knowers of God) gives vital information about the historical, religious, social and economic situation of Anatolia at that time, as well as about Rumi and those around him. Furthermore, there are significant records about the region's architectural history, carpet weaving, and musical arts. In addition to the compiled information, there is also information obtained by the author and by his own experiences. The work has particular importance in reflecting the mystical Sufi manners and ceremonies of the period. (Ansiklopedi İ. , 2021)
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“Aflaki frequently states in almost all stories in his work that sama rituals are performed and adds among which there are some that last three days and three nights.” (And M. , 2007, s. 419) The miniature above is crucial since it depicts Rumi whistled in ecstasy, not only with the music with specific notes but also with the rhythmic hammering sounds of the apprentices in the jewelers' bazaar. “There are four significant elements in a complete sama: Music, beautiful voice, dance, and ecstasy. We can also add the symbolism of the sama to these. …
Sama seen in various sects such as Samah for Bektashis and Alevis. Here, too, the elements of the sama fully exist.” (And M. , 2007, s. 420)
“Sufism, or Islamic mysticism, is a way of Islam that values sincere simplicity and exuberant sentimentality. It is also called the essence of Islam.” (Demirok, Sağlık Sektöründe Sanatın Uygulamaları ve Faydaları, 2017, p. 40)
“Books such as Rumi's Mathnavi, Tabrizi's Malakat, and İbrahim Hakkı Erzurum’s Marifetname propose issues such as sleeping less and eating less while informing about the struggle of the soul and asceticism, as they refer the effects of spiritual practices on human physiology.” (Küçük, 2016, p.192).
The Middle Ages was a long period when endless wars and famines, epidemics, and infectious diseases were intense and intertwined. The epidemics in Central Asia spread to other countries via the Silk Road and India. The most important transit routes are Istanbul via the Crimea and the Black Sea; Egypt through Mesopotamia and Arabia.
In medieval Europe, the churches were the only shelters for the wounded, the weak, and the sick. Many monasteries-hospitals were built to serve the sick, especially with the initiatives of the Benedictines. The ongoing treatments in these monasteries included nutritional control, clothing aid, incantations, and prayers rather than medical care. These services of the monasteries are open to everyone. However, most patients
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prefer clerics who are famous for healing instead of physicians. The Popery forbade medical service in monasteries, claiming that it caused the clergy to neglect their primary duties. Thus, hospitals providing medical services broke their ties with monasteries and fell into the hands of civil organizations. Schola Medica Salernitana is the first recognized medical school in Europe. No anatomical information was provided in the school, and the books of Hippocrates, Galen and Islamic scientists were studied.
2.1.4.iii. Arts and Health in Europe
As it is known, maintaining the point reached in science and thought as it is, without changing it, and preserving the existing as it is, is a negative development for humanity. For this reason, it is significant to review and renew the thoughts and practices in any field. In this sense, Medieval Ages were a period in Europe where new thoughts were blocked, scientific studies and developments stopped. The definition of this medical period, which accepts discoveries of Galen without questioning and fixes them in a way that does not allow any change, is known as Scholastic Medicine in history. In this period, medicine and healing were peeled off totally from their roots; the traditional healing models in animism and paganism and formed in a brand-new shape with Christianity.
Gods and spirits were replaced with saints and angels, demons with devils, Asclepius temples with churches and monasteries. Dream rituals in the temples emerged as the sacred sleep ceremonies of the saints in the churches, and the icons of the saints were loaded with sacred meanings and took their place in the churches, monasteries and even houses for healing and protection purposes. In the Middle Ages Women healers
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were captured, accused of witchcraft, imprisoned, and burned to death. (Demirok, Sağlık Sektöründe Sanatın Uygulamaları ve Faydaları, 2017, pp. 30-34)
Medieval German Christian mystic, Benedictine abbess, philosopher, writer, composer Hildegard von Bingen (1098-1179) at the age of eight as the first step of her mystical journey was confined to the monastery of St. Disibod. Later gaining more authority she established a monastery for women only, with the increase in the number of women in the monastery and the acceptance of her ideas by the Pope. Hildegard lived a very active mystical life during St. Rupert's monastery she founded. On the one hand, she addressed the priests with sermon tours and claimed that the priests’ group should be reformed, and on the other hand, she confronted other mystics by allowing women in the monastery to dress up, wear jewelry and sing tunes. The most essential feature that distinguishes Hildegard, who has an important place in the history of Christian thought and mystical tradition, from other mystics is the dynamism that she brought to the Benedictine monastic school.
Figure 38.
Eibingen Monastry, Hesse, Germany
Note. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eibingen_Abbey reached on June.20.2021
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Furthermore, Hildegard, who has a noble background, has come to the fore in the establishment of women's monasteries, the approval process of her visions, and the worldly power brought by this nobility ties in the sermon tours where she had the opportunity to address the priests. Moreover, Hildegard is not a mystic who remained within the borders of the monastery. She is open enough to meet Friedrich, the emperor of the time and nobles, priests, and mystics.
(Dergipark, https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/download/article-file/778810 , 2021)
Hildegard's medical and scientific writings differ in focus and scope, although thematically complementary to the ideas about nature that she reflects in her mandalas. These writings are mainly come from theoretical knowledge of the monastery from her experience of helping and then managing the medicinal herb garden and infirmary, and possibly from its extensive readings in the monastery library. As she gained practical skills in diagnosis and treatment, she combined the physical treatment of physical illnesses with holistic methods centered on spiritual healing. She is known for her healing properties, including the practical application of tinctures, herbs, and precious stones. She combined these elements with theological ideas. Everything that is on the earth is for human use. In addition to her practical experience, she gained medical knowledge, including four elements of humor theory from traditional Latin texts. Hildegard has cataloged her theory and practice in her two books.
In her book Scivias there are twenty-six visions and thirty-five miniature illustrations. “In every vision in the book, she drew, wrote and composed what she saw, believing that it was the voice of heaven.” (Demirok, Sağlık Sektöründe Sanatın Uygulamaları ve Faydaları, 2017, p. 36)
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Figure 39.
Scivias, Cosmos and Humanity, Part 1, Vision 3
Note.https://musictales.club/article/europe-worshiped-12th-century-prophet-her-visions-rather-her-music-talent reached on October 08.2021
“The miniatures Hildegard used in her visions in her works contributed to Christian art in the field of image and illustration.” (Temiztürk, Bingenli Hildegard: Orta Çağlı Bir Hıristiyan Mistiğin Perspektifinden 'Öteki' Algısı, 2019, p. 401)
She wrote and composed over seventy hymns, melodies, musical dramas, and the Book of Simple Medicines, Book of Compand Medicine, Book of Divine Works, Physica, Book of Virtues.
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Figure 40.
Scivias, Choros of Angels, Part 1, Vision 6
Note.https://musictales.club/article/europe-worshiped-12th-century-prophet-her-visions-rather-her-music-talent reached on October 08.2021
“She is a healer elevated to sainthood in 2012 by Pope Benedict XVI. Bingen’s visual theology book and musical compositions are crucial examples of the unity of art and medicine from that era to the present. Today, the herbal remedies she recommends in her books are still used, and the hymns she composed still listen.” (Demirok, 2017, p. 36) She is the pioneer of German alternative medicine. She emphasized the importance of protecting health in preventing diseases. She is a mystic who says that being healthy is possible with a holistic approach, and this requires wisdom.
“Particularly during the Middle Ages and Renaissance, medicine was far more advanced in the Islamic world than in western Europe. Venetian recognition of this fact is evident in their use of Ibn Sina’s (Avicenna) Canon, a Greco-Arabic medical encyclopedia noted for its comprehensiveness and excellent organization, as their principal textbook for medical students at the University of Padua. In 1521, the Giunti (Junta) Press in Venice issued a revised Latin edition of the Canon that superseded the twelfth-century translation common throughout Europe. ”(Metropolitan, 2021)
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Figure 41.
Ibn-i Sina, Canon of Medicine, translated in Latin 15th century
Note.https://www.muslimphilosophy.com/sina/gal/IS-gal-27.htm reached in June 20.2021
Figure 42.
Ibn-i Sina, Canon of Medicine, Translated in Hebrew, 15th century
Note.https://www.muslimphilosophy.com/sina/gal/IS-gal-27.htm reached in June .20.06.2021
Medieval medicine often used herbal and animal-based medicines. This illustrated collection is in the British Library collection. It is the only source that survived medieval Anglo-Saxon England (11th century, 1000-1025). The Latin names of the herbs, the recipes, and the disease that should be cured are detailed. The season for plant picking and the methods were explained. How to prepare drugs noted. There are also herbs recommended against the bites of poisonous animals such as snakes and scorpions.
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Figure 43.
Coton MS Vitellius C III, f. 27r Colored drawings of herbs,11th Century
Note.https://www.bl.uk/medieval-english-french-manuscripts/articles/medical-knowledge-in-the-early-medieval-period# reached on June.20.2021
In the XIVth century, the plague took around 60 million lives, which corresponds to a quarter of the world’s population at that time. (Aydın E., 2006, p. 97)
A decrease in the population and consumption in cities led to the loss of market for the rural residents earning by agriculture and farming and deterioration of the economic relationship between the rural and urban areas. The plague created death and fear of death, and at the same time, human behaviors and relationships lost value in this chaotic environment.
“Humanistic concepts, ethical values, moral attitudes, and behaviors are on the verge of disappearing. People no longer think of anything but themselves. Treachery and hypocrisy, the feelings of grudge and hatred one by one brought inside out by the plague. (…) Bribery has become widespread in parallel with poverty and hunger. All kinds of crimes such as theft and murder have become increasingly commonplace.”
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(Aydın E., 2006, p. 98) Pharmacies in Europe emerged in Naples in 1140. Medicine and pharmacy completely separated from each other in 1240.
Pandemics seriously reduced the world population, especially in the Middle Ages. The lack of hygiene, the absence of baths in the houses, the fact that many people live with their animals are invitations to infectious diseases such as plague, cholera, leprosy, and tuberculosis. At that time, the physicians’ inability to find various cures for these diseases and the unwillingness of most people to comply with the quarantine rules led to the spread of such diseases and the serious number of deaths. Pain, death, funeral ceremonies, etc., are common topics dealt with in artists of the period.
The painting by Pierart Dou Tielt, Citizens of the City Burying Their Dead,1353 demonstrates in detail the crowds of European cities, the preparation of the people to bury their dead, expressions on their faces and their easily recognizable feelings during the pandemic. The Bubonic Plague, also called the Black Death, emerged, and is described as the worst pandemic period ever.
Figure 44.
Tourneu City Citizens Burying Dead,, Pierart Dou Tielt, 1353
Note.https://blog.academyart.edu/depictions-of-global-pandemic-throughout-art-history/reached on May.15.2021
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“Between 1300 and 1600, Europe's largest commercial city was Venice. Although it was governed as a republic like Florence, Venice is an empire. It controls the Adriatic coast, and numerous islands in the region lies from Greece to Cyprus. This maritime city was ruled by an elite ruling class.” (Farthing S. , 2014, p. 164) There were oriental patterns and designs in the city art and culture. Its solid commercial connection with the East played a critical role in the development of art in the city.
In 1348, a health commission was established in the city, and practices such as burying the dead body with unique methods, appropriate sizes of cemeteries, prohibition of leaving corpses on the streets, and measures to be taken against travelers coming from outside of the city were implemented and inspected. In addition, people who are infected or suspected to be infected are prohibited from entering the city.
Figure 45.
Giacomo Borlone de Burchis, Oratorio del Disciplini Frescos, Clusone, Italy
Note.https://blog.academyart.edu/depictions-of-global-pandemic-throughout-art-history/reachedon May,15,2021
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Figure 46.
Pieter Bruegel the Elder, The Triumph of Death, 1632, Prado Museum, Madrid
Note. Taken from https://blog.academyart.edu/depictions-of-global-pandemic-throughout-art-history/ on May,18, 2021
Teachings and beliefs of the Medieval Church, which insisted that man could not do anything without the help of God, changed with the beginning of the Renaissance. Techniques such as perspective have developed in this period of great artistic innovation. Florence became the arts center of the European Renaissance for most of the XVth century.
2.1.5. Renaissance Period 15th- 16th Century
2.1.5.i. Arts and Health in Europe
“The Renaissance marks the transition in European history from the close of the Middle Ages to the dawn of the modern world. The term ‘Renaissance’ means ‘rebirth’ and refers to a revived interest in Ancient Greece and Rome's intellectual and artistic treasures. Works by classical authors such as Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, and Homer, which had fallen into obscurity in the West, were rediscovered, and a new, humanistic outlook blossomed, that prioritized humanity and human achievement.”
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(Farthing S. , Sanatın Tüm Öyküsü, 2014, s. 150)
“Europe went through a period of “awakening” with the Renaissance and recovering from the heavy pressure of Christianity. One of the rational and bright sides of the Renaissance was the analyzing investigated approach towards Science and the Philosophies of the Middle Ages. Rebirth in medicine shows the preparation of the infrastructure of Modern Medicine with an uninterrupted process until today. Ancient medicine represented by Galen and became dogmatic by the church during the Middle Ages was subjected to criticism and scientific scrutiny during the Renaissance.” (Aydın, 2006, p. 107) Although it takes time for the innovations to be accepted, new perspectives have emerged with the struggles of innovative chemists such as Swiss scientist Paracelsus (1493-1541). Paracelsus also added salt to sulfur and mercury to four elements, which the alchemists considered essential substances, and put forward the first triad theory, which he called "tria prima", to treat the four humors. “According to Paracelsus, the universe is shaped by matter from the first object, which contains four elements (fire, air, water, soil), mercury, sulfur, and salt. Constructing the macrocosm, which consists of four elements, on the triad of Sulphur, mercury, and salt, Paracelsus considers that the same principle applies to the human structure. (Öndin, 2017, p. 36) Paracelsus adopts animism, the oldest way of thinking that accepts that all beings have souls, and even argues that air, one of the most important features of human life from birth to death, has a soul.
There was a break from the Middle Ages thought and belief systems during the Renaissance period. Even though the change started on a theoretical basis, then spread into the practical field. Strict Catholic rules were replaced by the moderate approaches of Protestantism with the reform movement in religion. “During the Renaissance, a new focus on anatomy emerged, and artists and physicians worked together in this
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field. These include Leonardo da Vinci and the physician Marcantonio Della Torre (1481-1511), Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475-1564) and the anatomist Matteus Realdus Columbus (1516-1559), and possibly the most famous couple, Tiziano da Cadore Vecellio (Titian 1490-1576) and the anatomist Andreas Vesalius (1514-1564).” (Tez, Yasaklı Sanat Olarak Minyatür Resim ve Gravür Tarihi, 2018, p. 222)
Italian universities have earned a well-deserved reputation in medical training. There has been an influx of students from all over the world. New views have been put forward and accepted in the field of medicine. In the process that began with the Renaissance, Arts studies became the driving force in medicine, especially Arts in anatomy. Anatomical drawings became much more realistic with the devoted work of the artists towards the end of the 15th century. The Renaissance also witnessed the rebirth of surgery, the very first steps of modern surgery.
“Florence enters the 16th century as a prolific city. This period was called the High Renaissance. “The artists of the High Renaissance shared the humanistic philosophy that placed man and human achievement at the center of all things. Their outlook is exemplified by the drawings and anatomical studies of Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), notably his drawing Proportions of the Human Figure (after Vitruvius), commonly referred to as Vitruvian Man (Figure 47). The drawing depicts a male figure in two superimposed positions with his arms and legs apart and simultaneously within a circle and a square. The idea of man as the measure of all things extended to all the plastic arts.” (Farthing S. , 2014, p. 173)
“The Renaissance thought, which considers man as a model of the universe, adopted the mathematical laws of antiquity, which clarified the relationship between God and man, and the understanding of sacred geometry. In this context, Donato Bramante (1444-1514), one of the famous architects of the Renaissance period, had designs
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dealing with the combination of circles and squares, which are the indicators of sacred geometry.” (Öndin N., 2016, p. 109)
“Bramante was influenced by Vitruvius (70/80-15 BC), the famous architect and author of Ancient Rome, in the field of geometry and construction. Vitruvius, who influenced Bramante and other Renaissance architects, in his work De Architectura, 15BC explains the link between the proportions of the ideal human body and geometry. According to Vitruvius, the human body is the main source of the proportion between the human body and geometry is the main source of the architecture.” (Öndin N., 2016, p. 110)
Figure 47.
Vitruvius Man
Note. (Zöllner, 2003, s. 105) Leonardo da Vinci Complete Paintings and Drawings, Taschen
These views of Vitruvius also attracted the attention of Leonardo da Vinci and became the focus of his efforts to establish a relationship between nature and man. The Vitruvian Man (1492), which he painted based on the views of Vitruvius, is the visualization of the sacred geometry of antiquity and yet at the same time the ideal Christian man created in the image of God. The Vitruvian Man reaffirms that the ideal
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divine form is a square within a circle. The square within the circle emphasizes the mathematical identity between the microcosm and the macrocosm. According to Plato, the circle is the perfect shape, and the circular motion is the closest motion to intelligence (Nous). For Pythagoras, the circle is the most beautiful shape and the square the ideal shape. Therefore, the circle and square represent the macrocosm since they are perfect and ideal shapes. (Öndin N., 2016, pp. 111-112)
Nilüfer Öndin, on page 309 of her book on Renaissance and Arts of Painting, writes that according to Leonardo da Vinci, who considers painting as a representation of natural objects, the artist must know both nature and man. For the depiction to be realistic, it is imperative for artists to closely examine the structure of the human body in the Renaissance. Technical drawings of the human body (such as internal organs, muscle system, nervous system) in the light of the information obtained through studies on cadavers were significant visual materials in medical education. Furthermore, she adds that one of the most known achievements of Leonardo da Vinci, who draws attention with his scientific studies besides his artistic identity, was his observations and drawings in the field of anatomy. (Öndin N., 2016, p. 309)
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Figure 48.
Leonardo Da Vinci, Skull Drawings
Note. (Zöllner, 2003, s. 403), Leonardo da Vinci Complete Paintings and Drawings, Taschen
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Figure 49.
Leonardo da Vinci, Anatomical drawings
Note. (Zöllner, 2003, s. 420) Leonardo da Vinci Complete Paintings and Drawings, Taschen
In the XVIth century, Germany separated from the Catholic Church and detached its ties from the ancient times and the Roman church with reforms under the leadership of Martin Luther, so that medicine turned into a science.
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Figure 50.
Rembrandt, Anatomy lesson of Dr Nicholas Tulp, 1632
Note.https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-artists-celebrating-medical-profession-renaissance reached on May.15.2021
The work, which was oil-painted on the canvas, depicts the moment when Dr. Tulp described the left arm muscle structure of the cadaver.
2.1.5. ii. Arts and Health in Ottoman Empire
During the 500 years reign of the Ottoman Empire period, a significant value was given to the profession of medicine. The palace appointed the chief physicians of the hospitals. The administration closely followed the developments and education in the medical madrasahs. The scientific applications can be categorized into two periods. The first period was the Islamic medicine period and the second period was when western medicine was involved. Adnan Adıvar stated in his book Osmanlı Türklerinde İlim that scientific studies started in the Iznik Madrasah (1330-32) during the reign of Orhan Ghazi. It became possible to translate medical books from Arabic and Persian during the reign of Bayezid I. (Aydın, 2006, p. 229)
“Ottoman hospitals were built by sultans, valide sultans, and Haseki sultans for the poor to receive inpatient treatment. Their patrons donated many income-generating
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properties to these hospitals bearing their names to cover their expenses. Treatments are of no cost fort the patients, even the burial expenses of those who died in hospitals were covered by the foundations. In time, the conditions of Ottoman hospitals could not be maintained because the lands held by their foundations were disposed of, and their incomes were transferred, and could not be fulfilled thoroughly.
It is called “Bimarhane” instead of “Darüşşifa”. While both physically and mentally ill patients were treated in bimarhane after the opening of Bezmialem Vakıf Gureba Hospital in 1847, mental patients were separated. The physically ill patients stayed at Vakıf Gureba Hospital, and the mentally ill patients were transferred to the Süleymaniye Bimarhanesi.” (Yıldırım, 2014, p. 272)
“The ones that have survived among the Turkish-Islamic hospitals are the ones built during the Ottoman period. The first hospital was built in Bursa during the reign of Orhan Ghazi. Yıldırım Beyazıt Hospital (1394) in Bursa gives us a point of view on the state of the first period Ottoman hospital architecture.
One of the early Ottoman hospitals, which was part of the complex that Mehmed the Conqueror built-in 1471 following the conquest of Istanbul, has not survived until today.” (Güreşsever, Haseki Darüşşifası (H. 946/ M. 1539), 1982, p. 106)
In her article, Güreşsever states that the madrasah plan that the Ottomans took over from the Seljuks was applied to Fatih (1470) and Süleymaniye (1555) Hospitals, and then centralized space was adopted in the Haseki Hospital, that was built in the late Ottoman period. She adds that the centralized plan served as a polyclinic in Edirne Hospital and Haseki Hospital. Right next to these hospitals, Darül Tıp was built and established.
Bursa Yıldırım Beyazıt Hospital, Istanbul Fatih Hospital, the hospital built by Bayezid II in Edirne and the hospital located in the Süleymaniye complex built by Suleiman
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the Magnificent are the most famous ones among the other hospitals. As in Islamic countries, hospitals in the Seljuk and Ottoman periods are also institutions that physicians are educated. There were rooms for medical students in the hospital located in the Fatih complex. (Aydın, 2006, p. 174)
“Fatih Kulliyesi (Fatih complex) has set an example for all the great social complexes that followed. In Fatih complex there was the first Turkish university established by Mehmed the Conqueror in Istanbul. The completely symmetrical structures grouped as the Black Sea and Mediterranean madrasahs on both sides of the mosque consisted of eight madrasahs and the hospital, Tabhane Madrasa, imaret (poorhouse), and caravanserai in the front.” (Aslanapa, Türk Sanatı, 1989, p. 240)
Halil Inalcik stated in his book Ottoman Civilization that since a hammam (Turkish bath) was built nearby before the construction of the complex, it is not included in it as an extra. “These structures, which serve the basic needs of the social life of the 60-80 thousand population of a newly conquered city, made the Fatih Complex one of the most important centers of Muslim life in Istanbul throughout the entire life of the city. These and similar structures acted as catalysts in the formation of urban identity, because they contain many functionalities for the citizens, and serve as gathering places. (İnalcık & Renda, 2004, p. 661)
Şerefettin Sabuncuoğlu was one of the most famous physicians and surgeons of the Mehmed the Conqueror period. He was born in Amasya, studied medicine at the Amasya Hospital, and continued to work as the chief physician in the same hospital.
He wrote and illustrated the only miniature surgical book written during the Ottoman period, dedicating it to Mehmed the Conqueror. The book, Cerrahhiyyetü'l Haniyye, was written in animated Turkish calligraphy. There are 138 miniatures and 168 pictures in this 409-page book. Two of the three copies of the book are in Istanbul
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Fatih Millet Library. The third is in the Paris National Library. In the book, in which surgical instruments and operations, the surgical applications are illustrated in miniatures.
Figure 51.
Cerrahhiyyetü’l Haniyye II.Volume facsimile
Note. (Uzel & Şerefeddin, 1992, s. 47) Cerrahhiyyetü’l Haniyye cilt 2, tıpkıbasım, TTK
In the light of the information provided in the Encyclopedia of Islam, Sabuncuoğlu Şerefeddin has two works named Cerrahhiyyetü'l Haniyye in 1465 and Mücerrebname in 1468. The most highlighting feature of Cerrahhiyyetü'l Hanniyye is that it contains pictures made using the miniature technique for the first time in the history of medicine, and it is written in simple Turkish. Sabuncuoğlu often prepared the drugs after trying them on himself, and collected their preparation method and use in his book “Mücerrebname”. Therefore, it has a significant value as it is the first book in the history of Turkish Medicine in which a physician collects the drugs and treatment methods that are his invention.
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There were three chapters in Şerefeddin Sabuncuoğlu’s book. The first chapter was on cauterization methods, surgical splitting, drilling methods, and orthopedic interventions. The second section was devoted to pediatric health and diseases. The third chapter was describing the surgical methods with pictures. It is the first known illustrated pediatric surgery book in the history of World Medicine.
Figure 52.
The doctor controlling the patient’s tongue, Cerrahhiyet-ül Haniyye
Note. (Dacosta, 1960, s. 57) Le premiere Manuscript Chirurgical TURC,Paris
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Figure 53.
Cerrahhiyetü-l Hanniyye, Şerefeddin Sabuncuoğlu
Note. (Dacosta, 1960, s. 105) Le premiere Manuscript Chirurgical TURC, Paris
“Edirne Complex of Sultan Bayezid II. (1484-1488) is one of the works of Hayruddin, one of the leading architects of the period. The complex is surrounded by walls. The unity in architecture and the main image of the complex reveal the structure of a strong building. The buildings, which form a separate site in the middle of a charming landscape, are in an ideal organization that gives peace to the soul for worship and treatment of the sick people in quiet nature. The hospital, the medical school, and the mental house fall to the west of the mosque.” (Aslanapa, 1989, p. 245) Health services are constructed separately. The section built for mentally ill patients is hexagonal, and it is the only hexagonal courtyard example in Ottoman architecture.
The complex of Sultan Bayezid II is one of the most significant religious, social, educational, and healthcare institutions of the period. The complex consists of many units such as a hospital, a medical school, a mosque, a guest house, a kitchen, a Turkish bath, and a bridge. The multi-purpose complex reflects the social understanding of the
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XVth century Ottoman period. where patients were treated in the hospital, students were educated in its madrasah, people prayed in its mosque, guests were hosted in its guesthouse and the poor were fed in its kitchen. The hospital is the first in the world in that it is a central hospital that aims to provide more service with less staff and that it has been planned by considering the needs in this area in detail. Similar ones started to be built in the West only 200 years later. In this hospital, the soothing sound of the music and the sound of water echoing on the stone walls serve as natural healers.
From Ibn Sina to Al-Farabi, from Seljuks to Ottomans, a deep-rooted understanding of music therapy is successfully implemented in treating physical and mental illnesses. Evliya Çelebi “Such a hospital that cannot be put into words, cannot be written by a pen,” described the hospital as indescribable. The complex had healed the patients for 400 years without interruption.” (Edirne, 2021)
Figure 54.
II. Beyazıt Complex, Edirne, Turkey
Note.https://www.kulturportali.gov.tr/turkiye/edirne/gezilecekyer/iibeyazid-kulliyesi-saglik-muzesi, reached on May,25,2021
“Turkish hospitals had mehter-i hakani and hospitals’ music bands. Let's just say here that therapy with music, which has a significant place in Turkish medicine, is not the
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Turks' invention. The Turks took this treatment method from the Arabs and Persians and developed it. In particular, Seljuk hospitals are at the forefront of treating mental illnesses with music. Hospitals are specially built to provide acoustics in music. “In this regard, for example, there was no hospital that is better than Edirne Sultan Bayezid II Hospital.” (Küçük & Yegin, 2016, s. 183)
“It can be said that the music used in the treatment was calming and cheering type of music. Since the essence of such a treatment was to relax the patient and make him forget his illness.” (Küçük & Yegin,, 2016, s. 182)
“In the Complex Sultan Bayezid II, a doctor was serving as a chief physician, second and third chief physicians, two ophthalmologists, two surgeons, and a pharmacist, in total 21 people allocated for the hospital among 167 officers serving in the whole facilities, and their daily allowances were archived. A portico and eighteen student rooms surround the northwest corner, the garden with a fountain and on the opposite side a sizable domed classroom and a medical school.” (Aslanapa, Türk Sanatı, 1989, p. 245) The complex, which reflects the social understanding of the state, consists of many units such as a hospital, mosque, guest house, soup kitchen, bath, bridge. The acoustics were built during the construction of the structure. Water canals and a small fountain were placed in for patients to benefit from the therapeutic feature of the sound of water. In addition to music and water therapy, herbs have also been used effectively in treatments.
One of the most famous complexes in the Ottoman Empire is the Süleymaniye Külliyesi (Süleymaniye Complex). The complex is integrated with the texture of the city of Istanbul and covers a space on a wide area with madrasahs, a kitchen, tombs, mosques, and streets connecting them. Haseki Hospital also partakes as an independent unit of the complex. The Haseki Complex and the Haseki hospital were built by
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Suleiman the Magnificent for Hürrem Sultan. It is constructed by the chief architect of the palace, Mimar Sinan (1539).
In his book Osmanlı Uygarlığı, Halil İnalcık says that The Grand Architect Sinan, the head of the Hassa Architects Association and who served during the reigns of The Magnificent Suleiman, Sultan Selim II, and Murad III, ruled the Ottoman architectural world for half a century. (1538-1588). When he was elected Chief Architect, he was a Janissary captain specializing in carpentry, construction, and engineering. After participating in many military expeditions, his talent opened the door to the chief architect. After Şehzade Mosque, one of the underlying projects of his career was the construction of the Süleymaniye Complex in Istanbul. (1551-1557).
“The unique building, in the complex, is the hospital in the history of Ottoman architecture, and it is especially significant in terms of being a unit on its own in the complex, which is not too vast.” (Islamansiklopedisi.org.tr)
Mimar Sinan completed the Süleymaniye Complex in 1555, which was built in the name of Suleiman the Magnificent, including a hospital and the Atik Valide Hospital in Üsküdar in 1583.
“Sinan did not adhere to a single plan in all four hospitals he built but applied different forms in all of them. He gave optimum attention to every structure to the plan of the madrasah and central-octagonal plans and thought of even the smallest detail and internal arrangements necessary for a hospital. Sinan served in two ways with these social institutions; The first is that these structures have survived to our time quite intact, and the other is that these structures have been able to meet the needs of their time, and they continue their functions even today.” (Güreşsever, 1982, s. 102)
“This complex constitutes the center of the religious and cultural life of the capital. Like the Fatih Complex, the Süleymaniye Complex shows that foundations are the
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basic institutions that form the basis of the social needs of the society.” (İnalcık & Renda, Osmanlı Uygarlığı, 2004, p. 672)
Figure 55.
Hipokrat and Simurg, Falname, Topkapı Palace Museum, H.1703
Note. (And M. , 2007, s. 319) Minyatürlerle Osmanlı-İslam Mitologyası, YKY
The Falnama (Book of Omens) addressed to Ahmad I was prepared by Kalandar Pasha between 1603-17. In this miniature, in which Hippocrates is portrayed in Ottoman clothes, Hippocrates is depicted on the back of Simurg while going to Mount Qaf to buy medicine. The original work is in the Topkapı Palace Museum.
“The miniature book that reveals the wealth and splendor of the Tulip Period (1718-1730) and represents the last bright period of Ottoman art and culture is Surname-i Vehbi. (1720) The miniatures in the book belong to Ottoman painter Levni, who knew the characteristics of the palace art of that period and produced many works.” (Tez, Yasaklı Sanat Olarak Minyatür Resim ve Gravür Tarihi, 2018, p. 173)
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“Levni has ensured to reflect realism and the joy of life in his works with inventions such as catching the figure in its most vivid moment, evacuating its surroundings and drawing attention to the necessary point.” (Tez, Yasaklı Sanat Olarak Minyatür Resim ve Gravür Tarihi, 2018, p. 174)
Levni Abdülcelil Çelebi, (1680-1712) early XVIIIth century miniature painter, served as a chief muralist and head of muralists during the reigns of Mustafa II and Ahmad III. He prefers soothing natural colors instead of striking bright tones, uses contrasting tones in harmony, and abandons the use of gold gilding, among technical features that he portrays the reality. He reflected the lifestyle and customs of the period realistically in his miniatures. And this is quite precious in terms of documenting XVIIIth century Ottoman life.
Figure 56.
Vazir-i Azam, learning about the health status of the princes from the head of surgeons in front of the mansion, Surname, Levni
Note.(Atıl, 1999, s. 69), Levni ve Surname, Apa Yayıncılık
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In the Ottoman Empire, Islamic medical education and medical treatment were applied to the sick person as a whole and allows his physical, spiritual and mental development to occur in a harmonious and balanced way.
This tradition and cultural formation, which came from the Seljuks, took place in the society with the Ahi Brotherhood and dervish lodge education in Anatolia. It is an education model adopting a master-apprentice relationship. Beside their education on religion, dervishes learned fine arts, music, and singing training are wished to be versatile, consistent, balanced, and harmonized in their relations with the outside world as the inner world. “The Mevlevi lodges concentrated in Istanbul were like a kind of art academy and music conservatory.” (And M. , Minyatürlerle Osmanlı-Islam Mitologyası, 2007, s. 404)
“We know that especially Mawlevi dervishes attend singing lessons and at least one instrument lesson during their dervish lodge education. According to Rumi, whirling and music is hearing the secret corners of the heart.” The famous Ottoman musicians such as Hammamizade İsmail, Dede Efendi are from the Mawlevi sect. Bektashi Order is also Ahead of other sects; Bektashi order also uses music and movements in their rituals.
(Küçük & Yegin,, 2016, s. 186)
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Figure 57.
Whirling Derwishes at Galata Mevlevihanesi (Tek minyatür, Philedelphia Freer Library)
Note. (And M. , 2007, s. 423) Minyatürlerle Osmanlı-İslam Mitologyası, YKY
If to classify the periods of medical science in the Ottoman Empire, the periods can be classified as the classical period, the period of recognition of Western medicine and the transition to Western medicine, and the period of complete application of Western medicine.By the conquest of Istanbul by Mehmed the Conqueror, Islamic medicine blended with Western medical knowledge. In the XVIIIth century, the translations of the medicine books allowed Western medicine practices to be applied in Ottoman medicine. “Because of its historical reasons.” (Alpkaya, 2014, s. 39) The Ottoman
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Empire could not keep up with the social, political, and industrial revolutions in the West in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
2.1.6. From the Age of Enlightenment to the Beginning of XXth Century
“The Age of Enlightenment is the era in which formed the intellectual and philosophical basis of the Western civilization's project of building a new human and society. The new man must first be equipped with a trait that shows the courage to use his mind.”
(Dergipark, (https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/download/article-file/217373). )
The movement of thought, which started with the 1688 English Revolution, with the personal rights and economic freedoms becoming more humanistic and libertarian, forms the basis of the Age of Enlightenment. The effects of the English revolution were fully ripe with the American revolution in 1776 and the French revolution in 1789. “The flourishing studies in the field of physiology were not only in circulatory physiology but also in respiratory physiology in the XVIIth century. The enrichment of medical knowledge was turning the eyes of researchers to new technical and scientific possibilities. Meanwhile, technical developments had continued. One of these technical developments was the invention of the microscope.”
(Aydın, 2006, s. 119)
Enlightenment philosophy is the most significant phenomenon in the XVIIIth century. The ideas and works of John Locke in England, Jean Jacques Rousseau in France, and Emmanuel Kant in Germany, and the freedoms and theories they suggested for society and the individual, played a crucial role in the change during the Enlightenment era.
“There were surprising developments in surgery, pathological anatomy, chemistry and medicine in the 18th century. Health is entirely controlled by physicians who have
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received training in this field. The design of the hospitals was organized with their departments, allowing patients to recover peacefully for treatment and for dying. Contrary to the ancient healing rituals that tried to unite the soul, body and mind, units and structures were created where physical treatments were the primary purpose. As the science focused on physical treatments, treatments have begun to develop by separating the patients' soul, body, and mental integrity.
In 1751, Benjamin Franklin proposed and advocated the benefits of using the arts in the health sector. He emphasized the importance of creativity and activity for inpatients.” (Demirok, Sağlık Sektöründe Sanatın Uygulamaları ve Faydaları, 2017, s. 46) Two major medical centers emerged in Europe in the XVIIIth century. Both founders are students of Hermann Boerhaave, the best-known clinician, and medical educator of the century. One of these centers was in Edinburgh, England, and the other was in Vienna.
In the last days of the Ottoman Empire, Tıbhane (Medicine Center) and Cerrahhane-i Amire (Surgery Center) were built and established (14 March 1827) by order of Sultan Mahmoud II. Later its name was changed to Mekteb-i Tıbbiye-i Adliye-i Şahane. In these medical faculties western medicine education and practice were systematically taught. Western medicine suggests a treatment model that uses the organ-oriented treatment method. The Vienna Medical Academy was very famous in medical education. Two doctors and a pharmacist from the Vienna Medical Academy were invited to the medical school in Istanbul.
“In the 18th and 19th centuries, Western medical science had developed enormously. Nevertheless hospitals were more or less the same as today's hospitals. Moreover, in the 20th century, art therapies and Arts in hospitals practices began to find a place in healthcare systems. Today, consideration of the emotional and mental health of the
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inpatient is a significant part of the whole. Efforts to organize an environment of the hospitals contribute to this way of integrity so that sterile, uncomfortable, and restless scientific environment has begun to be balanced.”
(Demirok, Sağlık Sektöründe Sanatın Uygulamaları ve Faydaları, 2017, s. 46)
The social and political change that started with the French Revolution at the end of the XVIIIth century continued rapidly in the late XIXth century and early XXth century; the industrial revolution, nation-states and the new structuring of nation-states that emerged from international relations have become the significant turning points in world history.
Nation-states are formed by the people who believed that the sovereignty came from God until then, that the power came from the human communities living in that country, that is, the people themselves, and the general acceptance of this idea.
It has spread from France to the European continent. The French Revolution supported the theory of nationalism by defending universal values. The effects of this process developed and resulted in the establishment of a regular army system, the establishment of a central and national education system, and thus the increase and enforcement of literacy, the acceleration of restructuring and reorganization efforts, and the strengthening of the common national language, history, and culture. Although it started in the Age of Enlightenment, developments in natural sciences could only be carried out by personal efforts and research associations, as the scholastic education system of that period did not allow. In particular, the systematization of production and education in science, the establishment of Polytechnical schools and similar scientific institutions, the fact that universities became autonomous institutions with the support of the state, and the separation of scientific institutions into social sciences and physical sciences have been accepted. And as a result of these categorizations,
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scientific researches could be carried out more systematically, in detail, and collectively. Great strides have happened in the production of knowledge. Thus, it was possible to scientifically examine the social development and change that occurred with the revolution. The industrial revolution, which occurred right after the French Revolution, started in England. Faruk Alpkaya in his 20. Yüzyıl Dünya ve Türkiye Tarihi, says that the industrial revolution refers to the replacement of production and economy based on agriculture and crafts, with industrial output and economy based on industry. With the industrial revolution, human and animal energy was replaced first by water energy, then steam power produced by fossil fuel, and then electricity produced by fossil fuel and water power. In this way, factory production started, and mass output was achieved. Mechanization, which prepared the industrial revolution, enabled a rapid increase in production, and industrial capitalism was born with the rise of goods.
It is a revolutionary time zone that changed Europe in the 19th century and the world in the 20th century. Transportation methods have been restructured with the production of machinery required for the industry-the development of transportation routes to facilitate increased trade. The invention of the steam engine made it possible to transport steamships, and the railway networks expanded with the production of the iron and steel. The concept of time and space have changed, transportation and communication have accelerated, and distances have shortened. News, information, and thought have spread rapidly. The cultural exchange pointed to the influence of Orientalism in the West and Occidentalism in the East. The Age of Enlightenment transformed the religion, destiny, and god-centered social structure into one that exalts the human mind, while the French Revolution led to the concepts of freedom, equality, and fraternity and the spread of the awareness that man is his own master. With the
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Industrial Revolution in XIX century, the relationship with the human and nature has changed. While he saw himself as a part of nature until that moment, he believe that he was the master of nature and that he could control and change it. By the end of the XIXth century, thousands of years of human history changed radically at an unprecedented rate. “Human life has ceased to be dependent on nature, and human life compatible with machines has begun to replace human life compatible with nature. All areas of social life were reshaped accordingly.”
(Alpkaya, 2014, s. 25) Furthermore, this century witnessed developments in medicine as well. French physicist and medical doctor Rene Laennec invented the stethoscope in 1816. In 1826, Dr. Fleming discovered penicillin; in 1882, Pasteur discovered the rabies vaccine, and Koch, on the same date, found the tuberculosis bacillus and opened a new era in the history of humanity.
Ordinarius Professor Süheyl Ünver is one of the esteemed Turkish scientists and art people who received his share of this holistic education in the early 20th century. During the 1933 University reform, he established the Institute of Medical History and later the Department of Medical History at the Cerrahpaşa Faculty of Medicine. Besides his health studies, he has taught Turkish miniature and decoration at the Academy of Fine Arts since 1957, re-established the Topkapı Palace Nakkaşhane, and trained many students.
Born in 1898, MD Ünver studied Calligraphy, Ornamentation and Marbling at Medresetül Hattatin (Calligraphy School) (1916-1923), and graduated from ornamentation education in 1923. For about fifteen years He took charcoal and watercolor classes from Hoca Ali Rıza Efendi. He painted Istanbul’s buildings, streets, madrasahs, wooden buildings, mosque courtyards, and inns, which are on the verge of disappearing, as a documentary and with miniature elegance. In addition to his dozens
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of books, his three thousand notebooks are preserved in foundations and institutes such as the Süleymaniye Library, the Turkish History Foundation, and the Institute of Medical History, and the archives are open to access the students.
Professor Ünver, in his book Tıp Tarihi published in 1943, asked, “I wonder what phase medicine is today?” and replied as follows; “It would be right to say without hesitation that it is in the phase of antithesis. As a matter of fact, in the XIXth century, the old medicine was fading away in the face of the advent of wonder and attention, which is so valuable.
All the ancient methods have been abandoned and the ancient knowledge lost its importance, not because the ancient techniques were ineffective. There were no such comparisons made in the past. The reason is that the new methods have been put forward firmly. These anatomical, pathological and physiological new methods have gained well-deserved popularity. In this way, the new medicine desired to be scientific and positive by leaving the ancient techniques of the art of medicine. We name this medicine as an antithesis in the 20th century.” (Ünver S. , 1943, s. 3)
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Figure 58.
Doctor’s Consulting Room, 17th Century, Süheyl Ünver
Note. (Şerifoğlu, 2017, s. 19) Süheyl Ünver, Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı Yayınları
Versatility is in Islamic education, and as in Far Eastern philosophies that existed thousands of years ago, Shamanism, and Hildegard von Bingen’s approach to humanity in the Middle Ages. A holistic perspective is seen in the esoteric, occult, and theosophical societies that developed from the late 19th century and emerged in Europe in the early 20th century.
2.2. Selected Artists Inspired from Healer Cultures and New Age Belief Systems
In addition to the social, economic, and political changes at the beginning of the 20th century, developing a modern oculist mentality, putting forward brand new arguments for spirituality, with its holistic approach by blending Eastern and Western theological and esoteric knowledge affected the public and also appealed
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to the well-known artists of the period. As a result, the spiritual leaders, Mme Blavatsky, George Ivanovich Gurdjieff, and Rudolph Steiner, come to the fore with their influence on Kandinsky, Arnold Schoenberg, Mondrian, Theo van Doesburg, Luigi Russolo, Mark Rothko, Bennett Newman, Joseph Beuys, and John Cage and many others.
Kandinsky included Mme Blavatsky's arguments and occult information in his book on spirituality. The creative process in art is a kind of ritual. The creative process can be called the experimental activity of the human mind to reach objective facts. It can lead to the opening of the imagination in the individual or group and thus create change in the perspective. It strengthens the individual's bond with nature and the universe. (Demirok, 2017, s. 2) In his book, Spirituality in Art, Kandinsky says, “Art is to establish the harmony of the whole,” (Kandinsky, 2015)
The artist stated that it is essential to examine the concept of theosophy to comprehend spiritual and creative experiences. He conceptualized the spiritual work of Blavatsky and Steiner and formulated his mission by combining the dimensions of art and spirituality. “For Blavatsky, theosophy is synonymous with eternal truth. The new person carrying the torch of truth will find the minds ready; brings a language that will tell the new truths, and an order that clears financial obstacles and difficulties from its path awaits him. Blavatsky says that 'the World, in the twenty-first century, will be a paradise compared today, and her book ends with these words.” (Kandinsky, 2015, s. 42) “The Theosophical Society was founded by Helena Blavatsky and Henry Olcott in New York in 1875 and has been one of the organizations that played a crucial role in the evolution of the Buddhist tradition and its adoption to the West. In the beginning, the association aimed to understand the supernatural phenomena of mediumship, to establish connections between spirits. A few years later, she deepened her attention to
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Eastern religions, combining the concepts of magic and mystery found in the Tibetan spiritual tradition with the interest of Western romantics in supernatural phenomena. While combining the belief systems, she did not use scientific language. Theosophy sought to find universal truth, offering a new spiritual system saying that religious traditions were too biased to find universal truth. For her, Buddhism was the tradition, best reflected esoteric and universal truth that can be set in all religions.” (Aksel, 2020, s. 93)
Figure 59.
Kandinsky, “Little Pleasures, 1911”, Guggenheim Museumi
Note.Taken from https://www.guggenheim.org/artwork/186 on June. 04.2021
The Little Pleasures is in the New York Guggenheim Museum Collection. Museum curator, Nancy Spector comments on Kandinsky's work; The wavy colored ovals and black lines crossed by moving brushstrokes are Kandinsky's first truly non-objective
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paintings. She defined the work; The web of thin, moving lines shows a graphical, two-dimensional sensibility, while vibrant, vibrantly colored forms suggest a variety of spatial depths. In his book On Spirituality in Art, Kandinsky, describes the life of the soul which can be represented as a large acute-angled triangle with the narrowest part at the top, divided into unequal segments by horizontal lines. (Kandinsky, 2015, s. 33)
Figure 60.
Kandinsky “Composition 8”, 1923, Guggenheim Museum
Note. https://www.guggenheim.org/artwork/1924 reached on June,04,2021
“In Composition 8, colorful, interactive geometric forms create a pulsating surface that is alternately dynamic and calm, aggressive and quiet. The importance of the circles in this painting prefigures the dominant role they would play in many subsequent works, culminating in the cosmic and harmonious image of Several Circles. “The circle”, claimed Kandinsky' is the synthesis of the greatest oppositions. It combines the concentric and the eccentric in one form and equilibrium. Of the three primary forms,
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it points most clearly to the fourth dimension.” Nancy Spector, Curator of the Guggenheim Museum, NY, USA (Spector, 2021)
Kandinsky's color theory took its roots from the color theory of the German Romantic philosopher, writer, poet Goethe. “The work of art is born of the artist in a mysterious and secret way. From him, it gains life and being. Nor is its existence casual or inconsequent, but it has a definite and purposeful strength, alike in its material and spiritual life.” (Kandinsky, 2015, s. 95)
De Stijl, Neoplasticism The avant-garde art movement that emerged from the Netherlands at the beginning of the 20th century is also the name of the magazine on Neoplasticism published by Dutch painter and art critic Theo van Doesburg, who was one of the founders and the leading theorists of the movement. The Bauhaus educators, painter, art theorist Piet Mondrian (1872-1944) and painter, architect Theo van Doesburg (1883-1931), aimed to simplify art and developed Neoplastic theory based on the theosophical literature founded and advocated by Mme Blavatsky. Theosophical ideology and philosophy were at the heart of their works.
Figure 61.
Composition IV, Theo Van Doesburg, 1917 each 286.5x56.6cm
Notehttps://www.theartstory.org/artist/van-doesburg-theo/artworks/#pnt_4reached on October.08.2021
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According to Mondrian, the most objective and rational explanation of the concept of absolute, set in the theosophical school of thought, was possible with Neoplasticism. Furtermore, the artist supported that his works would create inner harmony and balance in the audience. “According to the geometric abstract understanding which Mondrian calls 'New Plasticism', art is a kind of reflection of the unchanging laws of the universe. These laws are reflected in Mondrian's canvas as an asymmetrical network of rectangles of various sizes. The absence of any central focal point in the composition draws the viewer's eye to the web of relations on the canvas: the interrelationship of vertical and horizontal lines and basic colors…” (Antmen, 20. Yüzyıl Batı Sanatında Akımlar, 2008, s. 83) In Mondrian's work "Evolution" it is easy to spot the elements and symbols of theosophy by the way he used colors, figures, and shapes.
Figure 62.
Evolution, Mondrian, 1911, MOMA
Note.http: Taken from //www.pietmondrian.eu/english/individual-works/evolution-1911/evolution.html on May.29.2021
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The work is oil on canvas; 60.3x55.4 cm, in MOMA collection, New York
“Mondrian was deeply affected and influenced by the Theological Discourse that the eye leaving the phenomenal world will be open to pure thought. There is a required responsibility for those selected ones to open the eyes of others to spirituality.” (Öndin, Modern Sanat, 2019, s. 175) (Gül, 2016)
Figure 63.
Key to The Meaning of the Colors, Mme Blavatsky
Note. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theosophy_and_visual_arts#/media/File:Colorchart.jpg reached on May, 29,2021
HighSpiritualityDevotionmixedwithAffectionDevotiontoanobleidealPurereligiousfeelingSelfishreligiousFeelingHighestIntellectReligiousFeelingsTingedwithFearStrongIntellectLoveforHumanityUnselfishAffectionJealousyDeceitAngerAvariceSymphatyAdaptabilitySelfishnessPridePureAffectionDepressionMaliceSensualityLowTypeofIntellectSelfishAffectionFear
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Figure 64.
Yellow, Red, Blue Composition, Piet Mondrian, 1937-42
Note. https://www.moma.org/collection/works/80160 reached on June, 03,2021
The Russian painter Kazimir Malevich, during his artistic journey for a long time, painted according to a theory that he almost raised to the level of a religious belief. It is possible to see the traces of his philosophy in his artwork from the moment he began to simplify the compositions. His work called Zero Form was later called Black Square on White. “The big black square on the canvas was not an abstraction of any form, unlike the geometric shapes in earlier paintings. It looked more like a symbol than an image. He defines the square as the last form he can shelter in. For Malevich, it was a symbol (the symbol of silence) that tore apart the bridges of the past and was the starting point for new art.” (Yılmaz N. A., 2020, s. 112)
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In the exhibition in Petrograd in 1915, the work received very opposing reactions due to the place where it was displayed, referring specifically to the fact that Russian Orthodox icons were in Russian houses, at the intersection of two walls. Thus, he wanted to indicate that the work has a spiritual sense, therefore placed at a spiritual corner.
“The square, the expression of men’s superiority over the complexity of the empirical world, represents the rejection of the visible world as it does not exist in nature. Malevich’s square is the new face of the new art.” (Öndin, Modern Sanat, 2019, s. 161)
Figure 65.
The Black Square, Kazimir Malevich, 1913
Note.https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/kazimir-malevich-1561/five-ways-look-malevichs-black-square reached on June,03,2020
The Theosophical Society was founded in New York in 1875. Mme Blavatsky argues that "Hermetic philosophy and the ancient religion of universal wisdom are the keys to the absolute.” (Gül, 2016, s. 305) “Modern theosophy is a formation in which the Western occult and esoteric tradition combined with Eastern thoughts and concepts
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merged under the doctrinal leadership of Mme Blavatsky. It is necessary to distinguish the traditional theosophical understandings by defining the new theory in the roots of the Theosophical Society as modern theosophy.” (Gül, 2016, s. 318)
It is a fact that the Theosophical Society and the theories of Mme Blavatsky influenced the esoterism, occultism, and spirituality of the 20th century, also had an impact on the proceeding esoteric schools as well as the pioneers of abstract art. such as Wassily Kandinsky, Mondrian, Malevich, Brancusi, Mark Rothko and Barnett Newman.
Figure 66.
Broken Obelisk, Barnett Newman, 1970
Note. Taken from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_Obelisk reached on June,29,2021
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Figure 67.
Mark Rothko,14 Black Paintings, 1964-67
Note. https://www.widewalls.ch/magazine/rothko-chapel-50th-anniversary reached on May, 29,2021
The theosophical societies proceeding Mme Blavatsky’s doctrine are Rudolph Steiner’s Antroposophy and The Fourth Way of G.Ivanovich Gurdjieff.
“While music played an essential role in Rudolf Steiner’s Anthroposophical Movement and in George I. Gurdjieff’s Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man, its place was never strongly defined in the programs of the various Theosophical Societies. By the 1920s, the direct influence of theosophy on musicians had diminished, while its indirect effects were diffusing throughout Western culture. Among these consequences was the Peace Movement of the 1960s, with its strong input from Oriental spirituality. Much of the popular music of that period, with its aspirations towards human brotherhood and its connection with altered states of consciousness, can be seen as an extremely exoteric descendant of theosophy.” (Staples, 2021) George Ivanovich Gurdjieff, (1866-1949) Russian mystic, philosopher, spiritual master and composer appeared on the stage of modern esotericism and theosophy at the beginning of 20th century. He structured his esoteric ideas in St Petersburg and Moscow 1912-1916. Being from the same country as Mme Blavatsky, having Russian Orthodox and East
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Slavic cultural background had no significant value later when they established spiritual schools where they blended Eastern, Far Eastern and Western cultures. They became the leading figures of modern spiritual approaches, theories and practices. G. I. Gurdjieff was born in the city of Gyumri in today's Armenia, and spent his childhood in the city of Kars, a city which was blended with Turkish, Armenian and Yezidi cultures at that time. He questions the purpose of human life and pursues the absolute truth. As a result of his research in India, Tibet, Central Asia, Egypt and Anatolia, he structured his knowledge that he had the opportunity to integrate and blend the belief systems so that finally set his own in Russia, 1912. The spiritual system that he calls the "Fourth Way" is applicable in daily life. His followers were the Kharkov-born Russian writer P.D. Ouspensky (1878-1947), Thomas de Hartmann (1885-1956) and his wife Olga Hartmann.
Ouspensky, attended the meetings of Mme Blavatsky and the Theosophical Society before meeting Gurdjieff and was not satisfied. He later became a student of Gurdjieff in the 1915’s. The Russian composer Thomas de Hartmann, on the other hand, started piano lessons with Anton Arensky, who was the teacher of Rachmaninov, Prokofiev,
and Skjabin, at the age of eleven, and after the death of his teacher, worked with Sergei Taneyev in order to conduct further musical studies. Hartmann went to Munich in 1908 to study conducting under Wagner's student, Felix Mottl, where he met Wassily Kandinsky, who later became his lifelong friend. He joined the avant-garde art group The Blue Rider and contributed an article to the Blaue Reiter Almanac entitled “On Anarchy in Music.” He claimed that "intrinsic necessity" precedes rules and traditional practice in composition. Hartmann's music during this period was colorful, impressionist, including early Scriabin (Three Preludes, Op 11), Debussy (A La Lune, Op 18), and even Messiaen (end of Vision of Pushkin, Op 17 No. 4) reminds.” Meeting
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with Gurdjieff in 1916, he came to Istanbul through the Caucasus in 1917 and studied eastern music. In 1922, together with Gurdjieff, they established the Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man in Fontainebleu.
They composed 200 piano scores, which they called the sacred music of the East, to be played with the movements determined by the institute 1923-27. (Sicroff, 2021)
Movements and dances in harmony with the music composed by Gurdjieff and Hartmann were at the heart of the teaching. These sacred dances are characterized by unusual and symbolic movements of the body and are placed in unpredictable sequences.
Figure 68.
Gurdjieff Movements
Note. taken from https://austingurdjieffsociety.weebly.com/movements.html on May,31,2021
Constantine Brancusi attended the meetings of Gurdjieff and his student Orage whom Gurdjieff sent the USA as the lecturer for the meetings many times in Paris and New York, where he went to open his solo exhibition. It is possible to find traces of Gurdjieff's music, rhythm, and absolute philosophy in his abstract works.
“Edith Taylor's statement also mentions a meeting where Brancusi and Gurdjieff compared her cooking skills. This may sound a little strange, but it is not surprising
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given the lauded culinary talents of the two men. Edith Taylor's testimony is supported by a passage written by Pound in Ezra Pound's well-known book, "Guide to Kulchur." (Basarab, 2019, s. 190)
Professor Basarab Nicolescu also states in his article "Brancusi and Gurdjieff" that Edith Taylor drove Brancusi, Tristan Tzara, and Marcel Duchamp to Pieure to meet with Gurdjieff. “Another Gurdjieff pupil, esteemed American architect, interior designer, writer, and educator Frank Lloyd Wright (1869-1959), who first properly met Gurdjieff in 1934, had a connection to theosophy through close friend Baroness Hilla Rebay von Ehrenwiesen. Rebay was an artist, theosophist, and long-time friend of Solomon Guggenheim, who chose Lloyd Wright to design his museum in New York. According to Friedland and Zellman, it was Rebay who suggested to Lloyd Wright that he design the Guggenheim museum according to Theosophical symbolism; the museum‟s famous seven-tired spiral structure represented for Rebay a spiritual pathway and a model of the evolution of all „monads‟, which energized systems from atoms up to galaxies.” (Petsche, 2011)
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Figure 69.
Guggenheim Museum, NY, USA
Note. https://www.architecturaldigest.com/story/you-didnt-know-new-york-city-guggenheim-museum reached on May, 31,2021
Figure 70.
Guggenheim Museum, Main Hall, NY, USA
Note. Taken from https://coastarc.com/g-u-g-g-e-n-h-e-i-m on May,31,2021
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Another occultist who started his esoteric journey by attending the meetings of the Theosophical Society and Blavatsky at the beginning of the century is Austrian social reformer, philosopher, architect Rudolph Steiner (1861-1925), who studied at the Vienna Higher Technical School, mathematics, and social sciences, attended the conferences of the Theosophical Society between 1903 and 1913 and gave speeches on esotericism and occultism. In 1913, he left Theosophical Society and established the Anthroposophical Society. "He was invited to join the group of 'Significant living scholars' in Weimar, where he worked with them for several years in the Goethe-Schiller Archives.” (Steiner, Kozmik Hafıza, 2021, s. 7)
Universality prevails in Rudolph Steiner's work. P.M. As Allen states in the introduction to Rudolph Steiner's book Cosmic Memory, Steiner's philosophical perspective covers fundamental questions such as man's existence, the nature and purpose of freedom, the meaning of evolution, man's relationship with nature, and life after death and before birth. (Steiner R. , 2021, s. 9) He established a new school and a new spiritual system by combining the fields of medicine, education, art, agriculture, Goethe's philosophy of nature, Rosicrucianism, Kabbalah, Hinduism, Gnostic, mystical Christianity.
Steiner says that theosophy does not talk about the limitation of the knowledge that man can reach through his organism. On the contrary, he says that he is surrounded by the worlds he has through the organs of perception and indicates that it shows ways to expand his temporary limits. (Steiner R. , Truth and Knowledge, 2020, s. 9) Stating that Steiner's meticulous care and deep respect for human freedom manifests itself in everything he produces, Allen says that he sees the slightest compulsion or persuasion as an attack on human dignity and faculty. Therefore, he confines himself to objective
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expressions in his writings and speeches. He stated that he was completely free to accept or reject his own words. (Steiner R. , Truth and Knowledge, 2020, s. 10)
Figure 71.
Goetheanum, Dornach, Basel, Switzerland
Note. http://zehirsizsofralar.org/biyodinamik-tarim-nedir/ reached on May,31,2021
The Anthroposophical Movement, which he named Goetheanum in memory of the German writer, philosopher , and naturalist J. W. Goethe, is headquartered in Dornach, near Basel, Switzerland. Wood was used in the construction of the central building, of which the architectural drawings were undertaken, reflecting Steiner's organic structural ideas. Unfortunately a large part of the building, which was made entirely of wood, was destroyed by the fire in 1922, and the rest of the remaining wooden structure was rebuilt as reinforced concrete in accordance with its original form.
According to Steiner, architectural creation is a kind of intuitive art that aims to show the harmony between the spiritual and material world. As a result of the conferences, Steiner gave on bio-dynamic agriculture, a cooperative for evaluating dynamic biological products, which they named Demeter (Greek mythology, the god of soil and fertility). Steiner emphasizes that the inner rhythm of the earth is compatible with the cosmic rhythm. It states that every agricultural enterprise should design the farm
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considering these features. He argues that plants, like the soil, have daily rhythms and that irrigation and harvesting times will increase productivity.
“Steiner defines Anthroposophy as the spiritual growth path of human nature based on the senses, imagination, inspiration, and intuition. According to this understanding, there is an opportunity in human nature to solve the secrets of creation and universe.” (Özdoğan, 2020, s. 668)
“According to Steiner, people with a healthy soul have super sensory abilities waiting to be awakened. Some emotions are activated as information is transferred to 'sleeping' people. These feelings lift the veil from the spiritual eye of man, and thus higher understanding is attained.” (Özdoğan, 2020, s. 671)
He gave Eurhythmy to the group of movements in which music and bodily movements that he developed for therapy, aiming to break the patterns that hinder the spiritual development of man, are performed in harmony. This system, which is linked to dance and rhythm, has been supported by many exercises to provide physical and spiritual development. The general purpose of movements and dances that provide focus, self-control, and coordination are mind control, body control, freedom, tolerance, social awareness, and harmony. Thus, the connection between mind, body and spirit is strengthened besides social behavior. It is still effectively applied as a course in Waldorf schools based on Steiner's philosophy.
Beginning in 1919, Steiner established Waldorf schools that adopted the philosophy and practice methods of Anthroposophy. Waldorf schools, opened in different countries and cities today, are educational institutions where emotional and spiritual development is tried to be created with a balanced and holistic approach. In these schools, within the framework of respect for differences, appropriate education programs are prepared for students at different levels, and their development is carefully monitored. Among the
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schools' aims are to create the concept of democracy, transfer of the knowledge of rhythm between human life and universe, and without breaking away from the social elements, the decoration of the development of the student.
Figure 72.
Eurorhythm, Rudolph Steiner, Goetheanum, Dornach, Basel, Switzerland
Note.https://www.rudolfsteinerweb.com/Rudolf_Steiner_and_Eurythmy.php reached on June,04,2021
Students complete their education through three seven-year phases. The first stage between the ages of 0-7 is called the physical consciousness stage. There is safe, calming, simple and aesthetic visual learning and knowledge transfer to children in this stage. The second stage is the perceptual consciousness stage between 7-14. This period aims to develop emotionally. It emphasizes that children's artistic development should be intensified, their emotions are activated, so it is vital for them to establish emotional bonds with the subjects.
The third and final stage is the stage when students are between the ages of 14-21, which he calls the intellectual consciousness stage. In this period, education starts with painting; combining visual arts with positive science also causes students to particular interest in science. According to Steiner, individuals who start life by acquiring daily
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skills without breaking away from life physically, emotionally and intellectually can apply these stages they have learned and internalized in their lives. Developing in these aspects help them to become more mature. . “The Waldorf method aims to raise free people who have completed their self-development.” (Doma, 2018)
“In the future, occult science will be asked to specify what is required in each particular case and how it can be done, for it is not an empty abstraction but a body of vital facts that can quite well provide guiding lines for practical matters.” (Steiner, 2020, s. 20)
Steiner aimed to blend and modernize spirituality with positive sciences in his studies. “When properly understood, the truths of the spiritual sciences will give a man a genuine basis for his own life, enable him to recognize his worth, dignity, and self-essence, and give him the greatest enthusiasm for life. Because these truths illuminate him about his connection with the world around him; he shows himself his highest goals, his true path, and he does so in a way that meets today's demands. So much so that he does not need to be caught in the contradiction between belief and knowledge.” (Steiner, 2020, s. 13)
One of the Fluxus artists, Joseph Beuys, adopted Steiner's theosophy and Goethe's philosophy of natural science and emphasized the importance of harmony with nature both in his works and in his life, and had the opportunity to practice and develop environmental philosophy. One of the founding members of the green party in Germany, his project, which is included in the second part of the thesis as the most crucial example of environmentalist and participatory art, and many installations, is the "7000 Oaks" project. “Steiner's three-organ society model (economics, law, and culture) also served as a source for his social projects.” This section will discuss the Theosophical, Anthroposophical and shamanic approaches of Beuys to his art.
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“Steiner's influence is visible in the many works Beuys has done throughout his artistic life. (Merdaner E. , Joseph Beuys, 2016, s. 43)
Figure 73.
Joseph Beuys, Chief, Fluxus Song, 1964, Berlin
Note. (Knapstein, 1995, s. 27), Fluxus in Deutschland, 1962-1994, ifa
“Continuing with Beuys's words about "Chief, Song of Fluxus"; For me, Chief was first and foremost an important sound piece. The most repetitive was a muffled sound from deep in the throat, akin to a male deer's "oo" shout. It was a fundamental sound that reached far back in time. Such a performance that informs without informing always has a theory, a program or an account behind it. It is acoustically like transferring energy using only a carrier wave and not a semantic information form. The wave carries a kind of sound often found in the animal kingdom... (...) It means that my standing in the felt, like a carrier wave, is an attempt to step outside the autonomous domain of my species' semantics. It was akin to the ancient initiation ritual in which a symbolic death was experienced within the coffin. It takes rigorous discipline to avoid fear by being in the same position for 9 hours under those conditions, deprived and emotionless, without
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feeling claustrophobia and pain, and pretending to be dead.” (Merdaner E. , Joseph Beuys, 2016, s. 103)
Figure 74.
Joseph Beuys, How to Explain Pictures to a Dead Hare, 1965
Note. (Farthing S. , 2014, s. 501) Art: The Whole Story, Hayalperest Publishing Co.
“The golden and honey head, and therefore, naturally and logically, the brain and the way we understand thought, consciousness, and all the other layers that are necessary to explain pictures to a dead rabbit (the warm felt-insulated stool on which I sit, the radio made of bone, the magnetic iron plate under my foot). Electrical parts placed under it point to the transformation. I had to walk on that iron plate as I took the rabbit around from picture to picture, and as I walked with a strange limp, the iron at my feet
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would break the silence as I paused my explanations the radio was in an inaudible wavelength.” (Merdaner E. , Joseph Beuys, 2016, s. 89)
Figure 75.
Coyote, I Love America, America Loves Me, 1974
Note. (Farthing, 2014, s. 512), Art: The Whole Story, Hayalperest Publishing Co.
The basis of the action titled “The Coyote, I Love America, and America Love Me” is also based on shamanic elements. There is an effort to expand the boundaries of perception by trying to communicate with the spirit of the whole animal kingdom through coyote and Native American culture. When Beuys arrives in New York, as he gets off the plane, he is blindfolded, even at the gallery, till the end of the three days that, he boarded the plane and returned to his country in the same way. Here, he says that he aimed to focus on the coyote, and he did everything in his power to ensure that
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this focus was not disturbed in any way. “Beuys maintains the action in sessions of about one hour each, following certain choreography throughout the three days of the show.” (Merdaner E. , Joseph Beuys, 2016, s. 91)
“I believe I have touched on all of America's psychological trauma associated with Indians. Therefore,it can be said that a reckoning must be made with the coyote and only then will it be possible to get rid of this trauma.” (Merdaner E. , Joseph Beuys, 2016, s. 92)
Ener Merdaner, in his book of Joseph Beuys, says that, according to Steiner, a person can reach the understanding of the spiritual world with a series of meditations, free development is the prerequisite, and free thought is the result. “Spiritual education aims at promoting the development of love and freedom in society and thereby contributing to the evolution of humanity.” (Merdaner E. , Joseph Beuys, 2016, s. 42) In Beuys’ art, alchemical elements can easily be perceived. “The whole artistic manifesto of Beuys can be said to have alchemical meaning.” (Merdaner E. , Joseph Beuys, 2016, s. 44)
Alchemy, which aims at individual spiritual transformation by channeling the human mind and energies in nature, is included in the esoteric tradition. It also plays an essential role in the discovering laws related to the structure of matter. Practical, practical alchemy can be divided into two main parts, theoretical and mystical, spiritual alchemy. “The effects of alchemy, which is based on the principle of unity and harmony of opposites (coincidenta oppsitorum), which can be integrated into all aspects of human existence, on human spirit and matter depend on the finding of the Philosopher's Stone.” (Öndin, Rönesans ve Simya, 2017, s. 9) Öndin, in her book Renaissance and Alchemy; states that Chauser said that alchemy is a secret that is forbidden to be disclosed to everyone and that the belief in perfecting nature lies at the heart of alchemy.
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She also emphasizes that the belief in the perfection of nature is similar to the nature-art relationship of Plato and Aristotle. (Öndin, Rönesans ve Simya, 2017, s. 20)
The formation of metals, which grow and mature by themselves in nature, becomes accelerated with the knowledge of alchemy. Thus, alchemy, which can interfere with transformation, replaces time. This process is called Opus Magnum. "Opus Magnum refers to the processes and application process applied to the materia prima (first item) to find the Philosopher's Stone (elixir)." (Öndin, Rönesans ve Simya, 2017, s. 23) The four basic elements in alchemy are fire, air, earth, and water. The proportions of these elements in each substance are different. In addition, the three essential substances (Tria Prima), sulphur, mercury and salt are considered.
“Mercury represents chaos because of its fluidity. On the other hand, sulfur is the symbol of the active, combustible power principle. Salt is the symbol for the crystallized solid form. The basic principle is that the indefinite (chaotic) attains crystalline form (spiritual rebirth) through activity (fire). (Merdaner E. , Joseph Beuys, 2016, s. 45)
Vitriol is the term used in alchemy for the seven development and transformation processes. It appears with a mandala in the book of the sixteenth-century German alchemist Basil Valentine in Nitrogen or The Path of the Philosophers' Hidden Gold. (Öndin, Rönesans ve Simya, 2017, s. 23) The mandala describes the union of seven triangles and seven circles. The human figure has one foot on land, the other foot in the water, a torch (fire) in one hand and a feather (air) in the other, the sun, the gold symbol, and the moon, the silver symbol. In this mandala, the process of human change is detailed. The path and the change started with the black triangle. At the end of the process, the seventh triangle shows the unity of the substance and spiritual essence, which are associated with the sun and the golden color.
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Figure 76.
VITRIOL, Seven Stages of Alchemy
Note. (Öndin, 2017, s. 25), Renaissance and Alchemy, Hayalperest Publishing Co.
In the interview, Beuys with Heiner Bastian and Jeannot Simmen, these words are spoken: " there is a visible world and then an invisible world. The unseen world spans beyond the threshold of perception that contains the forces and forms and how they relate. Energy and its effects.” (Merdaner E. , Joseph Beuys, 2016, s. 53) In his performances he used dead or alive animals with special meanings in alchemy and shamanism. Like a horse, rabbit, coyote.
“When the avant-garde German painter Joseph Beuys (1921-1986) is reminded that his art contains "shamanistic" dimensions, he gives the following answer; “Shamanism is the deepest of roots... I think this ancient approach involves an idea of transformation... The nature of shamanism is therapeutic...” (Perrin, Şamanizm, 2011, s. 129)
Shaman accessories; Shaman's clothes, hats, drums, musical instruments, incense are intensifying objects with different meanings. The shaman drum is a part of the shaman with a great symbolic value. The vehicle that carries shaman from the world to the beyond, also defined as the embodiment of the female selective spirit. “Shamanic drums
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are often decorated with symbols. These symbols can be permanently embroidered on the drum or can be painted during the session. In such cases, it reflects the nature of the problem being addressed or the identity of the spirits involved.” (Perrin, Şamanizm, 2011, s. 60)
“The shaman's garment itself represents a particular religious microcosm that is qualitatively different from the surrounding space. On the one hand, it constitutes an almost complete symbolic system; because of its sanctity, it is equipped with many varied spiritual powers - notably 'spirits'. By simply wearing it, or handling the objects that take its place, the shaman is prepared to transcend normal unholy space and come into contact with the spiritual world.” (Eliade, 1999, s. 177)
One of the many artists who combine the philosophy of Theosophy with her art is the American contemporary, pioneering artist John Cage, known for her interdisciplinary works and her silent composition 4:33.
Transported by Sound and Image: Randomness in Art and Sarkis' article, Mine Haydaroğlu says, “As of the beginning of the XX. century, artists who employed chance elements in their artistic endeavors such as readymade, collage, performance, and installations, strove to create a visual language that reflected the richness of one particular place and time that went beyond the perception of only one viewer, thereby enriching this visual language with other sensory elements. Those whose efforts were geared towards representing art in life began to add space, time, and sound to the fundamental artistic elements like paint, line, and light.(Haydaroğlu, 2013, s. 39) At the turn of the century, musical expression and composition theories were used as tools that enabled the development of architecture and painting. It is possible to find alchemic, mystical, and shamanic elements in John Cage's works. The artist has especially used fire in his original prints. Fire has very crucial importance in shamanism and alchemy.
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“According to alchemy, metals consist of two parts: the non-volatile part called the body (soma), and the volatile part called the spirit (Pneuma). Spirit corresponds to the color of the metal and other metal-specific qualities.
The body is the same substance in all metals. Therefore, the distinguishing feature of metal depends on its spirit, not its body.” (Öndin, Rönesans ve Simya, 2017, s. 30)
"Not having a predefined form is also a formal preference. John Cage's work 4'33'' is often described as formless. The work performed with any instrument or instruments is based on the performer's NOT playing the instrument throughout the composition. The work allows the listeners to focus on the environmental sounds for a certain period, not the composition. The artist essentially reveals a form by "marking" the random sounds of a specific time period as art. Cage did not design the sounds that would emerge throughout the course of the study and cannot predict what sounds will emerge. However, these sounds themselves constitute the variables of the work. Sounds are variable because new sounds are created each time the exercise is repeated. However Cage's composition is specific. “Coincidental sounds of a particular place for 4 minutes and 33 seconds” are the way of working.” (Bayraktar, 2017, p. 146)
The belief system evident in John Cage's work, as in his entire life, is Zen Buddhism, reinforced by the lessons he received from his master, T. D. Suzuki. He carefully used the I-Ching and randomness in his original editions in detail.
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Figure 77.
John Cage 4’:33” Concert Poster
Note. (Bayraktar, 2017, s. 152), Sistem Teorisi Bağlamında Sanat Nesnesi ve Eşleme (Sanatta Yeterlik Tezi). İstanbul, Marmara Üniversitesi: Güzel Sanatlar Enstitüsü, Resim Anasanat Dalı.
Figure 78.
Etching, John Cage
Note. Crown Point Press Collection, with permission, SF, USA 2019
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Figure 79.
Etching, John Cage
Note. Crown Point Press Collection, with permission, SF, USA, 2019
In the Vitriol chart, which shows the seven processes in alchemy, the spiritual journey begins with extinction. Fire also plays a significant role in this extinction. The first act is the act of calcination and is the act of burning to reveal the hidden essence and is associated with the element of fire. “Calcination (calcinatio) comes from the Latin root cal, meaning limestone or bone. Calcining also means burning something until it turns chalky white and obtaining its ashes. After calcination, the substance is no longer affected by the fire. The skull of the black crow, which is the symbol of the Nigredo stage, also represents the calcination process.” (Öndin, Rönesans ve Simya, 2017, s. 25) One intersections of alchemy and Christian belief is the fire associated with the holy trinity.
According to the understanding, based on St Augustine, there are three natures in fire, which is a single element, as in the holy trinity; creative light (ignis lux), destructive power (ignis streamer), and purifying flame (ignis carbo). “He is regarded as the
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personification of God's purifying fire (Carbo Dei) in Christ; The purifying fire of God is also the regenerating and saving fire.” (Öndin, Rönesans ve Simya, 2017, s. 40)
Figure 80.
Etching, John Cage
Note. Crown Point Press collection, with permission, SF, USA, 2019
This latent fire, also called 'natural fire', has been described as dry water that does not wet the hands and a fire that burns without flames. It is also known that latent fire is salt, and it is obtained from tartar (white salt with an acid taste, insoluble in alcohol and ether) due to a process that requires skill. (Öndin, Rönesans ve Simya, 2017, s. 37)
The five transformation theories is a cosmology that expresses the understanding of life and the universe, developed by Chinese scholars thousands of years ago. It is a theory that, in nature, they associate the regular cycle of the seasons with the repetition of human development within a specific organic pattern. This theory has been used effectively in different aspects of life, agriculture, weather forecasting, economics, politics, personal psychology, and healing and treatment of diseases.
“In its most abstract form, the theory of five transformations says that all change happens in five stages. Each phase is linked to certain ores found in nature: fire, earth,
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metal, water, and wood. The process starts with the inspiration present in the beginning, the world of ideas. At this stage, the thing is formless but has immense energy to initiate movement. Scholars have looked at a similar element in nature and perceived the fire. Fire is almost shapeless but charged with enormous potential for transformation. Fire is the starting element of the transformation cycles that represent the embodiment of ideas. The transformations continue into a more solid and stable state known as soil. The process continues and assumes its most intense and material form; mine. The mineral state refers to the most concentrated, in other words, the most "yang" state . Here the idea clings firmly to the material world. The thing in question is born. That thing is real by then. The process continues with the most flexible and resistant element water. Water expresses the continuation of change towards a certain goal because water always flows towards the ocean. The evolutionary process then passes to the stage that the dream bears fruit; the tree. At this stage, the initial inspiration passes through the necessary processes for development and has given its fruit. The tree represents the climax of the cycle; For the tree not only bears fruit but also fertilizes the soil with its leaves, seeds and inedible fruit, enriching the soil and restarting the regeneration process.” (Monte. T., 2007, s. 121)
2.3. The Benefits of Arts to Individual Healing
In the book Görsel Sanatlarda Anlam ve Algı, Prof. Dr. Güler Ertan says that perception transforms the senses and stimuli received from the environment into a meaningful experience in mind. During the creative process, a sense of competence, an increase in self-confidence, and physiological and positive differences in the person's psychology occur. It increases the aesthetic perception and the joy of life. The ability to solve problems increases and the meaning of life raises. Since the end of the
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XIXth century, works and studies have been put forward in different fields that indicate these fragmentations in the personality of individuals. Henric Ibsen, in his play “A Doll’s House”, deals with the way a husband treats his wife like a doll, separating his work and family life completely, and the negative effects. Paul Cezanne, on the other hand, opposed the art perspective of the 19th century and argued that art should deal with the real face of life. According to Cezanne, beauty comes from holism. Freud, on the other hand, put forward theories that reveal the importance of anger and sexuality. He stated that suppressed emotions accumulated in the subconscious should be dealt with through psychoanalytic methods. He argues that severe depressions arise from ignored emotions. “Soren Kierkegaard, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Franz Kafka… Each one of these men foresaw the destruction of values which would occur in our time, the loneliness, emptiness, and anxiety which would engulf us in the twentieth century.” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 54) Nietzsche said that to get rid of the collapse, it is necessary to create brand new value judgments, and for this to happen, he suggested that all values be re-interpreted. These artists, philosophers, and intellectuals have developed brand new methods in their fields to help people discover their inner world.
2.3.1.Arts and Psychological Healing
The first half of the XXth century witnessed radical innovations in healthcare system and the political, social, and industrial changes of the countries. This period, in which value judgments differed with the two World Wars, religion became insignificant, and traditional social and political structures cracked, also hosts many scientific discoveries. Among these: Mme Curi’s radium, Albert Einstein’s discovery of the concept of relativity, the quantum theory of light and the mass-energy connection,
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neurologist and psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud’s theory of self, and his colleague Carl Jung’s Psychology theory, which analyzes the collective subconscious, subconscious and conscious, and emphasizes the importance of dreams and symbols in human psychology. Freud and Jung, who brought innovations to human psychology with their different analytical methods, profoundly influenced not only the field of psychology but also the whole XXth century thought, from art to education.
This chapter examines Carl Jung, Joseph Cambell, Carl Rogers: the person-centered therapy and Robert Ader and Nicholas Cohen: psycho-neuro-immunology and Rollo May’s arguments on individual recovery.
2.3.1.i. Mandalas and Myths
Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell used mythological and archaic symbols and their unconscious and subconscious symbols to treat the individual. “Jung argued that the era of reason and skepticism inaugurated by the French Revolution had repressed religion and irrationalism. In turn, the era of skepticism had serious consequences, leading to the outbreak of irrationalism represented by the world war. It was thus a historical necessity to acknowledge the irrational as a psychological factor. The acceptance of the irrational forms one of the central themes of Liber Novus.”
(Jung, 2021, s. 50)
American mythology professor J. Campbell, who has researched Asian, especially Japanese and Indian mythology, argued that mythological symbols deeply affect human psychology and that mythological symbols emerge repeatedly with creativity. Carl Jung argued that mythological symbols, archaic symbols, and mandala shapes, circular figures symbolizing the universe in Hindu and Buddhist symbolism express the unconscious and used it in his sessions with his patients. He also said that his
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mandala works have no artistic value; they are the expression of the unconscious. “My path is not your path, therefore I cannot teach you. The way is within us, but no in Gods, nor teachings, nor laws, Within us, is the way, the truth, and the life. (Jung, 2021, s. 102)
“In this century, psychologist C. G. Jung and mythologist Joseph Campbell have shown us that these myths and legends have widespread appeal because they illustrate universal human experiences.” (Capacchione, 2012, s. 18)
“For Jung, mandalas are elements that constitute the integrity of the person such as formation, transformation, infinite mind and self.” (Demirok, 2017, s. 50)
Figure 81.
Carl Jung, First Mandala, “Systema Mundi Totius, 1916”
Note. Taken from http://carl-gustav-jung.blogspot.com/2012/11/systema-mundi-totius.html on June16.2021
2.3.1. ii. Gestalt Theory
“German-American psychiatrist Fritz Perls established his method of psychoanalysis and called it Gestalt. “The word Gestalt means “form”, “completion”, “integration” in German.” (Cüceloğlu, 1990, p. 485) Cüceloğlu, in his book, says about Gestalt
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therapy; “Awareness is the core concept of Gestalt therapy. Consciousness and awareness include every aspect of our life, our emotions, thoughts, sensations in our body, behaviors, posture, muscle tension, facial muscles, as well as what is happening around us and what kind of relationship we have with it.” (Cüceloğlu, 1990, s. 486)
To achieve inner freedom, the individual must be aware of the events that affect him and take responsibility by choosing with his consciousness. Awareness includes being aware of the interactions from the environment and being aware of one’s physical condition, behavior, and attitude.
“The relationship between client and therapist in Gestalt therapy is similar to an apprentice-master relationship. There are two things to be learned from the master:
“The relationship between client and therapist in Gestalt therapy is similar to an apprentice-master relationship. There are two things to be learned from the master:
(1) To learn how to improve consciousness and awareness about different aspects of life.
(2) To be able to use the acquired consciousness in daily life without losing awareness.” (Cüceloğlu, 1990, s. 488)” (Demirok, 2017, s. 51)
2.3.1.iii. Person Centered Therapy, Carl Rogers
Cücelolu says in his book that Carl Rogers’ client-centered therapy and Fritz Perls’ Gestalt therapy are two branches that represent existential-humanistic therapy. According to Cüceloğlu, contrary to Freud’s mechanical approach, self-theorists emphasize to how people perceive themselves and their environment and how they make their choices rather than what has happened to them.
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“Rogers’ basic assumption is that the strongest innate impulse that humans are born with is the impulse of self-actualization, self-expression. The baby starts to do this from the very first days.” (Cüceloğlu, İnsan ve Davranışı, 1990, p. 481)
“A person who grows up in such an environment will grow up to be self-confident, conscious of his inner world, balanced and has good communication skills.” (Cüceloğlu, İnsan ve Davranışı, 1990, p. 482)
According to Rogers, unconditional respect for the client comes first in existential-humanistic therapy. Unconditional respect leads the therapist to two precious fundamental results. First the individual feels free and safe in an environment where he is loved and respected unconditionally. With the comfort of this feeling, he finds the opportunity to express his feelings as much as he wants freely.
“People who grow up in unconditional love have a strong and positive sense of self. If there is a difference between the behavior and self-consciousness, then anxiety arises” (Cüceloğlu, İnsan ve Davranışı, 1990, p. 429)
At the end of this process, the self-confidence of the client increases. The first basic element is unconditional respect for the person who directs the therapy. Secondly, it is necessary to have a strong sense of sympathy. He should be able to give the message “I feel you” to the other person. The third is sincerity. The person leading the therapy should be speaking frankly, honestly, and sincerely.
“When the three qualities mentioned above, namely unconditional respect, showing empathetic understanding and sincerity are found in a therapist, the client's psychological development is a matter of time”. (Cüceloğlu, 1990, p. 483)
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2.3.1.iv. Emptiness, Loneliness, Anxiety
“One of the few blessings of living in an age of anxiety is that we are forced to become aware of ourselves,” says modern philosopher Rollo May, and asks that question; “Is there perhaps some important source of guidance and strength we have overlooked? … How can anyone attain inner integration in such a disintegrating world? Or they question, How can anyone undertake the long development toward self-realization in a time when practically nothing is certain, either in the present or the future?” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 9) To find answers to these questions, May says, examining the elements in the areas that everyone tries to stay away from is something that every seeker must develop understanding. The major problems of people living in the XXth and XXIst centuries are emptiness, loneliness and worry, and the philosopher states that emptiness makes life meaningless and creates a painful feeling of powerlessness. He reveals these three elements as the most essential character traits that determine today's people.
It is a fact that has been revealed by sociologists and historians who examined how the vacuum affects society from a social point of view, just before the periods of radical social movements and changes.
According to May, individuals living in emptiness can only endure the monotony of life through the madness they rarely do, or at least find themselves in the madness of others, the philosopher describes the feeling of emptiness in the individual as; “The experience of emptiness, instead, generally comes from people's feeling that they are powerless to do anything effective about their lives or the world they live in. Inner vacuousness is the long-term, accumulated result of a person's particular conviction toward himself, namely his conviction that he cannot act as an entity in directing his own life, or change other people's attitudes toward him, or effectually influence the
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world around him. Thus, he gets the deep sense of despair and futility that so many people in our day have. And soon, since what he wants and what he feels can make no real difference, he gives up wanting and feeling. Apathy and lack of feeling are also defence against anxiety.” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 26)
According to May, Loneliness and Emptiness are always side by side. May says “and emptiness are loneliness thus two phases of the same experience of anxiety.” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 29) Loneliness occurs with the individual's fears and sense of emptiness. Man, the biosocial mammal, is afraid of losing his own existence when left alone
“…modern man's loneliness is his great fear of being alone (…) The cold fear that protrudes its icy head from subterranean levels is e that one would then be shut out entirely, left on the outside.” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 31)
Throughout history, people have struggled to escape from loneliness, and they have turned to various activities to get away from this feeling. May states that silence is frightening and evokes loneliness, and says that what is tried to be soothed by talking too much is the fear of loneliness. If we examine this fear even more deeply, we realize that it is the fear of death. Death is the absolute separation, absolute exclusion.
Man, who live depending on the judgments and acceptances of society and other people worry that they would lose their self-consciousness when they are left alone because the impressions these people have with their existence are the result of what others think and say about them. This state of loneliness triggers the anxiety of losing self-consciousness in the man. As it can be easily referred to from here, loneliness poses a real danger for human beings. Being loved and accepted in society brings incredible power to the individual in terms of eliminating the feeling of loneliness. Especially the individual who wants to be independent relaxes when he takes part in
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social groups, even at the cost of giving up his self. “… he was to go back into the womb.” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 34)
Today, people generally try to live by the expectations of society. As a result they are afraid of leaving their group, being alone, and being socially isolated. Acting with this fear distances them from their self-worth, causes losing their faith, and reduces them to loneliness and emptiness.
Emptiness and loneliness make us anxious. In our era, people are aware of the danger. Rollo May emphasizes that our age is the age of anxiety. The primary factor that increases anxiety is the uncertainty about the future.
Since the beginning of the XXth century, societies have gone through two great world wars. Through pandemic years intense feelings of isolation, emptiness, and anxiety become the most meaningful issue of the XXIst century Bertrand Russell writes that “Those who believe that their future is designed and bright are the most naive and stupid among us. Anyone who has had the share from imagination and a quick understanding is full of doubt.” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 35)
In these periods of uncertainty and crisis, where our courage is examined, those who can face disasters without fear, in a sense, do not know whether their common sense leads them to right or wrong.
Moreover he adds that constant intense anxiety invites diseases; “When an individual suffers anxiety continuously over some time, he lays his body open to psychosomatic illness. When a group suffers continuous anxiety, with no agreed-on constructive steps to take, its members sooner or later turn against each other.” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 36) Anxiety is a common aspect of many psychosomatic diseases such as ulcers and heart diseases. It is the greatest danger to our inner peace. It consists of not knowing where the individual's concerns are headed. May defines our era in the
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words of Herman Hesse; “when a whole generation is caught . . . between two ages, two modes of life, with the consequence that it loses all power to understand itself and has no standards, no security, no simple acquiescence.”
Stating a constructive way out, the philosopher argues that anxiety is a harbinger of internal conflict. He also states that the depressions we live in contain new hopes for the future. The most crucial part is to admit with openness and courage that we are individually and socially in a dangerous position.
Anxiety is the feeling of being “caught,” “overwhelmed,” and instead of becoming sharper, our perceptions generally become blurred or vague. Anxiety may occur in slight or significant intensity… People experience anxiety in all sorts of ways: a “gnawing” within, a constriction of the chest, general bewilderment; or they may describe it as a feeling as though all the world around were dark gray or black, or as though a heavyweight was upon them, or as a feeling like the terror which a small child experiences when he realizes he is lost. Indeed, anxiety may take all forms and intensities, for it is the human being’s basic reaction to danger to his existence or some value that he identifies with his existence… But as soon as the threat becomes greater as enough to involve the total self, one then has the experience of anxiety… It is the quality of the experience that makes anxiety more intense rather than the quantity.
(May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 44)
Considering that the most dominant value judgments on the individual are to be accepted and loved, it can be easily observed that the anxiety stems from the fear of being pushed into loneliness and not wanted by society. Anxiety indicates the state of anxiousness experienced relative to the danger.
The neurotic type of anxiety is the definition of the type of anxiety that persists even though it is not a state of worry. This type of anxiety destroys self-consciousness; it is
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an indication that the struggle in the body continues. Whatever level it is, it injures consciousness and blocks the senses. It hits the core self from the deepest point. It leads to the abstraction of the individual from reality. It is essentially an element that indicates a problem that needs to be solved.
The collapse of social value judgments, the creation of hostile feelings caused by individual competition and the sadness of others, the increase of loneliness and abandonment to incredible levels, the futility of attempts for individual interests without social gains may be consisting of the origin of anxiety.
For May, the factors that create situations that increase the sense of emptiness are the disappearance of the individual in the herd. Therefore, the effect of the individual language, which has a wealth of literature, music, visual arts, and the language used by the individual, decreases rapidly and, most importantly, the loss of communication with nature. The philosopher, who says that we should look for the root in nature, argues that increased anxiety causes a rapid break-in communication with nature.
May states that it takes a solid character to connect with nature without getting too caught up in it. He states that confronting nature can increase anxiety and the man who is afraid of it clings to the daily hustle and bustle, which increases self-alienation. Another consequence of one’s distancing from the perception of value and pride in one’s existence is trying to ignore the tragic importance of human life. However, there is a deep respect for man and a commitment to his rights and destiny. “The tragic right is a condition of life, a condition in which the human personality can flower and realize itself… But in our age of emptiness, tragedies are relatively rare… For the sense of tragedy is simply the other side of one's belief in the importance of the human individual. Tragedy implies a profound respect for the human being and a devotion to his rights and destiny.” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997)
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"The highest to which man can attain is a wonder," remarked Goethe Wonder is a function of what one holds to be of ultimate meaning and value in life. Though a tragic drama may cue off it, it is not a negative experience; since it is essentially an enlarging of life, the overall emotion which accompanies wonder is joy.” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 195)
It is the disease of our time that we have lost touch with the wise teachings of the past based on creativity. This bond is formed at the rate at which the individual reaches self-consciousness. “To the extent that an adult person has achieved some freedom and identity as a self, he has a base from which to acquire the wisdom in the traditions of his society and to make it his.” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 192) According to May, the only way to understand our identity as individuals is to make sense of our internal experiences, and we experience meaningful experiences at the level at which we participate in traditions, and to that extent, we enjoy life. This meaning also reinforces the trust that life means. This is What Nietzsche calls “beyond good and evil; ” and Paul Tillich calls “Transmoral Morality.”
“If a person chooses to live reality by taking all responsibilities and reflecting on all actions by connecting to layers of self, only then will value have a place in life. It is the human who chooses this behavior, with this awareness, he reviews his purpose, weighs the strength and credibility of his action, and then he does his business with conviction.” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 200)
It does not mean that the individual feels no doubt, on the contrary, doubting is at the core of existence, and the philosopher emphasizes that the essence of morality is the individual’s ability to take responsibility in all its forms. It takes courage to take on this responsibility. According to May, who states that courage is the most basic and permanent value among the virtues, courage is the capacity of the individual to resist
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the anxiety that arises as he attains his freedom. As the individual strengthens this virtue, he can face external threats with greater power.
The kind of courage that fosters constructiveness to be oneself is the foundation of any creative relationship. Dedicating onesself as well as proving yourself is a situation that takes courage. “The quality that above all deserves the greatest glory in art—and by that word we must include all creations of the mind—is courage.” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 209)
“…o produce, to bring to the birth, to bring up the infant work with labor, to put it to bed full-fed with milk, to take it up again every morning with inexhaustible maternal love... never to be discouraged by the convulsions of this mad life, and to make of it a living masterpiece that speaks to all eyes in sculpture, or to all minds in literature, to all memories in painting, to all hearts in music that is the task of execution.” (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997, s. 209). Every act resulting from original creativity means attaining a higher level of individual awareness and freedom. Saying that artists can reveal new forms and symbols directly and instantly, and also imagined symbols are expressed graphically by artists. He states that encountering these works creates a new moment of sensitivity and change in the individual. Symbols of alienation and anxiety are observed in abundance in today’s art. “…By the creative act, however, we can reach beyond our death. This is why (May, Kendini Arayan İnsan, 1997) (May, Yaratma Cesareti, 2015) creativity is so valuable and why we need to confront the problem of the relationship between creativity and death.” (May, Yaratma Cesareti, 2015, s. 52)
2.3.1.v. Psycho-neuro Immunology, Robert Ader, Nicholas Cohen
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“Psychoneuroimmunology is the study of the relationships between behavioral, neural, and endocrine and immune processes. Bidirectional pathways connect the brain and immune system and form the basis of the neural, endocrine, and behavioral effects on immunity. Examples of such effects are conditional and stress-induced changes in immune function and susceptibility to immunologically mediated diseases. These data suggest that researchers should no longer study the immune system as if it functions independently of other systems in the body. Changes in immune function are hypothesized to mediate the effects of psychological factors on the development of certain diseases, and research strategies are proposed to examine the clinical significance of behaviorally induced changes in immune function.” (Kriz, 2020)
Psychoneuroimmunology (PNI), also called psychoanodynoimmunology (PENI) or psychoneuroendocrinoimmunology (PNEI), is the study of the interaction between psychological processes and the nervous and immune system of the human body. Psychoneuroimmunology (PNI) defines an interdisciplinary approach that includes psychology, neuroscience, immunology, physiology, genetic sciences, pharmacology, molecular biology, psychiatry, behavioral medicine, and endocrinology. The main interests of the PNI are the interactions between the nervous system and the immune system and the relationships between mental processes and health. (Medikalakademi, 2020)
As a result of studies conducted by Prof. Robert Ader, president of the University of Rochester Medical Center, with Nicholas Cohen, head of microbiology and immunology at the same university, showing the link between the human body, different psychological processes, and the immune system; the strong positive and negative connection between the human brain and the immune system, psychology, neurology, endocrinology (hormonal system), and psychoneuroimmunology has been
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proven. According to Ader and Cohen, stress and the immune system are affected by emotional and behavioral manifestations, causing physiological changes such as accelerated heart rate, sweating, and increased blood pressure. Long-term stress, anxiety, fear, tension, anger, and sadness suppress and weaken the immune system. Man has difficulty in establishing his physical, psychological, and chemical balance, and the continuation of the regular order of the body cannot be possible. (Demirok, 2017, pp. 54-55)
Furthermore, after the scientific studies have proven that the psychoneuroimmunology, psychology, neurology, and immune system, which have been on the agenda again in recent years, examining the sociological environment, psychological state, and neurological status of the person together, A multifaceted individual improvement with a holistic approach in treatments emphasized necessary. In 1981, American medical doctor David Felten discovered the connections of neurons to the bloodstream and thus to the immune system. Felten and his team also found the connection of lymphocyte, macrophage and mast cells with nerve cells in the thyroid and spleen, and therefore with the immune system. In the light of this information, it is a fact that creative activities directly affect the physiological state and human psychology. (Serin, 2007)
2.3.2. Arts and Physiological Healing
While it was impossible for any branch of art in the 19th century to be under the same roof with centers, hospitals, and clinics where Western medicine was practiced; in the 21st century, art was reborn with its different disciplines at diversified levels, integrative treatments and complementary medicine centers and took its place in the healthcare system.
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The creativity process is not only for the health of the individual, society and the environment, but also for the general welfare of the individuals, the formation of the harmony of spirit, body and mind, and for improvement in the protective, convalescent and treatment processes. How active participation in the creative process makes a difference in the human brain and the scientific determination of these findings with brain fMRIs before and after the creative process was made possible by the joint research of the Nuremberg Art Museum and Erlangen University, a ten-week study in the museum. This study is only one of the numerous recent studies on the contribution of the creative process to human health.
The effect of art on the human brain and its functions is noticed by the changes it causes in spoken language, intelligence and consciousness. Art increases the communication skills and sense of unity of people living in the same environment. In addition, art is involved with practices in regaining health and protecting health. It has an essential place in ensuring the soul, body and minds integrity and balance. During the artistic process, the joy of life increases, participation in real-life increases and the loneliness decrease. The creativity process ensures the general well-being of the individual, the establishment of the harmony of spirit, body and mind. It is beneficial in regaining health and protecting health. It creates positive differences in the human brain.
The human brain provides body and mind coordination and forms the center of the nervous system, which organizes the regular functioning of all systems and hormones in the body. It consists of the cerebrum, cerebellum, and brain stem. The gray matter is of six layers covering the cerebrum, and the cerebellum is the cortex. White matter forms the internal surface of this gray matter. Information is carried by axons from millions of neurons in the cortex to the essential receptor cells. It is delivered to the
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required regions from the receiving cells by neurotransmitters. The cerebrum consists of two main lobes: the left lobe, which is analytical, systematic, logical, and the right lobe, where the coordination of holistic methods, emotional inputs, artistic experiences, spatial skills is regulated. Moreover, memory is hidden in auditory, visual, and spatial modalities.
The data shows that the immunoglobin secretion increases in the measurements of the choir members after their singing performance. Immunoglobin is an antigen protein necessary for the immune system that fights foreign substances. Active participation and a complex environment are two factors that increase the learning rate and positively support the formation of new brain cells. Particularly active participation slows and inhibits the formation of amino plaques associated with Alzheimer's and Dementia. When controversial situations occur, it leads to distress, anxiety, and depression. Chronic stress prevents the formation of new brain cells and can cause disconnections after a while, leading to Dementia and Alzheimer's. (Demirok, 2017)
Emotions are often the factors that guide people and set boundaries. Anger shows up when biologically it is intended to frighten others. Along with sadness, it often brings crying and indicates the need for help. All emotions send signals to the environment and also direct actions. Every emotion has physical and psychological expressions. Emotional mastery of the individual also demonstrates social competence and mastership. The Emotional development training should begin at a very young age. It is a fact that, during the third stage of pregnancy, the fetus can distinguish sounds and learn different vowels and hear very clearly. Newborns showed psychological signs of recognizing their mother’s voice and language. (https://artsandhealth.duke.edu/participate/make-gift).
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After birth, communication with the environment is more intense. Social Anthropologist Ellen Dissanayake researched the mother-child relationship for the first six months. (Dissanayake; 2000) The songs the mother sings, the mimics she makes, the speeches, the gestures are crucial features that provide emotional communication. It is possible to increase the social skills of babies and kindergarten children through cultural education starting from the first year throughout the early childhood period. Drama lessons enriched with poetry and music are perfect for acquiring emotional differences and learning social and communication skills. When reading a story to a child, using necessary gestures strengthens expression and accelerates learning. As the result of the research, it has been verified that educational studies that bring different disciplines together in adults, and, children are very beneficial in terms of separating emotional and social skills and using them correctly. Rhythmic dance movements are to intensify and strengthen emotional expression. Cultural education programs lead to the development of mastery in social skills and, increasing emotional ability if experienced for a certain period.
There is a very powerful correlation between musical education and emotional competence. The emotional and social capacity increases as music and musical education accelerate. Musical talent boost with the multiplicity of musical education and general intelligence increase in conjunction. It is a kind of training that occurs even while listening passively at a music concert and watching hand movements.
“The article written by Töres Theorel, in the 9th chapter of Creative Arts, Health and Wellbeing, indicates that even when the individual is passively watching the performance of any kind, it is recorded in his brain via “mirror neurons”, as if he performs in the same way. During the process the regions of the brain related to the movement and the regions related to emotions and empathy centers work. In the same article, Krumhansi measured the physiological reactions of the listeners by listening to songs containing feelings of sadness, fear, and joy. He found that the group exposed
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to sad music had a low heart rate, high blood pressure, and high skin conductance. It has been determined that when scary music is listened, breathing (breathing per minute) accelerates, blood flow decreases, especially in the hand veins, while the rate of breathing is high in joyful music. (Krumhansi, 1997, s. 67)” (Demirok,2017, p.72)
It is possible to give examples from history as well. “Songs of soldiers going to war on the march, songs by woodcutters going into the forest, songs by rowers in sea battles, songs and chants sung by sailors and fishermen. As in many places, unique music lists are prepared for gyms. In a study carried out in the Fitness Hall, the blood pressure, heart rate, and lactic acid ratios in the blood of the subjects were examined. It has been determined that the blood pressure and heart rate of young people who do physical activity with music and the lactic acid ratio in their blood are low. Moreover, in a study conducted with cyclists, it has been discovered that long-distance cycling activity without music was more difficult for cyclists than the same activity with music. (Artsandhealth) (Demirok,2017, p.72)
“Musical performance; playing an instrument requires physical effort and works hundreds of muscles simultaneously. Learning to sing by taking vocal training also teaches how to use the breathing muscles in a controlled way. In this case, singing requires the knowledge of certain breathing techniques, and in a sense, it is breath training. It has been determined that the plasma concentration of oxytocin in the bloodstream increases in professional vocal training and amateur. (Demirok,2017, p.73)
Oxytocin is a hormone known as cognition, tolerance, trust, friendship, social bonding, and love hormone pumped into the bloodstream. In its absence, narcissistic, a psychopathic, manipulative personality disorder is observed. (Wikipedia)
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To summarize, psycho-physiological connections are expanding between health and cultural activities. These are the connections from passive, starting with the chills that occur at listening, to active, the flow phase in participation. Music artists and those with extensive, long-term musical training have broader neurobiological formations in their brain anatomy. From this point of view, it can be argued that music education stimulates brain development and empowers social and emotional skills. (Demirok, 2017, s. 63-71)
It has been observed that active participation in art studies creates calmness in individuals, and as a result, blood pressure may be reduced, and blood circulation is relaxed. Furthermore when the continuity of these general well-being moments is ensured, improvement in lung-liver functions and hormonal balance occurs.
2.3.3. Arts and Mental Healing
The participant organizes his feelings and thoughts and experiences moments and formations to convey his solution with the help of appropriate tools. Ernst Fisher says: Art is a magical impulse to create, a necessity. (Fisher, 2012, s. 29)
2.3.3.i. The Psychology of Optimum Experience
“Prof Czikszentmihayli calls ‘the situation of a person who has the adequate capacity and education to fulfill a difficult task’ as “flow state”. This challenging situation, which is challenging but needs no effort since it is compatible with the individual’s ability, is called the highest level of all emotions in the individual, the increase in deep breathing activity, the parasympathetic activity mediated by the vagus nerve.” (Demirok, 2017, p. 71)
Elements of Enjoyment
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Prof Czikszenmihayli says that the optimal experience and the psychological conditions that make it possible seem to be the same all over the world and argues that “there are eight significant components of enjoyment. He has detected that at least one but mostly all of them are experienced together. The experience usually occurs when we confront tasks we have a chance of completing. We must be able to concentrate on what we are doing. Concentration. The task undertaken has clear goals and provides immediate feedback. Acting with a deep but effortless involvement removes from awareness and frustrations of everyday life. Enjoyable experiences allow people to exercise a sense of control over their actions. As a result, concern for the self disappears, yet paradoxically the sense of self emerges stronger after the flow experience is over. The sense of the duration of time is altered; hours pass by in minutes, and minutes can stretch out to seem like hours. The combination of all these elements causes a sense of deep enjoyment that is so rewarding, and people feel that expending a great deal of energy is worthwhile simply to feel it.” (Chikszentmihalyi, 2008, p. 49) Most optimal experiences are goal-directed activities that require psychic energy and cannot be realized without appropriate skills. It should be noted that the activities mentioned here do not have to acquire a physical skill. Reading is also an activity, requires attention and focus. It should be acknowledged that mastering the rules of writing and the language of the written text is not enough for reading. It also includes mastery of using words, recognizing historical and cultural content, knowing the story's turning point, and criticizing and evaluating the author's style.
Another universally accepted pleasurable activity is to be with other people. Socialization requires skill. Every activity includes a range of opportunities for action or challenges that require appropriate skills. If the person does not have the satisfying skill for the activity chosen, it is even pointless to be in. One of the easy ways to find
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encouraging challenges is in competitive situations. The most attractive aspect of all games and sports is when a person or team takes the field. In many ways, competition is a fast way to develop complexity. The competition gives pleasure only when it enables perfecting one’s skills. It ceases to be fun when it has a purpose in itself. Such activities should have goals and rules. Breaking the monotony of the day with micro-flow activities reduces boredom but does not add much to the quality of the experience.
Enjoyment occurs when difficulties are in balance with one’s capacity to act. The golden ratio between challenges and skills does not apply to human activities alone, and animals go through the same processes. Optimal experience occurs when concentration and skills are maximum. The fusion of action and awareness are the two main features of Flow, the optimum experience
If coping with the difficulties of a situation requires to use all the skills related to that situation, the person turns attention entirely to the activity, the focus is maximum, and the activity becomes spontaneous and almost automatic. The individual is at the point where he cannot realize himself apart from the action. At that moment, the concentration is complete, and the mind does not wander, does not think about anything else, the focus is at its peak. As a result, energy flows smoothly, gives energized, relaxed feeling. That is why the optimum experience is called Flow. The purpose of the flow is not to seek climax or utopia, it is to be in the experience for the sake of the experience itself. It is a kind of self-communication.
While the experience of flow may seem effortless, it often requires active physical exertion or highly disciplined mental activity. A momentary interruption in concentration destroys the pause flow. In daily life, our doubts and questions interrupt our actions, whereas, during the flow experience, there is no need to think since the
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action carries the person forward. We manage to focus during the optimum experience because the goals are often clear and instant feedback is obtained.
One must develop a strong personal sense of feeling in creative activities where the goals are unclear. It is impossible to experience flow without these guides. The type of feedback sought is often insignificant. What makes information valuable is the symbolic message it contains. When the goal is achieved, the knowledge gained by the process creates order in consciousness and strengthens its core structure.
One of the most mentioned aspects of the flow is that while the experience is going on, one can forget all the unpleasant aspects of life and focus on the optimum experience. In daily life, people get caught up in thoughts and worries that are unconsciously run into their minds so that it is nearly impossible to concentrate on present activities, to erase worries about the past and future.
Often the mundane state of mind has unexpected and frequent bouts of entropy (disorder)which interferes with the smooth flow of psychic energy.
On the other hand, streaming improves the quality of the experience. The structured demands of activity impose order and consciously prevent the disorder from interfering. Every activity that requires concentration has a timid time window. The main thing is to allow a select range of knowledge to come into consciousness. Therefore, all problematic activities that go through the mind generally are temporarily suspended. No feeling left other than to belong to the activity. With clear goals and instantaneous feedback, the concentration of flow, establishes the order, which is the order dispite disorder, in consciousness and initiates the pleasurable condition of psychic negentropy. The experience of flow is claimed to be experienced as a sense of control, or rather, not worrying about losing control. Activities that produce a flow experience, even in the riskiest of the experiences, allow the person experiencing it to
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develop sufficient skills to keep the margin of error as close to zero as possible. It is a fact that fun activities that create a negative flow state are as addictive as the positive state. When a person becomes too dependent on his ability to control the pleasurable activity to pay attention to other things, that is, when he loses the freedom to determine the content of consciousness, he loses ultimate control. As a result, the self becomes a prisoner of order and then loses the will to deal with the uncertainties of life.
Engaging with the self drains psychic energy and pumps the feeling of threat in daily life. He is reminded of how sensitive his essence is dozens of times a day, and each time this happens, psychic energy is expended to restore order in consciousness. However, but there is no room for self-examination in the flow. There is no situation that threatens the essence in activities that give pleasure. Being unconscious of the essence does not mean that the individual in the flow experience has given up control of their psychic energy or is unaware of what is going on in their body and mind. Generally, the opposite is true.
Optimum experience requires the very active involvement of the essence. Thus, loss of self-awareness does not mean the loss of essence, and indeed not the loss of consciousness, but simply the loss of consciousness of the self. When we are not preoccupied with ourselves, we have a chance to expand our perception of who we really are. Loss of self-awareness can lead to a sense of self-transcendence in which our boundaries of being are pushed forward. When a person puts all their psychic energy into an interaction, their core becomes part of a more extensive system of action than before. This system takes its form from the rules of activity. Its energy comes from one’s attention, it is a natural system and the self that is part of it expands its boundaries and becomes much more complex than before. This development occurs only when the interaction is pleasurable, that is when it offers non-simple opportunities
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for action and requires constant refinement of skills. Sometimes it may be necessary to give up self-awareness to develop a strong self-concept. The reason for this is very clear. In the flow, one is forced to do their best and constantly improve their skills. When it returns to normal after the end of the process, the self is no longer the same self. Instead enriched with new skills, information, and achievements.
One of the most apparent and common definitions of optimum experience is that time no longer passes as usual. Although it is often said that hours pass as fast as minutes, there may be a feeling of slowing down in some flow experiences. Most of the flow processes have their own pace and do not stand the passage of time. The transition from one state to another is dependent on its sequence of events, not on equally spaced times.
The key element of optimal experience is the absence of purpose in itself. “Autotelic” is derived from the words auto meaning self and telos meaning target. Self-sufficient means self-rewarded activity with no expectation of future benefit. When the experience is autotelic, the person pays attention to the activity because of the activity itself. When there is no autotelic experience the focus is on the result. An autotelic experience takes the flow of life into a different state. Alienation gives way to inclusion, helplessness turns into a feeling of control, and psychic energy works to strengthen the individual’s sense of self rather than being lost in the service of external purposes. Life is supported in the present when the experience is intrinsically rewarding.
Although the reason for this action of the human being, who painted on the cave walls 30,000 years ago, is not known clearly, it can be argued definitely to have religious and practical significance. For Czikszenmihayli, the real reason for the existence of art
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is the same in Paleolithic period and today, which is a source of flow for both painter and observer.
People who cannot find ways to have autotelic experiences are likely to be drawn into violence and crime. Unfortunately, a large part of society does not encounter enough motivational challenges and lacks the necessary skills to benefit.
Flow activities are a system of action that provides clear clues as to how a focused person is performing, feeling that the skills are sufficient to cope with the challenge at hand. An activity that produces such experiences is very satisfying. One does the activity for the activity itself, even if it is difficult and dangerous, without thinking about how one will get out of it. Optimum experiences may occur randomly or as a result of either a structured activity, according to a person's ability to flow, or both. These activities concern physical movements and also involve the activity of the mind.
Prof. Czikszenmihayli classified flow activities in four sections:
Agon includes games, competitions as their main features, such as most sports and athletic events. Alea is the section that includes all games of chance, from dice to bingo. Ilinx, or vertigo, is the name of the activities that alter consciousness by scrambling ordinary perception, such as riding a merry-go-round or skydiving, and whirling dervishes enter the stages of extreme happiness with the same means. All activities that change our perception of reality bring enjoyment and create the feeling of expansion in consciousness. Mimicry is the group of activities in which alternative realities are created, such as dance, theater, and the arts in general. (Csikszentmihalyi, 2008, p. 72) In his studies, Czikszentmihayli explored that “it provided a sense of discovery, a creative feeling of transporting the person into a new reality. It pushed the person to higher performance levels and led to previously undreamed-of states of
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consciousness. In short, it transformed the self by making it more complex. In this growth of the self lies the key to flow activities.” (Czikszentmihalyi M. , 2008, p. 74)
Individuals with self-awareness and attention disorders eliminate the possibility of experiencing the flow. Neither learning nor true enjoyment is possible when a person cannot control his psychic energy. Also, egocentric individuals are often unaware of themselves, evaluating each piece of information solely on their wishes. For such a person, everything is worthless in itself. Consciousness is completely structured for its purposes and anything that does not fit, not allowed to exist. Although the self-aware and egocentric people have different personalities, neither can control their psychic energies enough to enter the flow experience. They do not have the fluidity of attention, the needs of their ego control their attention. The social conditions that impede the flow can be harder to overcome. One of the consequences of slavery, oppression, exploitation, and cultural destruction is the destruction of enjoyment. To define social pathology anomie, and alienation are the two main features.
Anomy is the name given to the situation where the norms of behavior in society are muddled. People who rely on the rules of society to regulate their consciousness become extremely worried in such conditions. Behavior becomes erratic and meaningless when it is unclear what is allowed and what is not when it becomes unclear what the public values are. Alienation is the opposite definition given to the condition forced by the social system to individuals act against their own goals. These social barriers to flow are, by definition, equivalent to self-centeredness and attention disorders. At the individual level, anomy corresponds to anxiety, while alienation corresponds to boredom. Psychological entropy will give way to a pleasant sense of harmony in consciousness if one learns to bring order to his senses.
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A wide variety of activities based on rhythmic or harmonious movements produce flow. Among them, dance is the oldest and most accepted activity. The enjoyment is so intense that people give up many other activities for dancing. It is not necessary to be specialized in that activity to get enjoyment. Another activity in which the body is used as an instrument is mimicry and acting. “Even the silliest and clumsy impersonation can provide an enjoyable relief from the limitations of everyday patterns of behavior, a glimpse into alternative modes of being.” ( (Czikszentmihalyi M. , 2008, p. 100) One of the purposes of the flow experience is to strengthen the essence. It is valuable to develop visual potential systematically. Vision training is necessary to develop visual skills in all senses. only then individual can have continuous access to pleasurable visual experiences. “The visual arts are one of the best training grounds for developing these skills.” (Czikszentmihalyi M. , Flow, The psychology of optimal Experience, 2008, p. 107)
Visual education is needed to get a certain level of sensory enjoyment from visual pleasures. One cannot expect to enjoy without developing the required skills. Likewise, music and sound are orchestrated to relax the ear and function extensively to improve the quality of life. The benefit of music is to focus the listener's attention on patterns suitable for the desired mood. There are musical genres composed for every different social situation. As the regular auditory information, music helps organize the mind and reduces the psychic entropy or disorder we experience. It is also necessary to give full attention to enjoy in music. What makes life better is not to hear but to listen. Few people experience this act of listening and flow.
“As the Yaqui sorcerer taught the antropologist Carlos Castaneda, even the intervals of silence between sounds if listened to closely, can be exhilarating.” (Czikszentmihalyi M. , 2008, p. 110)
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Reading is the most frequently mentioned of the flow activities. However, people who spend a lot of time with art also appreciate the emotional, historical and cultural aspects of the work, rather than the purely visual aspects. It is one of the essential elements that all sensory and physical activities contain a mental component for the individual to be pleasurable and flowing.
If the individual does not know how to put the thoughts in order, the chaotic mind arises, the attention shifts to the most troublesome thoughts, such as focusing on real or imagined pain, immediate griefs, or long-term disappointments. Entropy is the normal state of consciousness, neither functional nor amusing.
The person who develops a strategy to overcome psychic entropy seldom gives up that habit he has developed. The best way to avoid chaos in consciousness is not to find external sources of stimuli but to acquire habits that control mental processes.
One of the simplest ways to use the mind is to dream. Nevertheless gaining such a habit requires practice and demands to apply the goals and rules inherent in flow activities. All forms of mental flow rely directly or indirectly on memory. How can one find more value in memory? If deciding which subject one is interested in is the starting point, paying attention to the essential data comes next. Once one has mastered the content, he can differentiate what is worth remembering and what is not. What needs to be understood here is that series of truths should be absorbed internalized. According to Czikszentmihayli every human being is the historian of his existence.
2.3.3.ii Relaxation Response
After graduating from Harvard Medical School in the 1960s, as a way of stress reduction Dr. Benson has found a practice he calls the Relaxation Response. Benson Institute, located in Massachusetts Hospital, provides scientifically proven meditation
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training to patients as a method of coping with stress. According to Dr. Benson, anxiety is one of the serious diseases of our age and emerges as a problem that causes diseases. Benson, who uses the phrase Relaxation Response instead of the meditation term, argues that the individual’s healing accelerates at the moment when he accesses from a fight-or-flight state to a state of acceptance, he can enter his inner world. Relaxation Response meditations regulate the heartbeat, lower blood pressure and calm them down. Benson states that the meditations, with a silent process of ten to twenty-five minutes in the morning or evening every day, can prevent diseases and protect good health for a longer period. In recent years, altered consciousness has become widely experienced. The physiological changes created by the Relaxation Response are closely related to the state of altered consciousness. This situation emerges as the scientific confirmation of the wisdom that is existed in belief systems and cultures throughout human history. This response describes the transition from an individual’s fight-or-flight response to acceptance. There is a scale ranging from deep consciousness to extraordinary sensitivity. Generally, this state of consciousness is not some state that can be achieved spontaneously. According to Prof Dr. Herbert Benson, it needs a conscious and purpose-oriented will, and the way to achieve this state is possible with meditation. Even though the term meditation may remind many of us of mystics, Christian monks, or Far Eastern cults contemplating God, and in that respect, it is related to religions. Although reaching an altered state of consciousness by meditation seems like a mystical experience involving deep philosophical and religious rituals, it is scientific proof that it increases communication skills, a sense of well-being, and a peaceful mind which creates holistic healthcare and relaxation.
Fatigue has never been detected in the applied research of Benson et al. with transcendental meditation associations. In addition to describing many different
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emotions, it is originally a universal feeling that rises above ordinary and everyday experiences and senses. It is a fact that this is an experience that reveals certain universal impulses in the human mind, which are also found in Eastern and Western mysticism. The age-old universality of this altered state of consciousness reveals certain notions and values and provides relief and relaxation with the sense of unity it gives to the individual. If to give an example from history, the goal is to achieve perfect self-sacrifice in Buddism.
Meditation is a personal experience that creates emotional depth in the individual. Regardless of the individual’s cultural background, meditation has four essential elements. These; Performing in quiet places (can be indoors or outdoors), there is an object to focus on, which includes focusing deeply on a symbol, such as a syllable, a sound, concentrating on a particular emotion.
It is necessary to have a passive stance against all the cacophony that occurs in the mind, allow many thoughts that come to mind during the meditation process to pass as they are, and stand in a comfortable position, which can be sitting or on the knee. The primary purpose is “to shut off the mind from external thoughts and to produce a mental solitude.” (Benson, 2001, p. 87)
With this method, the individual mentally creates emptiness that he can apply even in crowds and say “no” to thoughts that attack the mind. Meditation experiences built into the daily routine can reduce high blood pressure, which can have deadly consequences, and reduce the risk of heart attack and stroke. The relaxation response is a meditation technique that is recommended to be experienced for at least twenty minutes. It is a new concept to use the technique as a therapeutic tool. For the meditation, a quiet environment, an object to dwell upon, a passive attitude and a confortable position are needed.
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It is a fact that the lack of such activities and participation in the life of the individual brings weariness towards life and depression in cases that become chronic for a long time. Prolonged stress creates anxiety. Depression and anxiety interrupt the harmony and communication of brain nerve cells with each other. The prefrontal cortex and hippocampus display high mental and emotional function with the individual's active participation. With the absence of such conditions,- a decrease in brain nerve cells and a disconnection in their communication. Proportional decreases and increases were found in the schemas of hippocampus and prefrontal nerve cells detected by brain scans.
“Czikszentmihalyi’s Flow The Psychological Optimal Experience and Benson’s Relaxation Response are two components of the solution of the problems that generate tension. Coherence reduces blood tension and increases the joy of life. The creative process, including problem-solving skills and focuses on inner seeking, consists of many Flow and Relaxation Response moments.” (Demirok, Sağlık Sektöründe Sanatın Uygulamaları ve Faydaları, 2017, s. 56)
2.3.3.iii. Mindfullness Based Cognitive Therapy
Mark Williams, John Teasdale, Zindel Segal, Jon Kabatt-Zinn
The technique from the Asian wisdom traditions known as conscious awareness was adapted and refined for use in the modern medical setting by Jon Kabat Zinn and his colleagues at the University of Massachusetts Medical School. In 1979, Jon Kabatt Zinn laid the foundation for the “Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy” program. This program brings together the latest insights in modern science and the types of meditation that verified clinically effective in medicine and psychology. This new but effective synthesis, which blends two different methods of recognizing the mind and
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body, helps to create a radical change in the individual’s relationship with negative thoughts and feelings. This practice, which combines Western cognitive science and Eastern practices, is defined as Conscious Awareness. “The overall tenor of mindfulness practice is gentle appreciative and nurturing. Another way to think of it would be “heartfulness.” (Zinn, 2005, p. 7)
When the individual cannot find a way to alleviate painful feelings, he is usually tried to get rid of it, by suppressing it. In this process, regrets from the past are pierced and concerns about the future are produced. When the mind is in this state, the individual becomes distracted and cuts off communication with the outside world. It deprives the individual of enjoying life and enjoying the riches it offers. Being discouraged towards life and being in despair are the emotions that this situation reveals. “Love and compassionate meditative awareness can also play a tremendous role in a situation like this..” (Zinn K. J., 2015, s. 16)
To get rid of this mental activity pattern, Kabatt Zin and his colleagues, who are scientists and clinicians, argue that the meditation techniques they recommend prevent the moments of unhappiness that can often be experienced from turning into depression. It even emphasizes that, this style can completely break out of the negative mental activity pattern with these techniques. The body and the sensations coming from the body are neglected when the thoughts and feelings are lost or the feelings are tried to be suppressed. However, sensations from the body provide immediate feedback about what is happening emotionally and mentally.
Focusing on these sensations transforms the emotions by preventing them from being stuck in the past and turning to the future. Kabatt-Zin emphasized the importance of developing awareness with the mind, body, and emotions and wanted to realize the liberating and transforming power of the works of returning to the present, that is, the
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moment by defining numerous meditation techniques the individual can discover their technique. Thus, it also reveals the power of living the moment with full awareness. The first thing suggested starting studies is that it is necessary to understand how the individual is stuck with the patterns of thought, feeling, and behavior depending on the habits and thus how the individual is deprived of the joy and opportunities in life. It has been determined that this type of exercise is more effective with long-term applications.
In addition, it is highly recommended to experience it by focusing on the moment with candor and excitement, not with a sense of result-oriented. Psychologists Mark Williams, John Teasdale, and Zindel Segal have observed that at least fifty percent of individuals who have experienced depression become depressed again after a while, even though they seem to have fully recovered. Aaron Beck and his team determined that negative thoughts play a crucial role in depression. In the light of discoveries, it has emerged that there is a significant difference between individuals who have experienced depression and those who have never experienced it. “…depression creates a link in the brain between sad mood and negative thoughts, and even normal sadness can cause major negative thoughts to reawaken.” (Zinn K. J., 2015, s. 30)
Kabatt Zin explains the anatomy of depression, its four key dimensions by stating that it is necessary to start by learning the feelings, thoughts, bodily sensations, and behaviors that guide the reactions. Disturbing emotions in life are clues to ourselves and those around us that we are seriously upset and facing an unfortunate situation in our lives. However, this sadness leads to ruthless negative thoughts and emotions is one of the most important factors that trigger depression. In this process, the individual experiences the feeling of burnout more severely as he cuts off communication with his friends, friends, and family who support him and feed his soul.
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The effects of depression on thought, body, and behavior perception, can be summarized as follows; Sad, dejected, self-pitying individuals also experience anxiety, fear, anger, irritability, hopelessness, and despair at the same time. The strength of these emotions in the individual may manifest in different strengths. “Such self-critical thoughts are compelling and potentially full of poison. Like our feelings, they can be both the endpoint and the starting point of depression.” (Zinn K. J., 2015, s. 35)
The emotional reactions of individuals depend on how their minds interpret the data obtained through their senses. The main problem here is not the unhappiness inherent in life. The problem is our negative thoughts about ourselves that trigger an unhappy mood. It is possible that the temporary unhappiness can lead to depression by feeding on negative thoughts. Kabat-Zinn, Williams, Segal, and Teasdale emphasize that depression causes changes in feelings and thoughts and seriously affects the body. He states that substantial irregularities may occur in the sleep, eating, and life energy of the individual, that these bodily changes trigger the thoughts and feelings of the individual over and over again, and that this ongoing interaction also pumps the feelings of worthlessness and inadequacy. In addition to the emotional effects, it is also a fact that individuals may experience physical ailments caused by depression, and they seek medical help by suffering from bodily aches and pains. The body usually tends to tense up when faced with something negative. Research has shown that the heartbeat accelerates in times of danger, the blood withdraws from the skin and digestive system, rushes to the arms and legs, which are prepared to fight or flee or freeze.The brain does not distinguish between external and internal dangers in its earliest ancestral parts and gives the same responses. “For this reason, negative thoughts that come to mind also create contraction, compression, or locking in a part of the body, just like the external danger. These are the body’s preliminary
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preparations to freeze, fight, or flee. It can manifest as a sad mood, churning in our stomach, discoloration, or pressure on our lower back.” (Zinn K. J., 2015, s. 42)
The brain activates its circuits related to physical avoidance, submission, or defensive attack, regardless of what threatens internally or externally. Since this tension causes the brain to shut itself down, the individual’s living space is narrowed, the feeling of being blocked and stuck increases. Options begin to lose their importance, and links are broken. In particular, if the individual treats his own negative emotions as the enemy that must be fought and defeated, he will feel a permanent sense of unhappiness. Being temporarily unhappy and sad is normal moods, and accepting these moods and establishing good relationships prevents these feelings from having a lasting effect on our minds because the real problem is not being sad temporarily but our mind’s response to sadness. Addressing external problems can activate the analytical part of the mind to help achieve targeted goals and solve technical business problems, but this does not apply to internal situations. Suppose the active state of the mind, “self-focused, self-critical mood, obsessive thinking,” seeks an obsessive solution. In that case it creates a state of rumination in psychology, which blunts the individual’s ability to produce solutions, which is a part of the problem rather than a solution, and it also blunts the individual’s ability to produce a solution. This state creates some ideas that prevent direct participation in the life and focuses only on the information related to the realization of the aimed purpose and the problems related to that subject. These studies show that the body unconsciously influences the mental state. Emotions and thoughts affect the choices made. It is a fact that depression affects the body, emotions, thoughts, and behavior of the individual.
The alternative strategy to rumination is to develop conscious awareness, says Jon Kabatt-Zinn, and matches this capacity with being alert, not critical thinking style. The
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calm state of the mind is a very different way of understanding and perception from the active state. When a calm state of awareness of mind is developed, a person will improve an awareness of body, emotion, and mind, which deliberately and willingly directs attention to the moment, accepting the experiences as they are without judgment. The more time spent with past regrets and/or future anxiety is reduced, the more focused on the present and the present. Thus, the joy of life and vital energy are strengthened. The experience focused on the moment, formed with sincerity, removes the individual from the previously formed patterns in mind.
When conscious awareness developed; one learns to experience the world directly, without resorting to cruel interpretations of the mind. Thus, the person will be open to the unlimited possibilities that life offers. Being aware that thoughts can rush into the mind, and when the importance of this is realized, their coming and going can be left only the basis of thought, and this situation is not given too much importance.
Kabatt-Zinn says, “This type of behavior is a complete antithesis of obsessive thoughts that cause the mood to persist and come back.” (Zinn K. J., 2015, s. 73)
This action is deliberate, experiential, focused directly on experiences gained in the present moment, and then a non-judgmental experience occurs. Thus, the autopilot in the brain is deliberately and willfully deactivated, focusing on the present moment with all vigilance. Paying the same quality of attention to every moment lived, changing the way of attention changes the nature of the experience. Applying the time allocated for these experiences in daily life, the systematic way is a valuable effort to keep the individual away from depression. Art takes place in mindfulness meditations with its different disciplines. It can also take part in art practices; opening a particular time and place at the beginning and the end of the practice is one of the factors that accelerate returning to the present moment and focusing. Calming the mind means
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allowing relaxation, expansion, and focus on what is happening at that moment and thus being ready for what life has to offer.
Meditations on calming the mind include breathing and movement meditations that focus on the body, and meditations for noticing feelings and thoughts. For this strategy to be effective, it is necessary to start the work knowingly and willfully, that is, with a purpose. The simplest way to clear the mind is to focus on a single object with no mental or intellectual meaning, as has happened in many other historical examples. This exercise activates the brain networks corresponding to the object chosen as the focus of attention and inhibits the brain networks that direct the mind to different focuses. Thus, the mind relaxes. Any time attention and focus dwindle, a tolerant effort is required here. Continuing meditation by realizing and accepting that it is normal for the mind to tend to drift frequently creates a conscious awareness that allows new beginnings at every moment. The consistent experience of these situations allows each of the momentary experiences to be lived as they are.
2.4. Selected Contemporary Researches on Arts and Health
After the second half of the twentieth century, research shows that the brain changes developmentally facing different situations caused by environmental effects, behaviors, thoughts, meditation, and emotions, not only in the first years of life but also in adulthood, and it continues throughout life. Thanks to the advancing imaging technology developing in the late 1980s, we can evaluate how the brain works in time and visualize the complex connections between different brain regions informing how to think and act. The results of neuroplasticity research have determined that the continuous change in the brain has important effects on healthy development of learning, memory, and brain damage repair. The ability of the brain to adapt, the ability
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of its cells to change, is called neuroplasticity. As a result of the joint studies and research findings, it is a fact that art management practices are highly beneficial for mental health. According to the dictionary definition; The human brain is the center of the nervous system and is defined as a mollusk, whitish, three-layered, thick membrane-covered organ located inside the skull. (Ayverdi, 2006, p. 349) The gray matter covering the cerebrum is the cortex. The cerebral cortex makes up two-thirds of the brain and is the most developed part. Information is carried to the necessary receptor cells by billions of neural axons in the cerebral cortex. Structurally, there are four lobes in each hemisphere of the brain; frontal lobe, temporal lobe, parietal lobe, and occipial lobe. The frontal cortex, located in the frontal lobe, the brain's control center, is located just behind the forehead. It is responsible for planning, problem-solving, personality, self-awareness, motivation, judgment, social judgment and impulse control and emotion regulation such as empathy and generosity. The parietal lobe is responsible for processing emotional inputs, sensations of heat, pain, and touch, body map, body space perception, temporal lobe memory, and the management of sensations associated with memory such as sound, taste, and smell. “Right temporal lobe; interpreting facial expressions, auditory perception, processing of the voice and tone of others, sense of rhythm, enjoyment of music, coordinates visual learning. On the other hand the left temporal lobe, can be summarized as language comprehension and processing, helpful reading, and reading comprehension, ensuring the establishment of new information, medium and long-term memory, language and word recall, maintaining emotional balance, and visual and auditory processing, and integration. (Demirok, 2017, p. 66)
Nowadays, there are many research findings on how art has positive effects on human well-being, not only psychologically but physiological and mental health as well. The selected examples from the studies that strengthen the argument of this thesis are below.
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2.4.1. The Connection Between Arts, Healing and Public Health: A Review of Current Literature (NCBI) 2010
(NCBI, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2804629/)
In this article, Heather Stuckey and Jeremy Nobel tried to reveal the relationship between participation and health outcomes by scanning the studies conducted between 200-2009. Finally, they categorized the researches under four headings. These are; music, visual arts, movement therapy and, expressive writing. Music is the most researched and used of these four fields. It can calm the neural activity, having high sedative capacity, reduce anxiety and help regain emotional balance.
On the other hand, visual arts help individuals express situations with different materials that they have difficulty expressing in words, such as cancer diagnosis. The studies show significant decreases in physical and emotional distress when cancer patients participate in art workshops during their treatment.
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Table 1.
Details of Visual Art Studies Reviewed
Note. Taken from Stuckey, H. L.& Nobel, J. (2010). The Connection Between Art, Healing and Public Health: A Review of Current Literature, American Journal of Public Health, 100(2), 254-263
DOİ: https://dx.doi.org/10.2105%2FAJPH.2008.156497
Creative expression and relaxation allow individuals to open their way to emotional healing. Indeed, art contributes positively to creating meaning, protecting identity, rebuilding self-confidence participating in the artistic workshops. The article, can find explanatory tables related to the research scannings, under these four headings in the article.
“Art can be a refuge from the intense emotions associated with illness. There is no limit to the imagination to find creative ways to express grief. In particular, molding clay can be a powerful way to help people express these emotions through tactile participation that facilitates non-verbal communication and purification when unconsciously using materials and symbols.
(NCBI, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2804629/, 2021)
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2.4.2. How Arts Change Your Brain: Differential Effects of Visual Art Production & Cognitive Art Evaluation (NCBI) Anne Baldwirk, Jessica Mack-Andrick, Christian Maihöfner, Nurenberg National Museum, Nürenberg, Erlangen University, Erlangen, 2011
The research was carried out by the German National Museum in Nuremberg in partnership with the University of Erlangen in 2011. It sought answers to the following questions: Does art change the physiology of the human brain? What are the effects of visual art production on individuals?
Two different art interventions took place in the art education rooms of the museum. Advocating that visual art is a powerful resource for mental and physical well-being, researchers Anne Bolwerk, Jessica Mack-Andrick, and Christian Maihöfner, however, realized that there is inadequate data on the underlying neural effects. In particular, the fundamental question was whether visual art education has a functional effect on the brain's default mode network (DMN, Default Mode Network). The study was conducted among retired adults in two-hour interventions once a week. Twenty-eight adults, randomly allocated to groups according to gender and age, participated in the art intervention in two separate rooms for ten weeks. The Default Mode Network (DMN) was measured using fMRI (functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging) at the beginning and end of the study. Participants in the visual creation group actively produced art in the art class. The other fourteen participants in the cognitive art evaluation group were in the other room.
Covariance analysis was used to associate fMRI data with psychological resilience.
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Table 2.
fMRI Covariant analysis
Note. Taken from Bolwerk, A., Mack-Andrick, J., Lang, F., Dörfler, A., Malhöfner, C., (2014) How Art Changes Your Brain: Differential Effects of Visual Art Production and Cognitive Art Evaluation on Functional Brain Connectivity, National Center for Biotechnology Information,https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ on December.17. 2021
DOİ: https://dx.doi.org/10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0101035
Compared to the cognitive art evaluation group, the visual art producing group showed more spatial improvement in functional connectivity in the frontal and parietal cortices in the baseline and final analyzes. It stated that functional connectivity is related to psychological flexibility stress resistance. “Our findings are the first to demonstrate the neural effects of visual art production on resilience in adulthood.” (NCBI, 2021)
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Table 3.
fMRI fuctional connectivity, visual productivity group
Note. Taken from Bolwerk, A., Mack-Andrick, J., Lang, F., Dörfler, A., Malhöfner, C., (2014) How Art Changes Your Brain: Differential Effects of Visual Art Production and Cognitive Art Evaluation on Functional Brain Connectivity, National Center for Biotechnology Information,https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ on December.17.21
DOİ: https://dx.doi.org/10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0101035
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Table 4.
Psychological Resilience
P-value: statistical significance *
Note. Taken from Bolwerk, A., Mack-Andrick, J., Lang, F., Dörfler, A., Malhöfner, C., (2014) How Art Changes Your Brain: Differential Effects of Visual Art Production and Cognitive Art Evaluation on Functional Brain Connectivity, National Center for Biotechnology Information,https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ on July.30.2021
DOİ: https://dx.doi.org/10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0101035
2.4.3 What is The Evidences on The Role of The Arts in Improving Health and Well – Being? A Scoping Review. 2011-2019 (Researchgate) Daisy Fancourt, Saoirse Finn, University College London
The summary of this extensive research by UCL Ass. Prof. Daisy Fancourt and researcher Saoirse Finn is as follows.
This report focuses specifically on the World Health Organization Europe region and synthesizes global evidence on the role of the arts in improving health and well-being. The results of more than three thousand studies have determined that the arts play a significant role in disease prevention, health promotion, and lifelong disease management and treatment. Reviewed evidence includes study designs such as uncontrolled pilot studies, case studies, small-scale cross-sectional surveys, nationally representative, longitudinal cohort studies (screenings and relational research methodology), population-wide ethnographies, and randomized controlled trials from multiple disciplines.
The beneficial impact of the arts should be encouraged by acknowledging the growing evidence base and promoting arts participation at the individual, local and national
GROUPParticipant numberPre-interventionPost-interventionP-valueVisual art production Group1460.64 (±1.71 SEM)63.50 (±1.47 SEM)0.013*Cognitive art evaluation group1462.57 (±2.32 SEM)64.79 (±1.80 SEM)0.195
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levels, and supporting cross-sectoral collaboration. This report uses a review methodology to map the global academic literature in English and Russian from January 2000 to 2019. Over nine hundred publications were identified, with more than two hundred reviews, covering three thousand studies and more than seven hundred advanced individual studies. Ultimately, the review found evidence from a wide variety of studies using a variety of methodologies, with overall findings showing that art can potentially impact both mental and physical health.
It is possible to gather arts in health in two sections according to the review results. Those are; preventing disease and promoting well-being, art and health management, and treatment. The subheadings are shown below in table 5.
Table 5.
Arts and Health
Note. Fancourt, D., Finn, S., (2019) What is the evidence on the role of the arts in improving health and well-being? A scoping review World Health Organisation, Europe.
https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/329834/9789289054553-eng.pdf
reached on July,31,2021
The original text summarized by the author, 2021
Research methods included psychological scales, biomarkers, neuroimaging, physiological assessments, behavioral observations, interviews, and review of clinical
Arts &Health protection and promotion of well-beingArts and Health Managementtreatment and hospital staySocial impact on staying healthy Helps prevent deterioration of health supporting the caregiverSupport for care for those with acute illness Assist in non-communicable disease management Adaptation of individuals to their health statusAffecting mental and physical health Provide intrinsic motivation Increase of creative expressionTreatment of patients with neurological disorders Increased stamina Impressive in supporting end-of-life careAesthetic participation, imagination, emotional activation, evocation, cognitive stimulation, content of the art activity lifelong well-being supportivePreventing sedentary behaviors caused by conditions such as depression, dementia, chronic pain Developing the capacity of their creative potentialARTS & HEALTH
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records. Research studies have also drawn from different disciplines and theories. As a result there are inherent differences in the quality of this evidence. There are some areas where findings need confirmation or better understanding.
Art practices provide creative experiences for both the practitioner and the viewer and involve or provoke an emotional response. In addition, it is defined and required with special skills, art production, innovation, creativity, or originality related to the rules of form, composition, or expression. These criteria provide the boundaries for deciding what constitutes art, but certain types of art within these boundaries are diverse and fluid. In relation to health research, interaction with arts consists of five broad categories; performing arts, visual arts, literature, cultural events, online and digital arts. These categories combine both active and receptive participation. More importantly, they transcend cultural boundaries and include flexibility that allows the development of new art forms.
The World Health Organization firmly rooted health definition into the culture and has defined health as “a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity”. The definition focuses on being good both from an individual perspective and socially. Second, it can involve many aspects such as integration into society, contribution to society, acceptance and trust in society, individual understanding of society, and belief in the society. Since 1948, when this definition of health was published, the concept of health has expanded further. Complete health and well-being may not be everyone's goal. For example, the presence of chronic mental or physical illness is not necessarily a sign of being sick, but it can be a condition that needs to be managed. Therefore, Health is essentially a dynamic process of having the capacity for self-management. Linking art to health can be
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thought of as complex and multiple interventions, as art activities bring together many different components known to improve health.
Art activities may include aesthetic engagement, imagination, emotional activation, emotional evocation, and cognitive stimulation. Depending on the nature of artistic activity, social interaction may also include physical activity, interaction with health themes, and interaction with healthcare settings. Each component of art activities can trigger psychological, physiological, social, and behavioral responses causally linked to health outcomes. For example, the aesthetic and emotional components of art activities can provide opportunities for regulating emotions and reducing stress. Regulating emotions is unique to the way we manage our mental health. Stress is a known risk factor for the onset and progression of several health conditions, including cardiovascular diseases and cancers. The pursuit of the arts can provide opportunities for cognitive stimulation, learning, and skill development, not only by preventing the risk of dementia but also by helping to prevent mental illnesses such as depression. n addition, participation in the arts can reduce loneliness and lack of social support and discrimination, which prevent negative physiological responses in social interaction, cognitive decline, functional and motor decline, mental illness, and premature death. Each of the generally outlined art categories includes different combinations of health-promoting components, whether bespoke art programs, health or well-being targeted, or therapeutic arts programs delivered by trained art therapists. For specific communities or to affect certain health conditions, some types of art activity and specific art forms may be more appropriate than others because they can combine certain related components. These events reveal the different power of art projects. As a result, although exercises may contain health-promoting components, art is preferred with different disciplines as it goes beyond being for aesthetic beauty, provides
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motivation, and combines with creative expression. Another strength is that the multimodal nature of arts interventions means that participation can be associated with a range of different effects on health. As a result, this report explored the far-reaching effects of multiple different art activities.
The increase in the interest of the arts sectors in health coincides with significant developments in the global health policy of the World Health Organization, and the collaboration of multi-sectoral cooperation is a must. The WHO overall work program 2019-2023 encourages a greater focus on well-being and increasing human capital throughout life. Furthermore, the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development includes promoting health and well-being, providing quality education, building sustainable cities and communities, promoting decent work and economic growth, and working in partnership. All these goals, priorities, and approaches are integral parts of engaging the arts, increasing cultural capital within societies, and potentially helping to promote resilience, equity, health, and well-being throughout life.
Finally, arts-based health interventions are a unique opportunity to address the complexity of challenges, as art-based health interventions operate simultaneously at the physical and mental levels and the individual and social grounds.
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2.4.4. Effect of clay art therapy on quality of life and depression symptoms in patients with chronic neurological disorders, April, 2018 (Morressier)
Prof. Dr. Belgin Erhan, Dr. Deniz Doğan, Füge Demirok, MFA
İstanbul Gaziosmanpaşa Research and Education Hospital, İstanbul
Participatory art application details of the research are in 3.3.part of the thesis.
“Clay art therapy is one of the recreational therapy methods. The use of clay requires three-dimensional thinking, creativity, provides sensory stimulation. It is associated with satisfaction after completing a task. Unfortunately, there are few studies on the effectiveness of this treatment. A few studies have shown that clay art therapy effects on psychiatric patients. However, limited studies are conducted with patients with chronic neurological disorders.”
This study aimed to determine the effect of short-term clay art treatment on quality of life and depression symptoms in patients with chronic neurological disorders.
It was applied in three-hour sessions twice a week for four weeks in August 2017. Ten hospitalized rehabilitation patients engaged art workshop with clay. Five patients had spinal cord palsy, three had hemiplegia (stroke) , and two had cerebral palsy (a brain injury with no progression after the first five years of age) , and their age average were 41.5+/_8.9years. The Beck depression scale and 36-item short-form questionnaire (SF-36) measuring the quality of life were used to evaluate patients at week 1 and 4.
Initial and final mean value compared with the Wilcoxon signed-rank test (a test that measures whether there is a difference between two measurements obtained from the same data source). P-value <0.05 was accepted as a statistically significant difference.
(Morressier, https://www.morressier.com/article/effect-clay-art-therapy-quality-life-symptoms-depression-patients-chronic-neurologic-disorders/5ab4d4f0d462b80296ca505b?)
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Table 6.
Beck Depression and SF36 chart
Note. Erhan, B., Doğan, D., Demirok, F., 2018, May1-6. The Effect of Art Therapy Quality of Life and Symptoms of Depression in Patients with Neurological Disorders, 21st European Congress of Physical Rehabilitation Medicine, Vilnius, Lithuania.
https://www.morressier.com/article/effect-clay-art-therapy-quality-life-symptoms-depression-patients-chronic-neurologic-disorders/5ab4d4f0d462b80296ca505b
reached on July,31, 2021 https://doi.org/10.26226/morressier.5ab4d4f0d462b80296ca505b
Generally, the main goals of the treatment in neurological rehabilitation are to increase the function and independence of the patient, increase the quality of life, and ensure social re-integration. According to findings, obtained at the end of the study, the increase in the patients' quality of life reveals the positive effect of art. The results of this study were shared at the 21st Physical Therapy Rehabilitation Congress held in Vilnius, Lithuania.
Conclusion; There was a statistically significant improvement in the SF-36 energy/vitality subscale after the workshop with clay. Other parameters did not show a statistically significant difference for baseline and final scores. As a result, art interventions with clay can be beneficial for the patients as increasing the quality of life of individuals. Therefore, it can be effective in standard rehabilitation care. These findings are the results of the first study on the health effects of art using three-dimensional art intervention using clay in Turkey.
(Morressier) (Erhan, et.al., 2018)
Visual arts production group1st week results4th week resultsPost valueBeck depression scale8.60±6.13212.40±8.8840.065*Compassion Fatigueenergy51.00±27.66961.00±21.7050.040General health39.00±111.97249.50±15.8900.085
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3. PARTICIPATORY ARTS
3.1. Definition of Participatory Art
participatory (adj.)
1. Relating to participation.
participatory behavior
2. Open to participation.
from participate + -ory.
participate (v.)
1530s, “to partake, to share or share in,” a back-formation from participation or else from Latin participatus,
past participle of participare “to share, share in, participate in; to impart,” from particeps “partaking, sharing,” from parti,
past participle of partir “to divide” (from Latin partire, from pars “a part, piece,” from PIE root *pere- (2) “to grant, allot” + Latin -cip-, weak form of stem of capere “to take” (from PIE root *kap- “to grasp”).
“All artists are alike. They dream of doing something more social, more collaborative, more real than art.” Dan Graham (Bishop C. , Yapay Cehennemler Katilimci Sanat ve izleyici politikasi, 2018, s. 9)
Participatory Art is one of the self-detached practices of creative arts. The artist gives clues about the project he plans to create with the participant and leaves the creation to the participant's interpretation during the creative process. The participant turns into an arts producer by the end of the process. The activities created by the formation of participants for different reasons for centuries have formed examples of the participatory arts. “The pioneer of futurism, Filippo Tomasso Marinetti, praised the lack of “tradition, a master and a rule” of the variety theater in “Variety Theater Manifesto” published in 1913. The variety theater, which does not follow a consistent
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introduction and results and interferes with the passive position of the audience with conscious diverse surprises, has created an ideal model for the Futurists who deliberately agitate and provoke the audience in their activities and thus “wake them from their sleep” (Antmen, 20. Yüzyıl Batı Sanatında Akımlar, 2008, p. 221)
The enthusiasm created by the Futurists continued with the Dada movement. These movements desired to exhibit a positive and negative activity that cheers the participant or forces those who value it to like a specific behavior and attitude, rather than creating a permanent work of art. However, the concept of participation, pioneered by the Conceptual Art and Fluxus movement since the 1960s, has never lost its popularity.
Nazan İpşiroğlu, in her book Sanatta Devrim, says that “the industrial age is the social age that art undertakes the task of creating the world and lifestyle.” (İpşiroğlu & İpşiroğlu, 2017, s. 93)
In modern art, the work of art took its place in the art scene as a visual work that was glorified and preserved its uniqueness, presented to be watched rather than touched. British art critic Roger Fry defined the artist as the giver and the audience as the receiver. Even the American art historian Michael Fried argued that the presence of the audience would not make any difference to the artwork, in the 1960s The new terms and interactive works of art in the 21st century have brought art to a state where the audience fully participates, creates awareness, and creates moments, spaces, and fields in which the work of art is produced during the creation process. The most significant factor in this formation is that the multiculturalist tendency found value in the art world and the artistic expressions of different cultures were able to meet with large masses through the globalized economic order and the internet.
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Participatory art, one of the contemporary art types, mainly puts the participant in the foreground in the creative process. The result is determined by the flow of the process and continues to form like a growing avalanche without being entirely shaped until the final production moment. In this process, almost all authority is given to the participant, and the art production is under the participant's responsibility. During the creative process, the artist manipulates the sensory encounter of the participant and connects them to their production with their emotions, thus facilitating the association of their work with the message they wish to convey. The artist mostly leaves the control to the participant and ensures that the work produced by the participant's experience becomes the object or even the subject that occurs at that moment. With this aspect, the artist of the Participatory Art is in the position of coordinating and organizing the design. In participatory art, there is a solid audience-production relationship, ready space, use of sound, music, scent, visual art, and stage art, all are interdisciplinary formations. These studies are intangible, nonphysical experiences. Although the archives documented with photographs are tried to be associated with performance art, the essential difference is that it aims to close the distance between the audience and the artist.
It is essential to distinguish the participatory from the performative; if the management is in the artist’s discretion, the creation of art is performative. The aesthetics of participatory art is revealed by the suitability of the individual or the community with artwork formed by causal and relational experiences. Participatory Art constitutes the individual beside sociological and political elements inseparable from each other. In any case, physical participation is the fundemental prerequisite. Participatory Art requires individuals and groups willing to participate, with sincerity and openness, actively and must exist at that moment. A participation-oriented, participation-
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conscious participant is required. Mostly, in participatory art practices, there is no audience or observer; everyone works by sharing the same purpose in the process.
“Participatory art involves a perceived crisis in community and collective responsibility. Thus, it restores of the social bond through a collective elaboration of meaning. The part that embraces collective creativity and it is constructive and ameliorative.” (Bishop & Bishop, Participation Documents of Contemporary Art, 2006, s. 11)
One of the main characteristics of participatory art, perhaps the most important, is the desire to be actively part of a larger whole. The main force behind participatory arts is the collaborative care given to meaning and the restoration and strengthening of the social bond.
Some of the main features of participatory art can be listed as follows; Its opposition to the widespread belief in the unique nature of the artist and his work.
The desire to create an active topic, reinforced by experiences involving physical or symbolic participation and supported by active participation.
In terms of the nature of the work of art, relinquishing authority, non-hierarchical democratic formation, the author is in the position of collaging.
The experience is core oriented, surprising, and inspiring involves movement,
Has positive, creative processes, encouraging the participant by presenting data,
Creating a framework drawn jointly by the artist and the participant, collaborative creativity,
The collective dimension of social experience, collaboration, and building collective consciousness,
Including the perceived crisis and collective responsibilities in society,
Social platform creation, repair of social bond with collective attention to meaning,
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It also accommodates projects that may not specifically require exhibition space, such as semi-authoritarian zones outside the gallery and museum areas.
It creates a space of participation as an extension of social consciousness.
It demands active and continuous participation from the non-artist group in the structure of a new relationship act.
Manipulation and control of the individual participating without knowing what he will encounter exactly and how the experience will end.
The formation of a new collective consciousness throughout the process includes relational communication.
“We need to recognize art as a form of experimental activity in relation with the world.” (Bishop C. , Yapay Cehennemler, 2018, s. 304)
“Today, by the disappearance of the old hierarchies and hegemonies, the fragmented aesthetic diversity and artistic multiplicity are accepted in relation with the world.
There is a chance of democratization and participation in arts and culture by the new state of the audience, from passive to active participant.” (Yılmaz N. A., 2020, s. 477)
It is hard to activate the criteria of freedom, determination, and creativity when the audience becomes an active participant, and when redefining the term artist depends on external events and actions of the participants. Nowadays, participatory art is a poetic, allegorical, subcultural, and contemporary practice. In general, it has a dynamic structure based on research, experimentation, and publication. The artist does not have a hierarchical superiority. The participant plays the role of editor, observer, co-author, and even creator. However, the point where the ethical and critical tensions continue in the art of participation is the ability to escape the boundaries of the service culture, which is a field that is compatible with the context of contemporary art. (Bishop C. , Yapay Cehennemler, 2018)
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Shared production is riskier and more unpredictable in terms of aesthetic benefit. Therefore, collaborative creativity develops from a more positive and non-hierarchical social model and produces a positive and non-hierarchical social model. In addition, its structure that does not allow correction and revision refer to the impossibility of repetition. In his article “The author as the producer,” from his speech at The Institute For The Study of Fascism in Paris, Walter Benjamin says, “An author, who teaches writers nothing, teaches no one. Therefore, what matters is the exemplary character of production, which is, at first, inducing other producers to produce, and, second, putting an improved apparatus at their disposal. With the apparatus given, it is better if more consumers turn into producers-that is, readers or spectators into collaborators.” (Harrison & Wood, 2016, s. 535)
Participation, which started with the provocative, aggressive, enthralling attitude of the Dada movement, included the audience in the formation of art, and in a sense, burdened the audience, clearly in the 1990s. When the artist began to move away from the material-dependent attitude of art, waiting for the direct participation of the audience and taking physical action in the creative process; has further clarified its definition by adopting the attitude of sharing the responsibility with the participant. The nonphysical existence of these practices is intangible and creates collective consciousness and cooperation by social experience. There are two aspects of participatory art; the first is destructive and intrusive, the second is constructive and healing. Both options have a political attitude and commitment, and physical participation is a fundamental prerequisite. But at the same time, it always has a double ontological position with its human basis.
“It is both an event in the world yet at the same time away from it. It can communicate two different relations with the participants, the paradoxes repressed in everyday
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discourse, such as disturbing or pleasurable experiences that enlarge our capacity to imagine the world and our relations anew. To reach the second level requires a mediating third term – an object, image, story, film, even a spectacle.” (Bishop & Bishop, Participation Documents of Contemporary Art, 2006, s. 305)
As Claire Bishop says in her book Artificial Hells; examples in history such as Paris Dada’s Dada Season; Soviet Union’s Storming of The Winter Palace, October Revolution celebrations 1920 (third year of the revolution), Futurist’s Futuristic party, the 1910s Partaking Art, embraced open-mindedness, as a radical rejection of organized politics in 1980s. Stating that there is the potential to discover the highest artistic intensity in daily and vulgar space, she says that this serves a larger project in the name of equality and anti-elitism. (Bishop C. , Yapay Cehennemler, 2018)
Among its contemporary examples, events such as Samba dancing, the experience of beer drinking, organizing a garage sale, opening a shop, running a travel agency, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Untitled 1990 (Pad Thai) Untitled, 1996 (Tomorrow is another day), Social Platform creation Allora& Calzadilla, Chalk, 2011, can be counted.
3.2. Historical Development of Participatory Art
3.2.1. Dada Movement (1913-1923)
With the start of World War I, all countries in Europe found themselves in war one after another. On the other hand, Switzerland maintained its neutrality and kept its safety for the immigrants from the neighboring countries. That is how the artists, writers, poets, and painters migrated to Zurich.
In 1916, a group of artists, painters, poets, writers, who were in despair from the destruction of the war, lost their faith, opposed the stereotyped meanings and concepts, traditional aesthetic norms such as traditional religion, morality, law, and aesthetics,
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did not believe that anything can remain permanent and solid. They advocated the necessity of experiencing a brand-new philosophy, a brand-new language. By declaring the human mind unreliable, they have generally imposed a direct and open attack on everything civilized societies believed sacred. The artists Hugo Ball, Emmy Hennigs, and Romanian poet Tristan Tzara, who gathered under the same roof in response to the First World War, with the desire to shake and surprise the society, opened a cafe named Cabaret Voltaire, after the name of Voltaire who lived in the slums of Zurich and wrote sarcastically. They declared that art is anti-art, Dada is anti-dada; the group strongly challenged traditional ways of art, often strongly opposing the norms of bourgeois culture.
Gathering in Zurich Dada, Cabaret Voltaire nightclub, the group of artists became known in a short time for their noisy and provocative performances.
Tristan Tzara, Hugo Ball, Jean Arp, Marcel Janco opposed settled social, political, and cultural views, made peace with these values, and embraced diversity and innovation. The group aimed to create a new reality. They were consciously relinquishing control. Some of them made various montages with cardboard and strange objects attached to the canvas, while others were preparing the masks and costumes required for the performances.
“The Dadaists were masters of improvisation. The Spectators who encountered incredible inventions and shows full of unexpected situations felt upside down the world they were accustomed to. What dadaists wanted to accomplish was to raise awareness of the people by making fun of corrupt institutions and the values believed to be unshakeable.” (İpşiroğlu & İpşiroğlu, 2017, s. 90)
Quotations from DADA Manifest;
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“How can one expect to put order into the chaos that constitutes that infinite and shapeless variation: man?”
İdeal, ideal, ideal, knowledge, knowledge, knowledge
Boomboom, Boomboom, Boomboom
I have given a pretty faithful version of progress, law, morality and all other fine qualities”
“Everyone dances to his personal boom boom.” Tristan Tzara (Artun A. , 2015, s. 123)
In general, they have developed brand new styles and experimental styles in stock photography, collage, photomontage, poetry, painting, and performance art. Richard Huelsenbeck (1892–1974) was co-founder of DADA with Ball, Tzara, Arp, Janco in Zurich. The author, who performed drums in the Cabaret Voltaire, was a German psychoanalyst. Primitivism influenced Marcel Janco (1895-1984). He produced the masks and costumes of the artists in most of the performances in Cabaret Voltaire and in the Negro dances, which are an integral part of Dada performances. Jean Arp (1887–1966) is famous for his 1916-17 paintings of “rectangles arranged according to the rules of chance” with nature mysticism, harmony, balance, and Tao influences. According to Arp, randomness is connected with nature and is part of an inaccessible order within the integrity of its incomprehensible reason for existence. Harp considers it crucial for the artist to give up as much control as possible to create a work of art that is inspired by the randomness of nature, rejecting the malformed effort of human beings to impose order on the world. (Gompertz, 2015, s. 197)
Arp’s philosophical approach is the most positive in the Dada movement. But, generally, Dadaists have more radical and opposing ideas.
Berlin Dada was a political and outlaw club. Articles reflecting his ideas are regularly published and distributed in the DER DADA magazine of the club monthly. Raoul
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Hausmann, architect Johannes Baader, Richard Heathfield, and Hanna Hoech, the only female artist in the Dada movement. Raoul Hausmann (1886-1971) is the founder of Berlin Dada.
“Dada is the full absence of what is called Geist (Spirit). Why have Geist in a world that runs on mechanically?” (Hopkins, 2004, s. 145-146)
Figure 82.
Berlin Dada, International DADA Art Show, 1920
Note.https://www.moma.org/learn/moma_learning/themes/dadareached on June 20.2020
Raoul Hausmann used ready-made objects such as a hairdresser’s mannequin, tape measure, pocket watch parts, camera parts which reflect the spirit of our time in “Mechanical Head” (32.5x21.20), one of his important works, in 1920. The artwork is in Center Pompidou, Paris, France. The Art Critic is a lithograph, photograph, collage on 31.8x25.4 cm paper in Tate Museum, London, England, produced in 1919. There is a strong political protest placed in the work. To indicate the capitalist powers control the art critic, attached a folded 50 German marks on the critic’s neck. In addition, he wanted to emphasize that he was symbolically Blind by drawing many black lines in the eyes of the Art critic in the painting, and placed his business card on the painting writing the prime minister of the Sun, the Moon, and the small Earth. A human
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silhouette filled with newspaper articles also includes the word Merz in bold. This typographic silhouette is a nod to the founder of Hannover Dada, Kurt Schwitters. Hannah Hoech’s (1889-1978) work mentioned below is the work that attracted the most attention at the first Dada fair of 1920. It is produced by using photomontage and collage, exhibited in the National Gallery in Berlin, Germany. “Cut With The Kitchen Knife Through The Last Weimar Beer-Belly Cultural Epoch In Germany” 90x144 cm.
Political chaos is strikingly emphasized in this work. The artist has placed anti-Dada forces in the upper right corner, Artists, Radicals, and Communists in the lower right corner. John Heathfield 1891-1968. He produced radical photomontages criticizing the Hitler regime, Nazism, and especially Hitler: “Blood and Iron” 1939, “A Berlin Saying”, “Adolf The Superman” 1932. The police arrested Berlin Dada club artists from time to time, and their magazines were confiscated.
In Paris Dada, Marcel Duchamp, Francis Picabia, Louis Aragon, Max Ernst, Anton Breton established a more rational and intellectual Dada club, they held demonstrations that provoked the public. However, their subjects were neither as political as Berlin Dada nor as ethical as Zurich Dada. The group, which started to gather with the arrival of Picabia and Tzara in Paris, split into two separate groups when Tzara wanted to take the Zurich Dada as an example and ended with the Breton and Aragon establishing a more literary group and later joining the Surrealists. “
“To make a work of art by surrendering not only traditional skills but even much of one’s controlling function was to be a characteristic Dada element. These works hover curiously between asserting man and his world (as in Constructivism) and submitting happily to nature. It pointed relinquishing of control had already provided the basis for certain works by Marcel Duchamp.” (Lynton, Modern Sanatın Öyküsü, 2004, s. 130) Duchamp has made his mark on art history by challenging traditional art with the
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readymade. He exhibited his first readymade in Paris in 1913. The stool used as a “Bicycle Wheel” pedestal is as utilitarian as the wheel, so the equality between the structural elements is also ironically aestheticized in the work. Duchamp’s “Fountain” is the urinal he sent to the New York Society of Independent Artists’ exhibition held in April 1917. He signed the urinal, which he named Fountain, under the name of R. Mutt. The work was found rough and unsuitable for the exhibition. When exhibition committee rejected it, Duchamp sent the following article to The Blind Man magazine, arguing that the meaning the artist ascribes to it when using ready mades is more important than anything else. “Whether Mr. Mutt with his own hands made the Fountain or not has no importance. HE CHOSE IT. He took an ordinary article of life, 44 Dada and Surrealism placed it so that its useful significance disappeared under the new title and point of view – and created a new thought for that object.” (Hopkins, 2004, s. 71) Marcel Duchamp removed the fine arts from private space and entity and abolished them from the in-betweens of art and life. Thinking that it is not necessary to repeat the experiences of previous periods, Duchamp wants to reconcile art and life, the work, and the audience. “Art founded in life means a poem by Mallarmé or a novel by Joyce; it is the most difficult art. An art that obliges the spectator or the reader to become himself an artist and a poet.” (Paz, 2017, s. 88)
The most influential precursors of participatory art are the events organized by Paris Dada in April 1921, arguing that it is needed to move from cabarets and saloons to public spaces, to the streets, and to meet with the public. These activities are ways for Dadaists to create a more fundamental relationship between art and life. Grande Saison Dada is the first Dada event to move into the public sphere as the first event of the Dada season. The starting point of the events such as visits, commemorations, operas, conferences, etc., is the garden of the Church of Saint Julien de-Pauvre. At the first
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meeting, barely a hundred people gathered, and they dispersed after a short time due to the rain. The second significant event of the Dada Season, the “Barres Trial”, was announced as the trial of the Marxist writer Maurice Barres, and the purpose of the court was explained by Breton “to determine the extent to which a man could be held accountable if his will to power led him to champion conformist values that opposed the ideas of his youth?” (Bishop C. , Yapay Cehennemler, 2018, s. 82) Barres was also invited to this excursion event, held in the yard of St. Julien de Pauve Church, but he stated that he could not attend because he had another plan. The Dadaists dressed a mannequin and took it to court instead of the author. The so-called trial was a social form, where the public asked to participate in cooperation without any conflict in the event. The event, held in the early-20th century, is an example of early participatory art. Breton has turned to more refined and meaningful forms of participatory experience, aiming to develop more nuanced areas of social research. (Bishop C. , Yapay Cehennemler, 2018, s. 81)
Figure 83.
Great DADA Season, Saint Julien le Pouvre Church, April, 1921
Not. https://www.e-skop.com/skopbulten/dadanin-100-yili-paristeki-ilk-dada-sezonu/3235
reached on Jan.13.2022
These activities were generally anti-ideological and anarchist in nature. These Dadaist and Surrealist tours eventually turned into Situationist derives. It was used by artists
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associated with Situationist International in the 1950s and 60s. “Dada Season, in which Breton and others had appropriated the social form of the guided tour to produce a ‘social sculpture’ with the general public in the churchyard of Saint Julien le-Pauvre.” (Bishop C. , Yapay Cehennemler, 2018, s. 97)
“Social sculpture is a theory developed by the artist Joseph Beuys in the 1970s based on the concept that everything is art, that every aspect of life could creatively be approached and, as a result, everyone has the potential to be an artist.” (TATE, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/s/social-sculpture, 2020) The concept of social sculpture emerged as a term in which Joseph Beuys combined the idealistic ideas of a utopian society with his aesthetic practice. The artist believes that life is a social sculpture that everyone helps shape.
Kurt Schwitters founded the Hanover Dada club. (1887-1948). He is a more bourgeois, non-political member of the Dada who has sonatas and poems. Unfortunately Berlin Dada club members neglected Schwitters because of his non-political approach. Kurt Schwitters has made art out of waste and garbage such as bus tickets, confectionery paper; he believed that using used materials is a very suitable metaphor for a broken world, and combining found objects with the actual world has always been attracted him.
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Figure 84.
Kurt Schwitters, Merzbau, 1933
Note.Taken from https://www.tate.org.uk/research/publications/tate-papers/08/kurt-schwitters-reconstructions- of-the-merzbau reached on June ,20,2020
In Schwitters’ works, there is always a formless void and objects or collages in that void, aiming to bring the viewer to a solution. According to the artist, these paintings represent a part of life created by coincidences. “To emphasize that these pictures are parts of the whole of life, he gathered them under a single name and numbered them.” (İpşiroğlu & İpşiroğlu, 2017, s. 77) Moving the painting to the actual space of the room, taking over the room and creating a mobile environment can be called the first state of formations. The simplicity of this theory, which is called the Collage Theory, is a sign of its existence in the future, even though it does not fully coincide with the formations. He called these works Merz and made hundreds of such collages. The collage master Schwitters created an art that went through all the above-mentioned stages by building his house in Hanover in 1924 with collages, installations and mobile constructions, which he called Merzbau. A mixture of sculpture, collage, and installation, his cave-like house filled with collected loot and relics is a marvel of installation. He named his house, which he created as a series of Fields, the “The Cathedral of Erotic Misery”. “This gigantic structure, which is constantly growing and
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reproducing, was the concrete document of a formation that was uncertain where and how it would end. When the Merz column was built, it aroused astonishment in art circles and provoked criticism and harsh reactions.” (İpşiroğlu & İpşiroğlu, 2017, s. 79) The walls and ceilings of the building are solid, covered with angled and protruding abstract shapes and installations, one of the cave rooms is a structure with dimmed light and hidden sliding doors and a mannequin covered in bare blood. Schwitters continued to multiply these formations until they were bombed in 1943. “This structure was a mix of inventions and finds (objets trouves), associations and memories, and it was constantly changing as new ones were added every day. For Schwitters, life was full of coincidences;the artwork was also a product of life-explosion, a being born in its impermanence, growing and disappearing.” (İpşiroğlu & İpşiroğlu, 2017, s. 78) Schwitters has taken place in art history as a precursor of formations with collage areas, combinations and poetry readings. After the artist moved to England, he continued to work in the same style. He documented the development from painting to collage, from collage to field and from field to formations. (Sanford,1995) He published a magazine called Merz and is one of the artists who produced the most significant number of works in the Dada movement. “What did Schwitters want to tell with this work? Born in an environment of free creativity of constructive thinking, did this work herald the end of art or a new beginning?” (İpşiroğlu & İpşiroğlu, Sanatta Devrim, 2017, p. 79) In Nazan İpşiroğlus’s book Sanatta Devrim, she states that Kurt Schwitters does not want to display a high level of artistic creation with this work that has troubled him throughout his life, and he is trying to demonstrate an unpredictable creation process with his images, games and jokes.
Cologne Dada was founded by Max Ernst (1891-1976) and Theodor Baargeld (892-1927). Max Ernst has 50 serial works, Dadamax Typography. Minimax Dadamax,
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1919-1920 49.4 x 31.5cm, is in the Guggenheim Museum in New York. In his work, which he made using pen, ink blotting, watercolor, gouache and brown paper, he explained the mechanical structure of sexual activity. “The hat makes the man” 1920 (35.2 x 45.1cm) is among his works exhibited in the modern Museum in New York. Max Ernst participated in the Berlin Dada Fair in 1920, settled in Paris and later joined the Surrealists.
It is not enough to call Dada an art movement. The break created by Dada in the history of art is a real turning point. “Compromise with the past and liquidation of traditions was the starting point of Industrial Age art. Dada had reduced this cleansing movement to the people.” (İpşiroğlu & İpşiroğlu, 2017, p. 90) The artists participating in this movement underestimated the significance attributed to aesthetics and the sanctity that is thought to exist in the work of art and defined everything that is not aesthetic and illogical as a work of art.
“A distinctive feature of Dada art is its diversity. Dada movement was influential; performance art, poetry, sculpture, painting, collage, photography, photomontage. What the Dadaists had in common was their embrace of innovation and their opposition to established views of what art should be.” (Lynton N. , 2004, s. 127)
In addition to the activities they carried out by bringing different art disciplines together, they tried to convey their views to the masses through articles, essays, weekly and monthly magazines. Early avant-garde movements influenced them, the collage technique of cubism, expressionism, Russian constructivism, and futurism, Nietzsche, the ideas of Hegel and Marx, the mechanization that pervades all areas of life, that is, the Human-machine unity deeply affected them. Dadaist thought emerged almost simultaneously in Zurich, Paris, Berlin, Cologne, and New York. Marcel Janco, Hugo Ball, Emmy Hennigs, Tristan Tzara, Jean Arp, Richard Huelsenbeck, Marcel
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Duchamp, Raoul Hausmann, Francis Picabia, Hanna Hoech, John Heathfield opened Dada clubs in different cities and countries with their performances, collages and photomontages, periodicals, in short, they surprised shook the society with their art.
They pioneered many new movements and provided the sprouting of new ideas. With their unique perspectives and philosophies, they did their duty by criticizing the ossified systems and traditional norms formed in the society, radically changing the place of art and artist in society and the society’s perspective on art, and tried to dissolve the border between art and life by combining them.
“Even the bitterest work of art represents a constructive moment, not an anarchistic one. That Dada gave rise to art, indeed to major works of art, is evidence of the persistence of this constructive impulse.” (Lynton, Modern Sanatın Öyküsü, 2004, s. 126) Germany, which had defeated France at the end of the 19th century, started an intense industrialization and capitalization move. One side of this move is production, and the other is education. Life habits had adapted to industrial and commodity culture, and education and production had to rationalize. The Bauhaus (build the house) school of craft and design, the German educational reform founded in Weimar in 1919 by the architect Walter Grapius, is an organizational model that combines the applied arts and fine arts schools. Grapius considers that the modern world needs a functional aesthetic. Almost 500 students had graduated from the institution, which has been open for fourteen years. The academic staff established deep-rooted foundations in design education made changes, organized a very different training program and designed many products. Theo Van Doesburg and Laszlo Moholy Nagy served as directors in the institution where Kandinsky, Klee and Albers gave primary art education and had the opportunity to put their new ideas into practice. The Bauhaus style, which emphasizes the natural balance, was formed by giving importance to the weight and
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space it occupies, and color and texture in the designs. It was closed in 1933 because it was incompatible with Nazi aesthetics. Ali Artun, in his Çağdaş Sanatın Örgütlenmesi, mentions that Baudrillard’s political economy, which is the work of the first industrial revolution, spreads to signs and forms through “design”. For him, this transformation is a second industrial revolution. “Bauhaus ideology believes that the order of things is also decisive in the order of people. By designing the first, the second can also be shaped.” (Artun A. , Çağdaş Sanatın Örgütlenmesi, 2015, p. 95) As a result, Bauhaus is a cultural policy rather than an educational program as it is generally defined. “… it is the transformation of aesthetics into a programmed social reform movement. For this reason, the Bauhaus ideology constitutes an important pillar of many authoritarian modernization movements in Europe.” (Artun A. , Çağdaş Sanatın Örgütlenmesi, 2015, s. 96)
Figure 85.
Life in Bauhaus, 1928, Anni Albers, woven studio
Note. Taken from https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-modern/exhibition/anni-albers/seven-life-hacks-anni- albers reached on June 19/2020
Since the traditional administrative structure, law, education and tax system, which started with the Tanzimat in the Ottoman Empire and continued until then, came to the point where it could no longer regulate the changing economic and social relations, the
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restructuring and modernization movement had an obvious German cultural influence until the 1950s. It covers the period in which it can be felt and observed. (Alpkaya, 2014)
“The idea of “holistic design” represented by Bauhaus in Turkey, which constitutes the top priority geography of German cultural influence, has been influential in the pursuit of national and social unity, development, Westernization, and especially in the establishment of art/architecture/design education.” (Artun A. , Çağdaş Sanatın Örgütlenmesi, 2015, s. 96)
Efforts to bring art and life together cover an extensive area, from the surrealist research office in Paris in the 1920s to the Happenings that emerged mainly in New York in the 1950s, the political attitudes of the Situationist International in the 1960s, and the artistic wit of the Fluxus movement.
3.2.2. Happenings
In the 1930s, the American educator John Andrew Rice was the founder of Black Mountain College, located near Ashville, North Carolina, United States. One of the founders of the Bauhaus school in Germany, Walter Gropius, and the social reformer and educator John Dewey, the famous architects, educators, and men of letters of that time were on the advisory board of this educational institution, and he was the director of the Bauhaus, which was closed in 1933 by Hitler’s order. Joseph Albers was the director. His wife, Anni Albers, managed the weaving workshops. Upon the invitation of BMC founder Rice, the artists, administrators, and managers of the period established a private social sciences institute that puts art at its center. The institution was a diverse educational institution, where students freely developed and exhibited their work, and helped with tasks such as kitchen, agriculture, construction, repairs,
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and lessons were created without a specific hierarchy. After WWI, traditionalism was thought to be an obstacle to progress on the scientific path during the restructuring process. Replacing old values, rebuilding the society, and progressivism were the basic concepts, and studies were focused on freedom, democracy, and knowledge. Knowledge is the tool for progress in a constantly developing and changing world.
John Dewey is one of the philosophers who left his mark at the beginning of the 20th century. He based his philosophy on Pragmatism. “Pragmatism is a view that deals with knowledge in general and bases that knowledge on experience. The practical pragmatic method consists in consideration of ideas and theories in terms of their practical functions and consequences.” (Öztürk M. , 2008, p. 69) Dewey established the school of functionalism in Psychology and took an active role in its recognition. “Hidden harmony between functionality and beauty can only be discovered as a result of numerous trials and mistakes” (Gombrich, 1999, s. 561)
“Dewey with his colleagues (G. H. Mead, J. H. Tufts, and J. R. Angel) at the University of Chicago formulated a philosophy that would constitute democratic life. The starting point is the sources of social conflicts in democracy and developing strategies to resolve them. They formed this philosophy based on “functional psychology”, a new psychology theory of human behavior.” (Shook, 2003, p. 114)
Dewey defines himself as a philosopher of democracy, states his main goal as a progressive, reconstructive and constructivist to ensure the functionality of democracy, and directly bases his political and social theories on this basis. Accordingly, processes such as thinking and learning have an important place in adapting to life, and practice is the experience of the efforts we spend in tackling problems, and he directed his philosophy to develop solutions to explain the nature of research and learning. We cannot describe the philosopher’s research as an abstract search for truth. In Dewey’s
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view, science and ethics serve the same goal; to improve experience conditions. Experience is considered in this context as a practical concept. “Experience is not just assessment and insight; it is a problem solver, participant, and interventionist.” (Solomon & Higgins, 2017, p. 334)
Experience is the main element of knowledge. On the other hand, knowledge emerges as action through experience and is a tool for both strength and adaptation to life in the struggle for life. In the introduction to his book Art as An Experience, Dewey argues that aesthetic experiences help us structure our experiences about the way we find meaning, and argues that aesthetic experience processes bring tensions to a satisfying unity. In his opinion, the ‘correct’ is determined based on utility and remains valid only until conditions change. In pragmatist epistemology, the accuracy and value of knowledge is measured by its usefulness and contribution. To further explain John Dewey’s philosophy, it should be explained how the word experience is defined.
In the book, Ayşe Eroğlu’s John Dewey’de Sanat ve Deneyim, experience; is a concept where the theoretical and the practical, the fictional and the real, reason and action meet. In this case, he speaks not only of an individual experiencebut also of a holistic concept that includes the whole existence and brings the whole of the being into action. Therefore, the fact that the interaction of the living creature and the conditions surrounding it is intertwined in all life processes indicates that the experience is constantly occurring. (Eroğlu, 2017, p. 58)
Dewey treated art as an experience. “True art is both instrumental and perfect at the same time, and as soon as we divide art as useful arts and fine arts, we ruin the meaning of art.” (Shiner, 2013, p. 351)
In the early years of the Republic of Turkey, Atatürk invited John Dewey to Turkey and asked him to plan a democratic education, which was progressive and
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reconstructive. “Dewey accepted the invitation and presented a report after a two-month visit in 1924. The report bears the traces of Dewey’s educational philosophy, but rather contains practical suggestions to overcome the basic deficiencies of a newly established system.” (Öztürk M. , 2008, p. 74) During the reign of İsmet İnönü, the Village Institutes were established, based on the report written by John Dewey in 1924. Since the beginning of the 20th century, the newly established countries, the effects of the two World Wars, the need for restructuring, the radical change of the ongoing traditional structure, the transition to the political democratic system, new economic, philosophical, sociological, and psychological systems have emerged in parallel. Bauhaus, an art academy established in Weimar, Dessau in Germany in the early 1900s and in Berlin in the last year, and Black Mountain College, which was founded in the NC state in the United States in the 1930s, are institutions programmed with this democratic, progressive, and free education system.
As an extension of restructuring developments, twenty-one village institutes were established throughout the country in line with the needs and deficiencies of Turkey.
Figure 86.
Turkish Village Institutes, Farming Course
Note. Taken from https://bilimvegelecek.com.tr/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Köy-Enstitüleri3.jpg reached on July 26.07.2020
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Village institutes, which require active participation, were practical and aimed to improve welfare and society, had parts of several decares of garden, barns, poultry, apiculture, etc., as well as arranging some of them for floriculture and nursery training for farming education, even housing for teachers as planned.
At the end of the project, fifteen thousand acres of fields were made suitable for agriculture and started production. Thousands of saplings were planted, acres of vineyards were formed, hundreds of large-scale constructions were made, sixty workshops, hundreds of teachers’ houses, thirty-six warehouses, forty-eight barns, hundreds-kilometers of roads, sixteen water tanks, twelve agricultural warehouses, and twelve power plants were built.
The Minister of Education of the İsmet İnönü Government, Hasan Ali Yücel, decided to start the project, and it was widely carried out by İsmail Hakkı Tonguç, the General Director of National Education. These institutions, which had their fields, vineyards, beehives, breeding mortars and workshops, have formed a crucial part of a collective development plan that encourages participation rather than a traditional school. This project enabled infrastructures such as water, electricity, and roads to reach these areas by placing many buildings on the lands in the worst conditions, and thousands of trees were planted on these barren lands. Valuable teachers and educators of that period also worked hard on this project. The schools aimed to produce an enlightened majority from which the distinguished vanguard minority would emerge spontaneously. (Eyüboğlu, 1999)
“The transition of a society from one order to another does not happen quickly, even in the bloodiest trials. The habit of centuries can continue under the new order for generations.” (Eyüboğlu, 1999, s. 10)
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Figure 87.
Village Institute, String Courses
Note. Taken from
https://www.dunyabulteni.net/tarihin-izinde-koy-enstituleri-p7-aid,27546.html#galeri reached on June. 20. 2020
“The aim to be achieved is to raise the education level of the broad masses of the people, following Atatürk’s populist principles, thus to create the necessary conditions for the reforms to take place, to ensure the active participation of the people in political, economic and cultural life, and to raise awareness of their citizenship rights. The institutes can be seen as the most significant catalyst in the country's development, as they are an educational and development activity that reaches a large mass of people. The success of this education model, which remained at the starting point, was that it trained 16.400 female and male teachers, 7300 health officers and 8756 trainers until 1946, which filled the teacher shortage in the villages. Among the graduates are writers such as Mehmet Başaran (born 1926), Talip Apaydın (born 1926), Fakir Baykurt (born 1929) and Mahmut Makal (born 1933).” (Meb)
“The Turkish Revolution can be defined as an effort to ascribe literacy to the majority in its new sense. In the first days of the Republic, Atatürk and İnönü considered the reaching of literacy to the large mass, namely the peasantry, as a condition for our rebirth as a modern nation. The increasing efforts of the new state in this direction
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have finally given rise to hope that the shameful separation between the literate and the peasant will soon disappear. Village Institutes represent this hope itself.” (Eyüboğlu, 1999, s. 12)
In the program he presented for Village Institutes, John Dewey tried to develop a democratic education philosophy and model, suitable for scientific, social, and political developments, in which he gave priority to the individual as well as society. According to this philosophy, knowledge has a different meaning, so each individual creates himself by acquiring information according to his own nature and needs. In this process, by living various experiences, focusing on the solution of problems consisting of experiences, one can establish and develop an original thought system and create many new ideas. “In a society where the rules of social relations are constantly changing, the most important learning is found in the man’s adjustment to these changes and in resolving the inevitable conflicts caused by these changes. Adaptation and conflict resolution are social efforts that are necessary. These efforts are not only social influences but also social thinking processes. According to Dewey, democracy is an education for adults as well as children, as democracy is a lifestyle that provides rich opportunities for rational problem-solving.” (Shook, 2003, p. 113)
“Although the cultural reforms made in the first years of the Republic did not make any changes in traditional village life, it paved the way for social change in the context of modernization in the villages as in the cities.” (Öndin N. , 2003, p. 97)
In Village Institutes, fine arts education was as important as science and social science. It is predicted that students' quality of education who participate in applied art education programs will increase in general.
Hakki Tonguç, who was appointed to the General Directorate of Primary Education in 1935, is one of the founders of Village Institutes. “Philosophy, art, music, science,
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technique may be created with people who are not afraid of life, people who love it and can connect with an absolute passion. The new cultural life is nourished by new people organized according to new worldviews. Tonguç says that local values should not be neglected while aiming for modernization in education and culture.
Figure 88.
Village Institute, Beekeeping Courses
Note. Taken from https://www.habernediyor.com/egitim/aydinlanma-yillari-koy-enstituleri-h321.html reached on June 20 2020
The folkloric culture was harmonized with contemporary art elements and presented to the participants with applied activities, and opportunities were created for the participants to reach the local values they are used to and universal values. It aims to raise people who can think creatively and who can produce solutions to the problems they encounter. John Dewey also argues that to achieve individual and social goals, man should start from real-life experiences. Village institutes, established in Turkey in 1940, were based on Dewey's philosophy and the report he presented to Atatürk in 1924. John Dewey was also invited to the advisory board of Black Mountain College, USA by Andrew Rice, in 1933. The school's organizational structure and curriculum were based on a pragmatic, functional psychology-based philosophy based on social justice values. Although BMC is very famous for avant-garde art, architecture,
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literature, music, and dance, it is less well known that its system is based entirely on Dewey’s philosophy.
Black Mountain College graduates include American avant-garde artists. Robert Rauschenberg, John Cage, and Merce Cunningham, during their visit to the school in 1952, formed the first “Happenings” in the United States with an interdisciplinary experimental study that could be called Happenings. “There was dancing from Cunningham, an exhibition of the paintings by Rauschenberg, who also played a Victrola (an early record player), and a lesson given by Cage from the top of a ladder, which in true John Cage style of included passages of complete silence.” (Gompertz, 2015, p. 270) Cage’s lesson was put at the end of the night. Chaos prevailed during the event. The event exploded and was very successful, after which Rauschenberg, Cage, and Cunningham started working together. Rauschenberg was preparing the stage arrangement and stage sets, and Cunningham was dancing to the accompaniment of Cage’s experimental compositions. “Although most of the artists involved in the Happenings movement have an interdisciplinary attitude, they have worked with artists from different branches such as painter and sculptor origin dancer Merce Cunningham and composer John Cage. Despite the randomness in their appearance, the Happenings are presented rehearsed according to a pre-prepared scenario.” (Eczacıbaşı, 2008, p. 1161)
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Note.https://blackmountainresearch.files.wordpress.com/2015/07/floorplan-untitled-event1.png reached on June 19.2020
Among the artists who settled in New York after the 1950s, John Cage has a well-deserved reputation as a composer with painting, design, poetry, philosophy and music theory and compositions. “George Maciunas says that Cage extended Duchamp’s idea of the instant object using ready-made sound.” (Antmen, 2008, s. 204)
Cage is a composer, poet and educator who studies Eastern and Western thought systems and pours them into his life and art. He met Duchamp in the late 1940s and saw that his ideas were in line. Cage’s work includes contemporary ambiguous music compositions and efforts to purify the personality of the Zen spirit. His view of art was greatly influenced and shaped by his Zen studies and his lessons from D. T. Suzuki at Columbia University. Zen metaphysics does not contain hierarchy and points out that individuality cannot be isolated from being. He used chance and change as an artistic method, rejecting personal taste and making randomness valuable. In particular, he placed the “Book of Changes” (i-ching), which forms the basis of Far Eastern philosophy, into the core of his art. John Cage’s most important performance at
Figure 89.
Anonymous” Activity Plan, Black Mountain College, 1952
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Maverick Hall in Woodstock, NY. Cage’s composition “4:33” (1952), staged by David Tudor, is without any notes. While teaching at Black Mountain College in 1950-51, Cage was influenced by Robert Rauschenberg’s White Paintings. When he saw the white work on a white canvas consisting of three panels, he thought creating a silent work could also create the mirror effect of white on white in the audience. His silent composition, composed of four parts, is a work without note consisting of processes waiting to be experienced and discovered instead of an imposed composition without orchestration. Like Rauschenberg’s image-reflecting voids, Cage’s composition is one in which the listener can meditatively listen to his inner voice and the random sounds and even the external sounds the listener expects to hear. The audience, who eagerly filled the hall, were surprised and angry with the artist at the end of the concert. Cage states that his composition is not silent and rejects the criticism. “During the first “movement” he could hear the wind blowing outside followed by the patter of the raindrops on the roof. The work, he said, wasn’t about silence; it was about listening.” (Gompertz, 2015, p. 271)
Figure 90.
National Arts Foundation Gallery, Washington DC.,John Cage 1966
Note.https://www.npr.org/2012/09/05/160618202/music-is-everywhere-john-cage-at-100 reached on June 20 2020
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Although he was protested, he has pursued a large fan base, including innovative artists. Allan Kaprow is one of the artists who followed John Cage and was a student at the New School for social research in New York, where he taught experimental art. Kaprow admired Cage’s belief in the creative potential of spontaneity and his willingness to draw inspiration from everyday life. (Gompertz, 2015, p. 270)
Allan Kaprow, who studied painting, was very impressed by Jackson Pollock’s “Drip” and argued that Pollock’s performance was a ritual rather than a finished painting. For Pollock, the canvas is the field in which action is taken. (Yılmaz M. , 2013, p. 328) Dada offerings, Kurt Schwitters’ compositions and poetry readings also influenced Kaprow. For Kaprow, the difference between connections, formations, and environmental art is that ‘CONNECTION’ is tactile and navigable, Environmental Art is ‘walk-in’ activities; whereas “happening” is the only authentic “event” in which the audience can participate and no longer have to be affiliated with any museum or gallery. (Eczacıbaşı, 2008, p. 819)
“Allan Kaprow’s Happening of 1959 appears to have been the starting point. The news spread rapidly. The speed with which Happenings and other kinds of performances were set up throughout the Western world suggests the particular inducements this art form offers: close personal contact with an audience in place of the chilling rite of setting your works up in a gallery and then stepping back to watch the public engaging, or refusing to engage, with it; on the public’s side a disposition to give time and attention to an action offered in the guise of theatre or circus; the chance to tune one’s work to a particular place or moment.” (Lynton, 2004, s. 319-320)
Definition of Happenings in Eczacıbaşı Sanat Ansiklopedisi; The Happenings are stated as presentations that bring together the actor’s activities with other environmental and artificial materials, with an objective and random approach, in a
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three-dimensional space of movement, the stage qualities of which are eliminated by using sound, noise and sometimes smell. (Eczacıbaşı, 2008, p. 1161)
Kaprow says “Environments are generally quiet situations, existing for one or for several persons to walk or crawl into, lie down, or sit in. One looks, sometimes listens, eats, drinks, or rearranges the elements by moving household objects around. Other Environments ask that the visitor-participant recreate and continue the work’s inherent processes. For human beings at least, all of these characteristics suggest a somewhat thoughtful and meditative demeanor.” (Harrison C. W., 2016, s. 761) Kaprow's Happenings can only consist of situations that can also happen upon the acquisition of watching. These happenings have been experienced in open spaces. Participants watched alone. “When done in a dedicated way, it can be a highly meditative endeavor; yet cute, when done indifferently.” (Bishop & Bishop, 2006)
Continuing his art with installations in the 1950s, Kaprow also demands visitors to intervene in these assembles, thus aiming for co-creation. Kaprow argued that the sanctity of the artist and the uniqueness of the work of art, as imposed by the modern art theorists, is not in question, and by transferring the projects he initiated to others, he aimed to both ensure participation and put the process and chance factors into action, thus breaking the traditionalist approach of the artist in the hands of the authority. With this in mind, he organized the first Happening exhibition at George Segal’s farm, 1958. The exhibition he organized with a large group of participants, where he made most of his idea tangible, was held in 1959 at Reuben Gallery, NY, called “18 Happenings in 6 Parts”. Kaprow, who wrote the instructions on the cards, added the luck factor by mixing the cards well before handing them out, thus making prediction impossible. The acting the participants were asked to do were reflective of
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the frames from daily life. These acts were things like climbing a ladder, sitting in a chair or squeezing oranges. (Gompertz, 2015, p. 272)
“I think it is a sign of mutual respect that all people involved in Happenings are willing and committed participants with a clear idea of what to do. Here knowledge schema is required, Professional skill is not required; Situations in Happenings, however realistic or unusual, are so primitive that professionalism is unnecessary.” (Bishop C. , 2006, pp. 103-104)
“The best participants are those who are not normally engaged in art or performance, but are directed to participate in the event that is both meaningful to them and has idea but is natural in their methods.” (Bishop C. , 2006, p. 103)
Kaprow emphasizes that the artist should be referred to as an artist, not a painter, a dancer, a poet. In the introduction to The Story of Art, the critic and author of art history E. H. Gombrich says "There really is no such thing as Art. There are only artists. Once these were men who took colored earth and roughed out the forms of a bison on the wall of a cave; today they buy their paints, and design posters for the Underground; they did many things in between. There is no harm in calling all these activities art as long as we keep in mind that such a word may mean very different things in different times and places, and as long as we realize that Art with a capital A has no existence. For Art with a capital A has become something of a bogey and a fetish. You may crush an artist by telling him that what he has just done may be quite good in its own way, only it is not ‘Art’.” Since the 1950s, artists have started to create their works by associating different disciplines. John Cage Zen Buddhism inspired Allan Kaprow with his interdisciplinary works intertwined with creation, music, dance and literature with the luck factor. In addition to his exhibitions, Kaprow also supported his argument in his book Assemblages, Environments, Happenings and says
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“The line between art and life should be kept fluid” and continues “in the near future, some projects that are inspired by events such as games and athletics that include rules for a series of moves and that keep the outcome always uncertain, may be developed. A composition can be created with instructions that can be adapted to basic land types such as oceans, forests, cities, farms and performers such as adolescents, elders, children, nurses and even insects, animals and weather etc. This can also be printed and mailed for anyone to use.”
Note.https://www.x-traonline.org/article/allan-kaprow-art-as-life reached on June 20.2020 .
He said “It follows to that audiences should be eliminated entirely.” (Harrison & Wood, Sanat ve Kuram, 2016, s. 764) Kaprow’s ideas and arguments also provided new freedoms for conceptual and environmental art.
The significant development and expansion in participatory art practices in the 60’s first mentioned by art historian Frank Popper who summarized the change in “the work of art” as; “‘The work of art’ itself has more or less disappeared by gradual stages. The
Figure 91.
Fluids, Allan Kaprow, 1967
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artist has taken upon himself new functions which are more like those of an intermediary than a creator, has begun to enunciate open-ended environmental propositions and hypotheses. Finally, the spectator has been impelled to intervene in the aesthetic process in an unprecendented way.” (Popper, 1975, p. 11) In parallel to Frank Popper’s definition of work of art, Anna Dezeuze emphasizes that Frank Popper was the first to register the full extent of participation by highlighting the ‘overall change in the relations between the artist, work of art and spectator.’ in her book on The do-it-yourself artwork. (Dezeuze, 2012, p. 4)
Situationist movement, in the world where the systems changed in general after the wars in the first half of the 20th century, emerged in parallel with the restructuring and improving the society with the emergence of more liberal and equality-seeking systems. Guy Debord is the founder of the international, political, and avant-garde situationist movement that was after World War II. The Lettrist International group, of which Guy Debord was a member, was established with artists who participated in the disintegration of the Surrealists, the Imaginist Bauhaus group, and the CoBrA group, which aims to rediscover the art at the origin of life through experimental studies. The common feature of these groups, which have developed a critique of modernity, is to fuse art and life, art-anti-art. Debord first defined the modern capitalist society and then aimed to save the individual alienated by that society from the power of that system. In addition to the SI texts, maps, plans and detournements were among the group's activities, as well as the practice of deriving, which can also be called Happenings. It emphasizes that the image replaces the original and renders the essence meaningless. He draws attention to the fact that Karl Marx’s understanding of what is produced for change, commodity, has changed with contemporary capitalism. According to Debord, the exchange of commodities has given way to the spectacle.
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Thus, besides the material values of commodities, the values created by the show have emerged. While using the concept of spectacle, he expanded his sociological and philosophical space without breaking away from the Marxist axis. He has made the concept of spectacle an ideal discourse and has given it a sociological definition with a new content. Images and representations replace social reality. The emergence of the spectacle society parallels the discovery of photography. Social life, together with capitalism, has evolved to focus on spectacle and appearance. The spectacle imposes on individuals that they need something even though they do not need it, leaving them in anxiety and uncertainty because of this imposition. Uncertainties, anxieties, and risks surround society. Such societies are societies of risk. Images that have been cut off from social reality and transformed into a brand-new picture do not have the power to rebuild a life with solid foundations. The spectacle is both the result and the design of modern society. Therefore, it was not added to the system later. It is a concept that has been at the core of systems since ancient times. It is shaped at the core of the eye-centered thinking tradition. Vision becomes the most central faculty, and the eye becomes the central organ in comprehending the universe. Everything is changeable and fluid in culture, so every new emergence rewrites the past, and all images can shift in every writing. Thus, it brings together the moral values and material elements conveyed by the society by reproducing it with a brand-new image and meaning. In the modernization process, none of the forms of social life can preserve their pure form for a long time. Everything solid is bound to dissolve. It is one of the defining features of modern life. According to the society of the spectacle, there is nothing static, and the modern spectacle has constructed everything. In a way, the fate of society is now in the hands of the spectacle. It takes control of the needs, behaviors, and reactions of society. According to Debord, the spectacle is a social phenomenon encountered in
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any society where there is a conflict of interest and transferring value to the masses. The spectacle first produces its opposite and then swallows it. Participatory art in Western Europe and North America has had a constructive effect on the society of the spectacle, which has shattered social relations.
The crisis perceived in society involves collective responsibilities. The Marxist theorist, Debord, says that if the audience realizes that their ideas are being suppressed and their thoughts arrested, this creates an infusion towards being active in the audience. He defines it as the “construction of situations” and proposes new social realities and new social relations. It aims to eliminate the disconnect between art and revolutionary practice. He claims that all symbolic arrangements of physical and social reality are reflected in the mass media and that these tools thus reproduce this false reality. Situationist theory fearlessly defends the concept of a discontinuous life. He emphasizes that the basic idea in Situation International is the construction of situations, that is, the concrete construction of the momentary environments of life and their transformation into a higher passion quality. He argues that new kinds of games should be invented and emphasizes that it is an attempt to increase the quality of human life by minimizing the free moments of life.
“The construction of situations begins on the ruins of the modern spectacle. It is easy to see to what extent the very principle of the spectacle - nonintervention - is linked to the alienation of the old world. Conversely, the most pertinent revolutionary experiments in culture have sought to break the spectator's psychological identification with the hero to draw him into activity by provoking his capacities to revolutionize his own life. The situation is thus made to be lived by its constructors. The role played by a passive or merely bit-part playing 'public' must constantly diminish, while that
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played by those who cannot be called actors but rather, in a new sense of the term, 'livers,' must steadily.” (Harrison & Wood, 2016, s. 745)
“Two significant concepts of Situation International are Derive (literally drifting) and Detournement (negation). Derive entails transient passage through varied ambiance, playful-constructive behavior and awareness of psycho-geographical effects. In a derive one or more persons during a certain period drop their usual motives for movement and action, their relations, their work and leisure activities, and let themselves be drawn by the attractions of the terrain and the encounters they find there.” (Harrison & Wood, 2016, s. 746)
“Detournement, the reuse of preexisting artistic elements in a new ensemble. The two fundamental laws of detournement are the loss of importance of each detourned autonomous element - which may go so far as to lose its original sense completely - and at the same time the organization of another meaningful ensemble that confers on each element its new scope and effect… Detournement is thus first a negation of the value of the previous organization of expression.” (Harrison & Wood, 2016, s. 747)
Guy Debord, in Situationist International article, says, “this sphere reserved for ‘free creative activity’ is the only one in which the question of what we do with life and the question of communication arc posed practically and in all their fullness.” (Harrison & Wood, 2016, s. 749)
“The task of the SI was therefore not to subordinate art to politics, but to revive both modern art and revolutionary politics by surpassing them both – that is, by realizing what was the most revolutionary demand of the historic avant-garde, the integration of art and life.” (Bishop C. , 2018, s. 93)eunique global mobility, symbolized by 1968 as it peaked in France in May 1968, but actually spread between 1966 and 1970, heralding the end of years of hope and prosperity, on the one hand, and the loss of
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power of traditional political opposition ways on the other. This first global movement was also the beginning of the era of globalizing social movements.” (Alpkaya, 2014, p. 197)
“Art for situationism is the conquest of Paris in 1968. It is the reorganization of functional, rational urban life imposed by modern urban design, to pursue desires and dreams. In other words, art is politics, poetry is revolution. The leaders of situationism founded the imaginist Bauhaus in 1953 against the rationalist Bauhaus, which reduced architecture, city, art and life to design products: Le Mouvement International Pour un Bauhaus Imaginiste. This art is alive.” (Artun, 2015, p. 99)
They pioneered the following art movements, especially Fluxus, Environmental Art, Conceptual Art movements, with a conceptual approach that would refer to the bond between art and life, with the practice of not producing art, their opposition to the specialization of art and including the process of living within the scope of art
.
3.2.3. Conceptual Art
The father of conceptual art is Marcel Duchamp, who incorporated the ready-made object into the art. Before it, art was a followed commodity, often brought to the forefront of aesthetics and technique. “Duchamp want to turn this around. He considered art should be first and foremost. Only after an artist has settled on and developed a concept would he or she in a position to choose a medium.” (Gompertz, 2015, p. 266) Furthermore, John Cage’s 1954 work “4:33” is also a forerunner of Concept Art. The musicless piece at the concert was a performance that surprised the audience. “…we go to hear music and to witness a performance; performance, it seems, is wilfully withheld; instead we become conscious of the unreality of the music
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we have come for, of its importance to us as a shield against reality” (Lynton, 2004, p. 331)
Perhaps the greatest transformation experienced in the art environment in 1960s was the discussion of the need for objects in arts. When the effects of an art practice in which idea came to the fore began to be felt intensely, the material existence and form of the work lost its effect to a large extent. (Antmen, 2008, p. 193) Conceptual artists tried to analyze art by using linguistic analyzes and semiotics theories developed by Ludwig Wittgenstein, Ferdinand de Saussure, Claude Levis Strauss and Roland Barthes. (Atakan, 2008, p. 46) Although minimalist artist Sol Lewitt’s article examining conceptualism explained the conceptuality of his works, in general, the art of thought, informational art, were tried to be gathered under the roof of Conceptual Art. “This kind of art is not theoretical or illustrative of theories; it is intuitive, involved with all types of mental process and is purposeless.” (Harrison & Wood, Sanat ve Kuram, 2016, s. 893) It has gone far beyond traditional genres such as painting and sculpture, and the audience is invited to a mental perception process with art projects, installations, environment, and land art. When the object is excluded, and idea is upfront, the mental perception has priority before the aesthetic concern. By questioning the uniqueness, permanence and material value, the method of documenting with carrier tools such as documents, photographs, maps, drafts and videos was used, and a revolution was created on the traditional definition and form of art. The artist’s goal is to make the work mentally interesting. He pays attention to the fact that his work is emotionally dry and dull. Conceptual art does not have to be logical. We encounter a logical sequence built to be corrupted, or logic may have been used to obscure the artist’s true intentions, plunge the viewer into a paradoxical situation. “These artists examined the concepts of art through discussions instead of
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producing works of art that could be exhibited in galleries in line with Conceptual Art.” (Atakan, 2008, s. 46)
Even if it has a physical form, the appearance of the work is not very important. The form forms the grammar of the work as a whole. It has a limited importance. This basic unit (form) is intentionally uninteresting so that it remains a part of the work as a whole and does not break the unity of the work's integrity. The repeated use of simple forms narrows the scope of the work. When this arrangement was finalized, the work became the tool of the idea. We can easily say that the philosophy of the work takes place within itself. Sol Lewit says, “I think the piece must be large enough to give the viewer whatever information he needs to understand the work and placed in such a way that will facilitate this understanding. (Unless the idea is of impediment and requires difficulty of vision or access) ” (Harrison & Wood, Sanat ve Kuram, 2016, s. 894)
“The purpose of their use of extremely complex language was to challenge the audience intellectually, allowing them to learn through instructive discussions within themselves.” (Atakan, 2008, p. 47) However, the artwork produced for visual sensation is perceptual, its subject covers the art of optics, light, and color, it is not conceptual.
Conceptual art phenomenon Marcel Duchamp’s presentation of any object (readymade object) or action as art has shaken the traditional definition of fine arts and creativity. The belief that art should be based on skill and talent in the traditional sense was shaken, the factors shaping artistic taste were questioned, it was suggested that concepts such as conceptualization and meaning should precede plastic form, thus leading to the importance of intellectual experience. “Marcel Duchamp, one of the leading artists of the century, brought his work out of the retina borders established by Impressionism and into the field where language, thought and sight interact. There it
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was transformed by a complex interplay of new mental and physical materials, greeting many of the technical and visual details to be found in later art.” (Harrison & Wood, 2016, p. 804) Erased De Kooning Drawing of 1953, created by Robert Rauschenberg by being influenced by these thoughts, the empty gallery exhibition organized by the French artist Yves Klein on space, and Piero Manzoni’s “Artist’s Shit”, “Artist’s Breath” are among the first conceptual works. The critic, art historian Marcus Graf, in his article in the book Sanat, Tarih, Estetik, Kesişen Derlemeler, states that Magic Base by the Italian conceptual artist Piere Manzoni, is one of the first examples of participatory art, due to the structure that invites the audience to stand on it. (Yılmaz N. A., Sanat Tarih Estetik, Kesişen Denemeler, 2020, p. 476)
Joseph Kosuth who argues art for art ideology, says “Art ‘lives’ through influencing other art, not by existing as the physical residue of an artist’s ideas.”(Harrison & Wood, 2016, s. 903) He questioned the meanings of words such as art, meaning, painting and space by saying that “visual experience and aesthetic pleasure should be excluded, and without language there is no art.” (Antmen, 2008, p. 195)
“Kosuth’s contribution to ‘Information’ and he explained the concept as follows: The expression was in the idea, not the form—the forms were only a device in the service of the idea... Kosuth is questioning how representations or accounts of an object relate to the object itself, how these relations are processed and whether one form has more value than another.” (Farthing, 2014, s. 502) The artist, above all, gives importance to generating ideas by deactivating the object that can be possessed, exhibited and reproduced. Having a significant role in forming all the movements that developed after 1960, Conceptual Art also played a significant role in the conceptualization of traditional visual arts, such as painting and sculpture, by defending the idea of unlimited creativity instead of talent.
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Norbert Lynton in his book “Art: The Whole Story” says for Conceptual Art that it prevents us from showing the reactions we are accustomed to, he also wants us to reconsider the things that transcend art in our approach to it. Thus, we break the usual patterns and cooperate with it in its way of questioning. (Lynton, 2004, p. 330) The most significant artist who continued his activity in the 1960s and 70s is Joseph Beuys. For Beuys, art is the idea that people will show by standing against age's social and political constraints and inequalities. He emphasizes that war should be waged against this lack of understanding against human creativity and states that creativity that is not used correctly leads to aggression. (Batur, 2015, p. 46)
3.2.4. Fluxus
The Happenings that emerged in the 1950s and the Fluxus movements that emerged in the early 1960s are of the same character as the futuristic and Dadaist spectacles. The term coined by George Maucinas is derived from “flux”. It means flow, purification, movement, swell, multiplicity, ascension, ascent. We can easily say that thinking and presenting human actions as art is one of the essential elements of Happening, Action, Fluxus, Spectacle, Body, Process and Participation. It is almost impossible to delineate the boundary between them.
With John Cage, George Macuinas, Yoko Ono, Nam June Paik, Carole Schneeman, and later Joseph Beuys and others, Fluxus became a collective movement. The necessary ground for bringing together different forms of expression leads to festivals being organized in different cities and countries. The typical attitude of the artists participating in this flow from different countries made Fluxus an international movement. The multi-dimentional structure gathered the poets, writers, musicians, painters, and sculptors of the time.
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“Fluxus artists drew upon Marcel Duchamp's concerns regarding the viewer’s relationship to an artwork. Duchamp considered that the deciphering process that spectators went through in order to understand an artwork was permeated by their desires and creativity, and that this was an integral aspect of the artwork. Fluxus artists wanted to close the gap between modern art and daily life. Instead of an art of self-expression, which they believed overvalued the individual artist, they championed a political art that was engaged with the physical world and social issues within.” (Farthing S. , 2014, s. 512-513)
“Fluxus, which developed largely parallel to the line of Cage-Zen-Buddhism-DUCHAMP-DADAISM, opposed individual, emotional, special talent and commodified fine art products, and envisioned living the world in its current flow with daily events instead of making art” (Eczacıbaşı, 2008, p. 522)
Ontological thinking then encompasses multisensory experiences in ways that reinforce our attachment to the world. It happens through unique sensations experienced in the perceiver’s body. Levin cites from Maurice Merlau-Ponty’s Phenomenology of Perception: “Our bodies are far from limiting us in our encounter with the world, simultaneously providing access to what our senses perceive and connecting us to the entire universe of human perceptions. “The Fluxus movement puts personal expression as the order of the day” (Higgins, 2002, p. 61)
“In What Is Art For? the Darwinian art historian Ellen Dissanayake asserts that the art production is a universal biological imperative, like language, though it differs from language in both form and function. Art produced by all peoples is “special,” she argues, even if these peoples have no notion of high art (as made by fine artists). Dissanayake explores three characteristics of art that transcend both individual practice and cultural norms: all societies produce art; art institutions are integral to
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social order; and art is a psychologically, psychically, and intellectually pleasurable form of engagement between people. Her findings help explain Fluxus experiences as art.” (Higgins, 2002, p. 61)
In the chapter titled “‘Making Special’: Toward a Behavior of Art,” Dissanayake defines enjoyment in art as a bio-behavioral necessity because it marks reality according to belief systems and promotes human sociality. After describing the importance and interaction of play and ritual, Dissanayake states: Art makes use of out-of-context elements, redirecting the ordinary elements (e.g., colors, sounds, words) into a configuration in which they become more than ordinary… Reality is converted from its usual unremarkable state—in which we take it or its components for granted—to a significant or specially experienced reality in which the components, by their emphasis or combination, or juxtaposition, acquire a meta-reality.” (Higgins, 2002, p. 62) Art experiences make the participant's experience special. Fluxus artists pushed aesthetic concerns into the background and expanded the limits of methods and materials that could be considered art. Street shows, electronic music concerts, sound installations and performances are works to dissolve the boundaries of life and art.
“Due to its excluding the traditional art object, adopting transience as a philosophical attitude instead of permanence, and attaching importance to the process and the moment rather than the finished work, the surviving examples of Fluxus, which we can see mostly from their photographs today, reveal that the artists mostly use waste materials from daily life.” (Antmen, 2008, p. 205)
The fundamental elements Beuys uses in shows and actions constitutes a whole with his voice, movements and clothes, these exhibitions he creates are both spectacle and action. The same can be said for George Brecht “Drip Music”, Gilbert & George and Abramovich. The common denominator from the theatrical Beuys to Haacke
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emphasizes on the contradictions and dilemmas of both individual and social life. (Yılmaz M. , 2013, p. 326) The period when he was the strongest was between 1962-1978. Among his sources of inspiration are Futuristic evening performances include the Novi Lef movement in Russia, Dadaism, Duchamp’s cynical cynicism, and John Cage’s experimental musical work. J. Cage’s words, “Art must have a function. Art should be able to change our perspective on our life and what is going on around us” is like a summary of Fluxus ideals, which express a change in life as well as in art – and maybe mainly in life. (Antmen, 2008, p. 204) Fluxus has an ideal and an interdisciplinary structure to change life rather than art.
Felix Guattari (1930-1992) “For Guattari, art is an endlessly renewable source of vital energy and creation.” (Bishop C. , 2018, s. 292) Based on these words, he aimed to produce projects to eliminate alienation with transformative roles and tasks, including creative workshops, patient personnel equality commissions, and workshops to develop self-management, which he organized in the psychiatry clinic in La Borde, where he was hired in 1955. In these projects, the effects of Jacques Lacan, existential Marxism, and structural linguistics can easily be observed. While questioning social life forms, Guattari insists on the ethical-aesthetic paradigm that includes demolishing existing art forms. “
Art is blurred entirely when merged into life, ‘risks the perennial possibility of an eclipse.” (Bishop C. , 2018, s. 293)
“Guattari suggests that each work of art must have a ‘double finality’: ‘[First] to insert itself into a social network which will either accept or reject it, and [second] Despite the danger of collapsing should celebrate the Universe of art. Guattari’s language of a double finality speaks to the double ontology of cross-disciplinary projects that are so
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frequently presented today, preeminently among them art- as- pedagogy.” (Bishop C. , 2018, s. 293)
Lgyia Clark “Air and Stone”, 1966, MOMA
“My entire process has been an attempt to unite art and life, and sometimes when a raw perception comes to me in life, it is the abyss. The abyss—the thematic focus of my latest propositions and of my earlier ones as well. A couple sitting with their hands closed against one of their eyes which remains open, the other closed, the movement of their hands which open to allow a small space to form between them, the field of vision in the perception of the encounter of the spaces between the two people; this is how the space I call the interior space of the body is discovered….I experienced that space as an abyss until a short time ago. I began to wonder if that space might not be the same space that I’d been referring to for years as “empty-full,” a space that was still a metaphysical space….I discovered that in that space the body is the house, and that when people become conscious of that space, they rediscover the body as a totality—their vision of the world becomes broader….Let’s slow down, I didn’t say what I am;… I’d never a priori be a painter, a sculptor, or, much less, an architect. This is what surprises me every time I pose this problem to myself. Every time, I see with more clarity that my problem was purely existential in kind (space and time were my themes). If I began with painting, it was simply the point of departure that was most readily available.”
Although Lgyia Clark continued her art with painting and later with three-dimensional works, she later turned this experience into an artistic, individual healing experience when she was told to wrap her wrist, which was broken in a car accident, in nylon to keep her temperature constant. Stone and Air, curated by Luiz Peres Oramas, was first exhibited at MOMA, NY. in 1966.
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Note.https://post.moma.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/CH2014.1944_vw2-Full_JPEG.jpg reached in November 08 2020
Clark named these objects first as sensory objects and later as relational objects. She used stones and rubber bags of different sizes in her exhibition. She closed the mouth of the nylon bag, which she filled with air, with rubber, and moved the stone she placed on the other end of the bag up and down, squeezing the bag with both hands. She said that the movement of pulling the stone into the bag and coming out when compressed emphasizes birth and also refers to rebirth. This experience is, for Clark, a work in which rebirth is possible again and again. “It is very important that the Air and Stone is about the lines in her own body. She started her research from the organic line in the painting and continued until the moment when her own body was broken. After this experience, she designs a healing object. These everyday objects she found were very helpful in dealing with their effects on the body.” (Luiz Peres Oramas, Curator)
Clark continued her recent work with artistic object designs, which she believes to have a healing effect on the human body, and exhibitions that allow individuals, groups and participants to experience these designs. For example in her exhibition titled
Figure 92.
Lgyia Clark “Air and Stone” 1966 MOMA
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“Breathe With Me”, the artist used the tubes of snorkels as art objects, which can be found in every store selling daily, marine equipment and diving clothes, and even in toy shops and markets at the beginning of the summer season. The participants used these tubes, called sensory objects, to listen to their breathing. According to the artist, the rhythm of the breathing echoing in the tube, once experienced, becomes impossible to forget. This acquisition, which the body automatically makes while working, also expresses contraction and release.
(Moma, https://www.moma.org/calendar/exhibitions/1422)
(Moma) The therapeutic artworks of Lgyia Clark; including Abyss Mask, Sensorial Masks, Stone and Air, Breathe With Me
Figure 93.
Lgyia Clark, “Breathe With Me”, 1966, MOMA
Note.https://www.moma.org/audio/playlist/181/2412 reached in December 11, 2020
In the exhibition; 0.4x40cm industrial rubber Submersible tube has been used as artistic material.
Lgyia Clark 1976-1984 Dialogues
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“I firmly believe that our great innovation is the form of participation, that’s what it means” November 8, 1968, Oiticica
“There is no longer an object to express any concept, but an audience that reaches its own self more and more deeply.” Clark, November 14, 1968
(Bishop C. , 2006, pp. 111-113)
“Real participation is clear. We will never know what we gave the audience writer.” From Lygia Clark’s letter to Oiticica, November 14, 1968
Helio Oiticica 1937-1980
The Brazilian artist has organized innovative exhibitions and events that push the boundaries of traditional art in her recent works. She focuses on combining art with life, inviting participation, liberating the participant, which she emphasizes in her installations and festival-like interactive works, and comparing with a brand new world.
The Parangoles is a series of works that the artist continued from the 1960s until her death. In the series, different materials such as fabric pieces, plastic and rope, which are designed to be worn in vivid colors, are formed with vivid colors such as yellow, red and green. It emerged when the artist met the residents of the Mangueira Hill area, the slum of Rio de Jenario, and made the artist participate in Samba, the traditional dance of Brazil. In The Parangoles series, the participants carry the determined brightly colored materials on the one hand and dance to samba rhythms while they are wrapped around their bodies. Here, the artist also has a desire to liberate colors with three dimensions. (TATE Modern, Helio Oiticica, Exhibition Guide, Ann Gallagher) The Parangoles, an experiential art example of the 60s-70s that can be seen today with documents, films and photographs, has a great influence on socially engaged art, social art and participatory art practices. In this work of the artist, there is an effort to liberate
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the marginalized and marginalized groups in society, to add them to the experience and thus to life.
Note.https://www.tate.org.uk/research/publications/performance-at-tate/case-studies/helio-oiticica reached on December 11, 2020
The Tropicalia movement is a Brazilian protest movement that emerged in the late 1960s. It emerged as a protest the dictatorial regime in Brazil in the 1960s and the oppressive rules created by the military government. Helio Oiticica was a vital figure who defined this movement. Although the song composed by the musician Caetano Veloso and the LP released under this name and visual arts are the elements that make up this movement, the name and movement of ‘Tropicalia’ is integrated with the artist Oiticica. After Caetano Veloso named his composition, it made a name for himself as a counterculture movement. Musicians, writers, and visual art artists have made
Figure 94.
Helio Oiticica, TATE, Parangoles Exhibition Opening
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interactive works that encourage new ideas, creativity, and even the musicians participating in this movement have tried combinations of Samba, Jaz and Rock’n Roll. The freedom of expression was fought through different art disciplines, using creativity to protest the restrictive regime of freedom.
Tropicalia is the artist’s best-known participatory art installation exhibited in Rio. Brazil is presented to the visiting participants as a tropical paradise. Parrots, structures adorned with vivid colors are equipped with greenery. This installation is a radical opposition to the situation of his country, where a military dictatorship has destroyed freedoms. The artist aimed to stimulate the emotions and expressions of the participants. Invited visitors are free to experience the installation and invited to walk barefoot on the sand, watch TV, or sit and stroll, albeit just for relaxation, encouraged especially in terms of free thought and free expression. Oiticica has taken care to ensure that his art is inclusive and participatory. In Tropicalia, the installation he performed at the Whitechapel Gallery in London in 1969, business people wanted to have lunch break, and those living in the vicinity brought their children to play in the sand. Oiticica has placed people at the center of his art. (TATE Modern, Helio Oiticica ve tropicalia Movrmrnt, Jill Drawer)
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Note.https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/helio-oiticica-7730/story-helio-oiticica-and-tropicalia- movement reached on December 11 2020
“In fact, what remains of Fluxus is not the individual works, but rather the spirit of Fluxus, which is still believed by many of his followers to continue today”. (Antmen, 2008, p. 206) Joseph Beuys, who perceives art as a social phenomenon, a dynamic of change and an effort for movement makes this spirit tangible.
“Beuys, who believes in the healing power of art and can create a real social transformation by activating a universal creative impulse, is an artist who almost embodies the basic principles of Fluxus.” (Antmen, 2008, p. 206)
He believed that art was a ritual-like process, and he thought, presented and lived the lectures and conferences he gave at the university as an act of art. He reveals the restrictive areas and understanding of traditional art and expresses the sensitivities of the new artistic understanding envisaged by a new generation of artists towards the individual, society and nature. (Antmen, 2008, p. 207). The artist is among the pioneers of Participatory and process arts, especially with the care and emphasis he gives to the
Figure 95.
Helio Oiticica, Tropicalia Exhibition, TATE
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process. “I am pleading for a gradual realization that there is no other way except that people should be artistically educated. This artistic education alone provides a sound base for an efficient society.” (Harrison & Wood, 2016, s. 953)
Fluxus artists also host events that create a new art experience by differentiating the relationship between the artist and the audience. In part related to Fluxus of this thesis, the writer would like to discuss the “7000 Oak Trees” project carried out by Joseph Beuys in Documenta VII, Kassel, creating social change and environmental improvement. Joseph Beuys born in 1921, is a German, activist. He fought as a Nazi pilot in World War II, and after the war, he expanded the boundaries of art by including people in his art practice. His stimulating, awareness-raising, and change-making works examiinge the human-nature relationship, placed healing the at the center of his art. He places shamanic and mythological elements in his art and aims to raise awareness. On page 88 of How to Read Contemporary Art, Michael Wilson mentions Beuys’ charismatic character and his semi-shamanic personality for direct communication. The tree is considered sacred in mythology and shamanism. It symbolizes the divine power of creation and is often perceived as the mother. In addition, the tree of the universe, which is believed to establish a connection between the underground, aboveground and sky, is a tangible example of how important trees are in many cultures. Ener Merdaner says that Beuys’ 7000 Oak project includes mythological and shamanic elements and an ecological preservation project. As Beuys states, this project is an “Ecological Gesamtkuntswerk” ecological holistic art. It can be considered as part of the broader “social sculpture” project. (Merdaner E. , 2016, p. 95)
The point where Beuys intersects with shamans and shamanism is the shaman’s work for the health of the individual and society throughout his life and Beuys’s effort to heal
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the society and nature, which he sees as sick, through art. The artist can show the traumas of time and initiate a therapy process.” (Merdaner E. , 2016, p. 104)
“It is the modern industrial and technological society that Beuys sees as having lost the vital forces that his art is trying to change, transform, or improve. According to Beuys, he thinks that with the Enlightenment, society and sciences became rational and lost their powers of intuition and inspiration, that the balance between the material and the spiritual was disrupted in favor of the material. As a result, the entire modern society came to the brink of a spiritual crisis. (Merdaner E. , 2016, p. 106)
Beuys, who believes that humanity is destroying nature, says that the destruction of nature is mainly in the industrialized regions of Germany, and therefore he decided to carry out the 7000 Oak project in Kassel, an industrial city. “The 7000 oak trees, which are not a random selection, also symbolize not only renewal but also the concept of
time. Oak is a tree that denotes sacred places since the Druids (ancient Celtic scholars), meaning “the one who found the oak tree”; seven, the symbol of the ancient rules of planting trees; Seven Oaks, on the other hand, is the name of some cities in the USA and England.” (Atakan, 2008, p. 79)
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Note.https://allartisquiteuseful.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/joseph1.jpg reached in June24.2020
“The artist saw this action as the beginning of his attempt to re-green the world.” (Atakan, 2008, p. 79) For this purpose, he vowed to “protect every tree, piece of land, uncontaminated rivers, old city centers and fight against all unplanned renewal projects.” (Atakan, 2008, p. 79) He plays a role in the founding works of the The Greens. The corrupted human wants to draw attention to the balance of nature and the universe. He wants to break and expand the boundaries of art and life. He hopes that democracy in its ideological meaning will be realized through art one day. The 7000 Oak project, which is at the forefront of his work in this direction, created a field for bringing together the people in the city of Kassel and the university students, schools, and enabled them to resolve the differences and conflicts over tree planting by organizing meetings using non-violent communication tools. At the end of this project, the ecological map of the city has changed. The public becomes conscious about the environment and learns that social issues that they cannot realize alone can be resolved by participating in society only when they are in communication. Being a part of a
Figure 96.
Joseph Beuys, planting the first oak tree, 7000 Oaks
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whole in harmony and balance creates social awareness in the individual. Individuals became the patrons of each tree and the basalt stone next to it, and they developed the awareness that the city is theirs and their home. The project established a link between arts and politics. In this way, it does not mean that Politics supports art, but that the concept of art expands, and a participatory and interdisciplinary work emerges. Thanks to the private space created by social art, an area of freedom and equality is created that everyone can share. The project, which spanned a long period such as planting trees, placing basalt stones next to them, melting the Tsar’s crown and pouring it in the form of a rabbit, wanted to make individuals and society realize being in harmony, able to integrate with nature, creating a balance, and the relationship between human nature and the universe, with many rituals. “Just like tribal rites, modern rites were performed for the well-being of society. Only the former relied on existing traditions, while the latter opposed any established tradition. After all, warning people was also a form of healing.” (Yılmaz M. , 2013, p. 328) Many frictions arose during the project. Beuys attended all the meetings and helped in problem-solving, even though the city administrators had restrictive limits due to the rules. According to Beuys within the frame work of these works which Beuys defines as social sculpture and social art, every human being is an artist. Life is all art. In one of his speeches, Beuys emphasized his desire to use himself and his life as a tool, the artist’s power to change the existing world, regeneration, change and the need to use the society for healing. The Project, which started in 1982, was completed when Beuys’ son planted the last tree in 1986 after his father passed away. This project has been continued as thousands of oak plantings and basalt stone installations by different institutes and even individuals around the world.
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“Many of Beuys’s social sculptures had political and environmental concerns. 7000 Oaks began in 1982 as a five-year project to plant 7000 trees in Kassel in Germany. It raised many questions about city planning, the future of the environment and social structures.” (TATE, 2020)
Note.https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/s/social-sculpture reached in June 18/06/2020
“This, latest of the art disciplines—Social sculpture/Social Architecture—will reach maturity when everyone alive becomes a creator, sculptor, or architect of the social organism. The participatory principle of Fluxus and Happenings, the art of partaking will then be understood. Only the realization of the revolutionary aspect of art can turn into political power and activate the minds of individuals to shape history.” (Artun A. , 2015, p. 145)
“EVERY PERSON who feels his freedom, is in a state of freedom and has learned all other conditions to create a TOTAL ARTWORK OF THE SOCIAL ORDER OF THE
Figure 97.
7000 Oaks, Joseph Beuys, Kassel, Documenta VII, 1982
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FUTURE IS AN ARTIST.” Joseph Beuys. (Antmen, 2008, p. 211) Thus, Duchamp expanded the field of art by adding the readymade object, Cage the ready voice and Beuys the human.
Yoko Ono: Wish Tree MOMA-Paris 1965-2003
Yoko Ono, one of the pioneers of the Fluxus movement, is also one of the pioneers of participatory art. “Wish Tree” is an ongoing installation today and continues with participants writing their wishes on small pieces of paper and leaving them on the tree. Like many of her other works, the installation emphasizes Japanese culture, Japanese temples, and Zen Buddhism practices. She says that the tree is a meditation
on the meaning of life and that it enhances communication, cooperation, and hope.
Not.https://www.artsy.net/artwork/yoko-ono-wish-tree-1 reached on November 14.2020
The Wishing Tree is a poetic installation created by Yoko Ono and is the title of a series of works she has produced since the 1990s in which trees have become components
Figure 98.
Wish Tree, Yoko Ono, 1996, Maalba, Buonos Aires
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and props for her conceptual project. For Yoko Ono, a work of art must create desire and arouse the curiosity of the audience: “All my work is a form of wish. Keep wishing as you join”. She often talks about as a child, how she wrote her wishes to small pieces of papers and tied to the branches of trees in temple courtyards in Japan. In this way, Yoko Ono encourages the public to identify, express and share their desires, write them on small papers, hang them on the tree, during the creative process of the work. The Wishing Tree is an invitation to meditate on the meaning of life, hope, desire, and the importance of communication. Participants are invited to leave a mark with their words and impressions on small blank tags hung on the branches of the wish tree and become metaphorical actors of a collective dynamic movement. When Yoko Ono invites individuals to actively participate in the installation, she highlights the similarities between individuals rather than emphasizing their differences. It is a well-known fact that Ono encourages individuals with any gender, anywhere in the world, to tag their wishes using any tree. Wishes (currently over a million) collected in this way by the artist are held in the IMAGINE PEACE TOWER, a beam of light created by Yoko Ono in 2007 to commemorate John Lennon, and every year from 9th to 8th October, John Lenon’s birthday, it lights up the sky on the island of Viðey, near Reykjavik in Iceland, until December. (Imaginepeacetower, 2020)
“Today's art is open to connecting, participating and being socially active rather than alienating from society. Suzi Gablik emphasized in her book The Reenchantment of Art that our most important task today is to “revive” all kinds of cultures. For Gablik, the phrase “revive” means going beyond the modern traditions of mechanism, positivism, empiricism, rationalism, materialism, secularism, and scientism in order to heal the world under the influence of the Cartesian example that separates mind, body, and spirit.” (Atakan, 2008, s. 131)
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Tania Bruguera
“Catedra Arte Conducta” is an art school presented as an artwork by the Cuban artist Bruguera in response to the lack of institutional facilities and exhibition infrastructure, as well as the restriction of Cuban citizens’ freedom of travel and access to information. In Cuba, young artists had neither control nor knowledge of their work, which was rapidly consumed in the Western market by wholesale purchases. Therefore ne of Bruguera’s goals was to train artists who have knowledge about the Global Market and can cope with this situation. These works of Bruguera continued from 2002 to 2009.
Pawel Althamer
Polish artist, Einstein Class, 2005. He conducted fun science experiments with seven juvenile delinquents expelled from school and a physics teacher fired for not wanting to give traditional education in different areas such as the teacher’s garden, picnic area, meadow, a beach, and the artist's workshop shared these with their neighbors. In the words of Claire Bishop, the work is a lively and compelling example of experimental participatory art; this social relationship was understood to work as a belated cure for the artist’s sense of exclusion that he experienced at school. Like many of Althamer’s work, Einstein Class is typical of his identification with marginalized subjects and using them to create a situation in which he can retroactively treat his own past. The entire project was videotaped by the Polish filmmaker Krzysztof Visconti, and then at the opening of the exhibition in Berlin, teachers, and students attended the opening as a continuation of their education. In its 2006 screening in London, the artist stipulated that Polish students be invited to the opening and that their peers in London were persistently recruited for the dubbing of the film.
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In Turkey, installations, parallel to the examples above, take place in different Art shows and Biennials. Sinop Biennial II, Nezaket Ekici group, the installations of Gülbahar Karaduman and Beste Durmuş and also, Oda Projesi (The Room Project) which is created by a group of three artists who, between 1997 and 2005, based their activities around a three-room apartment in the Galata district of Istanbul are examples in this thesis.
“Oda Projesi is created by a group of three artists who, between 1997 and 2005, based their activities around a three-room apartment in the Galata district of Istanbul (the oda project is Turkish for ‘The room project’). The apartment provided a platform for projects generated by the group in cooperation with their neighbors, such as a children’s workshop with the Turkish painter Komet, a community picnic with the sculptor Erik Göngrich, and a parade for children organized by the Tem Yapim theatre group. Oda Projesi argues that they wish to open up a context for the possibility of exchange and dialogue, motivated by a desire to integrate with their surroundings.”
As Claire Bishop indicates in her book Artificial Hells “ They insist that they are not setting out to improve or heal a situation – one of their project leaflets contains the slogan ‘exchange not change’ – though they evidently see their work as oppositional.”
(Bishop C. , 2018, s. 29)Bishop says that the Oda Projesi has a structure that approaches that of art and museum educators around the world and even the community art tradition, and in the interview with the artists of the project, they stated that their work is determined by dynamic and ongoing relationships rather than aesthetic considerations. They also stated that they consider aesthetics “a dangerous word” that should not be brought into discussion in terms of practical cooperation. (Bishop C. , 2018, s. 30)
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In her article, Lindt stated that the project is a superior model of collaborative practice, it is based on the rejection of the author, singular authorship is suppressed to facilitate the creativity of others, and it is emphasized that it contains an inclusive generosity, and social dialogue is used as a medium.
Sinopale, International Sinop Biennial is the name of an international art show that, in the context of local development, draws the civil society together to build dialogue through culture and arts, within the framework of the “artistic production based on sharing” model. This project is structured biennially and aims to work at urban, national, and international levels in order to make citizens of all ages perceive their own living spaces with a vision for the future anew, reflect on urban problems, share the collective historical memory and organize it utilizing artistic production, and to create a better social living space. (Sinopale, 2021)
Artists participating in the 2nd Biennale of Sinop in the team of Nezaket Ekici; The works of Beste Durmuş and Gülbahar Karaduman are also therapeutic examples of participatory art. Gülbahar Karaduman “Memory Tree”.
I saw the loneliness of elderly people sitting as I passed by their building…
I could do something for them and asked them to write on paper and describe their loneliness and the memories that they could not tell anyone. Hanging these fading memories on the tree, I aimed to revive them. People who came to see the memory tree at the performance hour revived these memory leaves as the water refreshes the leaves of a tree.
Materials: Straw paper, pen, fish line, hook, armchair
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Figure 99.
Gülbahar Karaduman, Memory Tree, Sinopale 2, 2008
Note.https://sinopale.org/gulbahar-karaduman/ reached on January.06.2021
Beste Durmuş, in her work “The Hatred Of Sinop,” says, “I arranged a table so that you can write down on paper and get off your chest everything that you do not like about Sinop. The participants crumpled up the paper they had poured out their hated on until all their anger and fury was gone, and then they calmed down by throwing the crumpled paper in the metal box. When the box was full with the citizens’ hatred, just like a ceremony, matches were distributed to everybody, we burned the papers and eliminated our hatred all at once.”
Materials: Table, paper, pen, metal box, matches
Figure 100.
Beste Durmuş, “The Hatred of Sinop”, Sinopale II, 2008
Note.https://sinopale.org/beste-durmus/ reached on January. 06.2021
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3.2.5. Selected Contemporary Art Works
“Today’s important artistic practices address the possibilities for creating interaction and socialization between people outside of the family and neighborhood. For this reason, an aesthetic object can be a meeting, an encounter, an event, cooperation between people in space/time, a game, a festivity, social space, or any relational interaction. Most of all, the work of art can create a space for dialogue in human life.” (Atakan, 2008, s. 135)
Nicholas Bourriaud says, “art is a state of encounter”” (Bourriaud, 2018, s. 27) and
believes that in a world where social ties are standardized, art events can show alternative ways of life, interaction and action. (Atakan, 2008, s. 135)
Relational Aesthetics” is a term coined by the French art critic and curator Nicholas Bourriaud. According to this term, the artist tries to produce new human relations by using everyday experiences, instead of producing an individual object of aesthetic thought. (Melik, 2015, p. 14) The roots of this practice are based on Dada, Happenings and Fluxus movements. It is the adaptation of intertwining art and life to the present. “Art has always been relational in varying degrees, i.e. a factor of sociability and a founding principle of dialogue.” (Bourriaud, 2018, s. 23)
Democratizing art is among his aims. While evaluating relational art, Nicholas Bourriaud says that the playful structure that draws the audience in should be considered as a new form rule, not an art theory, and the artist shapes and spreads defeatist positions in these formations. He says that sometimes artists who propose sociality as a work of art can also use a predefined relational framework.
“What do we mean by form? A coherent unit, a structure (an independent entity of inner dependencies) which shows the typical features of a World.” (Bourriaud, 2018, s. 28)
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“Bourriaud adds that forms are formed by the deviation and accidental encounter of two parallel elements until the moment of encounter, and this is connected to the materialist philosophy tradition that started with Epicurus and Lucretius. Here, of course, he emphasizes that this encounter must be permanent to create a world. “Form can be defined as a lasting encounter.” (Bourriaud, 2018, s. 29) “In a nutshell, the work prompts meetings and invites appointments, managing its temporal structure.” (Bourriaud, 2018, s. 45) The philosophical tradition that underpins relational aesthetics was defined in a noteworthy way by Louis Althusser, in one of his last writings, as the materialism of encounter or random materialism. “Althusser's expression is that the state of encounter imposed on people is the tangible symbol and the historical frame of the social status of the society.” (Bourriaud, 2018, s. 23)
Creating positive life possibilities is the starting point of relational art practices. That is why relational art practices use the present time. The attractive do-it-yourself presentation gives the participant freedom of expression and the opportunity to open their universe to the outside world. These experiences maximize artistic relations and individual communication. One of the most important examples is John Cage’s 4:33. We can define the relational artwork process as an area of socialization focused on human relations and interaction and a process that operates and proposes change. It is a living, multiplying, moving, and stimulating process. The new use of process and space creates circulation possibilities. Here the artist constructs the practice like a quarterback. While setting up the game, the artist places the attraction to the sense of curiosity, partnership, familiarity and transfers his dominance over the work to the participant. “Instead of constructing the world on a conventional and preconceived idea of historical evolution, it is better to learn how to live in the world. The role of artwork is no longer to form imaginary and Utopian realities but, whatever the scale is
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chosen by the artist, to construct the ways of living and models of behavior within the existing realities. Althusser said that one always catches the world’s train on the move; Deleuze, that “the grass grows from the middle” and not from the bottom or the top. The artist's goal dwells in the circumstances of the present time, transforms life to an eternal universe by his relation to the conceptual world.” (Bourriaud, 2018, s. 20)
The early relational aesthetics collaborations include Joseph Beuys’ lectures on politics, aesthetics, social relations, artistic talks, Allen Rupersberg’s Café run with Gordon Matta and Clark, the hotel run by Alighiero Boetti in 1971, Martha Rosler’s sales completed in a garage. Since the 1990s, Rirkrit Travania, one of the most significant relational aesthetic artists, has successively established many models for human communication in the context of art. He founded Community Cinema for a Quiet Intersection at his home at East village of Gavin Brown Gallery, built the kitchen, bathroom, bedroom of his home out of wood, and the audience lived, cooked, and entertained in this 24-hour home. 1990 Untitled Pad Thai constitutes cooking Thai food and sharing it with the participants, which the artist continues to develop and exhibit today. In the 2000s, Carsten Höller, in her group project “The Baudouin Experiment”, kept 200 people 24 hours a day in a fully furnished room without a cell phone, television, radio or any other means of communication. Since the event was not videotaped, the participants learned how they felt only after everyone told each other what was on their minds. In 2002, Jeremy Deller re-enacted the 1984 miners’ strike in England with a similar method in his project The Battle of Orgreave. (Atakan, 2008, s. 136)
“The main aim of the methods of Trivanija is “ the formal construction of space and time that do not represent alienation and does not extend the division of labor into
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forms. The exhibition is defined as a time interval, leaving out the alienation reigning everywhere else.” (Bourriaud, 2018, s. 128)
“It was all about the layers of ‘likeliness and ‘otherness’. Rirkrit Tiravanijia describes that the leading ideas of transforming the art gallery office into a kitchen and serving food to the visitors came to his mind during the construction process of the exhibition (Untitled) in New York in 1992.” “The artist’s demeanor was simple yet at the same time transformative; it had removed the untouchable mysticism of the traditional display concept in one stroke and replaced it with an enjoyable participant experience.” (Wilson, 2015, s. 356) “In the words of the critic Jerry Saltz, the artist had turned into a ‘healer (shaman) who transformed his art into shamanic base into feeding, healing, and sharing’. Untitled 1992 (Free) was not a work to be skipped over; It created an environment that allowed the participants to establish new and active relationships and to interact with each other in the center of physical emotional and mental existence.” (Wilson, 2015, s. 356)
Rirkrit Tiravanija “Cooking and Drawing” ART BASEL 2011
Note.https://www.google.com.tr/search?q=rirkrit+travania+cooking+and+drawing&ie=UTF- 8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en-tr&client=safari#imgrc=OqHi4GHesskKVM reached on June.18.2020
Figure 101.
Rirkrit Tiravanija “Cooking and Drawing” ART BASEL 2011
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Rirkrit Tiravania, born in 1961 in Buenos Aires, exhibits projects that integrate with the relational aesthetics theory of Nicholas Bourriaud. The artist aims to try to incorporate art into life. In this context, “Cooking and Drawing” 2011, which he exhibited at Art Basel, is one of the best examples of relational art. These art exhibitions are interactive events that increase interaction between participants and strengthen social bonds. “Relational aesthetic artists try to produce new human relations by using common experiences instead of producing individual aesthetic thought objects.” (Melik, 2015, s. 14) Relational art characterizes the work of artists that precedes the idea that the audience should complete the artwork. Participants and their ideas can transform the work during the process. Here Bourriaud sees a political tendency, cooking together, taking home a piece of art, working with local communities, cooperation, and communication activities, for Bourriaud strengthens the ties that the market economy has weakened by emphasizing consumption and individuality.
Note.https://www.google.com.tr/search?q=rirkrit+travania+cooking+and+drawing&ie=UTF- 8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en-tr&client=safari#imgrc=OqHi4GHesskKVM reached on June 19.2020
Figure 102.
Rirkrit Travanija, Cooking and Drawing” ART BASEL 2011
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Travanija joined Art Basel in 2011 as the artist of a South Asian 100 Tonson Gallery, with his project “Cooking and Drawing”. On the one hand, he cooked and served Thai cuisine for those who wanted to participate, and on the other hand, he organized an event related to the subject he determined, which opened up a space for the participants to paint murals. Travanija has been carrying some pieces such as backpacks, kitchen tools, and camping equipment as part of the event since 1990. Artist is interested in bringing people together. The Thai-American artist, emphasizing his national identity, has primarily used a mixture of peanuts, hot peppers, tamarind, and fried rice noodles in his exhibitions, which was created as a result of the desire to create Thai food as an extension of the democratic policy that began to sprout in post-war Thailand. In addition, Travanijia also uses the Beuysian ritual of placing the materials used throughout the exhibition in a steel and glass box. He even takes ceramics lessons to produce ceramic bowls to serve the participants during the exhibition. The artist uses his art to build awareness in participants.
Thomas Hirschhorn
The artist Thomas Hirschhorn who lives in Paris aims to open spaces, to site paradoxes in his installations. In her book, Artificial Hells, the Art historian Claire Bishop, says that “Hirschhorn’s gallery-based installations juxtapose horrific images of violence with high culture and philosophy, and throb with social pessimism and anger, his public projects juxtapose different social classes, races, and ages with a fearless defense of art and philosophy.” (Bishop C. , 2018, s. 284)
He used car tires as they are well-known and multi-functional material in his installation Flamme Eternelle in Palais de Tokyo museum in Paris in 2014.
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He built rooms and spaces with car tires and placed an unending fire in the middle of the gallery throughout the entire exhibition. Different spaces such as the agora, the library, the bar, and the thinking areas create sections where the participants can be alone by themselves, and areas where discussions can be made, ideas can be shared, and friendships can be established. The artist aims to bring individuals and groups together, encourage the participants to think, and develop more conscious awareness by spending time by themselves. The artist especially takes a stance against retrospective exhibitions and states that he is focused on the present time and the production of new ideas and creating a more robust social bond.
Note.https://www.palaisdetokyo.com/en/event/flamme-eternelle reached on Dec.11.2020
Hirshhorn was always present in the exhibition space, which he created as a temporary studio to be with the participants. The authentic, public space he created in the museum was open to all art lovers. There was an area created as a welcome center for intellectuals to discuss issues, and there was also a bar where everyone can take a breath.
Today, it is necessary to ensure that the interdisciplinary projects, with what Bishop calls the double final, both social and artistic, can be strong and prosperous by questioning, testing, and correcting the applied criteria. In order to achieve this, such
Figure 103.
Thomas Hischhorn, Flamme Eternelle, Palais de Tokyo, 2011
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projects should be followed carefully, and new criteria, languages, and terms should be produced and created in order to ensure their explanation.
Guerilla Girls; Complaint Department, TATE 2016
Guerrilla Girls is an anonymous expert artist group founded in 1985. The name of the group came from the masks they always wear. They prefer to be called by women artists who have made fame in art history. The group aim is to fight discrimination and corruption that has been created, especially in the art world. They act and oppose every subject, such as politics, the film industry, war, with posters, billboards, stickers, books, and even accurate data obtained. They call themselves the art World conscience, saying that if the history of art does not encompass the whole culture, then only the privileged, the powerful, and the wealthy impose their history on us. In particular, they try to raise awareness with 80 posters and projects against sexism and racism against women in the art world. Using humor especially in their posters, they argue that female artists can be funny and feminists can be fun. Although the Guerrilla Girls are an activist and protester group that performs their art with street art, their work is exhibited at MOMA and TATE Modern. They have revealed that the museums mostly hold exhibitions for white male artists with the data they have collected from the museums, and they have tried to draw the attention of both museum directors, curators, and art collectors to this problem.
The work carried out by Guerrilla Girls at TATE in 2016 consists of creating a platform that invites individuals and companies to complain. If you have a complaint about art, culture, politics, environment, and, it is an invitation to express it. In this respect, it is an example of relational art. The “Complaint Department” is an excellent example of an artwork that increases the interaction between the participants and leads to new ideas from common experiences.
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Artists should stop making art for just one percent and start making some art for the rest of us. Interview Magazine
How can you tell the story of a culture when you don’t include all the voices within the culture?
Kahlo, NY Times (How can you really tell the story of a culture when you don't include all the voices within the culture?
Kahlo, NY Times)
Figure 104.
Guerilla Girls, Complaint Department 2016, TATE Museum, London,England
Note.https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-modern/tate-exchange/workshop/complaints-department reached on October.20.20
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Jennifer Allora and Guillermo Caldazilla, “Chalk” 1998-…
Note.https://publicdelivery.org/allora-calzadilla-chalk/ reached on November13, 2020
“Art is the product of a social life.” (Ersoy, 2016:40)
Figure 106.
Jennifer Allora & Guellimo Calzadilla, “Chalk”, Los Caudillos Meydanı, 2016
Note.https://publicdelivery.org/allora-calzadilla-chalk/ reached on November.13.2020
Figure 105.
Jennifer Allora, Guellimo Calzadilla, “Chalk”, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis,2019
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“Public artworks not only benefit the wider reach of participants, but also “require event organizers to engage with politicians, urban planners, and other city officials for necessary permits.” (Atakan, 2008, s. 140)
Today, it is necessary to ensure that the interdisciplinary projects, with what Bishop calls the double final, both social and artistic, can be strong and prosperous by questioning, testing, and correcting the applied criteria. In order to achieve this, such projects should be followed carefully, and new criteria, languages, and terms should be produced and created in order to ensure their explanation.
3.2.6 Media Art
“The Worldwide Web, which opened in the early 1990s, heralded a new era, pioneered the breakthrough of computers and global networks, symbolizing the emergence of a unipolar world after the recently collapsed Soviet bloc. As a thriving network, the internet has become a space where brand new categories are imagined in community, interaction, and creativity, in which research and experimentation can be done.” (Melik, 2015, s. 12) The Art critic Marcus Graf, in his article Bütünden Parçacılığa argues that the rapidly changing, globalizing and dynamic visual culture, with ever-increasing momentum, the computer, www and media, digital technology, and interactive networks, which are the guiding forces of social and artistic change. He states that today, at the beginning of the 4th Industrial Revolution, with smartphones, watches, tablets, laptop computers, and artificial intelligence software, perceptions and fiction about reality have changed drastically. (Yılmaz N. A., 2020, s. 477)
Thanks to the approach of Internet Art artists, digital art, also called Web Art, is used as an art tool. The fact that internet technology has become cheaper, easier to reach, and more accessible encouraged the increased the artists. By using this technology,
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participation has become unlimited as well as accessibile. “The main feature of media art is that it examines technology itself and appears in daily life.” (Melik, 2015, p. 12) Pasting multiple objects one after another and turning them into a completely different work reminds us of dada collages. The most remarkable difference is that it allows participants from different countries to be included in the project by using internet technology, and it also reaches millions at the same time. Internet Art challenges traditional values about what a work should look like, and examines the distinction between artist and audience.
Jointly launched by Johannes Gees and CALC Collective, the website-based work “Communimage” continues to offer space for joint creativity since 1999. This project is an online project that invites participants to publish their own images and then connects them to form a visual mosaic whole.” (Melik, 2015, p. 12) The Communimage project has been continuing since 1999; 2329 people from 93 countries participated.
With 26,582 images, print size of 15.097x10.984: 165.825.448 m2 was created.
The data received is as of 09:25 on 16.06.2020.
This online project, which strengthens the sense of belonging to a community and provides an equal visual loading area for everyone and a written expression area, is positioned with collective creation and co-authoring. Based in the city of Seville, Spain, it started under the leadership of a core group of artists working with the Gees. Today it operates independently. With a wide range of images, this collectively created map is the accurate demographic representation of the global internet community.
In continuing Participation Art as internet art, it would be appropriate to emphasize the term participation design. Components of participatory design; problem areas, related groups, the aims of these groups, and the techniques, methods, and procedures used
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while applying. It is applied in all building phases, from planning, programming, and designing to construction, maintenance, management, and obsolescence, and renewal. “Due to the development of information technologies, participation studies have also been transferred to the computer environment.” (Eczacıbaşı, 2008, s. 840)
Technology and communication regime are in demand in contemporary society. Technology has indeed taken charge of progress and identity problems. There is the concept of network at the beginning of the concepts that define the communication regime. “The concept of the network is a system that brings together the various poles, whose inputs are undefined to a certain extent, based on things that can be grasped and can help other micro-networks take action at any point in the overall network. Thus, the wholeness can expand. Achieving this wholeness simply takes place.” (Cauquelin, 2016, s. 48)
“Connecting to a network means access to the neural system, the union that acts in the form of networks, all community points.” (Cauquelin, 2016, s. 49) Being involved in an art project using new media requires knowledge of the internet. It cannot be said that participatory art complies with the principle of art for all. In addition, it does not seem possible these days to determine that it helps individual improvement. Self-expression and being a part of the whole creates awareness.
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Figure 107.
CALC Collective and Johannes Gees, Communimage, 1994. . .
Görsel Arayüz, Statistical data after March, 23, 2014
26.642 pictures, 94 countries, 2.338 participants (Melik, 2015, s. 12)
Harrell Fletcher ve Miranda July, Learning To Love You More, 2002-2009
The exhibition is created by the participants of the website “Learning to love your more”, designed by Yuri Ono, founded by artist Harrell Fletcher and Miranda July, and uploading the situations, photographs, posters, and videos they created, as well as sending real objects to the associated museum, considering the instructions given by the artists.
1. “Make a child’s outfit in an adult size.
2. Make a neighborhood field recording.
3. Make a documentary video about a small child.”
These unconventional yet creative assignments are just a few of the seventy tasks that form the backbone of Harrell Fletcher and Miranda July’s 2002-2009 interactive
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website event Learning to Love You More. The assignments Fletcher and July designed open to the public led those who considered and implemented them to register on the site and submit various “reports” documented with photographs and text.”
“Fletcher writes in his article that “These assignments, perceived as some kind of recipe, meditation practice, or the lyrics of a familiar song, were intended to guide people through their own experience.” (Wilson, 2015, s. 144)
Note.http://www.learningtoloveyoumore.com/hello/index.php, reached on November,13, 2020
The participatory element in this work emphasizes that the artist participates in the public in different roles, as a moderator, curator, trainer, collaborator.
Following the assignments published on specific dates, the participants uploaded the objects, people, video footage they made into their works of art, and then sent them to addresses such as museums, art galleries, and foundations supporting art. Fletcher and July created a book with the same name in 2007
Figure 108.
Harrell Fletcher and Miranda July “Learning to Love You More”, 2002-2009
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Figure 109.
Harrell Fletcher and Miranda July “Learning to Love You More”, 2002-2009
Note.http://www.learningtoloveyoumore.com/index.php, reached on November,13, 2020
Assignment number 63; “Make an encouraging banner”
1. Draw each letter of the sentence on a large piece of colored construction paper or big squares of fabric. One letter per piece. Draw them blocky so you can cut them out.
2. Cut them out.
3. Glue each one onto a piece of construction paper or fabric that is a contrasting color.
4. Then, glue the edges of all the pieces of paper or fabric together to make a banner.
5. Hang the banner in a place where you or someone else might need some encouragement, for example, across your bathroom. Or between two trees so
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that you and your neighbors can receive encouragement from it. Or in a gas station.
The documentation part requested that the work done in line with these instructions be photographed and uploaded to the website. Finally, it was added that this poster would be good to be kept, and it might be requested to be exhibited in a show someday. Museums accepted the project, and participants asked to send their works to the exhibition areas for the preparations. So the participants also experienced a substantial exhibition period in museums. Like MOMA, SFMOMA, FORD Foundation.
3.3. Participatory Art Practices Implied By The Writer
3.3.1. İstanbul 2010 European Capital of Culture Project, Boğaziçi University BUPERC “Sculpture Workshop and Peace Education”
The workshop was organized and conducted by Füge Demirok, the Arts and Culture Committee head, Peace Education Application and Research Center, Boğaziçi University.The Project was a part of the “Cultural River Istanbul” Boğaziçi University project, within the Istanbul 2010 European Capital of Culture events. The workshop was organized as a 10-week program at Boğaziçi University Red Hall during the Fall semester of 2010. The daily program had two parts, the first was about peace education and self-awareness and the second part, constructing a sculpture named “Unity”.
Arts critic Claire Bishop states that “The entire act of planning and carrying out events, seminars and discussions (and the alternative institutions that may arise as a result) can
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be viewed as artistic outcomes, just as the production of abstract objects, performances and projects.” (Bishop C. , 2018, s. 263)
At Boğaziçi University, Peace Education Application and Research Center, many projects were prepared and registered to Istanbul European Capital of Culture Agency 2010, under the title "Istanbul Culture River".
The writer, as the manager and coordinator of the sculpture and peace education project “Unity” planned the meetings every Tuesday from 14:00 to 16:00 during the Fall semester of 2010. The workshop took place in the Red Hall, South campus, where the iron-wired basic construction of the sculpture and the materials stay all the time. Announcements were made to the university's different departments for the participants to gather on the first day.
Workshop; Participants, students from different faculties and Dept. B.U.
Concepts such as pain and suffering, the term other, human rights, conflict resolution, acceptance, love, compassion, started by BEUAM member lecturers by saying, who is the other, where did you feel the other, do you have such an experience, which are made more meaningful by folding over each other at each stage. It is a work in which the participants share their experiences at the end of the time allocated for each information transfer, and the remaining time spent on the construction of the sculpture we call "Unity," and during the construction of the work, they share their own experiences, which reminds the concept and concept discussed that day.
Bogazici University BUPERC chair, Prof. Dr. Fatoş Erman, Vice Chair Nur Bekata Mardin, Member lecturers Aylin Vartanyan Dilaver, Dr. Hayal Köksal, Dr. Gamze Gazioğlu, Jennifer Sertel, and head of philosophy department Prof. Dr. Stephen Voss provided support with 20-30 minutes of information each week on the layers of peace education and self-awareness.
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The workshop ended in December 2010, by the end of the Fall semester. The concept of “Unity” embodied on the sculpture was the end of the process.
Figure 110.
Boğaziçi University, BUPERC sculpture workshop, Fall Term 2010
The study aims to acquire self-awareness and peace education on conflict resolution.
The study ended with the awareness that what we call the "Other" is ourselves and that conflicts are problems related to our inability to realize our multiple identities. Participants, who came from different regions of Turkey (18-22) at different ages and received education in various departments of the university, verbally expressed in the last lesson that they experienced the feeling of unity towards the end of the workshop, which they started without knowing each other.
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Figure 111.
Boğaziçi University, BUPERC sculpture workshop the last meeting
December 2010, In the last session, Boğaziçi University, Head of Philosophy Department Prof. Stephen Voss, described the different phases of love and compassion, starting his speech from St. Augustine, Ibn-i Arabi, and Mawlana opened an experiential space where the participants shared their experiences and thoughts on the subject by emphasizing the destructive and constructive sides of love.
3.3.2. Taksim Gaziosmanpaşa Education and Research Hospital 2017
In the participatory art study conducted with patients with neurological disorders, it was observed that art improves the quality of time spent in the hospital and reduces anxiety. Especially compassion fatigue and Beck depression test results, valuable data supporting our observations were obtained. These tests are the first test results obtained by medical doctors during an art workshop held by an artist and volunteers for the patients with neurological disorders in Turkey.
When starting this project, sculpture students Tuğçe Özgen, Zeynep İnal, and Esra Öztürk, who have been coming to study sculpture on weekends more than four years, stated that they would like to participate voluntarily. A meeting was organized about questions that come to mind such as the working hours of the group, attending the sessions that will be held every week, in rotation. Donations solve the financing
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required for the materials. Material; Mud from Hasan Usta Anadolu Hisarı, thin MDF plates in 20x20 size from the carpenter, small size nylon bags, large size garbage bags, scissors, paper cups, paper plates, and beginner level sculpture tools and a few small polyester inspiring sculptures.
Figure 112.
Taksim Gaziosmanpaşa Research and Education Hospital, July, 2017
Figure 113.
Dried, hardened, colored clay figure
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In the meeting with Taksim Gaziosmanpaşa Training and Research Hospital, the Physiotherapy Department administrative officer, Prof. Dr. Belgin Erhan, and the hospital's Chief Physician, the artist got permission to have a pilot study. The empty room is examined, and the needs are detailed. A cupboard and a long table or two would have been enough. At the room exit, there was a sink that patients with neurological disorders could easily use. The day we started working, the cupboard and two long tables were placed. Zeynep İnal, Tuğçe Özgen and Esra Öztürk voluntarily participated in this study on a rotating basis. Esra Öztürk was a lecturer at Gebze Technical University, Faculty of Architecture, who taught Photography in Architecture, MİM 226.
She suggested taking photographs of the patients during the creative process and exhibiting them by the end of the workshop. In the exhibition that opened in September 2017, the images were prepared by Esra Öztürk and presented with 30x30cm photo blocks accompanied by the three-dimensional dried and painted mud works of the participants. In this study, the patients' compassion fatigue and energies were measured beside the Beck depression test measuring depression. According to the results obtained, it was found that even with these pilot sessions, which can be considered a short period for gaining scientific data, a visible positive change occurred in the patients. This study shows us how the creative process has positive effects on individuals.
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Figure 114.
Sculpture and Photography Exhibition, Poster 2017
Although patients with neurological disorders who receive physical therapy sessions during the recovery process under the supervision of a medical doctor have long-term depression due to post-traumatic stress and the effect of the disease, an increase in energy, decrease in compassion fatigue test measurements show that art workshops are effective help in patients healing process even in a short time.
It is necessary to support the studies concerning arts with longer-term, systematic, and minimum of three-month series, including repeating the tests and comparing the new results with the control groups to reach healthier scientific data. Detailed studies are needed in the future. The table showing the test data received can be found on page 175 of the 2nd chapter, which also includes current research.
3.3.3. A Participatory Art Practice, EKAV Arts Gallery,2020
Ebru Ceylan, “An Eternal Moment” Photography Exhibition,
Music: Hans Zimmer, Time, Inception
Participatory Arts Practice: Mindful Walking, Body Awareness Meditation, drawing and poem writing creative session
The artist undertook the role of mediator and coordinator in this event.
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Figure 115.
EKAV Arts Gallery, Mindful Walking Meditation, 20.02.2020
Materials: Colored pencils and pens, paper, five meters white cloth, a table, twenty chairs
Purpose: To provide cooperation and collaboration between the participants, to establish a connection, to create a free space for participants to explore their thoughts about the theme Winter,
The poem, which was written there at that moment on the theme of winter, was written on a 500x100cm white cloth with two or four-line additions by twenty participants and completed with drawings. The work is in the EKAV art gallery archive.
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Figure 116.
EKAV Arts Gallery, (The Writers Collection)
Figure 117.
EKAV Arts Gallery Invitation Poster (EKAV Arts Gallery Archive)
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CONCLUSION
Since the beginning of human history, art and creativity have been practiced with different disciplines in the daily lives of civilizations to portray experiences, overcome the fear of nature, reach the divine, and add meaning to life in general. It has taken its place as an inseparable part of rituals. As there are several artistic developments in the processes of social change, the pioneering, motivating and activist attitude of art can be easily observed in the historical process as a part of the restructuring.
In her book Görsel Sanatlarda Anlam ve Algı, Prof. Güler Ertan says that perception transforms senses and stimuli from the environment into a meaningful experience in mind. During the creative process, aesthetic perception, a sense of competence, an increase in self-confidence, as well as problem solving skills develop. Physiological, psychological and mental positive change occur. The creative process is for the general welfare of the individual, society, and the environment and the harmony between soul, body, and mind. Arts with various disciplines applied for preventive medicine, healing during the convalescence period, and treatment process in healthcare systems
“Art expands the psychological boundaries, has spiritual, physical and psychological benefits, enables different centers of the brain to work at the same time, creates a bridge between the conscious and subconscious, increases awareness, it is social, emphasizes cultural differences, takes part in rituals and cultural formation, carries the traces of social change.” (Demirok, 2017, s. 6)
The second chapter of the thesis has investigated the intersection of arts and medicine throughout the historical process. The research is scanned on the psychological, physiological, and mental benefits of arts on health and placed into the work with selected examples. It has proven that the creative process in arts is beneficial for individuals having disabilities and the benefits of the general well-being of people.
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The fourth part of the second chapter illuminates that according to the results of the comparative research of the Nuremberg Museum and Erlangen University, conducted with healthy, twenty-eight newly retired individuals, the visual arts production group developed the functional connection between the prefrontal cortex and the parietal cortex at the end of the ten-week study detected with fMRI images. No improvement was observed in the cognitive art evaluation group as in the art production group, in terms of evaluative acceptance of the artwork as an aesthetic experience in which the parietal regions of the brain are associated with visuospatial exploration and attention. It is indicated in the results of the research that the prefrontal cortex, the functions are planning, memory organization, self-control, decision making, judgment, problem-solving, creativity, and courage, functionally linked with the parietal cortex, which is the interpreter of the sensory world around the body, increases psychological resilience. (Table 3, p.168)
“Psychological resilience gives individuals the strength to endure and struggle in the face of difficulties. Those who have this power can recover more quickly from the traumatic events they have experienced and can continue their lives. They can even transform the stress experienced into a beneficial situation. It is an innate feature in some individuals. Studies have revealed that psychological resilience is a condition that can be built-in, though the ratio can change over time. The individuals can become psychologically stronger or lose their resiliency according to the traumatic or pleasurable experiences.”
(KAVİ & KARAKALE, 2018) (Kavi., Karakale)
Table 1 on page 166 shows that patients with chronic disease and disabled persons benefit from arts with various disciplines as much as healthy individuals and society. There are different kinds of difficulties the patients face during treatments. Especially
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cancer patients experience pain, insomnia, loss of social roles, fear of the future, decrease in self-confidence, activity restriction, and changing social relationships. Creativity and arts are beneficial for those patients such as reducing time-related to the disease by focusing on positive life experiences, improving their self-worth and identity as they provide opportunities for continuity, success, and challenge, developing a social identity that resists being defined by cancer, and expressing their feelings with symbols during chemotherapy. In the light of these findings, it is a fact that art production and active participation increase individual healing and social communication skills.
The third chapter investigates the history of participatory art, especially the artists who prioritize the healing aspect of art in their works, installations, and social community, and participatory art practices. Participatory art, one of the contemporary art genres, puts the participant in the foreground. It is one of the self-liberation practices of creative art. Almost all authority is transferred to the participant in this process, and the work produced is under the participant's responsibility. In the creative process, the artist manipulates the sensory encounter of the participants and connects them with their emotions, thus facilitating the association of their work with the message they want to convey, the participant's active involvement generates creativity.
In participatory arts, a substantial audience and presentation relationships lie in which interdisciplinary formations can be used such as ready space, sound, music, scent, visual art, and stage art. Some of them are intangible, nonphysical experiences. In any case, physical participation is the prerequisite. Everyone partakes for the same purpose in the process at the same time. The nature of the art practice does not allow correction or revision. In addition, it includes the impossibility of repetition. One of the essential characters of participatory art, perhaps most importantly, is the desire to be actively a
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part of a larger whole. The main force behind it is the colleborative care attributed to meaning and the restoration and strengthening of the social bond.
Participatory art includes perceived crisis and collective responsibilities in society. Thus, it restores the social bond through the collective care given to meaning. “The part that embraces collective creativity and relinquishes authority is constructive and ameliorative.” (Bishop C. , Participation, 2006, p. 11)
In this thesis, the primary purpose was to research individual healing tendencies in participatory art practices, as active participation and complex environment positively affect new brain cells, develop learning skills, improve communication skills, and enlarge a sense of unity and acceptance. The thesis also covers the research and implementations of the author between the years 2010-2021. These implementations, the results, and evaluations, accomplished with volunteers and participants displayed in different institutions such as hospitals, universities, art galleries, and foundations. Promoting participatory art practices enhances healthcare and welfare. Furthermore, supporting the certificate programs in arts and medicine would be beneficial for future artists in creating a new working area.
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