"The great difficulty, indeed the tragedy of our modern life, lies in the fact that we differentiate between the things which concern us and things which do not concern us. We are musical or we are not; we are religious or we are not; we are concerned with economic affairs or we are not. We have our "job" and our "free time"; we drive off on our vacations and stare at the natives come to us and cannot imagine what these people are about in all their buildings....In a word, we have lost the unity of life."
Primitive man saw no distinction in the different actions he performed. It was neither work, nor dance, nor religion, but it was all life. There were not compartments in his mind of the different areas of his life. In fact, the dance itself embodied this unity. It was dancing that brought the community together, dances that brought them closer to the sacred. Vondel writes:
"As air through many organ-pipes is guided,
One spirit is to many toungues divided,
In equal time through field of equal sound,
Where Church and God together dance the round.
The angel hosts from heaven's height descending
Dance deeply down, our sacrifice attending,
About Christ's body on His altar-stone"
The purpose of dance is to bring unity. Even today, there is a culture around different dances. People learn the dance from videos on youtube in order to participate in the dance with their friends. More than unity though, the dance connects us with the divine. Yet, in some senses the dance has also become profane. Instead of growing up in the culture and having it become a part of the culture itself, few participate in the dance or see it as a means for connection with the divine. Rather, dancing often revolves around mindless sensuality and is viewed as purely recreational.
If this is true, is it fair to ask if dancing in this sense of sensuality is still "art," and if it is still art, is it profane art? Can there be such a thing as profane art?
Zakiya Cummings
ReplyDeleteJust because dance isn't commonly being passed down in the "tradional" community matter the ultimate purpose is still to unite and provide some connection. Whether this connection is within a structure community/culture or just to establish further connections with a friends the background theory of dance uniting people is still in play. Art will develop, change and progress over different cultures at different times this doesn't mean that this continuous cycle re-defines if dance is art. I can't answer if there is a profane art because art to one may differ to the next, but I will say that art comes in different forms.