Evening Talks with Sri Aurobindo

On Beauty

 

12-8-1926

Disciple : What is it that creates physical beauty?

Sri Aurobindo : There is a certain vital glow which is really not beauty – when it is overpowering and full of personal magnetism it is dangerous.

Disciple : Can heredity account for beauty?

Sri Aurobindo : Not much. Too much of vital glow and charm may be due even to the hostile forces and it may be dangerous.

Disciple : Does beauty belong to the vital world?

Sri Aurobindo : The true vital world is a world full of beauty and grandeur.

Disciple : Is not beauty a part of perfection?

Sri Aurobindo : Yes, it is; but beauty and perfection do not always go together in life.

Disciple : Is not beauty psychic in its origin?

Sri Aurobindo : The psychic element gives only a certain charm to the form, not what people ordinarily call beauty. There is a vital and a physical element in beauty and even in these there is an "inner" beauty, a certain charm, a flame in the object.

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Disciple : It is said that Sri Ramakrishna's body had a glow which he used to hide from men by covering his body. Can one say it was inner beauty?

Sri Aurobindo : It may be the light of the Spirit; that is not beauty. There are many people who are not spiritual but are beautiful and some spiritual men are not beautiful.

Disciple : What is meant by saying that the Supreme is the True, the Good and the Beautiful '' satyam-śivam-sundaram”?    

Sri Aurobindo : That is a different thing. The "True" can be the mental form of the Supreme Truth, the "Good" has a relation to morality. Whereas ''Beauty" is different with different men, there is no one standard of beauty. There are certain things, however, which all people consider beautiful; for instance, the rose.

Disciple : What did Christ look like? Were the Rishis beautiful?                

Sri Aurobindo : None can say, because there is no record.

Disciple : On what does the creation of beauty depend?

Sri Aurobindo : True beauty is a creation from the Ananda plane.

Disciple : But some people say there is beauty in everything.

Sri Aurobindo : Yes. There is a Stage in which everything has its beauty. For a perfect creation of beauty three elements are needed :

1. The fundamental element of beauty which is present in everything.

2. The pervading quality or Guna.

3. The expression or form.

Where these three are in agreement then there is the perfect expression of the Ananda.

Disciple : What is the utility of aesthetic refinement in spiritual development?

Sri Aurobindo : The aesthetic sense is easily purified and can then open the path of approach to the Supreme through beauty. It is very difficult to purify a rough and gross being.

 

12-10-1942

Disciple : We have heard, and partly known, that the experience of delight is possible on the higher planes. Is it possible to experience "beauty" on these planes?

Sri Aurobindo : Beauty and delight are inalienable in the ultimate analysis, or rather in the ultimate experience on the higher planes. 

Disciple : Could experience of beauty be compatible with Shankara's conception of the Absolute?

Sri Aurobindo : In his conception experience of delight you can have, but beauty?  I don't think. There is no Laxana – the quality which is characteristic – of beauty there in the Brahman according to Shankara.  There is only the Self-existent and its Delight – white delight, if you like, but the colourful play of beauty would only be a figure in it and therefore unreal.

Disciple : Is form inseparable from the experience of beauty?

Sri Aurobindo : On the plane of matter it seems so, but it is not true on planes of consciousness above mind.  There, beauty can be formless.

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Disciple : There are people who experience deep peace but no delight in the Brahmic consciousness. 

Sri Aurobindo : In my own case the SACHCHIDANAND as Brahman comes more easily as a constant experience and ANANDA – delight – comes in to complete it, so to say, Delight is the essential Reality of existence.

Disciple : But many people are satisfied with the experience of the immobile aspect of the Brahman.

Sri Aurobindo : It depends.  If you approach the Absolute negatively – i.e. as a negation – you reach a more and more negative value.  If you take up the positive side

it leads you to a more and more positive value.

Disciple : Then why do the artists say that form is indis­pensable for art-creation?

Sri Aurobindo : We were speaking of the experience of beauty. But if you speak of art-creation then one can say that form is indispensable for that.

Disciple : Tagore agrees here that form is indispensable for the creation of beauty in art.

 Sri Aurobindo : But even there the form which gives the experience of beauty is not something apart from the Spirit. In the experience of the Brahman, the essential beauty is there without which the thing would not be beautiful.  In the experience of beauty you can perceive two distinct elements : the form and the spiritual element of beauty.  But the formal beauty is only an expression of the spiritual beauty, it is not something quite separate.  Of course, the mind can make a distinction and speak of them as two distinct things. 

Disciple : What is the connection between spirituality and art?

Sri Aurobindo : One can say that spirituality is the basis of art. Art expresses, or tries to express, the soul of things. The true soul of things is the divine element in them. Then spirituality, which is the discipline to come into conscious contact with the Divine, has a place, and a big place, in art.

In a sense spirituality is the highest art, the art of life; for, it aims at creating a life of beauty pure in line, faultless in rhythm, replete with strength, illumined with light and vibrant with delight. 

 

 24-1-1939

Sri Aurobindo went into silence for a while and when he came out he began :

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“I was thinking how some races have the sense of beauty in their very bones. Judging from what is left to us, it seems our people once had a keen sense of beauty. For example, take poetry, or Indian wood-carving, which, I am afraid, is dying now. Greece and ancient Italy had the perception of beauty. The Japanese are a re­markable people – even the poorest have got the aesthe­tic sense. If they produce ugly things, it is only for export to other countries. I am afraid the Japanese are losing that sense now because of the general vulgarisation. In Germany Hitler must have crushed all fine things out of existence – German music, philosophy, etc. How can anything develop where there is no freedom? I hope Mussolini has kept some sense of art.            

Disciple : He is very proud of Italians as a nation of artists! A friend of mine visited Italy, and found that the Italians still have a sense of beauty and art.           

Sri Aurobindo : Of music also; Art and music are their passion. The mother had a remarkable experience. She was staying in North Italy for some time and was once playing on the organ all alone in a church. After she had finished, there was a big applause. She found that a crowd had gathered and was ecstatic in appreciation.

Disciple : Indian music, especially in the South, has been preserved in the temples.

Nishta (Miss Wilson) is all praise for many Indian things. She finds great beauty in the gait of Indian women. She told me, "You won't .understand it, but I have seen our European women and I can understand it better. Indian women seem to me born dancers, they have such a fine rhythm in their walk.

Sri Aurobindo : She is quite right. I suppose it is due to their having to carry pots on their heads.   

Disciple : She also praises the coloured saris of our women and finds that the women have a sense of colour.

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Sri Aurobindo : I hope they are not giving it up under modern influence.

Disciple : Sari, though graceful. is not good enough for active work, it is inconvenient.

Sri Aurobindo : Why? The Romans conquered the world with their togas. Plenty of Indian women work with saris on. When this craze for utility – that is the modern tendency – comes, beauty dies; people now look at every­thing from the point of utility as if beauty were nothing.

Disciple : But beauty and utility can be combined, I believe. I have found at any rate, that the European dress for men gives one a push for work and activity, while the Indian dhoti gives lethargy and a sense of ease.                       

Sri Aurobindo : That does not prevent the European dress from being ugly. I have seen plenty of people leading an active life with the dhoti.

The most utilitarian dress is shorts and a shirt.

Disciple : But nowadays European ladies have made many innovations, they go about in shorts without stockings.

Sri Aurobindo : I see. At one time they used to cover the whole body except hands and face. I remember an incident in London. Bapubhai Majumdar was coming down from the bath-room in his hotel with his feet bare. A lady who came out of her room suddenly saw him. She ran to the manager and complained that the gentleman was going about half naked in the hotel! The manager called Bapubhai and told him not to do so!  Do you know this Bapubhai – He was at Baroda.

Disciple : Yes, he was seen once being stopped by police on the road for a breach of traffic rule. He gave such an eloquent lecture in English that the policeman was flabbergasted.

Sri Aurobindo : (laughing) That must be he : he was my 

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first friend in Baroda. He took me to his house and I stayed there for some time. He was a nice man, only some would say "volatile and mercurial". 

 

27-8-1926

(The other day there was a talk about the arūpa devas – Gods without form – and the rūpa devas and their planes. Sri Aurobindo explained that it was merely a mental way of dealing with those things. Beauty is not merely an abstraction of the mind. Of course, the mind can create a sort of division and think of beauty as an abstraction. It seems merely an idea without, as it were, any power behind it. But if you go to the plane above mind you find that all things that are abstractions in the mind are Powers and Realities there. There you find that beauty is a power of the Supreme.)

Disciple : I want to know what connection this power of beauty has with Vaishnavism. Bhakti begins with emo­tion. Is there a connection between Bhakti and this power of beauty?

Sri Aurobindo : How do you mean? I don't understand your question. Bhakti has not only the sense of beauty in it, there are many other elements besides.

Disciple : There is the emotional element but where or when does the element of beauty enter – at the beginning or at the end?

Sri Aurobindo : It may be at the beginning or at any other time. There is the emotional element, the element of faith, the element of love, of beauty, of ananda and so many other things.

Disciple : You said that "Beauty is a power of the Supreme". I want to have some idea of that power on the plane higher than the mental.

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Sri Aurobindo : Why on the higher plane only? Do you .think that beauty is not a power?  Do you believe that it is a mental abstraction?

Disciple : I can understand that it is a power in a certain sense on the mental, vital and physical planes. But what is it on the plane higher than the mind?  

Sri Aurobindo : Well, how can I convey an idea of it to you? Beauty is beauty everywhere and it is a power wherever it may be.

But what is your idea of beauty? What is beauty? Is it an abstraction?

Disciple : No, it is not an abstraction.

Sri Aurobindo : What is it then? When you say "There beauty in the rose," is it something apart from the rose itself? What do you mean by it?

Disciple : I mean it is a quality.

Sri Aurobindo : "Quality" is an abstract idea.

Disciple : I would say that it is not an idea but something connected with the life of the flower, something of the life-force in it.

Disciple : Whenever beauty of form is concerned, it is said that certain relations are required to be fulfilled, proportion, harmony, etc. Otherwise the form is not beautiful.

Sri Aurobindo : Well, that is not the whole of beauty. Neither is it the most essential element. You can say "That is how beauty expresses itself". But it is not the essence of beauty – lines, proportions etc. are there only as its supports, especially in the beauty of forms, not so much in other kinds of beauty. There is, for instance, beauty of emotion – of thought – of force – of Ananda etc. By observing the rules about line, proportion, rhythm, harmony etc, a man does not become an artist. Every time a new creator comes into the field of art he brings something which to others appears perhaps out of proportion. Then a time comes when people begin to see and discover new proportions and a new harmony. Even in music the same thing happens. For instance, when Wagner gave his music it sounded very unusual and, to some discordant. But at last they found harmony and rhythm and everything else. 

Similarly poetry is not some arrangement of words or ideas, it is a power which goes forth from the being of the poet.

In other religions there is a certain insistence on moral virtues, therefore they did not put the same emphasis on beauty. But in India God is the All-beautiful.

Disciple : What is the relation of Beauty and devotion (Bhakti)?

Sri Aurobindo : In the path of devotion – Bhakti Marga –  in India, God is regarded as the All-beautiful. In the case of other paths it is not so.

Disciple : There is an idea that for art limitation is necessary. There can be no art if there is no restraint and every great artist imposes his own limitations by himself.

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Sri Aurobindo : Well, it is not always true. Take the lines and forms used by art. You can say that they serve to limit the expression and there are artists who produce works of art under that kind of restraint. But it is not always so. Take, for instance, Shakespeare. At first the idea was that in his work there is no measure and har­mony.  It was considered bizarre. Then they found that it was a work of great art. In a poet like Shakespeare the movement is not towards limitation but rather expres­sion – a throwing himself out to cover everything.

And a work of art is not great unless the artist is able to express the infinite through the limitations, – unless the lines and forms are not overpassed, so to say. There must be beauty of line and form but that is only the primary basis, – the earth on which you stand, but it must go beyond and express something from within.

That is what we mean when we say that a particular work of art is "cold", though you can see that the beauty of line and form – the technique – is perfect. The work may not be sufficiently "inspired". Take Greek art : it was their aim to put as much of inner beauty as they could in a limited form and line which had set standards. In India we had quite another standard.

Disciple : What is it in beauty that gives us delight?

Sri Aurobindo : Beauty is the Divine himself in his Anand-power seeking to express himself in perfect form. That is, perhaps, the only definition that could be given. Since you are particular about it one can say that there are several elements of beauty : one is the power of Anand that seeks expression, the other is the form – or you can say, the manner in which it expresses itself.

Disciple : I suppose it is also necessary that the physical instrument should be prepared so that it can express perfect beauty.

Sri Aurobindo : Yes, the training of the physical instrument is absolutely essential because without it the work of art cannot take the perfect body.

Disciple : If we look at a man like Tagore, do you think that in a case like him also the physical instruments have to be trained, or can one say that the force which is working in such people creates its own instruments?

Sri Aurobindo : There are people who are born with their physical instrument ready. Even then a lot of training is necessary. Even if the force created its own instrument the work would be uneven – very good at times but very bad at other times.

Disciple : Tagore did a lot of work before he became established as a poet.       .

Sri Aurobindo : Shakespeare studied all the existing dramas before he wrote his own. One cannot play the violin without training.

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Disciple : Would not the Higher Power develop even the physical instrument when it comes down?

Sri Aurobindo : It is a great advantage if you can start with a good instrument.

Disciple : But how is it that when a man appreciates beauty he is not conscious of it as an expression of God?

Sri Aurobindo : There are so many things of which man is not conscious. I am not speaking of what man feels, or sees or, is conscious of. I am speaking of what is behind.

Disciple : If a poet does not know the language he cannot be a great poet,

Sri Aurobindo : Nor can he invent rhythms unless he knows prosody. In art, as in everything else, training is neces­sary; one can develop the sense of beauty consciously.

Disciple : Have not the musicians got the sense of beauty inborn in them?

Sri Aurobindo : Not all. And even if it is there, much has to be done before it expresses itself perfectly. So many elements have to be brought together and harmonised before there can be the perfect expression.

Disciple : Does not, then, the expression become forced?

Sri Aurobindo : Do you mean to say that when a poet writes his lines and then revises them and finds that certain things ought to be changed he is becoming artificial, or that his poetry becomes forced ? Not at all.

Disciple : Does the artist get his form from the vital only?

Sri Aurobindo : No. But these arts are such that they require their stand in the vital. There may be other elements in them but the vital is indispensable. In fact, the highest poetry cannot come unless through the vital. One may take the elements from the mind or emotion or other parts according to necessity.

Disciple : How far is mind a factor in the process?

Sri Aurobindo : If you mean the intellectual mind it has a very little part – though it, too, has a part. The whole

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process is very complicated. The first impulse is given by the vital and then there is communication with the higher mind – the intuitive faculty. Then something from there comes down to the heart and the artist again takes it up into the mind, and gives expression to it.

Disciple : That is to say, something from above comes down through intuition.

Sri Aurobindo : Yes, some power from above. I use the word "Intuition" in the general sense for all the faculties that act; more properly it is "Inspiration".

Disciple : In what way does the mind enter as a factor in the creation of poetry?

Sri Aurobindo : In the very highest poetry, the mind is silent; in other kinds, the mind is active but it is not the intellectual mind.

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