Dementialism

Abuskedti

Having studied (for the most part) the evolution of art, literature, poetry, science, history an philosophy through the centuries up to now, I believe that the current of thought has brought us to Dementialism. From plain representation, art became more and more psychological. The seeking of psychology and emotions within art brought us to impressionism, expressionism, surrealism and beyond. Art slowly moved more into the absurd, through dadaism, towards total subjectivism and landing on what today is called anti-art. The common sense of reality has been challenged and found faulty many, many times. Quantum mechanics, relativity and chaos theory have left many scientists struggling to understand what science really was. Philosophy died..... twice. Through the 19th century, idealism reached its climax and its nadir. Hegel's choking rationalism was surpassed by Schopenhauer, Kierkegaard and Nietzsche. Each of which became acclaimed (slowly but steadily) for their unconstricting schemes; each of which tried to put an end to philosophy and its eternal mental struggle by attacking the initial problem of man: "What's behind it all?" During the 19th (and into the 20th century) century the answers popped up by various philosophers were all as valid as the other. Kierkegaard professed the infinite jump of faith, Schopenhauer plainly stated the existence of pain behind Maya, Nietzsche dug out from the past the Greek's cyclic movement of life and gave us what to him is the Eternal Return of everything and finally Wittgenstein killed philosophy for the first time by announcing logically that man simply wasn't capable of answering everything. Then history gave us the final blow. The second world war didn't just massacre men, it massacred our minds. "Where was God?" everyone said. Where was God in the middle of Auschwitz? How come the western human race, thought to be incredibly advanced humanistically, couldn't manage to impede what happened. Philosophy crumbled, all answers were vain, and it died. Our society quickly fell into an existential relativsm and cartesian-like skepticism. The total absence of reference points and solid life values turned our society into into a superficial working class that has become slave of what philosophers call Techne, economy, machines, scientific research, consumerism and non-stop production. Rational and irrational mixed, all answers are perfectly valid for that which we cannot comprehend. Man has always had a petpeeve, it has never been able to accept non-sense (inteded as the absence of sense). Man has the urge of giving answers to everything. As scientific laws when in reach, as supernatural and metaphysical when absurdly inconceivable for us. Mankind has to relax. It has to keep aiming for its goals, but has to do so with conscience and principled perseverance. We shouldn't feel rushed by that which we cannot understand. We should accept it for what it is and feel normal with it. We should accept its irony and its unprejudice. We should learn to accept total non-sense as a possibility. We should accept DEMENTIALISM.

Dementialism can affect all aspects of life. I believe it is the feeling of our times and that it can be an actual current of thought. As such, it is capable of taking all forms, from poetry to paintings and from philosophy to science. Dementialism can seem often absurd. The difference is that absurdity is total chaos while dementialism is a very specific non-sense. Dementialism doesn't necessarily affect the form of art, rather, it concentrates on the absurdity of the situation at hand. It should evoke in the reader/viewer the feeling of being completely lost and invite him/her to accept it as an integral part of who we are