The Art of Natural Dressage

I would like to write a little about art .

Some people here said that they are not artistic......i don't believe them neither do they. It might be that they mesure themselves with other people who openly speak about their artistic talents. Well....i can asure you that everyone is an artist.
An artist in role playing, an artist in word choices, an artist in listening and interpreting, an artist in giving or taking....and so on.
Whole live is an art.....

So when we come up to horses .... we try to understand how and what. We read books, take lessons, tranings, clinics etc. To really understand you have to observe the horse in many ways. Skeletal, conformation, muscles, nervs, movement etc.........
today i revealed an important clue when it comes up in making saddles for a horse. (That's what i do). In every form of life there is a construction of the bow to find the arch. If you want to make a boat you use the elders knowledge in making it. It is a bow construction. Pick up a leaf and see.....the same basic construction. So...art is the way to see, hear, feel and discover Everyone has it.

greetings,

Stephanus

I wonder if that's something anyone can asure other people of? Personally, I think that people are just really different in the way they use big words. Maybe it has to do with setting thresholds, maybe with appreciating normalty instead of trying to make everything sound extraordinary, or maybe with something completely different? Whatever it is, as long as there is no fixed definition of art, I prefer to set my own criteria for deciding what to consider as art and what not.

Mmmh. That´s a hard one. It quickly boils down to the personal definiton of what "art" is and that´s an endless topic .

I spent quite some years of my life where I would´ve called myself an artist. Now I would rather like to come to a point where I can call myself an artisan one day. But that also depends very much on the personal definition. In English language those two terms are very closely related, stemming from the same etymological roots. In German for example the translations of those two words are worlds apart.

Of course there have always been people or groups who claimed that everybody is or can be an artist, even unwittingly. While the thoughts appeals to me, the question remains what can be gained or changed by calling myself an artist? If everybody is an artist, can I not just remove that title, like in a mathematical equation?

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Volker

The horse owes us nothing.

Some people call bullfighting art, and once I saw an 'artist' who's art piece was a real live starving dog tied down next to an artwork made out of dog kibble... The dog starved to death while masses of people watch the 'exhibition' like they would any painting or sculpture... It was in South America I believe, but I do not remember which country precisely.

What is Art, Bent branderup says the art starts as soon you reach piaffe, to me the art starts as soon as the horse starts to initiate any form of training and movement, hence the name of this forum. What is art? Art is in any case supposed to be unique as I understand it. So perhaps that encloses every ones unique view on the subject as well?

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www.equusuniversalis.com

If I may risk a personal definition of art: it´s anything that lets me as a human being feel beyond my boundaries, lets me sort of transcend into regions of human consciousness that are not easily reached otherwise. At least that´s what I like to use art for.
If I transfer that thought over to horsemanship, I think the art starts in the very first second that I interact with a horse in a way that lets me (and maybe even the horse) catch a glimpse of the possibilities that are in us. Possibilities to change me for the better.

As kitschy and lofty as this may sound, I strongly believe that horses can make me a better human .

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Volker

The horse owes us nothing.

Nothing kitschy about it, if not the very base of this forum

Art is to me what is coming from one individual's unique talent.

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www.equusuniversalis.com

I think art lies more in the eye of the beholder than in the talent of the "artist". Consequently, in my definition the artist is more the one perceiving than the one doing the art. If you know what I mean .

But here we are knee-deep in the struggle to define what art is...

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Volker

The horse owes us nothing.

"Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging items (often with symbolic significance) in a way that influences and affects one or more of the senses, emotions, and intellect. It encompasses a diverse range of human activities, creations, and modes of expression, including music, literature, film, photography, sculpture, and paintings. The meaning of art is explored in a branch of philosophy known as aesthetics, whereas disciplines such as anthropology, sociology and psychology analyze its relationship with humans and generations.

Traditionally, the term art was used to refer to any skill or mastery. This conception changed during the Romantic period, when art came to be seen as "a special faculty of the human mind to be classified with religion and science".[1] Generally, art is made with the intention of stimulating thoughts and emotions."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Art

Sounds great to me, just the word human should be let out as far as I am concerned for with this definiation, art is not only to be found amongst humans.
It also shows I still remain before the Romantic period ha ha !

Maybe we should start our own defination of Art, since that is the word our forum starts with

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www.equusuniversalis.com