The Act of Painting as Synchronicity—No

—No Beginning, No End

Jung maintained that the collective unconscious, or the archetypal layer of the unconscious (two terms for the same phenomenon), is involved in synchronistic events. Archetypes are neither physical nor mental but part of both domains, and they are therefore able to mani-fest themselves simultaneously both physically and mentally. Arche-types manifest themselves in physical events and in states of mind at the same time. Jung was influenced by the idea, from German phi-losopher Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860), of simultaneous events that are causally unconnected. Synchronicity is based on a universal order of meaning that is complementary to causality (Jung 1983, 26).

In 1950 Parker Tyler (1999, 67) stated that the paradox of Pollock’s labyrinth paintings is found in the condition of an artist being in the endless nonbeing of the universe. I surmise that Pollock’s tendency to create painting with no beginning and no end is consistent with a principle of Chinese science—that events are not to be understood through the concept of causality but, instead, on the concept of the simultaneity of events, which Jung referred to as synchronicity. The principle of causality does not explain the psychology of unconscious processes ( Jung 1966, 53–58). Synchronicity, on the other hand, describes the link between two events that are connected—but for which the linking cause and effect cannot be explained. Things hap-pen together somehow and behave as if they are the same, and yet they are not (Jung 1968, 36). When the Eastern mind looks at facts, one accepts the situation being described as it is, but the Western mind divides it into entities, small quantities (Jung 1968, 76–77). In other words, to the Eastern way of thinking, whatever is born or done in this particular moment of time has the quality of this moment of time (Jung 1966, 53–58).

In contrast, Aniela Jaffe (1964, 264–67) proposed that Pollock painted in a trance, and she said that his technique was parallel to what the alchemists called prima materia, or chaos. She explained that pure abstraction has become an image of nature. Jaffe wrote that according to Jungian theories, when the unconscious is unbalanced by the experience of consciousness, abstract art offers a refuge from the evil and ugliness of the world. In such a case, the artist becomes the passive victim of his or her unconscious.

In his book What Painting Is: How to Think about Oil Painting, Using the Language of Alchemy, James Elkins (1999, 5, 68–72) explained that the puzzle and the spirit of the alchemical and artistic experiment was to create a golden creature from the brown-mud lump of clay.

For the alchemists, the cloudy object was the First Substance, mate-ria prima; another name for it was fetid earth. The matemate-ria prima is brilliantly beautiful to the person who can understand it. In the same

manner, an artistic creation begins in a particular medium, and it is the artist’s task to discern what is worthy of saving and what can be transformed, until she is finally allowed to crawl out of the mud—the creative difficulty.

Elkins speaks of how artists love the paint itself, and they can be very entranced by it. In the finished paintings, marks are telling records of the painter’s body and thus, by way of that body, powerful representations of the painter’s feelings and moods. Paint itself elicits the thought of motion, and, by suggesting motion, it implies emotions and other wordless experiences. Paint reacts to every unnoticed move-ment of the painter’s hand, fixing the faintest shadow of a thought in color and texture (Elkins 1999, 192–93).

Elizabeth Frank’s (1983, 79) explanation supports my belief that Pollock’s painting process is consistent with Asian ideas. From the footage of Pollock painting, she understood Pollock’s movements to be “untrancelike, unrehearsed and unroutinized.” His graceful move-ments were intentional, immediate, direct, intuitive, and spontaneous.

I believe that in the act of painting, Pollock was in touch with his collective unconscious, and that his painting can be likened to a syn-chronicitous event.

While making art, a person cannot be distracted by the senses or by a disturbed mind. Instead, an artist becomes a fundamental or absolute subject, and a self without form quiets the noise (Hisamatsu 1971, 72). Shini’chi Hisamatsu (1971, 45–46) explained that Zen is the Self-Awareness of the Formless Self, and there is no form of any kind, either physical or mental. Implicit in this statement is that a mind has no form. The mind is focused on the moment and enters into a sense of oneness with the painting materials (Westgeest 1996, 17). Zen consists of joining self and life to such a degree of unity and rhythm that the distinction between the two—self and other—is forgotten. Self goes with the stream and becomes one with it (Watts 1982, 121). Enjoying absolute freedom means that while painting, an artist is not conscious of being him- or herself (Suzuki 1971, 45).

To an artist to be able to reach this freedom Brinker (1987, 6–7) wrote that a brutal injunction to kill is designed to kill desire, to switch off thought, to empty the spirit, thereby setting the scene for the experience of enlightenment. Satori is a sudden experience, described as a “turning over” of the mind (Watts 1982, 65). While in the art-making act, an Eastern artist is aware of the space around him or her—unlike Western painters, who are aware of the space in front of them. Self is situated in the indefinite space (Westgeest 1996, 20).

This discussion is similar to Pollock’s explanation of why he painted on the floor—in contradiction to Elkins’s belief that by doing so, Pol-lock was rebelling against academic painting. “He had to bend over, sometimes so far that he had to put his hand down to steady himself ” (Elkins 1999, 89–91).

In his foreword to Daizet Teitaro Suzuki’s (2004, ix–xix) book, originally published in 1934, Jung described satori as an unexpected natural experience, which happens in a condition of non-ego-like self when the self is no longer experienced or active in the ego. Satori happens in immaterial spiritual reality, in one’s imagination. More-over, Suzuki (2004, 62–63) wrote that the satori experience cannot be explained intellectually nor can it be taught. Satori is an inner percep-tion toward the self. Suzuki (2004, 64–68) continued, saying that one can open his or her mind to satori by taking on a new point of view while looking at things. Thus, no special meditation is needed. When one experiences satori, there is a sudden flash, and a new truth can be experienced. All forms of mental activity have to be removed; then a new awakening will review the old thoughts, and satori can occur.

Zen thinking and satori require absolute freedom, even freedom from any God. Such Zen thinking can be an everyday state of mind.

I have experienced that the connection between flow and the impact of the medium is surprisingly similar. Csikszentmihalyi (1988, 177–78) wrote that in the flow experience, a person has clear goals and the control to limit disruptive stimuli. However, the sense of control is irrelevant, because a person loses him- or herself and feels

harmoni-ous. Alan W. Watts (1982, 52–60) noted that one should concentrate the attention in flow, to lose oneself and external reality. In experi-ences such as listening to concert music, one should not think. The contact between an event and the mind’s response should not be bro-ken by discursive thinking. To give up everything is to gain all.

Milner (1986, 68–79) continued this line of thought by asserting that when this happens, a person’s awareness widens, and one is feel-ing what one sees, as well as thinkfeel-ing what one sees. When listenfeel-ing to music, the self is pulled out of a person, allowing the person to get closer to the music. Now hearing and sight and sense of space are all fused into one whole. For example, Milner (1986, 105–7) explained that while observing something, a narrow attention serves personal desires, and a person attends automatically to whatever is interesting.

In contrast to this condition, wide attention happens when desires are held in leash. In this state of mind, because a person wants nothing, there is no need to select one item to look at rather than another; it becomes possible to look at the whole all at once—to attend to some-thing and yet want nosome-thing from it. Magic happens when a person gains the ability to give wide attention.

Creative activity is a path for reconnecting to a spiritual source. At the moment of creation, artists experience joy, and thus, they experi-ence something greater than themselves. Joy is the predominant mood whenever something new is brought into being and accompanies a feeling of intuition in the Tao experience. It can happen, for exam-ple, when visiting in a cathedral or hiking in nature (Bolen 1979, 81, 92). As noted above, Jung explained that the East bases much of its science on irregularity and considers synchronicity, rather than cau-sality, to be a more reliable foundational principle of the world. In Chinese science, treatises focus on the possible changes of life (Jung 1984b, 44–45). The I Ching, or Book of Changes illuminates the main branches of Chinese philosophy, Taoism and Confucianism. The Tao emphasizes the idea of change and refers to a positive and even joyous attitude toward life (Jacobi 1964, 290; Wilhelm 1978, lv).

As noted above, Pollock was not in favor of accidents in the paint-ing process, and he wanted to have total control while paintpaint-ing. This attitude can be related to Zen ideas and also to the Freudian concept that there is no such thing as an accident (Frank 1983, 111). Capon (1973, 7) wrote that Pollock’s artwork was very much in control:

Contrasts can be achieved between shapes, thickness and texture of the paint, and intensity of color. Colors can be overlapped or superim-posed; several layers of paint in one area might contrast with a wash of paint in another area. One can make brushstrokes of various widths and lengths. In the example, the white areas are just as important to the total effect as the colored shapes around them. Very little of this type of work is achieved by accident; the artist is very much in control. He must be self-critical and exactly conscious of what he is doing. Every brushstroke creates a new picture. It is very often a good idea to have, or develop, a basic theme at the back of one’s mind.

I maintain that Zen principles are similar to Pollock’s act of paint-ing. For example, Daisetz Teitaro Suzuki (1971, 29) explained that mind (kokoro) is not attainable or graspable; mind is no-mind, it does not have a subjective state, and it is somehow like an airy nothing.

Furthermore, he advised that a person might encountering two issues while studying Zen: First, he or she might experience seeking for the donkey while riding on it, and second, once on it, neglect to get off it because of self-satisfaction. The main thing is not to ride on a donkey but to realize that you and the whole universe are the donkey itself (Suzuki 1971, 33–34).

Moreover, Suzuki explained that to reach the spirit, the intellect must, for a while, be denied. When the spirit is reached, the intellect works through it, and in this way life becomes purposeless and at the same time purposeful (Suzuki 1946, 93). According to Suzuki (1946, 82–83), “Being spiritually conscious is therefore more than contem-plation, though consciousness itself suggests a form of dualism. But spiritual consciousness implies that there is neither one to be conscious

nor the fact of which the mind is conscious. To be conscious yet not conscious of anything at all is true spiritual consciousness. Here the object and the mind are one, and from the oneness arises the world of multiplicity. . . . The greatness of the world comes from our own great-ness, and all about us acquires its greatness only from ourselves.”

Additionally a noble self-discipline is expressed in Zen art (Hisa-matsu 1971, 57). During meditation, the concentration centers on the awareness of now. Everything in life should be done with this focus on the here and now (Westgeest 1996, 22). One goal in Zen art is for an individual to gain control of his or her own mind (Awakawa 1970, 19). A related belief is that of the Native American, who believes that 80 percent of all cures must first take place in the mind of the patient (Villasenor 1966, 72). When concentrating, one’s thoughts should be kept on one thing instead of dozens, and the thinker should forget time tables and rules (Milner 1986, 94). Helmut Brinker (1987, 12) wrote of the Eastern concept that people can achieve creativity by a form of discipline in which a person is required to have a firm hold on the spirit and yet not be conscious of the fact.

Moreover, Milner explained that doing can be controlled. For example, the secret of playing ping-pong is to do it with a loose and relaxed arm. In such cases, the arm seems to know what to do by itself, and the internal gesture seems to be to stand aside. She added that it is better to look forward to and enjoy the feeling of movement in your body, instead of thinking of it as a tiresome task to be avoided whenever possible (Milner 1986, 72–73). Essentially, in this discipline, it is important that one should not hate what one is doing.

In meditation, the mind is the key to life, and the essential task is to master the mind. This is done through a technique of meditation, or zazen. The aim is to release the mind from having to think about the body and banish wandering thoughts so that attention may be directed to a particular task. This meditation is similar to Indian yoga.

However, the aim in the meditation is not to reach any kind of trance, which is more common in yoga (Watts 1982, 80–81). I believe that

meditation and relaxation exercises can complement painting activ-ities. To work abstractly is to work directly from the unconscious, which is similar to meditation.