About being

The foundation for this philosophy is a dynamic concept of things:Being – as a constant evolution from the interaction of two contradictory opposites.Synthesis – arising from the opposition between thesis and antithesis.

A dynamic comprehension of things is also basic to the same degree, for a correct understanding of art and of all art-forms,In the realm of art this dialectic principle of dynamics is embodied in CONFLICT, as the fundamental principle for the existence of every art-work and every art-form.

For art is always conflict:

(I) according to its social mission

2) according to its nature,

(3) according to its methodology

According to its social mission because: It is art’s task to make manifest the contradictions of Being. To form equitable views by stirring up contradictions within the spectator’s mind,and to forge accurate intellectual concepts from the dynamic clash of opposing passions.According to its nature because: Its nature is a conflict between natural existence and creative tendency. Between organic inertia and purposeful initiative. Hypertrophy of the purposive initiative – the principles of rational logic – ossifies,art into mathematical technicalism. (A painted landscape becomes a topographical map, a painted Saint Sebastian becomes an anatomical chart.) Hypertrophy of organic naturalness – of organic logic – dilutes art into formlessness. (A Malevich becomes a Kaulbach, an Archipenko becomes a waxworks side-show). Because the limit of organic form (the passive principle of being) is Nature. The limit of rational form (the active principle of production) is Industry. At the intersection of Nature and Industry stands Art.The logic of organic form vs. the logic of rational form yields, in collision:

The dialectic of the art-form.

The interaction of the two produces and determines Dynamism. (Not only in the sense of a space-time continuum, but also in the field of absolute thinking. I also regard the inception of new concepts and viewpoints in the conflict between customary conception and particular representation as dynamic – as a dynamization of the inertia of perception – as a dynamization of the “traditional view” into a new one.)The quantity of interval determines the pressure of the tension. (See in music, for example, the concept of intervals.There can be cases where the distance of separation is so wide that it leads to a break – to a collapse of the homogeneous concept of art. For instance, the “inaudibility” of certain intervals.)

The spatial form of this dynamism is expression.The phases of its tension: rhythm.This is true for every art-form, and, indeed, for every kind of expression.

Sergei Eisenstein: A Dialectic Approach to Film Form