Spirituality and Beauty in Artistic Experience

It is well known that inspiration and creativeness are lacking in most of the art1 that is produced, and though moments of inspiration and true creativeness occasionally enrich his life, the creative artist knows that these are more frequently absent than present in this work. The theory of sublimation remains incomplete in claiming for all artistic production certain mental processes which do not explain the contemplative2 experiences of the creative artist. The same theory is offered to explain the creation of art alive with æsthetic form as well as the production of art that merely copies these forms with a deadly competence. The same theory is offered to explain making and appreciating. The tardiness of psychoanalysis in contributing a more complete and helpful theory to science, æsthetics, and art criticism derives from our neglect to classify the varieties of artistic experience. I have offered a working classification in The Aesthetic States of the Mind.3 I propose now to help complete the theory with a description of the class of artists whose contemplative creating and appreciating do not arise from the sublimation of sexual energy4, and whose unconscious aim is not to