Introduction

Abstract

Whatever may be the reasons for which science and philosophy attempt to disentangle the net of formal constructions that the evolving human mind has established for his own use and the race’s survival, the reason for which, rightly or wrongly, the contemporary artist also seeks the primitive virginal state of man is different. The purpose of the artist is not to satisfy intellectual curiosity as to what is the basic set up of the human being or the original, initial state of human virtualities from which the self-constructing process began. The purpose of the artist is to find the virginal source of human creative endeavor, which is not geared to man’s survival and vital progress but to the artistic fulfillment of his nostalgias and higher yearnings. Could our artistic creative endeavor have been launched simultaneously with that human functioning oriented toward mere survival? We will allow that it did not. To the contrary, the artistic quest issues from dissatisfaction with the round of everyday life.