King No Says I Don't Have To Listen to a Thing You Say Painting

This painitng (and many more) is all about the power of art as a mechanism for joy. Karl Groos, an early 20th century psychologist, studied infants and their delight after figuring out that their actions could cause predictable effects. For instance, the observable thrill expressed by babies after manipulating the path of a toy by randomly moving their arms, and then repeating the action and getting the same effect: Expressions of utter joy would ensue. Groos coined the phrase “the pleasure at being the cause,” suggesting that this is the basis for play, which he saw as the exercise of powers simply for the sake of exercising them. Before Groos’ study, the majority of economists and social scientists believed humans seek power because of “an inherent desire for conquest and domination”. 100 years of repeated experimental evidence proved otherwise, that aggressive suppositions like Nietzsche’s “will to power” were unfounded. Human beings love play and seek fulfillment through self expression, not domination. I quote at length: Groos posited we exercise our powers as an end in themselves, even if the situation is pretend, which reminds me of another keen observer of humanity, Kurt Vonnegut, who wrote: “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.” Tying his work to the ideas of the philosopher Friedrich Schiller, Groos suggested that this is all that freedom is. For instance, the desire to create art “is simply a manifestation of the urge to play as the exercise of freedom for its own sake as well. Freedom is our ability to make things up just for the sake of being able to do so”. Those who are denied (or deny themselves) the personal power of make-believe suffer openly as literal prisoners and slaves, or privately by the self-imposed refusal to implement their innate powers of freedom.

Painting:Acrylic on Paper

Original:One-of-a-kind Artwork

Size:12 W x 16 H x 0.1 D in

Delivery Time:Typically 5-7 business days for domestic shipments, 10-14 business days for international shipments.