Of course, it will not be possible to distinguish these three kinds of activity unconditionally, as well as the spaces they organize: each of the activities also contains the beginnings of other activities subordinate to it, and each of the spaces is to a certain extent not alien to spaces of the other kind. Thus, in technology there is certainly a certain artistry, which is not necessary in order to achieve the goal set by technology, as well as a certain philosophical and scientific thought that enriches the theoretical attitude to the world. In philosophy and science it is always possible to discover a certain artistry and vital applicability, i.e., the technical side. In the same way, a work of art contains, to one degree or another, both vital utility, something technical, and one or another technical relation to reality. In every activity there is everything, and every space has an affinity with the others. And it could not be otherwise, since culture is one and serves one subject, and spaces, no matter how diverse they are, are still called by one word – space.

Nevertheless, these types of activity can be distinguished according to their prevailing meaning. And despite this distinction, fundamentally they do the same thing: they change reality in order to rearrange space. The force field deployed by them can be interpreted as a producer of the curvature of space. But it is possible, and logically more expedient, to say that the required space is evoked by the force field, manifested, in the photographic sense of the word. The gesture forms space, causing tension in it and thus distorting it. This is one approach to the change in reality that has been produced. But another approach is possible and more appropriate, when the tensions from the gesture indicate a special curvature of space in a given place. She was already there, preceding the gesture with his force field. But this invisible and inaccessible to sensory experience curvature of space became noticeable to us when it manifested itself as a force field, which, in turn, considered a gesture. If a piece of cardboard is superimposed on the poles of the magnet, then the surface of the cardboard seems to the eye to be no different from the same cardboard that does not lie on the magnet. This space therefore appears to us to be homogeneous, and in small areas Euclidean. But this does not mean that it is really so, and will always be perceived as such, but only that we are insensitive to the forces at work here, or to the curvature inherent in space.

By sprinkling cardboard with iron particles, we manifest a force field or spatial curvature for our perception. At the same time, we can interpret the picture of the force field as produced by a magnet and producing, in turn, the curvature of space, or, on the contrary, we can say that the preceding curvature of space at this place (meaning the place in the sense of a place, an event, i.e., as determined by the coordinate of time) determines the force field, which in turn posits a magnet with its poles. In the same way, in the realities of culture, the change in reality produced can be interpreted both as a cause of the organization of space and as a consequence of the already existing organization. In this case, the images of the isolation of reality are places of special curvatures of space, its irregularities, nodes, folds, etc., and force fields are areas of constant approach to these highest or lowest values of curvature. Further, then, those visual images which art posits, or those devices which the technician builds, or, finally, those mental models which the scientist or philosopher puts in word, are all only signs of these folds and distortions in general, together with the areas of approach to these places. A cultural worker places boundary posts, draws boundaries and, finally, draws the shortest paths in this space, together with systems of lines of equal effort, isopotentials. This matter is necessary for the organization of space to reach our consciousness. But this activity reveals what exists, and is not posited by human arbitrariness:

In vain, artist, you think that you are the creator of your own creations.

They were forever hovering over the earth, invisible to the eye...

There are many invisible forms and inaudible sounds in space,

There are many wonderful combinations of word and light in it,

But only those who know how to see and hear will transmit them[75].

Such is the objective, realistic understanding of art and, like it, the understanding of philosophy, science and technology. The other view, according to which the artist and the cultural worker in general organizes what he wants and how he wants, the subjective and illusionistic view of art and his culture, is profoundly alien to the former in the order of the cultural worker's well-being and his worldview. But both views are formally equal, equally possible, isotenic interpretations of one and the same fact: culture. However, of course, one or another understanding of one's own activity, although capable of being interpreted in both directions, cannot but be affected by the special tonality of the activity itself.

XXIII

We will speak more narrowly and more definitely, about artistic activity. Is it because the artist saturates certain areas of space with the content accessible to the receptivity for which the work is intended, it is distorted and made especially strong or especially weakly capacious, i.e., it is organized? or because it is already organized, possesses special capacities, and is therefore curved, and therefore allows for an uneven load of the required content, both are formally one and the other. It can be figuratively explained: the artist saturates a certain area with some content, forcefully presses the content there, forcing the space to yield and accommodate more than it usually accommodates without this effort. To a geometer who measures spatial extensions—lengths, surfaces, volumes—as a chosen or physical standard, the extension of a given area, and consequently its capacity and curvature, will not appear to be altered by this. This is true, but it means nothing: for as a geometer, in terms of its basic physical process, it is incapable of noticing a work of art at all; the latter is inaccessible to him, just as a magnetic field is inaccessible to one who has neither iron nor metal masses at all. Of course, not perceiving a work of art that simply does not exist for a geometer, the latter has nothing to say about the curvature of its space.

This is one approach. The other understands space itself as having in certain areas a markedly distinct capacity in relation to one or those perceptions on which the artist is counting. These places of space turn out to be greedily absorbing, sucking up the means with which this artist works; or, on the contrary, these means are very poorly accepted by them. The artist with his means of capturing moves in a given space, as in uneven terrain, and from the way these means of his scatter from some places and accumulate in others, he gets an idea of the organization of space. He then feels compelled by the objective conditions of work, by the terrain in which he works, to act in this way and not otherwise, not to do what seems desirable to him, and, on the contrary, to do the undesirable and even unforeseen. He is as if rubbing paper with a pencil with a model placed under it, while the images appear by themselves. This is the realistic approach to art.

But, again, from the formal side, both are only interpretations of one fact. In all the arts there is one process. In music, the characteristics of the capacity of the corresponding spaces are tempos, rhythms, accents, meters with different shades, as dealing with durations, then melody that uses pitch, harmony and orchestration, saturating the space with coexisting elements, etc. In poetry, the same meters and rhythms, melody and instrumentation, as well as visual, tactile, and other images evoked indirectly, serve as such means. In the visual arts, some of the enumerated elements, such as meter, rhythm and tempo, are given directly, although not as clearly as in music and poetry, others, such as melody, are evoked indirectly, and still others, on the contrary, appear directly and with special explicitness: visual and tactile images, colours, symmetry, etc. In spite of apparently fundamental differences, all the arts grow from the same root, And as soon as you begin to look at them, unity appears more and more convincingly. This unity is the organization of space, which is achieved to a large extent by homogeneous methods.

But precisely because of their homogeneity, what has been achieved is far from being the same. Painting and graphics occupy a special place among other arts and in a certain sense can be called art par excellence. Whereas poetry and music are somewhat close, by their very nature, to the activity of science and philosophy, and architecture, sculpture and theater to technology.