2. Art must be grasped from the artist.
Now we can read on (rule 797): "... from this standpoint to examine the basic characteristics of power, nature and so on! And religion and morality! " Nietzsche made it very clear that from the above two understandings about the essence of artists, other shapes of the will to power-nature, religion, morality, and we can also add society, individuals, knowledge, science and philosophy, etc.-can be solved. These beings are consistent with the existence of artists in a certain way, with artistic creation activities, and with the situation that all beings are being created. Other beings, artists obviously can't "bring out" them, but they all have the same form of existence as what artists create, that is, works of art. In the previous aphorism (796), we found evidence of this meaning: "Where there are no artists, there are also works of art, such as human bodies, and some social organizations (Prussian government forces, Jesuits). To some extent, the artist is just an initial stage of all this existence in the chain. The world is a work of art that breeds itself-"Here, the concepts of art and works of art are obviously expanded to any kind of" bringing out "ability and anything that is essentially brought out in this way. This kind of artistic concept is consistent with the usage that was quite popular at the beginning of the nineteenth century, and it is also consistent in some procedures. Until then, art still refers to any kind of ability to "bring out", "display" and "produce". Artisans, politicians and teachers, as people who can bring something out, are all artists. Nature is also an artist-a female artist. At that time, art had not evolved into the current popular narrow concept, that is, "art" and "beautiful art" that brought something beautiful in works.
Now, what Nietzsche wants to clarify is the earlier and broader meaning of the word art.. In this artistic concept, art is just one type among many other arts. In Nietzsche's view, the "bringing out", "appearing" and "producing" of all other arts are consistent with the beautiful art to which the artist has devoted himself. "An artist is only an initial stage" refers to an artist in a narrow sense, that is, an artist who only "brings out" beautiful works of art.. Based on these discussions, we can now draw Nietzsche's third statement about art:
3. According to the broad concept of artist, art is the way for all beings to appear; As far as the existence of being is concerned, all beings are creators who create themselves.
we know that the will to power is both a creation and a destruction in essence. Art, as the way for all beings to appear, is not anything else, but the will to power.
Nietzsche clearly defined art as the will to power. Before that, his first book, Tragedy Born from Musical Spirit, had understood art as the basic feature of being. In this way, we know why Nietzsche returned to the view of art in The Birth of Tragedy when he wrote Will to Power.
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In the broadest sense, it is regarded as the art of creation, which constitutes the basic characteristics of all beings. Therefore, art in a narrow sense is such a kind of creation, in which creation is carried out for its own sake and tends to the clearest realm; Art is not only a shaping of the will to power, but also the highest shaping of the will to power. The will to power becomes visible only as art and with the help of art. However, in Nietzsche's view, the will to power is the foundation on which all future values are based, and it is the criterion for all new values that appear as the opposite of the old values determined by religion, morality and philosophy. Therefore, if it is true that the will to power can obtain its highest shape only in art, then the setting of the new relationship of the will to power must also come from art. The new value is a revolution to the old value, and the resistance and drastic changes brought by this revolution must also come from art. Will to Power 794 says-
"Our religion, morality and philosophy are all decadent forms of human nature. Resistance to these decadent forms is art. "
according to Nietzsche's explanation, Plato's first principle for morality, Christianity and philosophy is that this world is worthless; It is obsessed with sensibility and should have a "better" world than it; There must be a "real world" above the world, a super-perceptual world; The perceptual world is just the external manifestation of the "real world".
In this attitude, the world and life are completely denied. If you say "yes" to this world on the surface, it is only to deny it completely more thoroughly. But Nietzsche said that the so-called "real world" of morality is a world of lies. Sensory, perceptual-appearance is the basic element of art, therefore, it is art that reaffirms everything that has been denied by the hypothesis of "real world". Therefore, Nietzsche said: "Art is the highest power to resist all the will to deny life, and it is the most outstanding hero against Christians, Buddhists and nihilism." Accordingly, we can draw Nietzsche's fourth point on art:
4. Art is the most outstanding resistance to nihilism.
..... Art, especially in a narrow sense, is to boldly say yes to the senses, to the illusion, to the "unreal world", or, as Nietzsche pointed out, to things that are not "truth".
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Nietzsche also said:
"In my early years, I took the relationship between art and truth very seriously. Even now, they are so incongruous. I still respect the seemingly unquestionable relationship and dare not offend easily. My first book dealt with this problem. The Birth of Tragedy believes in art in the context of another belief-that it is impossible to live with truth; The' will to truth' is simply a symbol of degradation. "
this sounds counterintuitive. However, once we understand this passage in the right way, we will not feel that it is abnormal. Here (as Nietzsche did elsewhere), the "will to truth" refers to Plato's and Christianity's will and belief in the "real world", the extrasensory and the thing itself. In Nietzsche's view, this idea is to "say no" to our worldly life and to the home of art itself. The real world is the real world, so Nietzsche claimed that in the relationship between art and truth, "art is more valuable than truth." That is to say, sensibility is higher and more real than extrasensory things. In this regard, Nietzsche also said, "We have art so as not to die of truth." Here, the word "truth" is once again used to refer to the so-called "real world" with super-sensibility, which hides the danger of destroying life. Nietzsche's "life" always refers to the kind of "rising life" that gets rid of the entanglement of truth. Super-perceptual time is just to lure life away from the healthy and lively perceptual and sensory world, so that vitality will be weakened and dried up ... Fortunately, we still have art, so that we will not be destroyed by such super-sensory truth. With art, extrasensory things can't make life decay to a field that is extremely deficient and completely collapsed. From the connection between art and the essence of truth, we can draw Nietzsche's last conclusion about art:
5. Art is more valuable than "truth".
Let's review Nietzsche's first four points on art:
1. Art is the most transparent and intimate shaping of the will to power.
2. We must grasp art from the artist's point of view.
3. According to the broad concept of artist, art is the basic way of existence for all existences. As far as existences are concerned, they are all creators who create themselves.
4. Art is the most outstanding resistance to nihilism.
inspired by Nietzsche's five points about art, we can now look back on an earlier sentence he said on the same question: "... we find that it is the strongest stimulus to life ..." It is not difficult to understand that saying that art is the stimulus of life is nothing more than saying that art is the shaping of the will to power ... We can't take this sentence as another view of Nietzsche on art.