Chaos II
Last week I went to the beautiful Tropenmuseum, where a small but
instructive exhibition is devoted to Escher and Islamic Art. I got
impressed by this artist again. This summer I had proposed to use some
of his drawings as illustrations for the last cabinet-paper I worked on:
about 'Do-Democracy', Civic self-organisation and its conditions
through attitudes and behaviour by governments. In the end
this idea did not materialize for all kinds of practical reasons and
because the minister had a better idea for illustrations, but that is
not the point here.
Why is Escher so appropriate for this topic?
1.
His drawings are selfreferential like the whole concept of
participative democracy, especially if this is described by government
(e.g. the hands that draw themselves);
2. The Eschers designs are
complementary, like the responsabilities taken by civil society and at
the same time left open by government: you never can tell which comes
first;
3. Like listening Bachs fuga's you are unable to perceive the
single complementary objects (e.g. fishes and birds) at the same time.
This also goes for the system's world of governments and the world of
daily life of citizens;
4. Especially the balance between chaos and
order is well illustrated by some of his works, one of which is on
display in Tropenmuseum;
5. Metamorphosis!
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