Sublimity: Art, Nature, & Everything In Between

This school year – my very last year of high school, and the entirety of K-12 education – I’ve been enrolled with the program SelfDesign. I’m enjoying it so much; I was able to take a course on philosophy that opened my eyes (all three of them, haha) and my awareness to the vastness, the mysteriousness, and the sublimity of the world. There are so many different takes on philosophy, so many opinions, ideas, arguments, and thoughts on what is real and what is not, how reality works, what is right and what is wrong, et cetera. However, I believe that a basic concept in philosophy that many would agree on and resonate with is the sublime.

Sublimity, in a simple explanation, is a sense of both awe and terror at a landscape or scene. When one gazes at a waterfall or a cliff face, the sheer majesty and beauty and danger can bring both inspiration and adrenaline. The main idea is that beauty is seen as a safe, delicate, and soft feeling, whereas the sublime is both beautiful and scary. And yet, though this sublimity terrifies us, we still seek it out. We admire it in the ocean, in mountains, in animals – in the raw ferocity and spirit of nature. We admire it, as I have, in the vastness of the night sky.

For this philosophy course in SelfDesign, I made an assignment on sublimity and created an art piece for it that I wanted to share here. Below is part of my reflection and writing for the assignment, as well as my artwork.

When I learned about the sublime in this unit, I began thinking of my own interactions with it and how sublimity has shaped my life. As someone who deeply appreciates nature and being out in the natural world, I can note many times I’ve felt impacted by sublime scenes. One aspect of this that I feel captures that impression so well is the night sky.

Looking up at stars, planets, and the moon on a clear night always makes me feel both infinite and insignificant. Though in human day-to-day lives we are so caught up in our own troubles, moods, and relationships, it all seems quite trivial when compared with the bleak and wonderful and ever-expansive canvas of the universe. What is out there? How can we ever know? And most importantly for a philosophical sense, why are we – all of us, everything, every being and object on this Earth – here, of all places, and pondering our existence? It’s impossible for me to wrap my head around.

In [one of my assignments] for this unit, I explored my thoughts around art and morality, and how art can help people see new perspectives as well as provide a sense of comfort, or catharsis, to the viewer. Looking at an art piece and resonating with it is a wonderful feeling – a feeling of being seen, understood. I would think that many people might resonate with the art piece I created for this assignment. That sense of questioning our existence and our purpose while admiring the beauty and terror of the universe is a theme I’ve seen quite often in other works. Yet, in another way, we are connected to it all; we are made from the universe, and somehow it created us. There are different theories and ideas around what or who the creator exactly was/is, but many would agree that we intrinsically belong to this planet – and therefore we are very likely more connected to it than we think.

In this unit, I learned the definition of “sublime” and how it applies to art. I don’t think I’d heard of the phrase before with regards to beauty and philosophy, so it was a new and very interesting concept to me. Like I mentioned above, it helped me ponder my own encounters with the sublime and why exactly I feel so drawn to both beautiful and terrifying things. I’ve started to look at the world with new eyes and note when I feel that touch of sublimity.

My art piece ties into this unit because it explores “examin[ing] the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence” – the figure I drew in the foreground is looking up at the sky, pondering life and the universe and everything in between. I believe the piece also includes “allow[ing] people to question their assumptions and better understand their own beliefs” because art can be very thought-provoking, and one might look at this work and either resonate with it or not, which would then help them to question their assumptions and/or understand why they think a certain way. Because of these two reasons, I think I applied my understanding in a novel way and provided my own personal and unique take on the sublime.

This is how my art process went:

First, I sketched a silhouette of an androgynous, vague figure (I wanted this drawing to feel inclusive and resonant to many) and coloured it in with Sharpie.

Next, I scribbled in – not very neatly, I’ll add – a few different colours in watercolour pencil (mostly black, with two shades of blue).

To activate the watercolour pencil pigment, I added water in small increments across the page.

The next few steps of the piece mostly involved swapping between adding more pencil to darken areas and painting across it with water to activate the pigment.

Next, I drew in a moon with a white gel pen by tracing the centre of a roll of Washi tape.

To add more interest to the sky, I added more colour in a few areas. I also drew in ground underneath the figure’s feet with more Sharpie.

Next came adding the stars and gently drawing details on the moon face. I finished the ground as well.

Finally, after adding a few more stars, details on the moon, and a shooting star and a few shining stars, the piece felt done to me.

I hope this post serves as in inspiration to look for more of the sublime in the world. Though those rough ocean waves or tall, jagged mountains hold a promise of danger, there is beauty to that; I believe it is because we are reminded of our humanity and our mortality. Compared to that of the Earth, our lives are fantastically short. A blink of an eye, a snapshot of a hummingbird’s blurred wings in flight. To make that blink all the more meaningful, why not seek out that reminder of beauty and death, admire it even for an instant, just to make our moments of life that much more precious?