by Nik Nejad

Ever considered yourself to be an idol worshiper? In the context of this discussion you might. To disambiguate the term “idol” first, let’s use an example. Looking back at Abrahamic religions, we know that idol worship is VERY BAD. In the Hebrew Bible there is a quintessential anti-idolatry narrative of the Golden Calf; (here’s the Coles Notes version)

Moses was on Mt Sinai being the savior of mankind and receiving the Ten Commandments, while the Israelites lose certainty of his return and begin to worship a Golden Calf. Moses then returned and made a whole bunch of people kill another whole bunch of people as punishment for worshipping the Golden Calf. What they were supposed to do was have faith in the creator, not the Calf. But that didn’t happen. *Sigh

I totally understand why the Israelites decided to do as they did; the Golden Calf was real, they could SEE IT. Most of humanity in today’s world does the same on a daily basis (except for the token shaman and sage here and there). If you can see it, touch it, smell it, feel it, or hear it, then it is real. Everything that we have ever experienced has come through the conduit of the senses. The creator that Moses talked about, well, they couldn’t even find him on Instagram.

We are by nature, slaves to our five senses. So it’s not a surprise that the physical world trumps all the other wishy-washy stuff. But first lets understand exactly how meager the realm of the senses really is. (The term meager is generous to say the least). Consider this: Our eyes can only pick up on a fraction of wavelengths out there, but we know that infrared exists, we know that x-rays and radio waves exist too, though we cannot directly sense them. The same goes for hearing and all of the other senses. All together they can only capture a minuscule fraction of ‘what is really going on’. There is a massive spectrum of vibration and frequency beyond that which we can access. Relatively speaking, we are quite blind.

But how else are we supposed to experience the world if not through our 5 senses? That, my friend, is where spirituality kicks in. The big paradox. It asks for us to not only go beyond our senses, but also rational thought. ‘Even the conscious mind, and your several layers of ego, can be preventing you from connecting to the light.’ For generation Y this might be more than hard to swallow, surely more difficult to swallow than a can of Coke Zero.

You want something real? How about the look of your recently lifted face, that new car smell, the sound of people praising you, and the feel of that new Fendi handbag. This is idol worship in the 21^st century. In the Mosaic times they had the Calf, today we have the Kardashians, both representations of our bond to the material. Enlightenment Shenlightenment! Unless it’s in fashion,

“Being Zen is the new black, didn’t you know?”

We are obviously going down some kind of road, and our pace is picking up. The world is getting smaller, things are moving faster and faster. According to Ray Kurzweil, genius inventor extraordinaire, we are moving toward a point, “the singularity,” beyond which it is hard for our yet-to-be synthetically-enhanced, brains to understand. What effect does hyper-materialism have in the future? Some would argue that, in today’s world, the mass-commoditization of culture has in effect led to its degradation. For example, earlier this month, Mark Simpson, who coined the term ‘metrosexual’ proclaimed, “The metrosexual is dead. Long live the spornosexual.” What is a spornosexual? As Simpson puts it: “where sport got into bed with porn, while Mr. Armani took pictures.” It describes how men want to be wanted for their bodies, not for their whit, charm, clothing and especially not for their deep substance. His article not only exemplifies increasing obsession towards the physical, but is also a rather ironic example of how common lexicon is changing with the times. We are seeing language cut down into effective little packets, delivering information more economically. It’s all rather funny, I mean LMAO.

What about art? From its inception, art was a highly spiritualized tool. Think cave paintings, to ancient Greek sculpture to Caspar David Friedrich. Now spirituality is close to completely absent in contemporary art. Hirst may very well introduce concepts around spirituality and religion, but it ends up being a commentary rather than a real connection. It also helps that Hirst has become a very powerful brand.

“Spirituality, yes! A great idea! Sounds like it can make some serious bucks.”

I consider myself to be a spiritual artist, which is becoming more and more of an oxymoron as time goes on. Thus I beg to ask: ‘Is there room for spirituality in contemporary art?’ Is its relative absence due to socio-economics, wherein artists are simply suppliers meeting a demand in a capital market? Or have the artists themselves lost touch with spirituality and also fallen to the cult of the material? The answer will likely be a mucky shade of grey rather than black and white. It is nevertheless important to continue questioning the purpose of art, especially considering the potential art has to transform culture rather than simply be the by-product of it.

Unfortunately, we don’t have any precedent to see if we are going down the wrong road or not. Globalization, cloud computing, robotics and genomics are game changers in this new world, call it ‘Post-Singularity’ or the ‘Age of Aquarius’. The purpose of this blurb is not to criticize, though some of the rhetoric is intentionally Perezian. All I am saying is ‘lets just keep our selves in check’, so at least we don’t walk down this road with a blindfold on our eyes fixed to our smartphones, and eventually fall off a cliff. Perhaps I just recommend a brief moment pause to ask, ‘how does spirituality fit in to this increasingly material obsessed culture?’ Are we still striving for truth? Are we conditioning the youth to be excellent consumers or to elevate themselves and society? Is the road we are on bringing light or darkness? Will we be the Israelites worshiping a Golden Calf or will we wait for Moses?

Nik Nejad was born in Toronto, Canada on October 23 1984. He is of Persian heritage and is currently based in New York city. Working mostly with painting and video, his work has addressed the association between spirituality and technology. A variety of international publications and media outlets have covered Nejad’s work including: Harpers Bazar, Time Out, Dubai TV, and Oasis Magazine. Nik Nejad has also been very active as a social entrepreneur. As a member of the British Council’s Cultural Leadership Initiative, he recently co-founded Alternational, a platform to expose the current cultural shifts taking place in the Middle East.

http://www.niknejad.net/