AG; : Anybody else got a question? What if you follow the Shambhala training in art. You ever taken Shambhala training here?
Student (1): Never
Student (2): A challenge.
AG: Being here, actually being here.
Student (1): Yes, Allen
AG: Rather than being away. – Yeah, actually being present. One idea was that art (the artist is..) – that art is really, simply, appreciation, or perception, of what is around, in the space around, to live with the space, perception of details, actually seeing the details of what’s around (a brick wall, a white…), seeing, and hearing a little feed-back echo, hearing the details and seeing the details, and therefore actually taking in more information and.. but there was a point in ancient years, when it was what?… play?
Student (2): Work (you actually work with a discipline).
AG: Well, what good is that? I think the idea was.. we have to (be)…
Student (2): Well, “mind shapely, shapely art, shapely..“.
AG: Yeah, but why shapely art?… [tape breaks and then continues]
…. (so we’re dealing with)..political aesthetics, social aesthetics, and, you know, a sane society proceeding from Tibetan Buddhist teaching , (teachings) which they’ve sort of codified to try to find out a formula for what they think is the basic clear ground for what we’re talking about.
(And what was their) formulation?
Student (3): (Well, it was a lot of what you said .. My limited understanding of it is that art, basically, ought to be non-judgement(al) – and, I mean, there’s a lot of ways that art can actually be judging, I mean, even people who think that “I have this vision that people should see” – even that – exactly.
AG: The power-shot, that we were talking about before.
Student (3): Yeah – But.. And, in terms of the sacredness of the world that.. I don’t know if this is Buddhist or Shambhalian, but I know that you…
AG: See, if you can connect the language with what everybody here who doesn’t know Shambhala can understand..
Student: (3): Ok, I see. {pause]
to be continued
Audio for the above can be heard here beginning at approximately ninety-one-and-a-quarter minutes and concluding at approximately ninety-three minutes in