"good but too weak" - Process for intensifying the feeling that is generated.

[droqen]

1. In ~ The Nature of Order Book Two, Alexander wrote (paraphrasing):

The artist putting their feeling into the work:
THIS IS NOT VERY INTERESTING

The work generating feeling in me:
THIS IS ESSENTIAL AND IMPORTANT

There is a subtle but critical error here: Alexander is contrasting a process (what the artist does) with a goal (what the art does). I agree, one thousand percent, with what he wrote... but how is the artist to move forward, knowing this? The two items are not immediately usefully comparable and I'd in fact argue that choosing to pursue a goal over a process is extremely detrimental.
(See ~ Atomic Habits - todo: link to more detailed/specific notes when I have them)

2. In ~ The Creative Act, Rubin wrote:

A point of view is different from having a point. . . . It's of no use to know [or portray] your point of view. . . . The true point is already made in the innocent act of perception and creation.

This presents a better angle towards a potential system or process for achieving Alexander's ESSENTIAL AND IMPORTANT feature of art, although it's by no means complete. (Maybe I could mine The Creative Act some more and find a good quote, but I don't really care to do so at the moment)

PRODUCES NOT VERY INTERESTING WORK:
The artist puts their feeling into the work,
expressing, communicating, or portraying their felt feeling

PRODUCES ESSENTIAL AND IMPORTANT WORK:
The artist looks at the work and notices how they feel,
working to enhance their received feeling

(Alexander actually says this more or less directly in that chapter, but I'm highlighting how his big-picture summary fails and how we must summarize it differently -- through describing two processes: a good process and a bad process)

[droqen]

This is not a good final version, btw, but it is a start.

[droqen]

What is the feeling?

To what does the feeling refer?

I'd like to also connect us to ~ Don Potts, when he says:

sometimes, something very sweet, something so lovely, will sort of express itself, something very sweet because it's purer than the thoughts one normally picks up because it's a little bit subtler than that. You know, because the wave drops down, and you can taste this real sweet thing, and you'd like to have your hands on it.
. . . you'd like to have your hands on it. So you start out building a trap to catch this thing.
I don't care what kind of artist you are, painter, sculptor, speaker. . . .

The feeling is the thing the whole game is made to 'trap', to catch. Some sweetly inaccessible, indescribable, full emotion. It's not one feeling, but The deep feeling. SYNAPSE ~ The Mirror of the Self.

[droqen]

"good but too weak" - a phrase i've found myself returning to many times
reiterated upon here in My notes from the cruise

through the use of rules or any other medium, one does not create beauty or goodness, but discovers and enshrines it. traps it. grants an invisible thing visibility, by granting the appreciator line of sight to that thing. to create is to create connection.

see also this longer post (bottom)
very similar to Don Potts' thing, his "trap"