ABSTRACT

Everything we are to study rests on the bedrock of the spontaneous reactions that we make, from earliest infancy, to nature and to created things. A child hears a piece of music and reacts by marching up and down, swinging its arms: it listens enraptured to storytellings: it may begin by simply throwing paint, but soon takes an intense interest in the precise choice and positioning of colours: it delights in the movement of trees and clouds and the textures and fragrances of the world. These responses are a form our life takes, as natural to us as eating and sleeping. They are the beginning of what would issue, were education systems designed to reinforce rather than to frustrate our aesthetic development, in being moved by Janác?ek, entranced by Kundera and fascinated by Kitaj.