Between culture and politics

One of my students asked me:

Is art supposed to elevate people or just make the unusual habitual by repeating it? Is it not better for him to avoid what is not accepted by the general public, so as not to offend their feelings?!

Do violent films, for example, add anything other than make violence normal?

Reality is bad, what is the role of art? That is the question..

I said: Art is a fantasy and a vision that is broader and more comprehensive than a snapshot depicting the moment. Art has to do both, recording reality and charting the future, its good and its bad, and its possibilities.

The story that the function of art is to elevate people is partially true, but it puts it in one mold, and elevating oneself requires seeing the bad and the beautiful, and it is preferable if there is a message and a contrary message. In the end we have to choose.

Choice is a human virtue.

I always said to my disciples: I learned from the skilled from my teachers, and from the ignorant as well. Sometimes I helped bad surgeons and said to myself, ‘I can’t do their dress’, as if the bad I saw taught me the good I wished.

Once again, art is not a camera that has to take a snapshot, but art has to see all life in its different shades, and it does not negate the existence of what we do not like because we do not want to acknowledge its presence in our lives.. Art gives the right and opportunity to every follower to form his concept.

The idea is how do we prepare society to do its part in choosing?

Here comes the role of education and the media in creating a neutral value fabric in the soul.

A colleague of hers said: Isn’t it better not to put young people in front of multiple choices so that they do not make mistakes?

I said: Those who cannot choose are not qualified for life.. Those who cannot choose are doomed to dependence and adherence to the beliefs of those who lived before them or those who ride on their minds, and these are the soldiers of backwardness and terrorism.

I remember what Dr. Taha Hussein in his great book “The Future of Culture in Egypt”: “Illiteracy is not only illiteracy of reading and writing, but of reading, writing and understanding. Whoever reads and writes and does not understand is a ride for those who understand.. and a slave to the one who chooses a way for him because he cannot choose.”

The first young woman said: What do you think about what is happening in the social media from the attack on the movie “Friends and My Dearest” and its heroes, and the demand of some politicians from members of the Egyptian parliament to ban the “Netflix” platform from Egypt for fear of the Egyptian society’s values ​​that are threatened by such films?

I said: I come back to choose again.. The Netflix platform, like any other, is a private platform, and only those who pay a financial subscription to it can see what it offers. The Internet from Egypt is either ignorant of the reality of the impossibility of this, or it wants political heroism by repeating what it knows is impossible, or it is riding a wave of mobs and demagogues.

I return to what you asked me about the film, of which there are English, Italian and French copies. It is a well-adapted film, and I did not see in it what motivates this ferocious campaign in Egypt only without all the countries of the world.

And I added: Only the ignorant are the ones who break the barrier between drama and reality, and judge the artist for his skill in impersonating the character the author writes.

Was Farid Shawky a criminal as a human being because he assumed the character of the villain in his films? Do we put Mahmoud El-Meligy in the circle of hard-hearted and gang leaders? Shall we retroactively prosecute Faten Hamama for her love for Omar Sharif, who is married to Zaki Rostom in the movie Nahr al-Hob, or is Ahmed Mazhar a guest from the history of cinema because he was the engineer who tempted the young girl in the movie “Doaa al-Karwan” .. Or should we erase Hind Rostom’s films because they appeared As a night girl in some of her films or danced with Farid al-Atrash on the train in the movie “You are my love,” and we ban Egyptian Abdel Halim Hafez because he sang his immortal song “Oh, my heart, hide me” while drinking wine in the cabaret?

If our distinguished political council had existed at that time, it would have been occupied with almost daily fateful decisions, running after art, artists, intellectuals and enlightenment.

Even worse, and with the same logic, we have to take Professor Al-Akkad out of his grave to be tried for writing the poem “Translation of Satan” and imagine a dialogue in it between God Almighty and Satan, which Dr. Taha Hussein gave him the principality of poetry. before checking.

Art, gentlemen, does not express what each one of you thinks of beliefs, but rather flies ideas and imaginations through time and events.

I read Imam Sheikh Muhammad Abdo in 1903 about plastic art, acting and music, he says that drawing is a type of poetry that is seen, but if you look at drawing and it is that silent poetry, you will find the truth visible to you, enjoy it yourself as your senses delight in looking at it.

Art, my children, is beauty, and beauty is a distinctive feature of this existence, manifested everywhere, and it is a kind of order, harmony and harmony, and it has countless manifestations and manifestations, accuracy, tenderness, consistency, balance and interdependence, and many other manifestations that the conscience feels, and if it cannot Express it often. This represents two different levels of human capabilities: the ability to feel, and the ability to express. And because the sense of external and internal beauty is cognitive awareness, it can be learned. As for the other ability of the human being, which expresses, shows, and reveals beauty, it is the ability of the artist, whether he is a photographer, an actor, a writer, or others with different artistic abilities. Since science and experience have proven that there is a lot of knowledge and skills that a person can learn, especially at a young age, and enable him to increase his abilities in expressing beauty, every human being is an artist with a degree of degrees, and the uniqueness in art remains for the special talents in which a person is unique from else.

The human soul that tastes beauty is the soul that is capable of creativity and innovation, seeing what is beautiful and building on it.

The educated young man said: What does all this have to do with politics, Doctor?

And his colleague added: How do you work in politics, and you are in essence a scientist and artist?

I said: With all due respect to everyone, if the cultural depth does not match