Shape clay. Blow a horn. Draw a picture. Pen a tale. Such expressive acts are the work of our emotions. They share that pedigree with the violence that boxers, sumo wrestlers, and practitioners of other fighting sports channel through their chosen protocols.
Punching is part and parcel of boxing, and slapping is fundamental to sumo. Spectators who choose to watch those sports think nothing askance of blows delivered within the rules. They certainly don’t criticize the perpetrator for causing pain to his or her opponent.
Athletes in violent sports undertake workouts designed to prepare them to absorb punishment, as well as exercises for cultivating the ability to administer punishment. Acts of artistic expression entail a violence every bit as potentially damaging as physical impact, and expressive artists, like martial artists, need to equip themselves to absorb that violence without incurring unendurable damage.
The violence encountered by athletes is largely physical, though it has an undeniably psychological dimension, whereas that encountered by artists is chiefly psychological. Foremost amid the psychological violence endured by artists is stress. That mode of psychological violence is as indispensable to the creative process as it can be destructive to the artist.
Every superlative work of art is a manifestation of an artist’s success in channeling stress into positive output. It is a reflection of systematic training undertaken by the artist to equip herself or himself to manage stress in that manner. We should bemoan, therefore, a trend of recent decades in Japanese education.
School teachers and administrators in Japan have largely abandoned instructional methods that expose students to physical or psychological stress. They have thus abrogated their responsibility to equip their students to cope with stress and to channel it into positive outcomes. Here is one more reason for pessimism about the prospects for our nation.
