The book of tao

This book draws closesly together two apparently widely separated threads and shows how closely interwoven they really are They are art and philosophy and in particular Chinese art and the philosophy of Taoism Taoism which is the philosophy associated with Lao Tzu and with ideas of yin and yang is essentially about harmonizing the conflicting forces of the universe into a dynamic balance of spiritual and material elements held together by the endless processes of transformation Art is also about transformation and about the harmonizing of reality into a balance in which change and transformation are captured yet never frozen or deadened The underlying pulse of the Universe and of art is creativity and not surprisingly the is as true for Western art as for that of the East It shows itself in dynamic composition and in the portrayal of natural forces And this is why Ben Willis evocative deeply felt and highly readable book is relevant to our understanding of the universal principles of creativity itself The Tao of Art