An Elegy on Intellectualism
A Glance at Mehdi Sadr´s Performance at East Gallery Held on Tuesday 7th October 2014
1. Who is an intellectual? What social and class position does he possess? On what background does he tolerate the pressure imposed on him by the government authorities? Why does he stand against them?
2. These types of questions and the similar ones have got the philosophers and sociologists involved for years to understand better the functional role of intellectuals.
Based on some definitions, however, an intellectual is defined differently when he changes his role against people or any social dominant power. In some societies, since the rate of illiteracy was high, those who were able to read and write got the chance to be labelled "intellectuals". But, gradually as the time passed on, there came people who despite their knowledge and awareness were employed by men of power and practically made a lot of effort to suppress people and intellectuals. At the present time, the definition given for "an intellectual" has got involved with a lot of contradictory and scattered ideas to the extent that some believe having knowledge cannot result necessarily in intellectualism(is not necessarily a factor for being named "an intellectual". What determines the function of an intellectual is the element of awareness, its applying and its developing to bring about the growth of societies.
3. Despite all these differences in views, intellectuals have always and over all historical ages had one common point and that is "having gone through suppression and torture". The most obvious example to approve this idea—
that intellectuals were murdered and suppressed in the West—is Socrates. (Socrates is the most obvious example for this suppression and murder in the West.) Hallaj is its counterpart in the East. But its mythological sample is Prometheus. His torture has some reasons which are interesting to hear from Kratos´ tongue. Kratos is one of gods who is at the service of Zeus. Kratos´ famous quotation while addressing Hephaestheus(god ofcraftsmanship)is stated below:
"He(Prometheus)stole your blessing-the glow of enliving fire(from Mount Olympus) and submitted it to the mortal mankind. So he must be punished eternally for committing such a sin exerted on gods, bow to Zeus´ omnipotence and ignore the idea of helping human beings."
4. But why must the stealing of fire seem so painful to gods´? The decoding of this mystery goes as follows:
5. That noble Titan who stole fire (i.e. knowledge and awareness) from Olympus´ gods to save his own creation (human being) from blackness and darkness (i.e. ignorance) was in the end accused and had to go through a painful punishment(perpetual torture) as a response to his action by Zeus(the symbol of oppressors and men of power).
6. But what consequences does this torture have for the oppressors? For what crime should an intellectual be angered at? What is the reason for this enmity?
7. Prometheus answers Oceanus while describing his torture:
"So I´m the captive of the agony (I´m imprisoned for the agony) the tolerance of which is painful and the viewing of it is hurtful. I have never thought to share and feel the sorrow of human being can be the source of my pain and suffering. As you see, I´m bound in chain with a situation defaming and dishonoring Zeus.
8. Oceanus: tell me what price should be paid for helping others and not heeding one´s own situation?
9. Prometheus: Lots of pains and naivety of the empty-headed.
10. Now by referring to the first question of this article "Who is an intellectual", let´s discuss the characteristics of intellectuals from the point of view of the famous Greek dramatist Aeschylus:
11. Prometheus addressing Kratos: "Weep in front of the commander, praise and flatter him. But Zeus is nothing to me. For a while he is free to rule as he likes, but very soon there comes the time when his dominance over the gods comes to an end."
12. Aeschylus, blaming the servants and flatterers, says so while quoting Prometheus:
"You newcomers gaining new power, you think in vain to be under the protection of a tower that no pain can penetrate into. But you should know that necessity is more powerful than knowledge."
13. However, an intellectual can come to peace by tolerating the suffering gained from awareness as Prometheus was content with what he had done: "I bear this pain willingly, for there´s no dishonor in suffering what an enemy gets from his own enemies" In another place, Prometheus is happy with his suffering when he´s addressing Hermes (Zeus´s Messenger) who takes pride in torturing Prometheus("as if you take pride in what has happened to you) saying: "I take pride in myself?" I wish my enemies, including you, could take pride in themselves as such."
14. An intellectual is also blamed, in many cases, by his own society—the society that questions him why he has left the easy and comfortable life coming from the silence against the oppressors´ cruelty and inclining to following a hard life tolerating pain and problems. This is considered sickness by the society. It is that sort of sickness which the society complains about, although it is sometimes expressed in a proud way.
15. But Prometheus has an answer for it: "Yes, the intellectual is sick in case that hating enemies is called sickness."
16. In the end, there is a punishment, a terrible one, for an honest intellectual—the punishment in an exchange of enlightening the man indarkness.There´s always punishment for rescuing human beings from ignorance and lack of knowledge. The punishmentwhich Hermes promises Prometheus: "There comes the time when the winged dog of Zeus, the red-coloured eagle, greedily tears up the flesh of your body. Every day, an uninvited guest comes for breakfast, eats happily while gnawing at your liver."
17. Prometheus´s story, at the present time, has an objective, outer and real representation. Intellectual´s torture has always been on to-do list of men of power and authority who want people of ignorance, superstition and darkness. Such powerful and authoritative men have mostly intended to damage those intellectuals who constantly attempt to give awareness to people.
18. Likewise, Mehdi Sadr´s intention in his Performance Art is to express the same subject in "Prometheus"—the exertion of torture on an individual, but with a new and modern language—a new expression which the contemporary oriental man can understand. He talks about an earthly torture not a mythical one. By choosing a mythical title as "Prometheus", Sadr gives a historical reference to the tortured individual "the intellectual who is carrier of knowledge and awareness".
19. The dripping of water by itself is not hurtful, but if any noise gets repeated, it disturbs the nervous system. The reason is that it makes the mind concentrate on the noise; consequently, the mind stops focusing on other cases the person willingly decides to do. Therefore, this causes to torture the person. The procedure is as follows:
Water drips on the face especially on the forehead from a high place. Then, the amount gets more and more and this causes torture. Meanwhile, the noise of water drops hitting against the forehead if it is in a noiseless surrounding can cause a lot of psychological disturbance. The continuation of this event leads to a situation in which the tortured person after a while thinks that the falling of water drops hit his head like a sledgehammer.
20. Sadr in his artistic work sits on a chair the back of which is facing against a camera reproducing the picture of dripping of serum over his forehead on a screen again and again.
21. Sadr´s Prometheus is a representation of constant torture having been continuously exerted on an intellectual during many centuries. As he has prepared two of his similar situations for his audience beforehand, he calls uponthem toexperience this event. By making them think about theirability of being an intellectual, he calls upon them to sit and see if they can carry the load of torture or not—the torture of knowing and making it known.