The word “Nothingness” represents something abstract that everybody perceives in their own way. You can see it, think about it, and feel it in your own personal experience. This experience comes into “existence” through human consciousness, as the philosopher Sartre (1905-1980) stated. But how can something be the negaJon of all enJJes in the world or the nonbeing? How a state where nothing is present, or where nothing exists that is important or gives meaning to life, be experienced through the human mind? It’s something you can’t describe with words, but it can be perceived and can touch your soul unJl you find yourself wrapped in tears, wondering how something only you can perceive will have such an effect on your well-being.
The case of Rothko’s PainJngs (1903-1970) is crucial to understanding the “nothingness” made visible. Mark Rothko was an American arJst with Jewish-Latvian origins. His art is among the most recognizable of the 20th century. In his works, he painted the world as he experienced it, with his own feelings that flow in informal and abstract art. His abstract painJngs were the main point of his success. All of them represented human emoJon and, as he clearly stated, they were nothing less than the very nature of human experience. “A painJng is not a picture of an experience; it is an experience”, that’s why his painJngs can bring you to tears. However, only you will feel if those tears are from pain or happiness and where they actually come from. His painJngs are on the verge of “nothing”: no figure, no line, no space, and eventually even no color, and sJll cause strong emoJons in human beings. These emoJons do not come from “nothing”, but from yourself and your experience of life, evicted from the “anJthesis of all enJJes”.
In the end, a painJng that does not represent anything has a stronger emoJonal effect rather than one that is represented in every single detail, that has a well-defined story and that is clear to understand. What a fully detailed painJng does not have is your reflecJon in it; it’s something that’s told to you, not something you will find yourself surrounded by.
These “empty” painJngs and the general “nothingness” find you alone, alone with yourself, alone with your mind without anyone else who can tell you what they really are. It’s you when nobody is watching. The personal experience of life with all emoJons you feel, coming all together in a full “stream of consciousness”.
Only your mind can perceive those thoughts altogether, trying to give them a sense but it will be your heart and your whole body that will deal with them and that would have an effect on your subconscious. That can happen to everybody but only those who are cold and raJonal won’t experience “nothingness”; also being emoJonless is a form of nothingness, isn’t it?
Carolina Parrotta “Tra I Leoni” Issue 106
However, if you want to be more raJonal and you don’t believe that “nothingness” can have this effect on human beings, you can listen to what Seneca (4a.C-65d.C) stated in his predicJons as a Stoic philosopher: living in a state of “nothingness” is represented by wasJng your Jme not dedicaJng yourself to wisdom. Real wisdom is represented by the conJnuing aspiraJon to always learn something new and wholesome that can elevate your person, without wasJng your Jme on other enjoyable things that won’t make you live your life to the fullest.
Between personal experience and raJonal one, there’s a thin line that links every percepJon of “nothingness”
and you, how do you experience “nothing”?
I have pursued a scientific education that culminated in obtaining both Italian and American diplomas. I am currently embarking on a journey through the complex yet fascinating field of International Economics and Finance (BIEF) at Bocconi University.
I find beauty in elegance, a principle that guides me beyond academic pursuits.
