Let’s face it, David Lynch is an ARTIST, and artists can do whatever they want. Freedom of expression derived from freedom of speech is a constitutional right of every person. This is a basic – some say God-given – right expressed in many national constitutions, especially in the United States Constitution. In capitalism the invisible hand of the “market collective consciousness” rewards the artists with name, and fame, and material well-being, thus if the market is “efficient” it selects from the ocean of artists the most desirable by the people. Certainly, David Lynch seemingly has achieved this level of accomplishment.

However, art criticism is also an established tradition, whereby the artists are critiqued and analyzed for their work, thus establishing a balancing force. There are two opposing philosophical positions regarding ethical art criticism. The moral perspective, and the autonomism, which claims the morality of the art should not be evaluated, but only the aesthetic appeal of the art form.

We know David Lynch is a successful filmmaker, with worldwide appeal. We also know that David Lynch as a person and his David Lynch Foundation has become an empire within the empire of the Raja Kingdom for the many Transcendental Meditation educational programs he has personally inspired and his foundation has financed.

Now let’s look at his art as it was presented in Moscow in 2009, during a DLF tour of that country. These pictures are taken from the documentary called “Shadows of Paradise”, by Sebastian Lange. We thank Sebastian for recording these art forms on film and sharing them with the world. So let’s begin our ethical art critique.

We begin with these eyeballs, looking at the viewer of the art. A kind of self-referral.

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Here is a close-up of the eyeballs. We’ve heard before that “walls have ears”, but eyeballs also? It appears so at the Moscow exhibition of David Lynch’s art. Perhaps it’s true in more ways than we can imagine in Russia… 🙂

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Here is a strange piece of art, that seems to be a photo of two women naked with breasts showing, and something smeared on them. One of the women has some paint on her neck or perhaps there is something wrong with her neck region – is it torn open? I can’t tell from the screenshot taken from the documentary film. What am I supposed to think of this? Well, many artists have made art strange like this. Let’s move on.

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Here is normal-looking photographic art. Perhaps a house in Fairfield Iowa, but it could be any house in the Midwest. OK, this is mundane, a scene from Midwest winter. I get that, and experienced it also.

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Here is more art on the exhibition wall. The Russians who came to see David Lynch’s art are getting their money’s worth.

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The many people who visited David Lych’s art exhibition are warming up to see the more exotic and strange art forms in the other room. They came to see the creative mind of the world-famous film director, and the man promoting Transcendental Meditation in Russia and Ukraine. It can be assumed that visitors know about David Lynch’s foundation, his involvement in TM, and his many movies and TV series. The visitors wish to see what other art forms David has created. Let’s move on to the next room.

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Enter the BIZARRO world of David Lynch’s “other art”. It’s like suddenly finding yourself in a Twilight Zone episode where artists have gone mad, and anything can happen in art. Ohh… I am sorry I am describing planet Earth in the 21st century without the dimensional rift of the Twilight Zone, and we are looking at a yellow couch with a woman (gender = female) who is naked with an old-style rotary telephone. Is David showing us that this female form is a prostitute? Or a phone sex worker? Or someone’s girlfriend? We will never know. It’s all in the mind of David Lynch, who promotes spiritual and uplifting meditation for children in schools. As I said, artists can do anything, but to balance them, there are also art critics in the world. The handwritten text on the art says “Well… I can dream, can’t I?” Let us ponder this art piece to understand its message. There can be many messages according to the viewer’s state of consciousness.

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Let’s move on, and look at the next piece of art. This is a close-up of a man, who seems to be painted/sculpted from some excrement-like brown material (yuck!), obviously created from material found in an art store or home improvement store. He is holding a real knife which sticks out of the art piece in a threatening manner. Unfortunately, we couldn’t snapshot the entire art piece from the vídeo, but you can see it in the film documentary by Sebastian Lange. The text that goes along with this piece says:

“Do you want to know what I think?”

No David, I don’t want to know what you think, but you are welcome to publish the real meaning of this art piece, as I am totally out of ideas. Was it some bully in your high school class? Was it an incident in some ghetto alleyway long ago? David, are your frustrations related to art? Does it relate to your critics? Hmmm… perhaps it does relate to your critics.

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Let us turn our attention to an art piece displayed in a large picture frame. The transparent layer seems to be glass or some semi-reflective material, and there is a painted layer behind the glass and a layer before the glass that is sculpted and glued onto the glass. On my computer I saved this picture under the name “smashface”, but I could have named it “sh*t face” too. Sorry for the inappropriate language, but this art piece does bring out the critic in me, and I am holding back from giving my true evaluation of this art expression because I do believe in freedom of speech and freedom of expression. The text painted in the upper-left-hand corner says:

“This man was sh*t 0.9502 seconds Ago”,

which seems an appropriate way to put it. The character in the art piece is going through a traumatic event of immense proportions, and we are witnessing his death and mutilation by some unknown force, or a final traumatic medical emergency. This artwork is not recommended for decorating your kitchen or your dining room!

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I wonder what the Moscivites who saw this art exhibition think about Transcendental Meditation, the Quite Time school meditation project for children, and the value of Maharishi’s Vedic Science? What can they infer about David Lynch’s past traumas and emotional state? Has TM helped him get past those traumas, or are these new traumas caused by Vedic Sciences? For the uninformed, for those who know little about TM, these could be legitimate questions.

Furthermore, I wonder what the K.G.B. (now called F.S.B.) concluded about the whole David Lynch art exhibition happening in their city. As many are aware, for decades the Natural Law Party, the World Government of the Age of Enlightenment, and the Global Country of World Peace, in other words, the whole TM scene has ruffled feathers around the world with its utopian political ideals. A reasonable assumption would be that these governmental organizations investigated, and then wrote up in their reports who and what was visiting their country with big the utopian proposals. It would be normal run-of-the-mill protocol for such organizations to do this, especially in the former communist countries, which are always suspicious about influences coming from the West.

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In a sense these art pieces sort of do represent Transcendental Meditation, Maharishi’s Vedic Sciences, and David Lynch promoted programs, because David the artist is placed on a pedestal in the TM world, and the association is inescapable. David Lynch has become an ambassador of the TM-VedicScience cause and he brings his artwork with him, at least that is what happened in Moscow. So the Russians, the Ukrainians, and the rest of the countries who are interested in Maharishi’s Vedic Sciences, especially the flagship Transcendental Meditation program may analyze these David Lynch artistic expressions – movies included – when they make their official recommendations about the whole TM scene. The evaluation of the effects of meditation on mental and emotional health would be taken into consideration, especially to safeguard children. Every government naturally wishes to protect its youth. This is especially true in the former communist countries which have rebuilt their strong Christian traditions.

In the Pravoslav – Eastern Orthodox – countries, there is a sense that things coming from the West are not always beneficial, and all it takes is one fanatic Pravoslav believer to write a bad report or news story. David Lynch has given ample opportunity for this scenario to happen in those Pravoslav countries. You don’t have to believe this analysis of mine, but just think that there may be some truth to it. I am sorry, but I am being critical, for the sake of the image of transcendental meditation. It is not only the art that is being analyzed here but indirectly the association with the Holy Tradition and the wonderful meditation it gave us. Smashface/sh*tface blew my fuse, sorry.

Let’s move on to perhaps the most disturbing art piece by the great filmmaker. This piece of art also sprung from the mind of David Lynch. We are perplexed by its nature. The artwork depicts a handwritten text, perhaps describing the meaning of the artwork.

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What does it mean? This text is only a portion of the artwork, and it gives the linguistic FRAMEWORK for understanding the creation:

“Bob loves Sally until she is blue in the face”,

reads the text written on the artwork.

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Here is the main part of that artwork, apparently showing a “blue-faced Sally”.

No… I don’t think Sally is a blue-skinned hindu avatar god – I am pretty sure of this.

We can ponder, and imagine many things in this artwork. To me, this is a particularly disturbing and unsettling work of art. It seems to show Bob “loving” Sally, as the text on the artwork does explain, and it seems to be violent, where Bob does something perhaps sexually to Sally in a disturbing way.

In the previous “smashface” piece it was just some tragedy happening to one person and some external force that was the main event, but with this “Bob loves Sally until she is blue in face” art it seems to be one individual acting aggressively against another person, a female if I understand it correctly. Sally is turning blue as if dying from the lack of oxygen. Or is the female figure wearing blue makup? Better to forget the image.

This is a truly disturbing piece of artwork from the mind of the great David Lynch known around the world for his charity work helping children learn Transcendental Meditation. Do the parents and school principals know about these artworks? I doubt it. I don’t think David Lynch shows his art exhibitions in the schools where TM is promoted by DLF.

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Here we see a grotesque man in underwear, with what seems to be an illuminated light in his underwear in his genital area. Is this supposed to represent something sexual? “Vajunga Red dog dog” can be seen written on top. There is a power cord running from him to the electrical socket on the other side of the art piece, clearly showing that the light is plugged in. I am not sure what this artwork represents, but at least it’s more reasonable than the previous art piece. What does it mean? I have no idea. It is in the “smashface” style, probably made from similar materials. My critique is that this is a very strange piece, seemingly from a traumatized mind, like the other art pieces. Not something I would want in my home. Can you imagine this art piece in your living room? Would you look at it every day as you sit on your couch? Would you use it as a night light in your hallway? How about that knife-man artwork? Would you want it in your dining room? I am being humorous here, but you get the point.

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During the art exhibition in Moscow a reporter asked David Lynch “Mr. Lynch you are so creative…”, and then proceeded to ask him how he gets his energy and creativity. David gave a short monologue on the value of TM. If I had been there I would have been embarrassed that this artist would speak about TM to the press. I would have felt queasy and uneasy, about this association, but this is just my opinion. David Lynch associates his artwork with his TM program and leaves no doubt in anyone’s mind that this connection is there.

We have doubts about the DLF and TM connection. We also doubt that Maharishi understood who David Lynch is. We doubt Maharishi saw these artworks. We doubt Maharishi understood that the TM Movement and the global country would be associated with these and other artworks, by David Lynch. We also doubt Maharishi sat through any TV series or movies made by the famous filmmaker. Perhaps he was given short summaries about the art, by people close to David. It seems reasonable to assume the enablers who were between Maharishi and David Lynch knew or partially knew about David’s various artistic expressions, and presented a rosy picture of the artist’s creative work.

I wrote in the beginning of the article that in capitalism the invisible hand of the market rewards of punishes businesses and artists, and David is no exception. This invisible hand is at work right now even, in this critique of his artwork. This invisible hand may have been at work in the Russian sphere also, where problems have arisen for the Raja Kingdom in recent years.

The question is who enabled this association between David Lynch and the TM Movement? Besides Maharishi, who decided in the TM Organization or the Global Country of World Peace to associate Transcendental Meditation, and the Holy Tradition of knowledge with David’s personality, and expressions of his persionality? Who enabled this to happen? Of course, the doubters will say “Maharishi knew everything, because he was enlightened, and how dare you question Maharishi?”. However, I think Maharishi didn’t know these things. He was willing to accept the financial help from David, and his foundation since it helped support various Maharishi organizations, but maybe he would not have accepted the help if he had seen the complete line of creative expressions by David. Just guessing here.

It’s simply a marketing question. What do you associate a product or service with? We do understand that David Lynch has complete freedom of expression, and we are very supportive of this idea. The problem lies not with David’s artwork, but with those in the TM Movement and the Global Country of World Peace, ultimately the Rajas themselves who to this day enable this association to continue. It’s just a marketing question. Do you want your products and services to be associated with this person’s artwork, even to the slightest degree? Other businesses sometimes make a stand and disassociate with certain ideals, groups, or expressions, just to clear things up.

We at RajaLeaks are not saying this is what the Rajas should do – and they can do anything they want– but the invisible hand is at work worldwide, and the worldwide market as a living collective organism makes its own invisible decisions which may have already had an effect or may have an effect in the future.

As the invisible hand the ultimate decider of products and services becomes efficient in the future, there could be a change in the perception of TM, as information flows to the consumers. Parents, school teachers, school principals, responsible governmental leaders, and secret governmental bodies, have as their mandate to protect hearts and minds, from unhealthy influences. Rajas, leaders of TM, consider this aspect also. Yes, I understand, money speaks louder. That is also a problem.

Consider this a NEGATIVE review of the bizarro David Lynch’s artworks presented in this article. According to the philosophy of the two paths to art criticism, I give David Lynch an “F” grade both in aesthetic appeal and moral appeal. Disclaimer: This is an amateur art review and critique. Just so you know. We will continue to write about David Lynch in the future and even cover the brain-dead legal problems that happened around DLF in Chicago and other places.