“Some people choose to see the ugliness in this world. The disarray. I choose to see the beauty. To believe there is an order to our days, a purpose.”
Dolores Abernathy, Westworld
The above quote is Dolores’ base code in the series Westworld. Dolores is an android in the series who evolves from a simple farm girl, through a merciless killer to a political revolutionary who believed that choosing beauty was a lie, before returning to her base code when she was finally stripped of all her memories and returned to her childlike true self at the end of the third season.
We all have base codes, things that are so fundamental to our being that we may not even recognize them. This base code is what we strive for whether we know it or not, that longing just beyond our reach. Interestingly, Dolores (our lady of sorrows) is recognized as a poetic soul by the wisest and gentlest characters, Bernard Lowe, even while she is slaughtering her way through Seasons 2 and 3.
For traditional artists, choosing to see the beauty is in their base code. Anyone can see the ugliness and apparent chaos in this world and despair. The artist’s job, traditionally understood, is to create something attractive, which is to say beautiful for the patron. This beauty had value in and of itself, but it also charmed the viewer/listener, which encouraged the contemplation of bigger, additional matters. It also served to motivate by slaking the thirst of all human beings for something beyond mere existence, lifting the veil and revealing a truth beneath the obvious physicality of the thing. Like Dolores, unfortunately, the pain of being denied what is sought can distort the artist in some cases, yet even then great artists manage to see in their mind’s eye that beautiful and true thing of their dreams–their base code, that there is an order to our days, a purpose, and a beauty.
BLOG 94: We who choose to see the beauty
“Some people choose to see the ugliness in this world. The disarray. I choose to see the beauty. To believe there is an order to our days, a purpose.”
Dolores Abernathy, Westworld
The above quote is Dolores’ base code in the series Westworld. Dolores is an android in the series who evolves from a simple farm girl, through a merciless killer to a political revolutionary who believed that choosing beauty was a lie, before returning to her base code when she was finally stripped of all her memories and returned to her childlike true self at the end of the third season.
We all have base codes, things that are so fundamental to our being that we may not even recognize them. This base code is what we strive for whether we know it or not, that longing just beyond our reach. Interestingly, Dolores (our lady of sorrows) is recognized as a poetic soul by the wisest and gentlest characters, Bernard Lowe, even while she is slaughtering her way through Seasons 2 and 3.
For traditional artists, choosing to see the beauty is in their base code. Anyone can see the ugliness and apparent chaos in this world and despair. The artist’s job, traditionally understood, is to create something attractive, which is to say beautiful for the patron. This beauty had value in and of itself, but it also charmed the viewer/listener, which encouraged the contemplation of bigger, additional matters. It also served to motivate by slaking the thirst of all human beings for something beyond mere existence, lifting the veil and revealing a truth beneath the obvious physicality of the thing. Like Dolores, unfortunately, the pain of being denied what is sought can distort the artist in some cases, yet even then great artists manage to see in their mind’s eye that beautiful and true thing of their dreams–their base code, that there is an order to our days, a purpose, and a beauty.