Significant life experiences and their relationship with the education of the scrutinizing gaze in the beauty ecologist César Manrique

Abstract

The reality of the nature that we see can have multiple messages and meanings. Some of these are patent and continuously communicate with the individual, but others are hidden and are more difficult to unravel. A deep, contemplative and scrutinizing gaze is necessary to detect these messages. Educating this “new” way of seeing can help reinforce a person-nature bond that includes the aesthetic appreciation of beauty. This work shows the education of the gaze related to the artist César Manrique and the special bond that he established with the island of Lanzarote. He describes some key experiences, considered to be significant life experiences (SLEs), that revealed deep and secret messages to him and made him understand the true magnitude of the person-nature bond.