A recent comment reminded me: what I now take for granted didn’t always come easy - that is, to look at a piece of art and share the experience of the artists’ insights and efforts - to learn something from both ...
From an early age, Art has always been transporting - allowing me to live vicariously through the representations of the picture, satisfy my precocious curiosity, and raise questions leading to other inquiry; including the thrill of discovery - it was a way of un-puzzling mysteries ...
a way of utilizing that uniquely human characteristic of curiosity, deduction, and rational thinking ...
One of my first experiences with ‘great art’ was at the Philadelphia Art Museum. In and of itself, the experience left me awestruck; the classical architecture, magnitude, and the collections it housed. At ten years old I wanted to live there, and in subsequent years I probably earned partial residency status.
I came upon a piece that seemed gigantic at the time and totally captivated my attention: “Prometheus Bound” by Peter Paul Rubens. Nearly eight foot square - as big as some rooms of the house where I was raised. How did the artist paint it to look so real at that size? How did something so grotesque look so appealing, so sensuous and exciting? It made me think of similar feelings about paintings and sculpture of the crucifixion of Jesus and the Passions of Christ in our diocese. Who was Prometheus and why did he look so inhumanly masculine and why was the eagle attacking him? Why was it in partial darkness, where was it, and where was he bound? During the same visit I recognized other work that was either painted as darkly or had that lush and lavish appearance - but Prometheus stood out, and even at that age I knew I could only learn one thing at a time.
I’ve never been one to sit comfortably with questions so I began to ask teachers, and when that failed, went to the library - another favorite place to be. It turned out that Prometheus was a character of Greek Mythology and that he stole fire from Zeus who had him chained to a rock as punishment where a vulture would consume his liver every day - it would grow back - and the same would happen ad infinitum ...
Prometheus was apparently the cause of human suffering for mortals - whereas I thought it was Adam and Eve from stories in catechism - what made the Greek story different than the Catholic’s or Jews - those questions would have to wait. If the story was Greek in origin, why did the painting look as lush as Pennsylvania’s landscape. Everything I had seen of Greece looked more like the Jersey shore. Later I learned that Rubens was from the Netherlands and frequently traveled to Germany, Italy, and Spain - lived during a Baroque Period, and that artists often painted the surroundings they knew best. What I was finding from one painting is that every answered question leads to dozens more - an endless riddle of fascination with geography, history, literature, and people. My appreciation of cause and effect - and being human was elevated. I could write volumes on the impact of this painting and the trails of human history it left for discovery, but my point has been made.
Because of the complex trail of evidence left by a painting,I’ve learned to simplify my questions over the years when confronted by something new:
- What word or series of words best describes my initial response? [What do I feel?]
- When and where was the painting made? [Where is it from?]
- What was going on when it was made? [What inspired it?]
- Why did they choose the materials and approach? [What is it made of?]
- What are the artists’ influences; personal and/or sociological? [What does he know?]
- How does the piece relate to history - past and recent? [Why?]
- What school of thought governs the painting?
- How does it relate to my view of the world and which needs modification?
- What does the paintings existence contribute to the world?
- Does the artist deserve further consideration and inquiry of is their effort peripheral to my predisposition?
- What have I learned by the experience?
As an example, lets look at the previous blog entry “no. 38” while applying these questions ...
The answers may look a little like this while beginning to form a thesis about the work:
- what words ?... delicate/ frailty/ obscured/ mysterious/ predominantly white/ purity/ misty spots of color/ faint/ a little contradictory - busy and simple, scribbled but exact, spacious but dense/, uncertain but definite/ free/ liberating/ lyrical/ ...
- where ?... rural Pennsylvania/ spring time/ northern hemisphere/ east coast of U.S./ near New York City, Philadelphia, Washington D.C./ NYC is the art capital of the world after WWII/ D.C. is the capital of the U.S./ Philadelphia has provincial history during Revolutionary period/ Native Americans occupied the area/ location of Civil War conflicts/ notable geography - Pocono mountains/ reputable industries/ academic surroundings - six universities in the area ...
- what’s going on ?... blossoming of deciduous forests/ abundant farming region/ after a severe winter/ unseasonably warm spring/ political dramas surrounding U.S. Health Care reform/ public displays of discontent with government/ depressed economy/ the U.S. is at war with Iraq, Afghanistan, and troubled by stability in the Middle East with Iran and Israel/ there seems to be an unreasonable amount of fear about economy, jobs, health, and terrorism/ erratic and sometimes bigoted behavior among parts of the population/ beyond popular music, television, and movies there doesn’t seem to be much emphasis on culture or education/ the news media portrays its citizenry either as dumb and lazy or vicious and out of control/ ...
- made of ?... translucent paper/ small scale/ ink/ sprays/ economical/ easy to produce quantity/ either for study, comparison, or commercial purposes/ interested in layering and obscuring previous ideas/ veils/ interested in drawing materials that are easy to apply/ capable of calligraphy, delicacy, and expression ...
- influences ?... [available through google] - nature/ music/ abstraction/ dedicated/ serious/ informed and versatile in contemporary idioms/ politically aware/ jazz/ improvisation/ expressionism/ recent illness/ studio relocation/ reading physics and classical philosophy/ listening to Arvo Part, Elaini Kairindrou, Marilyn Crispell, Keith Jarrett/ frequents the Deerhead Inn jazz club/ spends a lot of time outdoors witnessing nature/ Lithuanian and Austrian ancestry ...
- relationship ?... abstract, yes/ expressionistic - yes/ improvisational - yes/ similarities to other abstract expressionists and neo expressionists: Pollock, later work of De Kooning, Twombly, Polke/ differences: more deliberate, edited, combined/ intentional effort to combine selective areas and events ...
etcetera, etcetera, ... but you get the point - one thing leads to another and another - until every painting done by an artist [and i use the term cautiously], becomes a summation of previous works in a continuum ...
[P.S. So to comment on a prior comment - “I’m sure they would if they could” ...
It’s hard for me to imagine not having anything to say about art - and judging from what I see on other blogs and depreciating art copy, I believe most people are either ill-equipped to comment, don’t want to risk exposing themselves, or it’s too much of an effort to summon the will or reason - OR - maybe the art work isn’t deserving ...]
