I’m collecting marks in my sketchbook. Marks, or motifs, as I (via Fiona Godfrey) have come to think of them. Making, collecting, contemplating – . Some feels like mine, others have to go – even if I love the look of them. I’m not satisfied with using my eyes only. The motifs have to connect…
On mastery versus meaning
I have been reading quite a lot of Jungian psychology and philosophy over the past few years. Here are some notes from Jason E. Smith’s new book: Religious but not Religious. Living a Symbolic Life (2020) On mastery versus meaning Meaning is a psychological state that can affirm life. Mastery, by contrast, is not affirmation,…
A lexicon of shapes, lines, marks and symbols
A short report from an ongoing study: Marina Strocchi – A Survey 1992-2014 from Marina Strocchi on Vimeo. I think the art of the Australian painter Marina Strocchi makes a wonderful addition to my library of artists making great marks. Marina Strocchi’s works incorporate the dynamic ‘Roar’ collective aesthetic, indigenous landscape influences and rural Australian…
What could possibly go wrong …?
Bad dreams, or maybe just the world as such … seeping into my art?
From nothing
… to something? Making tiny artist books – playing with personal motifs This is the question I’m asking myself: How can I develop and extend the range of marks, shapes, symbols and patterns that are mine – or even: which are my motifs? what is making my art mine? Part of having a ‘style’ as…
When color is entirely to the point … is the point!
According to the American artist Gary Komarin (1951), the best paintings “paint themselves.” He says: You have to get lost in the painting for a time. You cannot simply stand outside like a quiet observer. I believe he is right, and as a maker, the best part of the creative process is definitively those moments…
A prayer for the new year
In the midst of hate, I discovered within me an invincible love. In the midst of tears, I discovered within me an invincible smile. In the midst of chaos, I discovered an invincible calm. I realized through it all that … in the midst of winter, there was an invincible summer. For it says that…
“I’ll be Pavlov, you be the dog.”
Listen to this, and you’ll get a wonderful start of this new week: Ask Me – the Poetry of William Stafford The Little Girl by the Fence at School Grass that was moving found all shades of brown,moved them along, flowed autumn awaygalloping southward where summer had gone. And that was the morning someone’s heart…
