All winter I’ve been working on a series of paintings with the working title “The Art Disagreeableness”. It’s (unpleasantly?) personal. It’s an ongoing project with the goal of transgressing my own proneness to making nice …, my inclination to believe my task in life is to please the world around me. Yesterday I sensed a…
Tag: James Hollis
Still painting
Most often, the anxiety aroused by the summons to a larger life is more than we can bear. James Hollis, “Creating a Life”, p. 49 I have started a new series of paintings with the working title “ The Disagreeables”. For a long time I have tried to override my own inclination towards agreeableness when…
Still life paintings in 2021?!?
So why would one, or more precisely I, want to make still life paintings in 2021? I have asked myself this question quite often lately but have yet to find a good answer. Not only do still life painting seem a bit … old fashioned?! The still life has in fact always been regarded as…
Just when I thought I was finished reading theory …
… my desk is once again filled with philosophical texts. It might be hard to find a common theme in the stack of books in front of me, but I guess they all in some sense could fit on a shelf labelled “philosophy of life” – or maybe: getting old (with grace) is the least…
Growing older
I have been reading the Jungian analyst James Hollis on and off for a year now, and he’s still my favourite thinker/writer when it comes to reflecting upon growing older, or more specific, what he calls; the second half of life. The first decades of our life are mostly spent in making adaptations to the world and…
The Call to Create
Spending my Sunday morning in the company of James Hollis — ON HEARING (AND ANSWERING) THE CALL TO CREATE According to Hollis: So much of the self-help genre prattles on about “happiness.” “Thirty Days to this or That…”. “Five Easy Steps to…”. You fill in the blanks. But this Pablum does not feed the soul,…
James Hollis & the second half of life
Did I mention that I have been reading the Jungian analyst James Hollis this summer? Hollis has written several books on what he calls the second half of life. I am not in any way ready for making a meaningful, abridged, account of his perspective on life. But I might give you a glimpse into his way of…
sub rosa 