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: Thomas Moore
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…
From representational drawing to invented worlds
My recent shift from drawing to painting has not only led to a shift in form, but also, as it turns out, a shift in content. When painting, my focus is no longer on the observed outer world, as it is when I am doing urban sketching, croquis or floral studies. When painting my focus…
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…
An aesthetics of one’s own
The small things in everyday life are no less sacred than the great issues of human existence. Fifth post on CARE OF THE SOUL: I am a maker. I have been a maker for as long as I can remember. Making (in the form of writing, drawing, painting, knitting, cooking, gardening, blogging …) still gives…
Going deeper
FOURTH POST ON THOMAS MOORE’S CARE OF THE SOUL: Jung equates the unconscious with the soul, and so when we try to live fully consciously in an intellectually predictable world, protected from all mysteries and comfortable with conformity, we lose our everyday opportunities for the soulful life. The intellect wants to know; the soul likes…
Narcissus at work
THIRD POST ON THOMAS MOORE’S CARE OF THE SOUL: The myth of Narcissus is usual evoked when philosophers study the individual’s relation to its own self. In the following Moore paints a bigger picture: SOUL This is one of the deeper implications of the Narcissus myth: the flowering of life depends upon finding a reflection…
True family
Second post on Thomas Moore’s Care of the Soul: The sentimental image of family that we present publicly is a defense against the pain of proclaiming the family for what it is—a sometimes comforting, sometimes devastating house of life and memory. (Care of the Soul: 26) Just a few months ago my uncle, age 70,…
A family is a microcosm
For me, and I guess for many of you, Christmas is all about family. It might be the only time of year we all gather. Or the time of the year one becomes most aware of not having a family, or not wanting to be a part of one’s family. It is a time of…
sub rosa 