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Posted on 10/31/2015 6:37:05 PM
By Donald Fox
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We humans are a curious lot. We question the world and our experience of it, accumulate massive amounts of data, attempt to classify and organize that data into coherent information from which to make sense, and then explain as best we can what we can only guess at anyway. Our imaginations are ripe and fertile and allow us to explore other avenues of consciousness that otherwise would be unobservable.
The truth of the moment is that we don’t even know what consciousness is, what reality is, or what existence is. Our models of these things take us to distractions that we call real, and those diversions are many and varied. Art may simply be one of those distractions as may be religion or philosophy or science. What we call belief, that mental calisthenics that enables us to persevere in the face of potential doubt or uncertainty, may be a basic survival mechanism to keep us going until the body can no longer sustain itself.
I don’t necessarily believe any of these things myself; I’m just looking at possible questions that have been raised by others in the past and will continue to be raised by others in the future. However, since art is something that has great importance for me, I want to keep investigating aspects of its nature. Also, since art is a construct of the human mind, by questioning art and its creation, I get to speculate about the mind, my mind as an artist, and how it functions. Part of this is considering why I do what I do.
I have heard many artists say that they make art because they feel compelled to do so. That suggests that the individual is driven by some outside force, which could be the case for all of us relative to everything. Personally, I don’t think so. There is a will to live. There is a drive to do. There are the needs that underlie those things like breathing, eating, resting, exercising, and so on. Since we created culture, and maybe since we created language which enabled us to make culture, we have fabricated many activities that may have originated in the need for food and shelter. It is hard to know about origins of some things, perhaps anything. We create explanations by way of theories and postulations. Mostly, as individuals, we go through a learning process that includes maturation, and we decide to do certain things based on what experience has taught us, some of which has come from within ourselves (our decisions about things) and some of which has come from our cultural environment (family, society, and the world at large).
I make art because this process is interesting to me, and I have some ability to so it. I feel motivated by correspondences among things as I perceive them. I enjoy ambiguity, parallelism, synchronicity as well as colors, shapes, and forms. I appreciate metaphor and symbolism. As I also experience a sense of knowing about some things, I choose to investigate whether I actually know something or not, whether it seems real to me or not. I leave science to others, but I enjoy speculation and the possibilities of investigating perceptions based on visual and emotional content. I am curious to take things that are related, similar, or unrelated and to form them into something new and different from what I may have experienced about them initially. I suppose it’s a bit like a game where the rules and the goal are made up in the process of also creating a strategy to resolve something that is not quite clear at the outset. The end product is called art because it has potential meaning beyond the parts from which it is composed.
Posted on 10/30/2015 11:22:01 PM
By Donald Fox
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Drove south this evening to attend a school graduation ceremony for our south campus. Traffic was very heavy and slow moving out of Houston then slowed again right before my exit to Texas City. At the next exit south, the freeway was shut down because of a major accident. Lucky I wasn’t going to Galveston although one of my painting students was going there for the weekend. Hopefully she managed to do that much earlier and missed the hassles.
Life in a major city is filled with many interesting experiences and also some that can be aggravating and downright inconvenient. Avoiding rush hour traffic is wise if scheduling allows, but for many they get stuck in the midst of it. I’ve been there myself many times but do my best to avoid it. Leave early is a wise mantra.
Planning is key to life in these parts just as planning is important for one’s career. I know people who have their careers and lives mapped out. They graduated from school, got a job with a major corporation, and everything else follows what the corporation mandates. My path has been quite different even though I’ve had jobs with organizations and currently am on the faculty of a small career college. This does dictate part of my schedule (like tonight’s event), but I do have a modicum of flexibility that many people do not.
While moving around the city, one of my favorite pleasures is listening to public radio. Shows like All Things Considered, the Diane Rehm Show, Fresh Air, or Bull’s Eye keep me both entertained and informed plus educate me on numerous art-related issues. I am able to keep abreast of current events with added commentary and insightful reporting. Diane Rehm covers wide-ranging topics and interviews interesting creative people (much like Charlie Rose on PBS). I avoid the talk radio so popular with many people because conservatives like Glen Beck or Rush Limbaugh only showboat their incendiary views, insult people, and give highly slanted “discussions” of issues important to them without giving dissenting callers the opportunity for proper rebuttal. They do this while also bleating over the so-called liberal media being biased. I don’t disagree that most news media rarely give a full picture, but they do report on both conservative and liberal issues. Besides, a thinking person can separate the political wheat from the chaff without the hoarse screechings of self-appointed prognosticators.
My greatest interest is in intellectual discussions about artistic issues whether interviews with authors, performers, or other artists. Additionally, there is a lot of interesting scientific discussion on programs like Science Friday (Sci-Fri) and sometimes on TED Talks, which cover topics in technology, entertainment, and design. Entertainment and design topics often touch on art, creativity, and the psychology of both creative and critical thinking. There is much to be said for radio as a primary means of communication and cultural expression.
Posted on 10/29/2015
By Donald Fox
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I love art history and history in general. Many art appreciation courses are structured chronologically but tend to focus on significant and periodic changes in artistic expression. Often the effect of one culture on another is addressed like the early Greek Kouros figures that are highly reminiscent of classical Egyptian sculpture: rigid body postures, arms extended by the sides with fists clenched, one foot placed forward, and the entire figure faced forward in a totally unnatural stance. The Greeks had to have been aware of earlier Egyptian sculpture. There also is the obvious classical Greek influence on the art of the later Roman Empire that includes copies of Greek statues not to mention the wholesale borrowing of Greek mythology. These, however, are the expected ideas to be found in this type course.
What is more intriguing is how art fits into a particular culture or era. What was happening politically and socially at the time the Egyptian pyramids were built, for example (some of this fits well with Biblical history), or what about painting in Britain and America at the time of the American Revolution, or roughly a decade later in France during the French Revolution? This is where we begin to see that art is not created in a vacuum but has relevant significance to a culture and its people.
Today, in American art, we see many factions, some of whom purposely isolate themselves from the history and politics of the moment. Art is considered pure and absolute in its own right, and this can apply to realism or abstraction. There also are artists whose work is specifically political and/or socially oriented. Some artists may attempt to criticize modern cultural values (Robert Mapplethorpe or Andres Serrano in photography; Andy Warhol became a cultural icon by utilizing iconic advertising images in his art; the whole pop art movement in the sixties and seventies; art critical of wars like Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, or any issue that could be interpreted as an expression of American hegemony – there is an extensive list here). An artist may feel that for his/her work to be relevant, it has to have some socially critical or political edge. Otherwise, the art could be dismissed as just another example of commercial excess or a piece of visual, decorative fluff. We can also find art created for specific markets: western themed, marine art, pet art, commercial portraiture, and others. Depending on which side of a divide one stands, much of this art could be called strict commercialism.
The history of a current moment is difficult to pin down for that history is being made moment by moment. What seems on the surface to be important and relevant may simply be what is emphasized in the news, a kind of media-created significance that may later be shown as a minor player within a much larger context of people’s lives. Cultural myopia can create a mirage effect, a mirrored image, if you will, that has lots of glamor but little substance. Our current time, for example, where global players make the news every day may later be seen as a time when ordinary people distracted by their focus on making ends meet rose up and completely restructured the political and economic landscape. Within this turmoil lots of art movements may come and go, but what will last will only be determined by the passage of time. That history is yet to be written.
Posted on 10/28/2015
By Donald Fox
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Things happen in life, and they are either expected or unexpected. As children, pretty much everything seems mysterious to us, but gradually we learn about expectations that until we reach a level of awareness and understanding might simply be more unexpected surprises. We acclimate ourselves to the world and perhaps cruise along with day to day normalcy (which we learn from family, culture, the basis circumstance of our lives) until something unexpected occurs. We then adapt and assimilate that new experience or in some cases are wounded by it – the death of a pet, for example – and we adjust our lives to that event for better or worse. We learn about control, or the lack thereof, or better yet, the illusion of control. The process of adaptation is itself fraught with unexpected responses – there are many possibilities and so many variables, but as humans we attempt to minimize the uncontrollable in order to gain maximum control. All of that is but an illusion if we are truthful.
Some part of us knows that nothing is truly predictable, nothing truly certain. It has almost become a cliché to suggest that anything could happen at any moment – the proverbial unseen bus, an errant meteorite, or an undetected physical flaw that does us in. The adaptive side of us exerts caution when necessary, triggers fight or flight when appropriate, or directs thinking to positive and productive considerations most of the other times lest we become consumed by fear of the unexpected.
Religion, philosophy, and art all approach human psychological and emotional challenges in different ways. Sometimes there is overlap and sometimes complete agreement among these perspectives. We exhibit faith or doubt, confidence or uncertainty, diligence or hesitancy in all that we think and do. We celebrate that which brings life and positive energy and seek these things out. We tend to avoid the negative and the harmful. Because we are human and flawed, there can be a mixture of positive and negative while we still maintain emphasis on the positive. Aberrations do occur and we see darker elements manifest in our experience and our expression. Art and literature illustrate this range of complexity in stories and myths. More than a simple coping mechanism, our art is one of the powerful ways we have developed to understand what could otherwise be a hopeless situation filled with helplessness and vulnerability. We use art not only as a means for adapting to life but also as a means of triumphing in life while additionally creating a legacy that we pass down from generation to generation.
Posted on 10/27/2015
By Donald Fox
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In nature we often see edges as defined but not so neatly as we might think. It is our perception that gives definition, and since we do not remain static, neither do many edges. Something substantial like a tree or a rock we readily acknowledge as solid and stabile, but this is simply our limited perspective that judges it so. Rocks are worn down by the forces of nature, and trees grow or shrivel in their life cycles. As we move through a landscape, what we see from any given vantage point will necessarily appear differently from another vantage point. We register an object in our minds as being stationary as we move around or past it, but its position in space is relative to our movement. Even if we stand still, the object will appear to move as the natural light source moves and alters our perception of the object that is illuminated.
Is the shoreline of the ocean constant? What about that of a lake or other large body of water? There is fluctuation here as well. An animal or person breathes and makes many small movements even when sitting or standing still. These motions may not be noticed when we concentrate on the forms and shapes of the body. The motion of our eyes, however, is constant, for this is normally how we see and understand what we are looking at. Rarely do we fixedly stare at something. Our visual picture of the world is composed of numerous snapshots that are smoothed out, so to speak, within our minds. We tend to think of everything out there as being constant, but we’re inwardly projecting that constancy rather than perceiving it.
We have become used to measuring our world and all of its parts, creating complex comparisons, and synthesizing our understanding of what we experience with internal reconstructions, mental images that we take to be accurate portrayals of what is out there in front of us and around us. This is obvious, some might say, but is it really? It is from our experience of the world that we create art and other inventions. Even in the most mimetic of art forms, we impose an order that may not be present in what we actually see. We create somewhat arbitrary boundaries, edges, contours, according to a single point of view, but in the process of doing so we actually impose our interpretation of what is there. Our so-called objective observations are mingled with emotional response to colors and shapes a well as imaginative restructurings that one artist might perceive but another not (or perceive differently).
Personally, I find that my experience changes all the time. My experience of the world, like so many of the world’s parts, is constantly in motion. Consequently, it is much less important to me that things are always the same (given all the cyclical movements among the stationary objects). It is much more interesting to notice what is there in the moment I perceive it, recognizing that my perceptions are always influenced by my thoughts and feelings. There is no way I could ever capture the multi-layered experience of being, but I can perceive everything as always being new and different. I find myself, therefore, shifting away from what is known to noticing as much as possible what is becoming. That, for me at this point in time, is what art is about.
Posted on 10/26/2015
By Donald Fox
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Recently John Weiss published a blog titled “Focus on the Story, Not the Tools.” He humorously told his own story about an intervention by his family over his denial of buying more than one too many pochade boxes. I enjoyed the blog and agree that the tools (the toys) can sometimes become distractions rather than the support they are intended to be.
I love a good art supply store. There was a great one in Houston years ago called Pearl Art Supply that I really miss. They had more varieties of paint brands, canvases, brushes, paper, easels, and all the accompanying gadgets than any other store that I’ve seen in Texas let alone in Houston. It was a great place to go simply to browse and daydream about all the great work that could be made with those materials and tools. Sadly, they went out of business.
I’m also reminded, though, of the importance of good tools and especially choosing the right tool for the job. As a crafty person, one who has done carpentry, plumbing, electrical repair, mechanical repair, house painting, gardening, general all-around fixit stuff (I’m a homeowner), and professional construction work, I understand the importance of the right tool for the job. This I learned from my dad, one of the best fixit persons I know. When I can, I upgrade tools or add those that I know will improve outcomes and cut production time. This is different from tool worship or tool fetish. I applaud and encourage those that utilize the best tools.
A collector, though, is something different. Collectors love to admire. They may study and become knowledgeable about whatever they collect – and being informed can be a good thing – but many collectors do little more than admire. A tool collector will likely not use the tools in the collection for fear of damaging them. The tools, therefore, lose their purpose, or as John suggests, they become a distraction from doing the job. An artist’s tools used rightly, on the other hand, have given us millennia of cultural expression and countless variations on the human story.
Posted on 10/25/2015 6:38:44 PM
By Donald Fox
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Time Passage
An article in today’s paper has me thinking more about current technology (several recent blogs) but mostly about time. Each of us comes into the world at a specific point in time. We measure time, though we may not understand it or even agree that it exists, according to the system we have created to mark its passage. A person is born into that system and educated to it, taught that there are natural cycles of day and night, these accumulate into days, weeks, months, and years that constitute our lives – or at least the understood measurement of them.
We also learn about the past, but as children all that is really important is the present. We begin to build our own past through experience and our recollections of that, and at some point we imagine and possibly look forward to our future. What governs the present, however, exerts enormous influence for this we assume is the reality that is true. We give ourselves over to that without much consideration until there is enough self-awareness connected to awareness of what lies beyond the self. We gradually learn that we are not the center of the universe. We may even begin to question what is real and possibly what it all means. If lucky, we become curious about the past and how life was the same yet very different. We also notice that life does not always appear to our peers, to other cultures and nationalities, and to other philosophical persuasions the way it may appear to us.
Among these realizations is that the concept of time has greatly changed not only from childhood experience but also from that of our ancestors. The history of transportation, of communication, of warfare, and of most any technology illustrates a different experience of and understanding of time. This has affected how we experience the course of a day and how we plan for the future. Since the dawn of civilization, there has been a gradual acceleration of experience that from roughly the time of the Renaissance in Europe has increased with the passage of each century. By the nineteenth century and the beginning of what we may call the modern age, the acceleration has been amplified by dramatic technological breakthroughs.
We have moved generally from an agrarian society to an industrial one with implications that have often exceeded our ability to grasp them. Since the invention of film and movies, we now have visual, real-life images of slower times: cars, ships, transportation of goods, communications shifts from written letters delivered by post to telegraphs to radio messages to telephone messages to real-time television images to computer messages. We can observe the changes and recognize the “inconvenience” of those slower times. The wiser among us will also note other effects on social structure, learning, psychology, politics, and moral issues. We see the effects in art and literature and how these forms of commentary and communication also have changed in dissemination. Teachers worry about the short attention spans of their students and their seeming need for entertainment and instant messaging. Adults express concern about losing not only the time to be able to sit and read abut also the ability to process information that requires lengthy thought and/or discussion. Some artists imagine dystopian futures where centrally controlled and forced-information fed individuals have lost their ability to think for themselves. Given the state of information on the internet, some believe that the future is now, and it will only get worse.
Fortunately, we still have books, bicycles, libraries, museums, and some public discourse. Computers and the internet are tools that can enhance the value of many of these, and it is our responsibility to use them wisely.
Posted on 10/24/2015 11:04:06 PM
By Donald Fox
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I can distinctly remember that as a child I firmly believed in a kind of magic being present in the world. I don’t mean the hocus-pocus incantations of a magician while performing sleight of hand tricks. The magic had to do with fervent belief about something bringing that thing to fruition. For example, I often believed that something good would happen by the end of the day or on a particular day, and more often than not something good did happen. My insights were not very specific and so were not really predictions in the classic sense. By being general rather than specific, I probably increased the odds of something good happening. I could also interpret most anything large or small as a good thing and therefore fulfill my prophecy. This form of magical thinking is not uncommon among children, and aspects of it carry over into adulthood.
Part of magical thinking is linked to a sense of play in my view. It’s like a game of pretend. When belief in the pretense is very strong, one can become convinced of the reality of that pretension. Several psychological disorders seem to operate in this way: delusion, mild compulsion, and projection, as examples. Fantasizing about something is closely related to daydreaming, an innocent enough activity for many. Fantasizing is also not too different from imagining a goal and taking steps to achieve it. Most consider this a practical activity, but it also is a form of magical thinking. Images, words, or ideas are used in place of the desired thing as a motivation to move towards that thing. A person is acting very much like a shaman to visualize, perform some ritual activity, and then manifest the object of desire.
Arguably a rational thinker could draw distinctions between action that will bring about a reasonable expectation and the action of a superstitious person hoping for something to occur simply by thinking about it. We have many reasonable activities, however, that closely parallel the kind of magical thinking associated with superstition and/or delusion. Many spiritual beliefs would fit this description. The belief in justice sometimes takes on a magical coloration. One believing that his or her actions are better than those of others – the concept of the greatest good, for example, seems rational though not always practical.
Artistic expression often results from a kind of magical thinking, imaginary play – impractical steps to create a predictable result or practical steps to create something with no practical value, a thing of impracticality. As humans we go to great lengths to justify our thoughts, our choices, and our actions. We distinguish between the sensible and the nonsensical. We identify the real and separate it from the imaginary. We also take the imaginary and make it into something real. That we call invention, its practice creativity, and its practitioner a genius when the result is good enough. These inventions come from a form of play that is itself another form of magical thinking.
Posted on 10/23/2015 11:35:19 PM
By Donald Fox
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A few years ago a longtime painter friend asked me while visiting my studio how I titled paintings. He is a landscape painter, but not just straightforward-landscape-based-on-observation painter, although he does do a lot of plein air painting. His work is based on observation of nature, but like Renaissance figure painters who could construct a fully believable figure from almost any conceivable angle without a model, he can create an imaginary landscape that is convincingly real. There’s also a poetic quality in much of his work and a leaning towards a romantic view of nature. That view is informed by having grown up hunting and fishing in the southeast Texas landscape. He knows the moods and atmosphere of the land that bred him. Consequently, or maybe contrarily, his painting titles are either place names or generally descriptive – Sims Bayou or Morning Light, for example. He was aware that my titles are often different.
It’s an interesting question, for I also know that for my friend titles are usually an afterthought. Sometimes, he told me, he has to think for a long time to avoid either repeating a title or using one that’s too close to another. I can understand his concern, and I expect that generating titles is a challenge for many artists, myself included. Many modern artists have opted for Untitled followed by a sequence number or simply the number. Partly this comes from the modernist concept that a painting is not about anything external; there is no narrative or literary content. There is only the design as a unique composition. This is true, of course, if the painting isn’t part of a series of works – Untitled #1, Untitled #2, and so on might suggest a set of variations where paintings are actually referring to one another as variations on a theme. Many artists have worked thematically even before the Impressionists carried this to a high art form: Monet’s series of poplars, haystacks, Rouen Cathedral, water lilies, and so on, as examples. Other painters created variations on a narrative theme – Biblical painters, for example, became known for depicting important stories from the Bible.
Prior to the twentieth century, most paintings were titled either descriptively (Still Life with Fruit, Portrait of a Man, The Dance Class) or according to literary or historical allusion (Leda and the Swan, Jupiter and Io, The Raft of the Medusa). Portraits were typically titled with the name of the sitter. Some early exceptions with a more symbolic bent later exerted strong influence of late nineteenth and early twentieth century artists (The Tempest, The Garden of Delights, Melancholia). Genre painting introduced a different sort of narrative, short stories or anecdotes from daily life rather than scenes from Biblical or mythical stories. Titles for these was often descriptive as well.
The story of art, though, is quite complex, and there are many overlaps and inter-weavings as artists from different parts of Europe traveled to Italy and Greece for training, inspiration, and inevitable influence. It’s tempting to make generalities, but exceptions will always come to mind, and these involve longer explanations. The Classical influence was great and held sway through academic promotion for hundreds of years. Eventually, much of this was thrown off by rebellious young painters, or if not completely dismissed, then certainly reinterpreted. The influence of democracy and the decline of the aristocracy also affected artistic thinking as did the outcomes of many wars. As war became increasingly horrifying as the result of technological changes (better ways to kill large numbers), a sense of angst affected many artists. How, then, does this relate to titles of paintings?
Beginning in the late nineteenth century, the personal and the idiosyncratic began to surface increasingly among each new generation of artists. Many still followed the academic tradition, but others took bolder steps to attempt to redefine what it means to make art and what art may actually be (or what being an artist actually means). Much art became cerebral and detached from everyday experience. Other art focused on improvisational experiences. To me this latter is an extension of romanticism with the artist being something of a holy fool, not divinely inspired in a traditional sense but captivated nonetheless by an artistic spirit. Surrealism and Dada introduce dream images, the absurd, the nonsensical, and the bizarre. We find paintings with descriptive titles referencing the materials from which they are made, numbered, untitled, or symbolic titles alluding to obscure literary, mythical, or other arcane references (Red #3; Twenty-four; Portrait with Green Stripe; Autumn Rhythm: Number 30; Broadway Boogie-woogie – these only hint at the variety and range).
Titling paintings is a personal choice, but I suspect that most artists want the title to have some meaning relevant to the work. Even to tile a painting Untitled suggests a particular point of view respective to what a painting may be. Personally, and perhaps because of my background in literature and poetry, I opt for titles that are poetic, metaphorical, symbolic, imagistic, or ambiguous. Mostly I see painting as a visual statement that contains levels of meaning from its most simple existence as a colored object to a complex field that invites visual, emotional, and imaginary exploration. The title is one part of that statement, and I would hope that the viewer would read it as such.
Posted on 10/22/2015
By Donald Fox
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There are those who study creativity and creative people professionally. They may be psychologists, psychiatrists, brain scientists, sociologists, anthropologists, aestheticians, or those in other scientific or academic disciplines. Some of these people might think themselves not particularly creative. Quite a lot of so-called ordinary people also think themselves lacking in creativity. Typically they mean that they are not artistic, for their definition of being creative is bound up with some kind of artistic skill or artistic expression. Someone lacking musical ability, however, still can appreciate music. He or she may have no sense of rhythm and yet can hear the beauty within musical compositions. The same can be said for appreciating color or design or painting or dance.
Most of us have a sense of imagination. We can do adult versions of the let’s pretend games that children so often play. That is an exercise of imagination as are certain aspects of critical thinking, also known as problem solving. Often one has to imagine a possibility in order to figure out a solution to a problem. In short, one imagines it. Creativity is wide ranging and likely knows few boundaries. Its applications far exceed what occurs regularly in the field of the arts.
Many years ago when I was in graduate school, I read several books by scientist and paleontologist Loren Eiseley. I believe he was affiliated with the University of Pennsylvania at the time. He wrote of the immense journey of humanity with an informed wit and wisdom that made complex scientific observations accessible to the average person. His use of language affected me most because he could write descriptively about a stretch of prairie in the most magnificent and poetic way. I felt as though I were following him on an amazing journey through space and time, the journey that is that of our human history. To be contemplative in the face of scientific observation and to see the poetry in rocks and bones that also reveal geological secrets is a powerful use of the creative mind. It effectively blends imagination with observation to give deeper meaning to all that is (as we perceive it) and our place within it.
I feel concerned sometimes that the amazing tools we have created through (and including) the computer and virtual reality may shift our vision away from the natural world, the world of our natural senses, into a realm that is captivating but is relatively sterile. It may ultimately be a hall of mirrors with endless reflections of our own distorted images. Some suggest that this may be a new evolutionary pathway, but I’m not so readily convinced of that. The long trek of humanity has proceeded by the use of our senses and the enhancement of our awareness of our surroundings. The past few centuries have paradoxically created greater possibility of unification via communication while also increasing insulation from natural ways of being governed by the sustaining environment that has enabled us to thrive. Now we potentially threaten that environment and alienate ourselves from our ancestral history because of increasing concern with the new and the next. Perhaps we’re just a bit too clever for our own good.
Posted on 10/21/2015
By Donald Fox
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Very few would argue that the world is complex. Once we begin to question exactly what that statement means, however, it becomes obvious that there is complexity within the sentence itself. Are we speaking about the natural world, the world of culture and civilization, the world as limited to this planet, or what exactly? If we consider human attempts to make sense of the surrounding environment – partly how to survive in it firstly, and then perhaps to understand something of its workings beyond immediate dangers or challenges – we see a long history of struggle, innovation, rapid rise or fall of cultures, or sustained presence of some cultures for extended periods, and many adjustments in thinking about what the world is and what it means to be a part of it.
In many ways, religions have simplified and codified the world. Everything is explained in terms of what a deity has created as a garden to be tended, a testing ground for cognizant souls to either pass into a higher existence or not, or as a great mystery that will never be resolved but must be taken on faith. Ultimate questions appear to be unanswerable – what is life, what is death, what is the meaning of it all? Faith is posited as the answer to these queries, but faith in what exactly? Here is where more complexity arises, for the many religious expressions do not agree except that there must have been a creator. The nature of that creator remains aloof and inexplicable except through the various systems of belief. These, however, offer no verifiable proof. Religious leaders look to ancient texts, but most of these are as obscure as anything else. Sin and corruption entered the world because of bad choices. It was the fault of the imperfect humans. Or, it was the fault of the great deceiver who tempted and fooled the humans. There are many variations of these tales.
Art has served as a means to interpret some of the religious explanations, and sometimes it has raised counter issues and even offered challenges to a dominant religious interpretation. Writers, typically, along with some philosophers, have posed alternative views or have attempted to defeat what has been called religious fanaticism, cultism, superstition, ignorance, irrationality, or stupidity. Every religion can’t be right since many claim to be the sole guardian of the truth. Does that mean that all religions are then false? Counter accusations of heresy, possession, or infidelity run against the atheist and agnostic. Whichever side one is on seems so clear and right from that perspective.
Both believer and non-believer can share the experience of beauty. Both can appreciate a sunrise or sunset, the pleasantness of a clear and mild day, the pleasure of a long drink of cool water, or the soothing sounds of breaking waves, wind in the trees, a simple bird song, or whatever experience is natural to the known environment. At some point, though, the conflict between the rational and the emotional will emerge, and a choice has to be made. For several millennia now art has reflected these choices and likely will continue to do so.
Posted on 10/20/2015
By Donald Fox
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There was a time in the past when my artistic ideas exceeded my skills to bring them to fruition. I still find awkward sketches in old sketchbooks that poorly illustrate what are potentially useful ideas, which may or may not be used in some future project. At the time, though, I thought what was done based on a particular sketch was insightful and powerful art. Quite simply, it was not. What it really was could be described as crude at best and very naïve insofar as its expression. I consider those things a form of juvenilia and many of them have been destroyed or trashed. They were not worth saving. The ideas are still there if I choose to pursue them, but the original manifestations are worthless to me.
In a time of political correctness, and this time has been going on for some while now, it is considered bad form to criticize one’s efforts too harshly. I learned in graduate school that anyone taking the step to present work publicly is putting him or herself out there for anyone and everyone to effuse, use, abuse, or refuse. There is no real separation of the artist from the art, for many will attack the creator for presenting what is considered substandard work. Yes, sometimes people do make mistakes, they misjudge, or they misinterpret, or simply do not understand. Those exceptions are probably fewer rather than the many, otherwise we wouldn’t call them exceptions. Ultimately, history becomes the judge.
Everyone has the right to make art, but anyone who does make art and then chooses to display that effort publicly is also inviting criticism. People will judge and sometimes judge harshly. If an art practitioner has done his or her due diligence, meaning studied and practiced and learned the craft well, then the criticism will serve to improve what he/she does. If that person has simply assumed that because it was personally made that the work is a masterpiece, then the rudeness of reception may well be deserved. The serious art practitioner, which is to say the serious student of art, will understand that the learning process is long and arduous and filled with many critical potholes. And this is how it should be. We learn by doing, we improve with practice, and feedback is an important part of that possibility for improvement.
The best students of art also learn to critique what they do. Art is not simply about self-expression. The artist isn’t simply a channel for creative spirit. A violin will not play itself any more than a brush will paint a picture. These are instruments that must be utilized by the artist, and though the artist might be described as the instrument of creative expression, he or she is the source of that expression rather than the mute instrument waiting to be brought to life. One could argue about motivation or inspiration or intuition, but these are concepts that define some aspect of the mystery that is creative expression. Unlike the young artist that may have a great idea but cannot fully express it, the mature artist has learned how to manipulate ideas, inspirations, insights with skill and mastery. The resulting work is a testament to the merging of many elements into a piece that ultimately rises above criticism (although it sometimes may be edified by it).
Posted on 10/19/2015
By Donald Fox
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There is a new kitten at my house, not an unusual event since my wife and I often rescue feral animals and take them in for spaying and neutering. Some we find homes for, some disappear on their own, and some end up staying with us. However, it has been well over a year since we had a kitten around. Most of the animals that show up are older and wise enough to seek out a good source of food. I suspect the kitten was either dropped off by someone or followed another cat from an apartment complex just down the street from us. It doesn’t really matter for this little guy – we’ve named him Guy Noir since he’s completely black – is the most independent (and smart) cat I’ve ever encountered, and I’ve encountered a lot of them.
Within days he had figured out the pet door, something that has stumped many older cats for months. Initially he was so small that he couldn’t push his way through like the larger cats; in fact, he could barely reach the bottom edge of the door. Somehow he figured out that if he jumped up on the lower edge and then rolled sideways he would tumble through to the other side. The first few times we actually saw him do this, we both totally cracked up. He also is not intimidated by any of the adult cats, even the largest of them, Mr. Bear, who also happens to be completely black. No, Bear is not the daddy because he was neutered several years ago.
Guy Noir is the typical bundle of kitten energy and a great source of comic relief. He stalks several of the adult females who don’t quite know what to think about him. He’s claimed a small circular cat bed that others had been using intermittently, but now it’s totally his. He’s also experimented with sleeping in our bed, something that only a couple of others have done. He is largely bug-eyed and fearless about everything, and it’s a joy to watch him learning how to maneuver among so many adults, eight not counting the two humans.
Human children develop and learn slowly compared to animals that live an accelerated lifespan. Even as kittens, though, cats have skills that far exceed their human counterparts. Their mastery of space and body agility is remarkable, and their curiosity seems to know no bounds. Kittens especially appear to be open to every possibility; anything can be a toy. Their playful inventiveness seems like an intuitive expression of imagination. Artists might do well to see the world with the eyes of a cat even if only for brief moments. I’m not sure our superior human brains could hold that much energetic stimulation for very long.
Posted on 10/18/2015 6:41:32 PM
By Donald Fox
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In my early study of art I took classes at several different schools from a variety of instructors. Drawing classes were the most numerous of these since I audited quite a few in addition to ones I was supposed to take for credit. It should be obvious that different instructors would have different methods of teaching, but I think that many tend to follow whatever they were taught – at least they do this in their early teaching years. Anyone that has taken a structured drawing class has likely encountered loosening exercises like making meandering lines all over a page or two of paper, gesture drawing and three or five minute poses when working from a model, blind contour drawing, and other kinds of challenging exercises that more often than not discourage rather than encourage a student’s development.
There are basic principles of drawing that can be discussed and learned. Whether gesture drawing or any kind of quick sketching is of value is questionable. Technique is developed over time and depends on more than simple eye-hand coordination. A student needs to be able to see with understanding in order to draw well and that develops with lots of practice. It is necessary to observe carefully, note what is seen, make corrections as needed, and keep working until satisfactory results are achieved. This may include starting over a lot. It will also mean figuring out that an outline is not the best place to start. As Delacroix and many others have said, it is most important to draw from the center out. This realization has to be experienced, and that comes from lots of drawing.
If someone looks at the seemingly quick sketches by many Renaissance artists or other masters, especially Leonardo or Rembrandt, it might seem like mastering the quick study is a way to develop drawing skill. My thought is that these artists had mastered their drawing skills first and were thus able to make powerfully realized quick studies, not the other way around. The real key is to draw regularly and frequently. With repeated practice, there will be improvement, for the more one draws the more one begins to discover the essence of what is being drawn. It is not simply about what makes something appear that way that it does – that is just part of the visual understanding – for that visual information has to be translated for the page into marks, lines, and smudges that say something about whatever is being observed. Compare what Picasso did with line to Giacometti’s line drawings. Picasso’s drawings have a classical simplicity, are fluid and elegant. Giacometti’s drawings are about energetic line meandering through and carving out space on the page; they are filled with excitement and motion.
Every student will find artists whose work he or she admires and may strive to emulate that. The truly dedicated student will most likely find his or her appreciation changing as more is learned and absorbed. One of those lessons, hopefully, will be that there is more to art than surface verisimilitude. There also is that elusive “it” factor that has become such a buzzword in the entertainment industry. A kind of mysterious, perhaps even magical, quality exists in the most powerful artistic statements. Sometimes there is complexity and sometimes simplicity, sometimes a polished finish and sometimes roughly hewn. As students gain sensitivity to their developing skills, they also begin to see more in the work of others. It becomes obvious that there are many ways to make artistic statements, and those that take traditional means and use them to make unique works are not necessarily more affecting than an unusual approach that results in a simple, clear statement. Because of the immediacy of drawing, the expression of idea and technique are virtually the same.
Posted on 10/17/2015 6:47:38 PM
By Donald Fox
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Several varieties of vines have taken root in my backyard. They grow in the beds alongside the fence that encloses the yard, but these vines are insidious and have spread underground much like bamboo and certain types of holly shrubs. If I dig in the flower bed or even in the yard, I will find layers of vines of different diameter spread like a vast complex web with runners that go for twenty or thirty feet or more. If I dig with a shovel I’ll eventually uproot thick nodules from which multiple branches spread out in all directions. This reminds me of nerve networks within the body or man-made networks of wires for electrical transmission. There are various interchanges and junctions from which wires come and go to spread power throughout a neighborhood.
The primary difference between man-made and natural networks is that the former is pre-planned to be most efficient and comprehensive. Natural networks are more opportunistic and grow according to lack of impedance and always toward the light. We might find organizational patterns in natural growth, but these patterns will vary depending on availability of space. Those created by humans generally follow some logical pattern that develops from the intended purpose of the network.
A drawing or a painting typically is a collection of networked marks that accumulate to render an image according to the artist’s design. Drawings may be constructed from hatched lines, parallel lines, meandering lines, or geometric grid lines that create tone, value, and texture – whatever the particular image needs to make it cone to life. Smudges and smears can create areas of tone and value as well and tend to create a softer look when fingers, a rag, of stump is used to blend lines and marks into tonal areas. The network of lines has very specific purpose, which is to create the effect of light and shadow that in turn gives the appearance of illumination, atmosphere, and volume to shapes and forms that otherwise would appear flat and two-dimensional. Careful manipulation of these lines or tones can also create the illusion of space.
It is easy to assume that people first learned to create recognizable images from observing nature. There is no real proof of this, but it seems logical that careful observation and use of patterns would lead to mimicry and verisimilitude. Why exactly this was done is another question that eludes definitive answers. Not until we have writing do we even begin to know what people were thinking about the world in which they found themselves. We see that thousands of years ago our ancestors were asking questions about origin and meaning much as we continue to do today. We have gathered an enormous amount of detailed information about the world in which we live and have speculated about its mysteries and paradoxes. We can be thankful that from very early times, even prior to written language, our forebears used artistic expression as a primary way to interact with and question their world, our world – that which is within as well as that which is observed without.
Posted on 10/16/2015 5:52:43 PM
By Donald Fox
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My work continues to explore themes related to windows and doors, metaphors that have relevance to civilized cultures since humans began constructing habitats to locate themselves physically in relation to nature and to isolate themselves from the vagaries of climatic challenges. This could follow a personal narrative about entrances and exits, which, with slight changes in details, is the story of all of us, but the importance for the work is in the generalities, not the specifics. My own story would fit better in essay or memoir format, better told with words rather than images. For the paintings, my story is only relevant as underlying stimulus for the thrust of the works.
I once wrote that I have always had dreams that are complex, cinematic, and epic and that follow a somewhat ragged narrative intermixed with symbols or events that become symbolic within the context of the narrative. Sometimes those dreams are what dream workers might call “big dreams,” ones that seem to have particular significance as prescient or global or spiritually emphatic, possibly portentous. These visual poems are usually most engaging within the dream world context. They do not make clear sense in the waking world, for just as in poetry there is a condensed language (albeit largely visual within the dream) that is ambiguous and arcane and must be deciphered, translated, or interpreted. Isn’t this what happens sometimes in life? Don’t people show up who are more than they seem? Their significance is not readily apparent, or it is discovered much later that a certain individual bore knowledge or gifts not recognized at the time. People also can be portals to other realms of exploration and experience.
I utilize the medium of oil paint on canvas and other surfaces to create designs that function as portals for the viewer into a perceived realm of colors, shapes, and interwoven marks that stand as literal testaments of the physicality of paint. Simultaneously, these images can transform into pathways for imaginative exploration of internal landscapes enriched by the viewer’s perception and sensibility. The paintings can be experienced simply as physical, crafted objects to be contemplated for what they may yield for the individual viewer. As artistic expressions, they also stand as metaphors for those experiences in life that hold mystery, magic, and infinite possibility.
Posted on 10/15/2015 5:53:30 PM
By Donald Fox
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I looked at a show of paintings today by a local artist whose chosen subject matter is consistently deconstruction sites, i.e. buildings in the process of demolition. These are painted as urban landscapes, sometimes close-up views where crushed and crumbled stone and twisted steel create a jumbled composition of grays and browns with muted tones of purple or blue accented with yellow or orange. Other views pan back to reveal partially destroyed silhouettes against a colorful sky, perhaps a sunset or sunrise. The sunsets are a bit much given the end phase of the buildings matching that with the dying of the day.
Of course the paintings can be read as abstract designs, but because their subjects are intended to be recognized, the abstraction only carries so far. Unlike abstract compositions where the space can be ambiguous, read as shallow with overlapping planes or possibly deep and maybe infinite space played off against substance and solidity, these images are very specific. The subjects do have an aspect of social commentary, the throwaway society and its refuse, but the attempt to find beauty in rubble ultimately falls flat. We see too many images these days of war-torn landscapes, bombed and blasted city structures from all over the world that are not about transformation, a possible twist that these painted images could have, but are completely about destruction and how easy it is to destroy what has taken generations to build. War also quite literally depicts the failure of human interactions that led to such destruction.
An artist may argue that living in an urban environment, one sees the continual destruction of the old to make way for the new. Since some of these paintings identify a particular site, they provide a slight historical note, but showing a stage in the process of destruction says nothing about the historical relevance of the building or site that is depicted as rubble. No before reference is made that might connect to an historical context. Nor is there contrast provided that shows the new coming from the old like a rising phoenix.
Photographs might be a better way to chronicle urban change. A painting is a deliberate and extended process of development over time and represents the painter’s thinking about the subject and manipulation of materials. Certainly there have been paintings that represent end stages of things. How many crucifixions have been painted? How many history paintings are there that represent the aftermath of a major battle? The most powerful images from the American Civil War were not paintings, however, but photographs of slain and mutilated soldiers, the very earliest examples of dramatic reporting. Most Americans are also very familiar with the photographic images of the twisted rubble from 9/11. How would a painting of such scenes provide any new perspective?
As a painter, I can understand an artist’s fascination with piles of rubble. I have many photographs that I have taken of demolition sites, and some of these are intriguing for their spontaneous rearrangement of massive objects. The contrasts between textures of stone slabs, rebar reduced to filaments hanging in space, and smashed concrete or splintered wood are captivating and not the kinds of things readily found in nature although rockslides that take out vast stands of trees in Yosemite or other mountainous regions come pretty close.
I don’t criticize an artist’s right to choose subject matter, and I wouldn’t criticize subjects just because they may have a negative edge. I would like to see a subject within a relevant context especially when it is based on observed reality (or is connected to observed reality even if the images are imagined as in the case of much painting prior to the nineteenth century). Consider paintings of nymphs and satyrs frolicking among ancient ruins, for example. At least with these there is a mythological narrative and reference to an ancient past, which adds a hint of mystery to the depicted fantasy.
Posted on 10/14/2015 7:37:12 PM
By Donald Fox
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If someone were to do a survey of the average person on the street and ask the simple question, “What is a painting?” we might assume that we would know the answer. Most people likely would say a painting is a picture of something made with paint and brushes by an artist or person who has some artistic skill. The question for an artist, however, is more than a simple one, and answering it is nearly as complex as answering what is art. If we look for answers in ancient times, we find that painting was a decorative activity used to adorn walls (cave walls if we go back far enough), utilitarian objects especially ceramics, furniture, some sculpture, and occasionally the human body. Painting was used to illustrate papyrus scrolls, and much later, paper and parchment scrolls and books.
What we tend to think of as a painting, an object created on wood or paper or canvas, is roughly about six hundred years old. The European Renaissance is when painting came into its own as a specific art form that by this time could be defined as a picture of a particular kind. Typically paintings were made of specific subjects. Religious paintings depicted the birth of Christ, Madonna and child, biblical stories, or pictures of patrons in pious attitudes. Also, depictions of various saints associated with the Catholic Church became part of church décor and teaching. Interestingly there also were paintings of pagan subjects taken from Classical Greek and Roman mythology since knowledge from those civilizations were models for much of the learning during that time. Knowledge of the classics became the basis for education that lasted for many centuries. Some western educational institutions still use the classics as core curriculum today.
It was also during the Renaissance that several other subjects became important to painting. One was portraiture, not simply pictures to inspire piety, but also character studies of individuals: initially important people like rulers or military leaders and eventually artists, philosophers, and those wealthy enough to commission a work. Paintings were also used to tell historical stories of famous events both contemporary and ancient. It is likely that from these that genre painting evolved since artists chose to paint accurate portrayals of daily life. No doubt there were economic issues affecting these changes including the growing popularity of landscapes as subjects. Economic growth, diversification, the rise of a merchant and eventually a middle class all affected changes in painting since patrons were no longer limited to the church or the state.
During this period from the Renaissance through the end of the nineteenth century, painting not only changed in its outward appearance – subject, style, and technical expression – it also changed philosophically. Art came into its own, so to speak. Artists and philosophers thought about and wrote extensively about various aspects of painting addressing topics such as mimesis, verisimilitude, the depiction of space and atmosphere, the use of colors, symbolism, spirituality, and philosophical significance. Aesthetics grew as a branch of philosophy and addressed purpose and meaning in the arts. Painting also grew in complexity (along with the reputations of individual artists), but a painting continued to be conceived as a picture of something.
Some say that Impressionism began to crack painting’s façade. An artist’s impression of something, how he/she felt about a subject, actually became the subject. Verisimilitude was of less importance, and this led to a painting like Whistler’s Nocturne in Black and Gold: the Falling Rocket, which led to the famous court face-off between Whistler and John Ruskin the leading aesthetician of the day. The transition from realism to abstraction (and expressionism) was not so abruptly marked, but it makes a good story. That early abstract painters held on to observable images (Picasso and Braque, for example) or mythological references (Der Blaue Reiter and the Symbolists, and later Barnett Newman and Jackson Pollock) is telling. A painting is always about an image. A painting is more than a process or an idea. The painting is something to be perceived, to be viewed and contemplated. It may be grasped visually and emotionally first, but it also will be absorbed intellectually and by deep contemplation. The simple collection of materials from which it is composed altered by a master hand transforms that painted object into a potent material focal point that is like a window on reality as the Renaissance masters conceived, but the reality does not stop at the visual copy (if that is even what is presented). Whatever is portrayed is more than a picture, more than an idea, more than a feeling, and more than an alchemist’s transmutation into something called art.
Posted on 10/13/2015
By Donald Fox
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Astronomers say that a dying star that has spent all its fuel collapses in on itself, becomes increasingly dense and heavy, so much so that its gravitational pull increases dramatically and nothing, therefore, can escape from its center. It absorbs everything around it and thus appears as a “hole” in space and time. It is black because no light is emitted from its center.
For close to five hundred years space was the most important fundamental of painting because without believable space, there could be no believable depiction of the real or imaginary worlds. Western artists developed systems by which illusionistic space could be created, and this core rendering of visible space enabled painters to make images that rivaled the real thing. Eventually, the clarity of spatial rendering gave way to atmospheric effects and the properties of light, illumination, captured artists’ interest. Observation of the natural world supplanted the imaginary cavorting of gods and demons, but revolutions in scientific inquiry led some artists to question the nature of reality and to question the reality of a painting.
One way to consider what happened with twentieth century painting is that space collapsed in on itself. The window on reality that had ruled since the early Renaissance was closed for many. The canvas surface became impenetrable, a screen to which paint could be affixed, scrubbed, poured, or spattered, on a space of extension only without any illusory third dimension to promote a false notion of depth. Painting became increasingly philosophical and intellectual in its conscious historical affectation. To be relevant an artist had to join the larger visual dialog.
However, some stars visible in the night sky no longer exist. Their phantom light is still traveling in space though the source long ago extinguished. Such is the light from art that lingers long after its source, its creator, has disappeared from the Earth. We the viewers are just as enthralled by the artistic light as those of earlier times, sometimes even more so, and our own aesthetic light will shine in the future as a visual echo of the time in which we looked to the past, questioned the present, and mused about what our days may look like from a point too far for us to see.
Posted on 10/12/2015
By Donald Fox
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Inspiration is a mystery. The experience may be totally unexpected. While walking down the street, driving across town, stepping into the corner drugstore, or taking a morning stroll in the local park, something catches the eye and the light comes on, the veritable lightning bolt moment. The experience is akin to having insight about something as may happen while reading a poem or good piece of literature and words, images, and meaning create a window into some realm previously unforeseen. Everything makes sense. The moment is an epiphany, and inspiration is also one of those epiphanal moments.
Where do these moments come from? What is that unique understanding, that special firing of sympathetic neurons that has a trigger effect to unleash creative energy, endorphins, and adrenalin plus who knows what else bodily response that spurs one on to produce something artistic? The ancients spoke of the muse and created multiple muses for different forms of inspiration. Greece and Rome had nine muses, the daughters of Zeus (Jupiter), each responsible for same aspect of inspiration and creative work. Modern day mystics speak of channeling inspiration from a higher source. In the years between then and now many stories have been told by many artists of their personal muses, some as fantasy figures, some as real people.
Creative inspiration, however, doesn’t have to be personified nor does it have to be encountered outside one’s self. The real source of inspiration is internal. The artist trains him or herself to be the instrument of creation, a living brush, a perpetual dance, an endless song. The flower holds the essence of its beauty and will unfold through many stages to fulfill its purpose. One plant creates many blooms. The artist also flowers but additionally has the foresight and capacity to tend the garden in which he/she grows.
Posted on 10/11/2015 3:15:21 PM
By Donald Fox
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We live in a world beset by dangers. This has been true for as long as humanity has existed (and likely before that). Survival is a day to day task and for our ancient ancestors had an edge of urgency that we today don’t usually have to address unless we find ourselves in a war zone or in a region governed by poverty and superstition. These, unfortunately, are recurring threats in many parts of the world.
Barring natural disasters and attacks by predators, those in most cultures today find survival challenges that result from artificial restrictions. Family, cultural, religious, philosophical, and psychological influences create barriers at worst and challenges at best for individuals all over the planet. Many of these restrictions are beliefs that have become reality over generations. Once accepted, certain beliefs become entrenched and difficult to eradicate. This is the way it is, so everyone seems to say, regardless how demeaning or damaging the belief may be.
We could classify many cultural beliefs as superstitious and try to sway people’s opinions through education and economic incentives (a favorite of American foreign policy). In the past (and presently in some regions), power ruled – the strongest imposed his/her will on the weaker, and caste systems, male dominance, patriarchal attitudes, and threats of damnation arose to keep the masses under foot. For some of us application of common sense would provide the answer, but where common sense is not a concept, it is not viable or even raised as an option.
The 2005 film Water illustrates the plight of a certain group in India, widowed women, some of whom can be child brides, who are then locked into lives essentially as outcasts. They have no position because they have lost their husbands. In essence, the woman is nothing without her man. This is a very ancient concept within the Hindu culture and for hundreds of years was never questioned (except perhaps by some of the widows that endured deprivation). The practice continues today although it has lessened. In his 2006 review of the film, the late Roger Ebert raised these questions regarding political controversy stirred by the film: “Who is still offended, and why, and what have they to gain, and what do they fear?” The controversy was considerable since the film was made by a woman, director Deepa Mehta, so considerable that filming had to be moved from India to Sri Lanka because of damage done to sets and death threats made against the director.
Ignorance is a powerful force. It breeds superiority on one side and superstition on the other. Those that see ignorance tend to become judgmental and dismissive; the ignorant are mostly unaware but resist anything that poses alternatives. Art sometimes allows us to see the humanity that exists among those subjected to ignorance, deprivation, and subjugation. It (art) can give us hope, make us ashamed (of our actions or inactions), or infuriate us that aspects of our world, humanity specifically, can create such inhumanity.
Posted on 10/10/2015 8:04:34 PM
By Donald Fox
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Most visual art is inert like a stone or a tree. We could argue that a stone is simply a happenstance, the result of some long term geological event or series of events, yet there it is inert and immobile. A tree, we’d say, grows from a seedling to maturity and changes dramatically over its lifespan even though it goes nowhere, is fixed and stable and in that sense only is inert.
More like a tree, perhaps, a work of art grows from the kernel of an idea into its fullest expression through a process by which various materials are combined and are transformed into the thing called art. The object, however, has no hand in this and is inert like the tree or stone unless it is transported from one location to another. Even so, the art does not change its character or form; thus, it too is inert.
Once an artwork is encountered by a viewer, however, it becomes activated and animated within the viewer’s eye and mind. Now, unlike the stone or tree, that artwork is a kind of messenger, a pipeline if you will, of information, emotion, and transformative experience for any viewer who engages with it. This experience can be timeless, for works from a hundred or a thousand years ago can be just as powerful in present time as they may have been in their own time.
Posted on 10/9/2015 6:01:39 PM
By Donald Fox
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Anyone who has ever attempted plein air painting is aware of what casual observers of a scene rarely notice. Every few minutes the scene changes, or rather, has changed. The light source is in motion; therefore, lighted areas and shaded areas continually shift. Many people have seen this dramatized with time-lapse photography, especially in films. It is as though time is speeded up, which makes the image shifts more pronounced. We see rapid motion of moving objects and shadows perform like active players in an otherwise static scene.
If we photograph something like a landscape, we get an instantaneous, frozen depiction of that scene. Again, this is what the casual observer might think normal reality because rarely does anyone sit and watch shadows move. A scene is taken in at a glance as the viewer’s eyes continue to zero in on one feature or another. Each visual ‘snapshot’ is perceptually integrated into the whole image, and the overall impression is of a unified scene very much like a mental photograph.
Since a painting develops over time, contrary to the instantaneous photograph, the painter has to stabilize that naturally changing subject into a unified interpretive image. This is done partly by fixing the light source to a single location and resultant shadows are also held in relation to that angle of light. This makes for an image that is imagined by the artist as much or more so than as it is observed. Also, because the painter is observing from a single viewpoint, the basic relationships of objects observed one to another remain constant. This also is different from most everyday observation as the observer literally moves through the landscape. Objects don’t move, but the viewer’s position and perspective in relation to those objects do change, which in turn alters the perception of those objects.
The underlying idea here is so simple that it is rarely noticed or voiced by the observer. The experience is so ordinary that it is easily not noticed since the brain automatically adjusts the viewer’s understanding without calling attention to what is occurring. Artists, however, tend to notice subtle changes for they are visually keyed to changes in pattern, color, shape, position, and other sensually perceived characteristics. Artists also understand how to take most any experience, observed, imagined, or emotionally felt, and transform it into the stuff of art. That art becomes the basis for new experience for both artist and audience.
In my view, however, art should never be confused with its subject; that is to say, a landscape painting is not a landscape, nor is nature a work of art. The artist’s expression may begin with nature, but whatever the artist experiences is transformed into something unique. Art is a construct that no matter how tied to nature it may appear, is always separate from it though it may be experienced by the viewer similarly to how nature herself is experienced through the senses and the emotions.
Posted on 10/8/2015
By Donald Fox
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The recent issue of National Geographic contains an article about recent finds of previously unknown human ancestors that predate well-known ones like Homo habilis and Homo erectus. The bones from several early human-like creatures were all found in a South African cave many miles south of the Olduvai Gorge area where other significant finds by the Leakey family had expanded our understanding of ancestors from millions of years ago. Other finds in Ethiopia also serve to broaden the picture of what still is a sketchy picture of our ancient humanoid past. Just as the increasing popularity of DNA searches by individuals to see how their far removed ancestors came from different cultural branches and migrated through various parts of the world, so does our continuing interest in past art and archaeology reveal other aspects of our common humanity.
When considering art, we sometimes learn of new ancient works that predate work already known. For example, recent discoveries in Indonesia and in France have revealed magnificent cave paintings that, as well as impress us with their beauty, also raise question about what else may be out there somewhere waiting to be discovered. This may not only be true of the ancient past. There could be historical works yet to be uncovered, artists not currently known who could come to light. This is not inconceivable nor totally fanciful.
Archaeologists, of course, work with very big numbers and often very small fragments. Years that are counted in millions are just as farfetched for me as those spouted by astronomers in light years to describe those galactic and cosmic distances. Our civilized history is such a small blip on the screen of time compared to those pre-civilized spans or the time required for those tiny dots of lights in the sky to get their luminance visible to us though it appears to happen with regularity every night.
We are curious creatures, inquisitive and imaginative. We don’t simply look up and wonder. We wonder (and wander) in every direction at once, so insatiable is that curiosity. Someday, hopefully, it will actually sink in that we are all connected in far more ways than we have allowed ourselves to believe. In western culture, of course, we like to think ourselves unique, and we tend to stress the autonomy of the individual. Our art portrays this idea again and again. At the same time, we also feel compelled to connect with others, perhaps the result of first being part of a family group. This too we illustrate artistically. In fact, none of what we so proudly call civilization would exist without our ability to think and work cooperatively. We are the paradoxical animal, always looking outward and always looking inward, always looking forward and always looking backward, and we continue a journey that was begun further in the past than we have yet been able to see.
Posted on 10/7/2015
By Donald Fox
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One of the reasons I love art is that it provides an imaginative playground. I don’t need a particular place for my imagination to unfold. In fact, its flexibility that allows it to pop us anywhere is partly what makes imagination such a delightful mental activity. It is supremely portable, weightless, and very accommodating as an everyday companion. Imagination, however, is unfettered; it is largely random although it can be directed. It tends to move however and wherever it chooses (I understand that I am the imaginer and that I do control it to a large extent – I simply mean that it can wander freely without my intervention).
What art does, on the other hand, is to create structure. We may think in modernist terms that artistic expression is largely spontaneous, but art itself is about structure, about giving structure to emotion, idea, memory, direct experience, or any combination of these. That more traditional art like easel painting pictures some person or place or event is done so through the artist beginning with basic structure of forms in space and then modulating these to varying degrees depending on his/her style and purpose. What a viewer sees in a painting is the image but also a unique balance of color, shape, and form that can be read as those elements just as easily as a recognizable image. The artist’s skill may cover those structural elements, but even in some of the earliest realistic portrayals of the world artists were aware of those elements. Their drawings clearly reveal this intimate knowledge of structural form.
Art has always been about structure whether we consider those masterful ancient cave paintings or some of the earliest (though much later) written artistic expressions. Writers use words (their primary structural element) much like painters and other artists use their particular artistic alphabet to create elaborate structures that exist on multiple levels. Metaphor and symbolism are forms of structure as are point of view, position in time and space, or choice of subject. The artist uses the available structural vocabulary, usually in imaginative ways, to create a sense of order that best conveys his or her experience to an audience. The audience then experiences the work partly for its surface message or intention and partly as a uniquely manifested structural entity. The appreciation of that aspect of the art can be just as powerful as the more obvious image or story or collection of sounds.
I love this so-called abstract side of art, what some might think of as a secret or hidden language that exists solely for the initiated. But, isn’t this one of the reasons that we study art – to find out about those hidden meanings and to reveal the riches they convey?
Posted on 10/6/2015
By Donald Fox
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The human mind is complex and infinitely inventive. The latter part may be hyperbole, for we’d never know whether something truly is infinite since we’d have no means for measurement or comparison. This, too, is unique to the human mind in that we can conceive what doesn’t exist as readily as we may perceive what we think does exist. We also have learned that much that we think we know is only partial, for that knowledge is limited by our perception. We say, for example, that the sun rises every day and know that it will rise tomorrow unless we are not here to see it. Yet, even in our absence we are certain that the sun will continue to rise for the foreseeable future. What we mean, of course, firstly, is that the sun appears to rise from our frame of reference here on Earth. We take that limited perspective as the truth of our everyday experience. We can also explain that the Earth is rotating around its axis every twenty-four hours, and the sun appears in the east on a regular basis. We simply say that it rises much like a child will say that the moon seen over his shoulder is following him.
George Bernard Shaw once wrote that “Everything happens to everybody sooner or later if there is time enough.” Here is another hyperbolic statement which may have a kernel of truth in it, or so we might either hope or imagine. The idea could be a paradigm shifting one that might enable us to alter our thinking to include any possible experience. Similarly, a friend of mine once said that we should “pay attention to everything all the time.” Aside from the near impossibility of that occurring, the idea seems like one to argue in favor of. There is such richness in the world that to pass over even the slightest of events is to miss something quite unique and remarkable.
We do like to bandy about words like infinite or unlimited for they have such an expansive ring to them. We like to see beyond our limitations and feel some sense of omnipotence, and we have many ways by which we aggrandize ourselves or others. From one perspective, the history of human achievement could be read as the struggle to stretch our bonds of limitation.
Through many variants human civilization has created possibilities that have been expressed through art, science, philosophy, religion, and other societal means. We identify and categorize in order to understand, and we imagine in order to move beyond that which seems either restrictive or impenetrable. We have moved far in our ability to perceive the world around us, within us, beneath us, and above us, and certainly well beyond us. All of this has moved into dimensions both large and small that many of our ancestors never conceived. Our achievements seem impressive, and yet we can be unsatisfied by what we don’t know.
The positive idea in all this is that we continue to question, to search, to imagine, to take what we know (or think we know) and re-imagine. Possibility may be the closest we can come to the idea of infinity, for there always appear to be possibilities beyond what we currently experience. Perhaps it is fair to say that our aspiration is to pay attention to everything all the time and to experience everything sooner or later.
Posted on 10/5/2015
By Donald Fox
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Plants especially, and some animals, are bound by geographical locations, and thus we see the great variety of species on a global basis. Thousands of years ago humans also were geographically bound, but this is no longer the case for most of us. There still may be isolated tribes and small groups of people who have little contact with the outside world. Mostly, though, today we have connection on a scale unprecedented in history. Cultural differences are still found, but these have changed dramatically in some cases as the result of global communications and cross-cultural influence.
The history of art reveals tremendous variety in creative expression with certain forms, use of color, or designs instantly recognizable as belonging to a specific group of people often at a specific time. There are no surprises here. It is also intriguing to find so many similarities in expression among cultures that had no contact with one another. There are stylistic differences, of course, but because we all are human and are concerned with survival, the effects of seasonal change, propagation, and insatiable curiosity about the nature of the world and the universe, we also express these concerns in surprisingly similar ways.
We could look at human artistic expression as composed of themes and variations. The cultural differences are interesting and sometimes significant, but the variations that have been created surrounding concepts of life, death, sex, spirituality, and origin are fascinating as a kind of symphonic theme and variation. In spite pf our many challenges and shortcomings when tasked to live cooperatively and in peace and harmony, our innermost expressions testify to the bonds that we share as children of the same planet. We have taught ourselves what we need to know to survive, and also to thrive. We just haven’t yet integrated the understanding that we all are, in fact, one whole instead of the disparate parts that some of our philosophies still distract us into thinking that we are.
Posted on 10/4/2015 5:29:54 PM
By Donald Fox
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The magic of art often lies in the simplest of gestures that carry a lot of emotional weight. I often think about drawings that have impacted me, for it is usually the economy of expression with one or two strokes of pen, brush, or chalk that activate a pictorial space and make it come alive with energy and emotion. Rembrandt was a master of this, and the majority of his drawings regardless of subject create a powerful sense of human experience on the flat surface of the page. There are hosts of artists whose work does something similar if not with the same breadth and power. Matisse’s simple brush drawings of faces and figures approach being stylized in their abstract reductionism, yet they convey a powerful sense of a person or a human form. Picasso dis this with linear drawings whose outlines not only enclose a distinctive form but also suggest the space around the form without resorting to shading of any kind. The sketchbooks of artists as diverse as Fragonard, Degas, or Archipenko reveal psychological and emotional depths with line and gesture. I never tire of looking at the amazing variety of simple graphic expression that has been handed down to us since those unknown Paleolithic artists first scrawled on hidden cave walls.
Posted on 10/3/2015 8:28:35 PM
By Donald Fox
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There is satisfaction in working on a large painting over a period of time. Each session builds on what has been done previously. New questions arise and are addressed, and each adjustment moves the project forward although additional questions may arise with each change. I am speaking about a not-preconceived subject rather than something like a landscape where most of the image is, to a degree at least, predetermined. Shifts in light source direction or a change in time of day can require dramatic adjustments to the color and sense of illumination. These can make a painting shift mood quite readily. And even with this process there is a combination of emotional and intellectual engagement with the painting from start to finish. Still, the image is more or less set from the beginning.
When the painting grows organically, there is much more in-the-moment investment on the part of the painter. There may be a beginning idea, but the end product is not necessarily foreseen. That has to develop by stages, and the conception could completely change somewhere during the painting process. There are many opportunities to discover new and exciting colors, shapes, and forms – or, opportunities for falling flat.
I usually think of paintings as exploratory processes. There certainly is a sense of going on a journey, an imaginative one, and that tends to lead in metaphorical and symbolic directions. Art is a symbolic form of expression that derives visual language from colors, shapes, gestures, and the manipulation of whatever medium or mediums are used. Working with this visual vocabulary is a decidedly sensual experience, and this, for me at least, lends a strong sense of play to the work that is necessary to produce the artistic product.
I know there are many who are puzzled by the creative expression of artists. Quite a few of these same people, however, understand the feeling of making a good play in some sport, completing a complex project, or deriving pleasure from whatever tasks they most enjoy doing. That combination of joy and pleasure, of action and feeling, is very much the same as what artists may feel when actively engaged with their work. There are those moments when everything seems to work together as one, there is a timeless sense of focus, and the energy flows without effort or concern. It may seem as though the painting is being done on the fly, but it’s really the convergence of intellect, emotion, concentration, and skill that produce the result.
Posted on 10/2/2015 7:31:19 PM
By Donald Fox
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Two roads diverge in a spectral wood yet each has a common element when traversed the opposite direction for they are paths that have joined rather than split asunder. We move forward in our various journeys and sometimes movement is superimposed upon movement. We may fear (perhaps a harsh word – are wary of, suspicious of, or strive to avoid) repetition, redundancy, doing the same lest we breed monotony yet drawn to a kind of rhythmic elocution that speaks of consistency and an ability to repeat in order to show competence in execution as if to say the first time wasn’t merely a fluke, more than a one-hit wonder. So, we call it theme and variation and is not about the comfort of the known but the imaginative leap down the other arm of that Y-shaped split recognizing that as atoms split apart so also do they converge and the seemingly random motion of spinning particles is a combining and re-combining of basic elements in a dance that renews as often as it seems to deplete. Forces in motion and we perceive one way or another recognizing that the slightest tilt of the head creates an alternate universe waiting to be explored.
Posted on 10/1/2015
By Donald Fox
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Popularity is of major importance to many while in high school. I do admit that I had lots of friends and acquaintances in high school, but I never thought of myself as popular even though I did count some of those popular students among my friends. Post high school, popularity shows up in many cultural settings like entertainment, sports, politics, fashion – there are all sorts of trends and many of these make up the bulk of what passes for popular culture. Popularity is taken up by advertisers and perhaps then blown out of proportion because now popularity is associated specifically with sales. What is being sold is an image, an ideal that one should match to be popular. Even local and national newscasters promote people and ideas, events and items as though these things are the normal and everyday standard that everyone is interested in. Culture is being reinforced in the moment by the media. This is the nature of popular culture – culture is the media message.
As a culture, certainly this is true for American culture but probably true for all consumerist culture, there is focus on superlatives. Now, whether this is a function of advertising or some deep-seated ancient survival mechanism that has become perverted within a materialistic setting instead of a natural one, this may be an interesting question to pursue. There are the magnificent examples in nature of the preening males vying for available females. Has this ritualistic mating expression become the basis for all that we do as a species to differentiate ourselves from each other? Does our great emphasis on the superlative in all sorts of social settings stem from this basic mating ritual? It is rather amusing to think so.
Humans, however, are very clever and also have become very adept at rationalizing ritual. We make elaborate rituals for nearly everything from religious expression to the release of the latest blockbuster film. Is all of this ritual simply our latent way of dressing up ancient urgings in contemporary attire?
We can take great pride in advances in art, science, civilization, technology, and maybe a few social institutions as we review the long march of what we call civilization. We even differentiate one form of civilization from another until we reach a point in time where separation begins to break down. Although Western and Eastern civilizations look markedly different at certain time periods, they also are remarkably similar underneath the surface appearance. Modern concerns with racial stereotyping is crumbling in the face of genetic information that is emphasizing our common heritage. We are all human regardless of exterior differences.
We seem to have a sort of push-pull between similarity and difference. On the one hand we work to fit in to various groups and on the other we promote our independence and autonomy. The old model of self-reliance, however, has transformed into a global polyglot in which we sometimes struggle to find meaning. This plays out in relationships between individual and culture, one culture and another, one belief system and another, one nation and another. Yet we develop international cooperation in the sciences, in limited aspects of politics, in economic interactions, and also in art and architecture. As we see these mostly positive interactions, we also see sectarian and fundamentalist clashes based on narrow mind-sets that reject the broader view. Is this a kind of global response column to our creation of a virtual global brain much like the reptilian brain exerts its influence against the rationalism of the cerebral cortex? Humanity has been questioning meaning throughout our recorded history. Every answer seems to beget more questions.
