Today, I rather fancifully imagined myself as someone quite erudite and intellectual, having found a copy of Marcel Proust's Remembrance of Things Past (Volume 1) in a local charity shop. I have attempted to read some of Proust's great work before, having downloaded an Ebook from Project Gutenberg. In the extracts I read back then I found the lyricism contained in his references to personal reflection and memory, and the multi-sensory capacity of his words to paint scenarios of people, times and locations past quite mind-blowingly vivid and not all difficult to follow (with some thanks to the translators).However, this was and is the mother of all novels and attempting to read any part of it as an Ebook was an ill-thought out and futile task. I hope this time to stay the literary distance and not give up after the first chapter; I feel I need a diversion of the complexity afforded by Proust, and I am intrigued by the concept of involuntary memory (the mundane, everyday triggers that take us back to another time, place), but it may be a step too far, and too soon - I need to firstly purge myself of all the small, inconsequential things currently distracting me...I have a small truth to reveal - I have been seduced by the networking phenomenon that is facebook. Encouraged, or was it gently persuaded, by some work colleagues I tentatively signed up; it will be great way to display your artwork and meet other artists said one real friend. A couple of months in the facebook jungle and it seems scarily populated by attention-seekers and have-to-post wall junkies, with lists of applications and friends so long, you can't help but wonder how they manage to write up their Christmas card shortlist, or find the time within their online schedule to do simple things like walking the dog or eating breakfast.I am humouring here, but there does seem to be a strategy or modus operandi to this new world order, taking a peek at other friend's lists, do some judicious poking, a message sent here or there, and voila! shiny, new virtual acquaintances are made (I am guilty of this too), making your friends' list swell at a rate unheard of in real life social circles. I hardly need engage in the thorny topic of add-on applications, the irritating prickles in facebook's blooming rose. In short facebook fatigue has finally set in.I am at the point of withdrawing my membership after failing quite abysmally in my search for old student day friends (I found solace in playing scrabulous instead!) - except that (much like the Eagle's Hotel California) you can never truly leave facebook, you can only deactivate your account. I contemplated joining an existing art group, but which one, there were simply hundreds to choose from? One solution is to set up a new group (read here, support group), to exchange artist information, discuss creative ideas, display new artwork, on the themes of sublime decay, artistic decay, or maybe the poetics of decay. Come gather, soon-to-be artist-friends, the facebook revolution will not be artistically compromised...
green light, grey matter
Here is a small detail from one of my latest paintings on panel - and also the original photograph that instigated my foray into black, grey and green...You can see this painting on my paintings page...
I am not sure if this is an algae, a fungus or lichen (or a combination of organisms - so i'm slightly stuck on a title), but some judicious googling has revealed from Wikipedia that lichen(s) can survive in extreme environments, are used as pollution indicators, provide nutrition for some animals and can survive for hundreds of years, recent research even suggesting that they can survive a short spell in outer space:after fifteen days the lichens were brought back to earth and were found to be in full health with no discernible damage from their time in orbit.Quite remarkable, and food for thought…
a philosophy of decay
A new year has unfolded, and freed from the ugly consumerism of Christmas, I have been contemplating more on my fractured philosophy of art and life, trying to resolve an anxiety with the direction my work is taking (I am not a post-modern political artist) and a desire to do and see things a certain way. How heartened I was (and enlightened) to have discovered Wabi-Sabi, an acceptance or appeciation of things imperfect, impermanent, incomplete, modest, humble and unconventional.According to Leonard Koren in Wabi-Sabi: for Artists, Designers, Poets and Philosophers, Wabi-Sabi:exists in the inconspicuous and overlooked details, the minor and the hidden, the tentative and the ephemeral: things so subtle and evanescent they are invisible to vulgar eyes.... rich in raw texture and rough tactile sensation. Their craftsmanship may be impossible to discern.... the suggestion of a natural process, irregular, intimate, unpretentious, earthy, murky, simple....Wabi Sabi seems to have its philosophical roots in Shintoism and Zen Buddhism, Wabi denoting a separateness from mainstream sociey, and Sabi, an aesthetic appreciation of things devoid of ostentation, pretension or artifice. There is a good article on this at The Hermitary.I feel a strong connection with the organic, subtle, ambiguous and elusive nature of Wabi Sabi (even the Japanese cannot rationalise it); the rough edges, aged patinas, the appreciation of weathered forms and base materials. It is the perfect antidote to the outwardly westernised synthesis of perfection we succumb to daily - it speaks more softly, discreetly, unassuming, a visual poetic language uncluttered by modern technological thinking...
Decaying Sunflower January 2008Although I didn't go looking for Wabi Sabi, I think that this most gentle of philosophical aesthetics has found a new philosophy in me...