Hey this makes me think about order and disorder. Like how landscape artists have imposed different kinds of order onto the landscape over the years. Poussin with an archetectonic structure, then the Impressionsists, who found a unifying structural unit in the stroke, and Cezanne, who I guess united them but went so much further. But this aint no art history lesson: its all about a way of conceiving the universe, and western thought has very often placed itself in the center of an organized plan. I guess more recently there has been an interest in chaos and indifference. I know nothing about "chaos theory," but what I find compelling in this painting are the bits of color here and there that seem to militate against unifying order, along with the structural solidity (the arc, the solid forms on either side.) So it seems like it is asking us to consider: is the order that you see only imaginary? is the universe chaotic and indifferent? But isn't it beautiful? sorry to go on so. . .
Yeah, really, from now on could you please limit yourself to two (gushing) sentences of no more than ten words each? It's a space issue, you understand . . .
I have to say that though I was not thinking about quite such big questions, I do think a lot about how to find structure in nature and at the same time make some (always inadequate) attempt to describe its overwhelming wildness. Not so much a literal wildness (lions and tigers), but the wildness of any thing out there that we try to translate into a picture through the impossible process of perception.
Don't mean to limit this problem to work that happens to be done directly looking at the motif (right word?). I don't really think the questions are that much different with other ways of working.
Oil on canvas, 16" x 20", 2008
Hey this makes me think about order and disorder. Like how landscape artists have imposed different kinds of order onto the landscape over the years. Poussin with an archetectonic structure, then the Impressionsists, who found a unifying structural unit in the stroke, and Cezanne, who I guess united them but went so much further.
ReplyDeleteBut this aint no art history lesson: its all about a way of conceiving the universe, and western thought has very often placed itself in the center of an organized plan. I guess more recently there has been an interest in chaos and indifference. I know nothing about "chaos theory," but what I find compelling in this painting are the bits of color here and there that seem to militate against unifying order, along with the structural solidity (the arc, the solid forms on either side.) So it seems like it is asking us to consider: is the order that you see only imaginary? is the universe chaotic and indifferent? But isn't it beautiful?
sorry to go on so. . .
Yeah, really, from now on could you please limit yourself to two (gushing) sentences of no more than ten words each? It's a space issue, you understand . . .
ReplyDeleteI have to say that though I was not thinking about quite such big questions, I do think a lot about how to find structure in nature and at the same time make some (always inadequate) attempt to describe its overwhelming wildness. Not so much a literal wildness (lions and tigers), but the wildness of any thing out there that we try to translate into a picture through the impossible process of perception.
Don't mean to limit this problem to work that happens to be done directly looking at the motif (right word?). I don't really think the questions are that much different with other ways of working.
ReplyDeleteYes, as you might guess from my own work, I think "the wild" can be conveyed in many ways.
ReplyDeleteIndeed.
ReplyDelete