Yesterday, I was listening to a doctor talk about the value of oxygen for someone who is suffering from heart problems and resultant breathing difficulties, even if it is just creating a "bubble" of enriched oxygen around the mouth and nose of the patient. Better breathing, a heart that feels more functional and thus an increased feeling of well-being... a simple, but important path to an improved quality of life. But of course, in order to have the supply of this extra oxygen, you have to set up either a tank or machine, and take the time to get the oxygen treatment...
Today, I was reading the December edition of ARTNews, with a feature article on Marina Abramovic and her upcoming presence at MOMA, New York. She was quoted as saying, "Artists have to serve as oxygen to society..." Her objective is to get people to stop and gain a sense of time through her performance art, and thereby alter their perspective and perception of their surroundings, world and life in general. In essence, she becomes the oxygen tank...
I think that just about every form of art - visual, performance, musical, whatever - can have this intrinsic value of causing people to stop, even momentarily, and thus alter their perception of the world around them. Perhaps that is why people have created "cabinets de curiosités" and then museums full of wonders... they provide the oxygen to allow societies to breathe deeply, reflect, learn and enrich life. A beautiful photograph, a wonderful painting, a drawing, a piece of music - I know that my life has been made rich beyond belief by seeing or hearing such art, and that frequently the image or the sound has stayed with me long after.
No wonder Ms. Abramovic used such a metaphor of how to maintain or engender a healthy life or a healthy society.
Showing posts with label Marina Abramovic. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Marina Abramovic. Show all posts
Saturday, December 8, 2012
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
Nature and a Sense of Time
Between preparing for my Art-Tasting open studio on December 5th and attending to family health matters, I am itching to get back to creating art. However, as I wrote in a previous blog (Daily Delights of November 26th), the natural world around me is sustaining and nurturing.
I was reminded of an article I had read in El Pais back in June, where journalist Isabel Lafont was interviewing Marina Abramovic. Whilst discussing her performance art, Ms. Abramovic talked of her upcoming MOMA retrospective that will last three months, with her performing day in, day out, all day in front of the public. The resultant mental and physical changes in her would thus be perceptible to the viewing public. She went on to remark, "We live in times that are so fleeting that we need to stop and become aware of the present moment. Artists need to do this and ensure that people stop for a moment and come to a sense of the here and now." (My translation from Spanish).
If people viewing my silverpoint drawings or watercolour pause and lose track of time for a moment or more, then I feel that perhaps I have been able to convey something of the timelessness and healing power of nature.
I was reminded of an article I had read in El Pais back in June, where journalist Isabel Lafont was interviewing Marina Abramovic. Whilst discussing her performance art, Ms. Abramovic talked of her upcoming MOMA retrospective that will last three months, with her performing day in, day out, all day in front of the public. The resultant mental and physical changes in her would thus be perceptible to the viewing public. She went on to remark, "We live in times that are so fleeting that we need to stop and become aware of the present moment. Artists need to do this and ensure that people stop for a moment and come to a sense of the here and now." (My translation from Spanish).
For me, nature provides that passport to the sense of here and now. When I am painting or drawing subjects from the natural world, that I hope will convey my messages to the viewing
public about the healing, centering power of nature, I find that time stands still. One's sense of time is always relative, anyway, (haven't we all wondered when, oh when, something important will finally happen, or when something horrid will just end and go away...?), but when I get involved in art, time has absolutely no meaning.
public about the healing, centering power of nature, I find that time stands still. One's sense of time is always relative, anyway, (haven't we all wondered when, oh when, something important will finally happen, or when something horrid will just end and go away...?), but when I get involved in art, time has absolutely no meaning.
If people viewing my silverpoint drawings or watercolour pause and lose track of time for a moment or more, then I feel that perhaps I have been able to convey something of the timelessness and healing power of nature. Saturday, August 25, 2012
Ironies of Art-making
Back on June 14th, Gloria Goodale wrote in the Christian Science Monitor about "Fleeting Architecture", saying that "we are becoming a temporary society". In a more recent article on July 20th, about museums and their future, she wrote, "It’s not about the collections anymore,”… “It’s about community.”
As an artist, I am left slightly nonplussed by these statements which I suspect are totally accurate about society in general today. For me, drawing in silverpoint has always implied a sense of heritage from the 12th century monks who started this medium rolling when they drew in lead (and later silver) in their wonderful manuscripts. There are still many illuminations and silverpoint drawings which have survived, despite the ravages of time. A respect for archival qualities of the materials and methods one uses in drawing and painting have always seemed to me to be necessary, given that collectors - individuals or institutions - normally don't want artworks they have acquired to self-destruct. Horror stories abound about disintegrating paintings, sharks not holding up in formaldehyde or drawings on acidic paper disappearing in yellowed slivers.
Nonetheless, as Ms. Goodale remarks, "We used to place a huge value on permanence and place, but that's gone... we want the novel, the next, and we're happy to throw away and move on in order to accommodate that." How to reconcile that trend and the need actually to have something in the museums, for the "community" to view, observe, learn from or celebrate...?
We artists still need to produce something. Granted, installation art, provisional structures, video art, performance art all abound. But at the end of the day, museums still have - usually - walls and something needs to go on those walls. Yes, the Christo events, like "The Gates" in New York's Central Park, are huge cultural events and money-makers and people are more willing to travel just to see temporary installations. Nonetheless, institutions like the Louvre, the Metropolitan Museum, the British Museum... still attract huge numbers of people seeking out the more permanent manifestations of art that have endured down the ages.
So as an artist, I have to decide, eventually, what kind of art to try and create - permanent or impermanent .. and just follow my passion. As Marina Abramovic remarked to Isabel Lafont in an article in El Pais in June 2009, "Art is like breathing, you just don't question that fact. You make art because life would be unlivable without doing so." ("El arte es como respirar, no lo cuestiones. Lo haces porque no puedes vivir sin ello.") She is completely right.
As an artist, I am left slightly nonplussed by these statements which I suspect are totally accurate about society in general today. For me, drawing in silverpoint has always implied a sense of heritage from the 12th century monks who started this medium rolling when they drew in lead (and later silver) in their wonderful manuscripts. There are still many illuminations and silverpoint drawings which have survived, despite the ravages of time. A respect for archival qualities of the materials and methods one uses in drawing and painting have always seemed to me to be necessary, given that collectors - individuals or institutions - normally don't want artworks they have acquired to self-destruct. Horror stories abound about disintegrating paintings, sharks not holding up in formaldehyde or drawings on acidic paper disappearing in yellowed slivers.
Nonetheless, as Ms. Goodale remarks, "We used to place a huge value on permanence and place, but that's gone... we want the novel, the next, and we're happy to throw away and move on in order to accommodate that." How to reconcile that trend and the need actually to have something in the museums, for the "community" to view, observe, learn from or celebrate...?
We artists still need to produce something. Granted, installation art, provisional structures, video art, performance art all abound. But at the end of the day, museums still have - usually - walls and something needs to go on those walls. Yes, the Christo events, like "The Gates" in New York's Central Park, are huge cultural events and money-makers and people are more willing to travel just to see temporary installations. Nonetheless, institutions like the Louvre, the Metropolitan Museum, the British Museum... still attract huge numbers of people seeking out the more permanent manifestations of art that have endured down the ages.
So as an artist, I have to decide, eventually, what kind of art to try and create - permanent or impermanent .. and just follow my passion. As Marina Abramovic remarked to Isabel Lafont in an article in El Pais in June 2009, "Art is like breathing, you just don't question that fact. You make art because life would be unlivable without doing so." ("El arte es como respirar, no lo cuestiones. Lo haces porque no puedes vivir sin ello.") She is completely right.
Monday, July 23, 2012
Artists' Egos
An aspect of the art world that the general public often talks about is an artist's ego - it is part of the domain of artistic myths and legends. Everyone, at one point or another, has heard about an artist seemingly behaving like a prima donna. It makes good copy for a reporter or writer and interests many readers.
Nonetheless, artists themselves seldom think specifically about ego or how they might be perceived as having a large ego. Usually we are all too involved with our artwork and artistic endeavours, and anxious to ensure its visibility, success and survival. There is usually such a clamour in the public space that it is hard to get viewed, heard, understood...
Marina Abramovic, a very successful artist whose reputation is coupled with a sense of serious dedication to her work, talked in an interesting way about artists' egos. She was interviewed in May 2009 by David Ebony in Art in America, and described how she had gained humility during a month-long yoga retreat in which she had participated. To achieve complete emptiness in her thinking, she talked of retraining herself to work from the top downwards, thus achieving an absence of ego. She remarked, "Our culture is so much about building up the ego of the artist. But it's not you who is important, it's the work. The ego is actually an obstacle to the work." (The image above is courtesy of the Guardian, UK, from an article by James Westcott about Abramovic's 2010 exhibition at MOMA, The Artist is Present.)
Thinking about her statement made me measure its truth. If you have envisaged a work of art and launch into making it, there is frequently an insistent little voice in your head talking about those preconceived ideas, how the work might be perceived, what effect the work might have on a viewer, etc.... Emptying your mind of all expectations and simply flowing, almost instinctively, with the development of the work is a totally different affair. Things happen that you do not know consciously about, perceptions that only become obvious after coming out of the creative phase, conversations that develop in spite of or despite the ego. Making art becomes a voyage into the unknown, a voyage unaccompanied by preconceptions and that looming sense of self.
After all, at the end of any creation process, the work has to stand on its own feet, away from any reference to the artist, in many senses. This situation was driven home to me a couple of days ago when I walked into the beautiful home of a new friend. On her walls hung a number of interesting pieces of art, some of which I recognised instantly, but many of which were created by artists I did not know. Their work was just that - artwork - and each piece transmitted its messages to me. The ensuing dialogue was, of course, coloured by my life experience and perceptions, but nevertheless, the paint on canvas or drawing marks on paper had to "make their own sale" to me. The artist's ego, in each case, was a moot point. No longer were there a gallery owner or the artist at my elbow to explain and validate the work.
It seems to me that Ms. Abramovic spoke wisely about ensuring that the ego should not get in the way of creating art. Letting art guide one in its making and then in its dialogue with the world is, in truth, very complicated and yet, very simple.
Nonetheless, artists themselves seldom think specifically about ego or how they might be perceived as having a large ego. Usually we are all too involved with our artwork and artistic endeavours, and anxious to ensure its visibility, success and survival. There is usually such a clamour in the public space that it is hard to get viewed, heard, understood...
Marina Abramovic, a very successful artist whose reputation is coupled with a sense of serious dedication to her work, talked in an interesting way about artists' egos. She was interviewed in May 2009 by David Ebony in Art in America, and described how she had gained humility during a month-long yoga retreat in which she had participated. To achieve complete emptiness in her thinking, she talked of retraining herself to work from the top downwards, thus achieving an absence of ego. She remarked, "Our culture is so much about building up the ego of the artist. But it's not you who is important, it's the work. The ego is actually an obstacle to the work." (The image above is courtesy of the Guardian, UK, from an article by James Westcott about Abramovic's 2010 exhibition at MOMA, The Artist is Present.)Thinking about her statement made me measure its truth. If you have envisaged a work of art and launch into making it, there is frequently an insistent little voice in your head talking about those preconceived ideas, how the work might be perceived, what effect the work might have on a viewer, etc.... Emptying your mind of all expectations and simply flowing, almost instinctively, with the development of the work is a totally different affair. Things happen that you do not know consciously about, perceptions that only become obvious after coming out of the creative phase, conversations that develop in spite of or despite the ego. Making art becomes a voyage into the unknown, a voyage unaccompanied by preconceptions and that looming sense of self.
After all, at the end of any creation process, the work has to stand on its own feet, away from any reference to the artist, in many senses. This situation was driven home to me a couple of days ago when I walked into the beautiful home of a new friend. On her walls hung a number of interesting pieces of art, some of which I recognised instantly, but many of which were created by artists I did not know. Their work was just that - artwork - and each piece transmitted its messages to me. The ensuing dialogue was, of course, coloured by my life experience and perceptions, but nevertheless, the paint on canvas or drawing marks on paper had to "make their own sale" to me. The artist's ego, in each case, was a moot point. No longer were there a gallery owner or the artist at my elbow to explain and validate the work.
It seems to me that Ms. Abramovic spoke wisely about ensuring that the ego should not get in the way of creating art. Letting art guide one in its making and then in its dialogue with the world is, in truth, very complicated and yet, very simple.
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