last year At wrote,
>To learn is to create. The individual learns creatively. Luckily, the
>individual is not loose ensemble of organs and spiritual realms. A
>humane human has already much of these seven essentialities in
>operation, physically and spiritually
I have just spent an hour or so constructing a mail to the list that would
seek to offer up something approximating 'contributing knowledge' that might
nestle into some small niche in the great wall of interesting text that this
form of dialogue seems to me to conjure up in my minds eye.
It seems a respectful way to proceed, by 'embellishing' what exists as much
as creating 'out of the blue'.
However, sometimes one has to conclude that one's ability to 'embellish' is
too effortful and that polishing my proverbial 'brick' into such a venerable
diamond field would be futile.
Since I am trying to make a contribution as someone with an abiding love of
the fine arts, particularly painting and drawing as well as it's history and
especially the (narcissistic human)? 'creative' elements within that broad
church and virtually none in the context of 'organisational life,' I thought
it might behove me to come in from a different more 'appropriate to who I
really am' angle.
There seems a willingness to accommodate many forms/contents of writing, why
not then try another approach?
By way of initiation I wonder if these descriptions of what it is like to
create as a great painter (Miro) causes any resonance within those who work
with that most subtle of materials, humankind?
"Every artist must find in his work his own method of inducing his
imagination to take shape, and to develop some initial idea, however
trivial, into a work saturated with meaning."
This for me is pregnant with connections to LO thoughts and reflections,
but for you?
"It is important that a great variety of incidents should be capable of
bringing about this state of mind, like the arrival of a shock, the
intensity of which is sufficient to initiate a tension of spirit which
leads to a new emotional activity. But it should not be provoked by
chemical means"
" -The atmosphere is only productive when it somehow provokes a deep,
urgent reaction, in a state of passion and compulsion I beginb
act, like a physical discharge, which makes me escape from realityb
cause may be tinyb
only a speck of dust or a flash of light. This form then begets a series
of things, one thing giving birth to another thing."
" The process is not always continuous. In the studio there are scores of
canvases in all states of progress, some scarce begun others awaiting,
possibly for years, the moment when that communion between him and his
work will allow him to establish that final state of tension he wishes it
to contain. Then there is a feeling of detachment and a shift of interest
from the finished work to younger, less developed members of the family
that he is constantly bring to life."
To sum up, "When I pick up a stone it is a stone, when Miro picks up a
stone it is a Miro."
And one especially for you At,
" I work like a gardener or vinedresser, things come slowly. My vocabulary
of forms, for example- I did not discover all at once. It formed itself
almost in spite of me. Things follow their natural course. They grow, they
ripen. I must graft. I must water, as with lettuces. Ripening goes on in
my mind. So I'm always working on a great many things at the same time"
To end, perhaps some of you might like to envisage what kind of vision of
a painting this title honours.
'The skylark's wing encircled by the blue gold enjoins the heart of the
poppy that sleeps on the meadow adorned with diamonds.'
Finally, I should love to see attempts to thread through these thoughts
the constructive thoughts and reflections of others, not least to see if
At can thread his seven essentialities into the fabricb
Best wishes
Andrew Campbell
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