Hi Tom, Chaz and Bernard,
Bernard, that was delightfully written.
Bernard wrote:When I first began to carve in wood I was advised to let the wood dictate what is going to happen. It has been the most useful bit of advice - serving me over twenty years. Obviously one must consider grain direction, features etcetera, but it seems too much for our brains to be able to add up all the qualities of the medium before our eyes in order to arrive at a form; rather one needs to either have a form already envisaged and than impose that upon whatever medium is going to be most functional toward the required result, or use a combination of one's examination of the medium and what it does visually with one's imagination to arrive at a potential form within it. It takes a lot of discipline to allow imagination its thing yet still remain realistic about what is achievable: In using this latter method, my experience is that primary 'visions' of what's achievable in any block of wood need to remain basic and amorphous to begin with - too detailed and you set yourself confines that eventually limit what can be discovered and actuated. The detail comes as further delight and surprise during the final stages.
This is why I think all is art, Arising. It is simply because everything, no matter what can become art to the artist. If it goes unnoticed by some, that doesn't mean it is not art. The next person can come by and be inspired. So it need not matter that everyone think everything is art, the fact that it may become art at anytime through the eyes of an artist is all that matters.
Chaz says it best here:
Art is best enjoyed by looking and touching and feeling (internally). When you spill ink and talk and talk about it you impose an intellectual interpretation upon it, smothering the art with words.
Take Homi Bhabha's remarks about Anish Kapoor his friend's work:
"The True Sign of Emptiness
It may be the most valuable insight into Anish Kapoor’s work to suggest that the presence of an object can render a space more empty than mere vacancy could ever envisage. This quality of an excessive, engendering emptiness is everywhere visible in his work. It is a process that he associates with the contrary, yet correlated, forces of withdrawal and disclosure, ‘drawing in towards a depth that marks and makes a new surface, that keeps open the whole issue of the surface, the surface tension...
If you think that you have seen ‘emptiness’ as that hole at the heart of the material’s mass, surrounded by a planished facade, then think again. To see the void as a contained negative space indented in the material is only to apprehend its physicality. To figure the depth of the void as providing a perspectival absence within the frame or the genre is to linger too long with the pedagogy of manufacture or the technology of taste. "
He is crafting his own art in words. This has nothing to do with the art which has to be a personal experience and can only be diminished by Bhabha's showing off.
This is precisely why I said it would be more beneficial for all people to learn to be artists rather than mathematicians. I am not taking anything away from math...it's just without art and art training as far as being able to stretch your intellect and mind in order to "see" things that may not exist yet, then what good is math? What good is math if you are constantly getting the same answers and following the same rules? What new can come of that? Certainly no math ever created anything without the use of practical creativity. Any mathematician can figure out how to build something...but they may not be able to know what they want to build. That is where art comes in...it helps the mathematician know what is important enough to use his math skills for...or as in Tom's post...to be able to collaborate with an object, (and this is where I part from Toms post regarding 'Statuary' and 'sculpture proper') be it what ever creative form one "takes" or tries.
Granted Tom, I will admit that getting your hands dirty and diving into some clay is waaaaaay satisfying....but that doesn't not mean one technique of art is "better" than another. It depends on the artist. I think what matters is that art is what a person wants it to be...and should always remain such in order for art to be constantly changing, growing, confusing people, bringing others to anger...whatever the creativity needs.... as an outlet.
The reason I say I would much prefer for all to learn art, is once you start seeing things from a unique perspective....like that of an artist...the sky is the limit. There is no holding you back....and it builds on itself. Just when you think you learned it all...you get another piece of the puzzle to make you take notice of something you had never seen before....and it is then that you realize that you are "collaborating"an inanimate object. I know that sounds wierd...but it is more true for me now than ever. When I allow the art to take over and so what it wills instead of me taking control and forcing it....it is way better than anything I could have done on my own.
And as far as sculpture goes....sculpture is the same as drawing or painting...you're just doing it in 3D. The same rules apply, but that is not where the collaboration/'magic' comes in....
Today, I was painting a mural....and I let my mind drift....I held a very loose brush and I allowed the wall to direct my brush where it wanted it to go....and it was incredible....the wall made my brush which was held by me...move in a way I would not have done it...or wanted to do it. I gave the wall control and did not question it...even when I thought it was "doing it wrong" (lol yes...I had a little control issue with the wall....I fought back at first...then surrendered...lol.) Anyway, the wall was right....and the clay is right too. An artist has to know when to let go...
Chaz is right Tom. The best way to understand art is to try it. But do not go with fear...and don't think you aren't good. No one is better than Tom to create Tom's art. All you will learn in art class is technique....that is just a skill like anything else...but to communicate with clay or paint or whatever...no one can teach you. You just have to experience it.
