Daily Practice 263/365

Title: "Novelty pigs"

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A scene I don't see every day - three pigs by the side of the trail, happy as pigs in....well, you know what. Actually, this little pig farm has played a part in my horse riding experiences. For some time I used to board my horse at a stable in the same area. Every now and then it's nice to give the horses a break from riding over jumps in the ring, and "ride them out" on the trails. There was a nice little "circle" route we could take - around the corner, down the road to this trail, along the trail to the next country road over, and then back along the roads to the stable. Now, most horses are extremely suspicious and frightened/worried about pigs. In fact, my horse could smell the pigs (not these, but their predecessors at the same farm) a couple of hundred yards away and wanted nothing to do with them. At the time, I didn't have enough skill or courage to get my horse to walk past this pig farm - we tried a number of times, but in the end we always "turned tail", and retraced our route back to the stable.

  

So as I was riding my bike down the trail today, I got a bit nervous about going past the pigs - how would my bike react? Would it rear, buck, or perhaps spin suddenly and dump me on the ground? Fortunately the bike remained reasonably calm as we went past the pigs, and later during the return trip I stopped to take this picture. I could see my bike quivering slightly on its kick-stand as I dismounted and approached the pigs, but with the picture taken I remounted and we went on our way back to the car.

Daily Practice 262/365

Title: "Window on a Constructed Reality"

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I never cease to be surprised how often I embark on a little photographic walk, only to get no further than the back deck - completely stopped and engrossed by clouds. I find that clouds communicate in a language of emotion that is obscure and difficult to interpret. It is perhaps a language that reflects our own emotional state, where we find signs of hope, joy, foreboding, or fear in the clouds as a confirmation of what we feel at any given moment.

  

Alfred Stieglitz was the first to make a concerted series of cloud photographs as a study in abstraction, which he referred to as "Equivalents". The website for the Phillips Collection has this to say about the Stieglitz cloud images: "Stieglitz photographed clouds from 1922 into the thirties. A symbolist aesthetic underlies these images, which became increasingly abstract equivalents of his own experiences, thoughts, and emotions. The theory of equivalence had been the subject of much discussion at Gallery 291 during the teens, and it was infused by Kandinsky's ideas, especially the belief that colors, shapes, and lines reflect the inner, often emotive "vibrations of the soul." In his cloud photographs, which he termed Equivalents, Stieglitz emphasized pure abstraction, adhering to the modern ideas of equivalence, holding that abstract forms, lines, and colors could represent corresponding inner states, emotions and ideas".

 
I think one of the strongest draws that abstract images have on me is the emotional response I often feel viewing such an image. If one can get beyond the expectation of representation in art, or in the "treasure hunt" of finding something quasi-representational in an abstract image, what abstract art offers is a very personal, unique relationship with each viewer. An image that gives one viewer a feeling of joy may well invoke a different response in the next viewer. As an artist, I love making abstract images because they go hand in hand with experimentation. You start with no idea of the destination, and little accidents and happy circumstance guide the way to a completely unanticipated, satisfying image. What more could an artist want?

Daily Practice 261/365

Title: "St. Peter Appears in the Sky, 1878 - Exhibit 03.004 from Dr. Hammer's Museum of Curiosities"

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It's been some time since I shared a story from my time with Dr. Hammer and his Museum of Curiosities. As I continued acting as his assistant, photographing the exhibits for a comprehensive inventory, I came across this photo in an album of religious images. To me, it looked like an early cloud study taken perhaps by one of the English photographers of that era. But when I showed the image to Dr. Hammer, his eyes became quite misty and he shook his head vigorously up and down. He claimed that it was irrefutable proof that St. Peter had appeared in the sky to a group of itinerant workers in Lower Saxony. One of the group was an amateur photographer, who recorded this sacred event. I couldn't see the figure of the saint at all, but Dr. Hammer excitedly circled St. Peter's head near the top of the photograph, and pointed out what he took to be the symbol of the cross on his breast plate near the middle of the image. Hammer was adamant that he could also see St. Peter's hands folded together in front of his body. Regardless of the veracity of the story behind the photograph, it was becoming clear to me that perhaps the largest curiosity of this museum was Dr. Hammer's intense, personal bond with each of the dodgy exhibits that it housed. I strangely found myself falling under their spells as well.

Daily Practice 260/365

Title: "Kinetic Bathroom"

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I was attempting a Chuck Close self-portrait moment in the bathroom, but just cannot bring myself to inflict that on either myself or the world at large. But I quite liked the ghosting and softening of edges in this little scene.

Daily Practice 259/365

Title: "Studio Sink"

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Oxidation of metals is a natural process of abstraction. This process of transient states is the fundamental basis of the Japanese aesthetic of wabi sabi. I found myself drawn to this particular subject by the luscious natural colours and tones, the layering of textured surfaces, and the irregular lines formed when layers flake off. There is a richness in that combination that is difficult (but not impossible) to achieve in paintings. But unlike painting, here the process proceeds by the natural laws of physics and chemistry, and there can be no hint of deliberateness in the result.  An artist friend, Rhonda Usipiuk, made some metal sculptures under humidified glass enclosures to study and take advantage of this process. Rhonda and I shared an exhibition entitled "Redox" that explored the phenomenon of making art by relying on the changing oxidations states of metals. In my case, that was the oxidation of iron ions in the formation of cyanotype prints, in hers the oxidation of the metals of her sculptures.

  

Rustarium, Rhonda Usipiuk artist

  

In response to my musings about the vast gulf that lies between describing a work of art using words, and being able to view the work, my friend JM Golding made the astute observation "...maybe it would make more sense for us to try to describe our responses to art rather than discussing the art itself, since language is one tool we have to express our internal experiences". I agree with this idea completely, it is central to understanding how art works and also to our own growth as artists. There comes a point where simply saying "I really like that", or "I know what I like" limits our understanding of art. Being able to start to move deeper in thinking about what aspects of an art work contribute to its draw upon us greatly enriches the experience. By doing this kind of "critique" of art whenever we are looking at it, we inform ourselves about how different elements of a work contribute to the strong response it invokes in us. This is true equally for both works that we strongly appreciate, and those that leave us cold or uninterested. Doing this deeper thinking on a regular basis educates our eye, and leads naturally to self-critique - applying the same deep thinking to work we make ourselves. Making that part of our art practice is how we as artists continue to improve and helps us make works that have more meaning for ourselves, and others.

P.S. - I just saw this quote someone posted from Rainer Maria Rilke "Understanding is attainable least of all by critique." How ironic, given what I wrote above. However, I wonder if Rilke is referring to criticism, as in negative feedback. When I write critique, I'm referring to a deeper analysis of an art work, which should be a balanced consideration of what does, and doesn't, work in the piece and is not personally directed at the person who made the piece. 

Minds Adrift

Here's a little sequence of images I took the other day. Click on any individual image to see a larger version.
 

  

  

  

  

Daily Practice 258/365

Title: "Contemplating non-existence"

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I had an odd e-mail exchange with a friend, let's call him "ALEX*" (*not his real name). He sent me and a another friend this e-mail:

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Hello Gentlemen Photographers,

I have been meaning to send these out.

I lovingly shot these fine portraits one evening when I was otherwise unengaged. The images are the result of long exposures and movement. No digital trickery was used, and all effects were achieved "in camera". What a fine looking family!

Cheers..... "ALEX*"

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Now, the problem was, there were no images with this message. "ALEX*" (*not his real name) is not above spoofing people from time to time, and what with him being a bona fide art school graduate, I thought he was doing a little spoofing in the best pomo traditions. So I responded "in kind", showering his "work" some of my most favourite empty-headed, meaningless flickr-type comments "awesome", "nice bokeh", etc. "ALEX*" (*not his real name), replied the next morning a little peeved with my smart-aleck response, with the actual images attached. Indeed, a fine looking family of people they were, too (and one was a cat, although it looked like some wild beast from the underground!).

I mention this because the original e-mail, with its minimalistic description of the "non-existent" images, reminded me of numerous times I've read reviews of exhibitions, or a discussion of an artist's many years of work in art magazines. It seems that there is a policy about these types of articles that states: "whatever you do, don't discuss the art shown in the two illustrations accompanying your article". Indeed, these articles are famous (at least to me) for going on ad nauseum critiquing or gushing about work that isn't actually shown in the magazine.

 

Which, in a very round-about way brings me back to Fairbairn's statement I talked about a couple of days ago, "Whereas art is unthinkable in the absence of either the artist or the work of art, there is at least no theoretical difficulty in conceiving of art in the absence of an audience". My question is this: is there an audience if the art work is only described, but not viewed? Can we appreciate art third-hand? In a way, it's an interesting exercise to first hear a description of a work, picture it in your mind from that description, and then view the actual work. It illustrates perfectly how inadequate a verbal description of a visual image typically is, which makes it interesting that we endeavour to discuss art. Perhaps the difficulty in verbally thinking about art explains why an entire, seemingly arcane vocabulary can and was constructed for use in critiquing art.