The Direction of Intention

“I believe that the very process of looking can make a thing beautiful.” ~ David Hockney

Sometimes I look at a blank canvas and see a composition. My job is to follow the image. To make it visible.

Sometimes I have an idea and I bring it to the canvas. My job is to explore the idea. To make it visible.

It’s a chicken-and-the-egg conundrum. What comes first? When I look at the peony do I see beauty or do I bring beauty to what I see? Is beauty a decision?

“Good-God!” I hear Kerri’s inner monologue-commentary on my too-ponderous questions. “Get out of your head! Smell the peonies!”

I wish I could. What happens when it’s not a peony that I see but my neighbor? Or someone whose worship is strange to me? Or someone with a different opinion?

Sometimes I look at a blank canvas. Sometimes I have an idea that I bring to it. Sometimes my job is to follow the image. Sometimes my job is to explore the idea.

The tricky part of language is that the biases are unseen. For instance, in English, the emphasis falls on the noun: me. Canvas. It implies the two are separate. Distinct. It obscures the relationship between. Connectivity is relegated to the basement, a lower status or obscured to the point of nonexistence. It fosters a philosophical orientation of…”it happens to me.”

Connectivity, once seen, once understood, requires us to recognize our responsibility for what we see. Our participation in the dance of creating what we see. In what we bring to “it”. What, exactly, do we wish to make visible?

read Kerri’s blogpost about the PEONY

Filed under: Art, Creativity, Language, Seeing, Two Artists Tuesday | Tagged: artistry, beauty, composition, culture, david hockney, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, ideas, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, noun, orientation, responsibility, separation, story, studio melange, the art of seeing, the melange, verb, visibility, visible |