I can't sleep…
I still wasn’t sure exactly what form the painting would take. But I did know how I should begin. Those first steps—which brush to use, what color, the direction of the first stroke—had come to me out of nowhere: they had gained a foothold in my mind and, bit by bit, taken on a tangible reality of their own. I loved this process.
~ Haruki Murakami, Killing Commendatore: A Novel. (Knopf, October 9, 2018)
Photo: cnd.ha (via Your Eyes Blaze Out)
Autumn steadily deepened around me.
The sky opened up, the air clear and crisp,
the clouds like beautiful white brushstrokes.
~ Haruki Murakami, Killing Commendatore: A Novel (October, 2018)
Photo: Matt Champlin with Brushstrokes
When I look at a work of art I ask myself: does it inspire me, does it touch and move me, do I learn something from it, does it startle or amaze me…do I get excited, upset? That is the test any artwork has to pass: can it create an emotional impact on a human being even when he has no education or any information about art? I’ve always had a problem with art that you can only understand if you have a degree in art history, and I have a problem with theories. Most of them are bullshit anyway. Real art is intense, enchanting, exciting and unsettling; it has a quality and magic that you cannot explain. Art is not logic, and if you want to experience it, your mind and rational thinking will be of little help. Art is something…that you can only experience with your senses, your heart, your soul.
— Gottfried Helnwein, from “Interview with Gottfried Helnwein“.
Helnwein, 69, is a visual artist who lives and works in Ireland and Los Angeles. He has worked as a painter, draftsman, photographer, muralist, sculptor, installation and performance artist. His work is concerned primarily with psychological and sociological anxiety, historical issues and political topics. His subject matter is the human condition. The metaphor for his art is dominated by the image of the child, particularly the wounded child, scarred physically and emotionally from within.
Notes: Art by Gottfried Helnwein on Pinterest by Rocio Jarabo 1; Quote via TheMindMovement.
One viewer who did not dismiss Millet was Vincent van Gogh. In 1875, he visited a large auction show of the artist’s late pastels. Van Gogh, who had not yet fully embraced his own artistic vocation, was smitten. When he entered the room, he later wrote his brother Theo, “I felt something akin to: Put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.”
Van Gogh was not alone in his reaction. Millet’s pursuit of humble subject matter and his skill as a draftsman would influence artists for decades. Pastels facilitated his innovations with perspective. Requiring no drying time, they were easy to rework, encouraging spontaneous expression. They also made him a virtuoso of green. “Path Through the Wheat” (c. 1867) abounds in sunlit grassy hues. Forest tones anchor two companion pieces, “Primroses” and “Dandelions” (both 1867-68), which Millet seems to have composed while lying on his stomach in the shade.
~ M.J. Anderson, from ‘French Pastels: Treasures From the Vault’ Review: Delicate and Delightful. Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts presents works by Degas, Millet and others, rarely shown due to the fragility of their powdered surfaces. (wsj.com, July 14, 2018)
Notes:
n. the kind of unnoticed excellence that carries on around you every day, unremarkably—the hidden talents of friends and coworkers, the fleeting solos of subway buskers, the slapdash eloquence of anonymous users, the unseen portfolios of aspiring artists—which would be renowned as masterpieces if only they’d been appraised by the cartel of popular taste, who assume that brilliance is a rare and precious quality, accidentally overlooking buried jewels that may not be flawless but are still somehow perfect.