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Monday, July 26, 2010
Monday, July 12, 2010
branches and lines
thinking about the point at which nature becomes a mark. fundamentally, i guess, this is a question of representation. despite such a rich history of this question trying to be resolved, it's still essentially a mystery, what occurs between the perceived world and interpreting this perception.
there's something awkward about this too, which intrigues me. i'm thinking right now about deKooning's women. why such spontaneous, energetic, and at times violent marks would have to come together to create an image of something other than what it is, and particularly an image of a woman, always seemed a very awkward thing to me. a strange goal and an awkward marriage of ideas and actions.
but there's something i like about this. there really was no hiding the fact that deKooning's marks were firstly about the action of making these marks, and secondly about the collective coming together of these marks to represent something entirely different, which of course influences how the action of these marks is viewed (was he angry at women, was he just having fun, was "woman" a metaphor for something else, etc.?)
but at what point does a mark cease to be just a mark and become something else? i don't think this question ever really goes away because "that point" is always shifting depending on culture and the individual's point of view.
if the simplest form of an image is line, than the closest natural form to a line that i can think of is a branch. a branch is easily represented by a line. so, if this argument holds, then at what point is a representation of a branch no longer seen as a branch, but only as a line?
maybe this is a ridiculous question, but it brings up something for me that is somehow essential to the way humans experience the world.
and again, it's somehow very awkward. how nature can become human action is a strange phenomenon.
so, back to the branch/line thing. if that transition is found between branch and line, or gesture, what happens? it seems that there's a very narrow grey area where these very different things are each other, where nature is human action. so, what does this say about a tree, which seems to exist independent from ourselves? i guess it's the classic "if a tree falls in the woods" question (does it make a sound?). does the tree exist apart from our awareness of it?
but i'm more interested in what we as humans do rather than what we think. i give primacy to action over thought, because thought means nothing without entering the world, which requires action. and there's no doubt that what we do as individuals and as a culture creates our realities.
so this means that humans have a lot of power at our disposal. an extreme and probably unimaginable amount of power. this scares me. it means we're capable of literally anything. that "anything" can be life-giving or destructive.
and yet a rose is a rose is a rose.
there's something awkward about this too, which intrigues me. i'm thinking right now about deKooning's women. why such spontaneous, energetic, and at times violent marks would have to come together to create an image of something other than what it is, and particularly an image of a woman, always seemed a very awkward thing to me. a strange goal and an awkward marriage of ideas and actions.
but there's something i like about this. there really was no hiding the fact that deKooning's marks were firstly about the action of making these marks, and secondly about the collective coming together of these marks to represent something entirely different, which of course influences how the action of these marks is viewed (was he angry at women, was he just having fun, was "woman" a metaphor for something else, etc.?)
but at what point does a mark cease to be just a mark and become something else? i don't think this question ever really goes away because "that point" is always shifting depending on culture and the individual's point of view.
if the simplest form of an image is line, than the closest natural form to a line that i can think of is a branch. a branch is easily represented by a line. so, if this argument holds, then at what point is a representation of a branch no longer seen as a branch, but only as a line?
maybe this is a ridiculous question, but it brings up something for me that is somehow essential to the way humans experience the world.
and again, it's somehow very awkward. how nature can become human action is a strange phenomenon.
so, back to the branch/line thing. if that transition is found between branch and line, or gesture, what happens? it seems that there's a very narrow grey area where these very different things are each other, where nature is human action. so, what does this say about a tree, which seems to exist independent from ourselves? i guess it's the classic "if a tree falls in the woods" question (does it make a sound?). does the tree exist apart from our awareness of it?
but i'm more interested in what we as humans do rather than what we think. i give primacy to action over thought, because thought means nothing without entering the world, which requires action. and there's no doubt that what we do as individuals and as a culture creates our realities.
so this means that humans have a lot of power at our disposal. an extreme and probably unimaginable amount of power. this scares me. it means we're capable of literally anything. that "anything" can be life-giving or destructive.
and yet a rose is a rose is a rose.
Thursday, July 8, 2010
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