I love colour, I love shape, I love texture, I love Looking. Looking becomes a way of appreciating the complexity in simplicity. Looking becomes a vehicle for understanding, and Understanding becomes a vehicle for Communicating. And I believe that drawing (mark-making in all forms) is, above all other things, a vehicle for communication. As important as speaking, touch, feeling or writing. It is Seeing, and then the giving of what you have seen, to others. How is that anything but Love?
a bit more....
In a previous post, I mentioned Love as being an important ingredient in making imagery. In a way, students perhaps need to have experienced some of this to know what I mean. I use lots of little phrases when I'm teaching, all of which are relevant at the time, and one of them is Feel The LOVE. This is usually aimed at my portfolio students, who need to learn quickly about the commitment and effort they have to find, and their experience with me is faster and more intense than on my other courses. Submersive. When I mention love, they know that it means they have to put more of All of themselves into their artwork. It means relax a little bit more, go with it a lot more, focus on it totally and fall in love with it. It means sticking with it when it feels difficult and keeping on when its nearly there, but not quite there yet. It might mean hold your breath more. Concentrate. It means being really careful with it. Gentle with it. Honest. Then time stops and the relationship between artist and artwork REALLY begins. And it shows in the work. So the next time you're in a gallery or museum, when you look at a beautiful painting and really connect in some way with it, when you are drawn in to it and feel some kind of awe or thrill, if you feel humble or even amusement, know that what you have connected to is the love that the artist put there. And what an honour that is. An honour for the artist. And an honour for the viewer who has entered their world.
Killanena Cows out for a Walk. (Or, as they say in Belfast, Ha-ou Na-ou Bra-oon Ca-oo.)
Colour pencil on Bristol Board, 15in x 8in.
I had an email from an old friend recently, a guy I went to college with many years ago, who finally twigged that much of my chat was about my dog in the woods. He asked, Do you ever do any WORK? This really made me smile. Who says that I can't have my office in the woods? Have you seen how many shades of GREEN there are in there?? (I'll talk about Green in another post...) I HAVE to go to the woods, because... I love the woods! (I love colour, I love shape, I love texture...)
I heard a lovely quote from Kahlil Gibran recently (brought to my attention by artist Robert Genn, who is a very wise owl indeed) - 'Work is love made visible.'
You can see it all the time.
Next up - Big Drawing, Belfast
Monthly Monday Killaloe
Water colour workshop, oils workshop and Portfolio Course.
Also, distance learning new module. Email for info
julie@juliedouglas.co.uk
No comments:
Post a Comment