The name of this blog comes from something which struck me when reading the obituary of an Israeli artist, Avigdor Arikha. In describing his work he said "He had to hold what he saw and felt, here and now, within a grid of potential brushstrokes or possible lines, without employing memory or imagination, for both were cheating".
 |
Samuel Beckett with a glass of wine. Avigdor Arikha, 1970. |
I found this very affecting and it certainly made me aware of my own practice and thought processes which are much more about memory and imagination. In fact, in recent times I have begun to think that I have a real weakness in seeing what I have begun to call "what's true in the silence". What is true and real now, in the moment without the varnish of memory or the sunlight of imagination. At any given time, I am either contemplating connections with the threads of history and narrative, my own, or that of others, or else noodling on how something speaks to an imagined future. So this blog is about equal parts memory and imagination, and equal parts "what's true in the silence". I guess that about covers everything.
I commence this blog with with humble expectations and great delight. I hope it will be a home for memory, a wide open space for imagination and a place for brushstrokes strong and true.
