Author ShawnA

Letters a-j-casson_madawaska-valley
33

Artist Damien Hirst, describing his spot paintings made by offsite assistants at undisclosed locations, said, “They’re all a mechanical way to avoid the actual guy in a room, myself, with a blank canvas.” For Hirst, it was a way of avoiding the possibility of his own mediocrity.

Weekly, an email comes in describing similar avoidance. They usually have an elaborate end-goal in mind, but struggle, for years sometimes, to get into the activity that the goal requires. What’s the matter? The matter is fear, and fear breeds avoidance.

Letters sonia-delaunay_rhythm-colour-no.1076_1939
6

The activities of most plants and animals are timed to the cycle of day and night. These natural rhythms are called circadian rhythms. The most obvious example is the sleep cycle. As well, many plants and animals are sensitive to other time cycles. “Phototropic” sunflowers, for example, turn their faces to follow the sun’s path. Others make their moves in guaranteed light. Some sea animals time their activities to changing tides. These creatures seem to know such times even when away from their home waters. Yep, if you put clams into your kitchen sink, they will try to feed when the tide is rising down there in the bay.

Letters Joanna-Braithwaite_Hall-of-fame
6

My picture framer of the past 25 years, once my dad’s, turned off his air nail gun for a chinwag: “What do you think of this barn?” he asked, gesturing toward an oil in for framing, a bucolic scene painted all over with a very small brush. I squinted past a tight foreground of scotch broom and looked around at other paintings in the shop, stealth in their charm or worldly importance and leaning in the shadows amongst their waiting moldings. I asked him how many paintings he’d thought he’d framed over the years and suggested that he’d probably seen more stuff than almost anyone.

Letters Winslow-Homer_Artists-Sketching-in-the-White-Mountains
17

An artist who wishes anonymity asks, “What of artists who get hooked on external validation? What do you think of artists who constantly seek some sort of approval from their peers, in clubs, even online?”

At the risk of being one of those who divide the world into two main kinds of people, there are two main types of artists: Those who have a need to listen to the opinions of others, and those who do not.

Letters lyubrov-popova_space-force-construction
13

When Swiss philosopher Jean Piaget was marking intelligence tests at a school for boys in Paris, he noticed that younger children consistently gave wrong answers to all the same questions. Piaget concluded that children of a certain age were simply not yet ready for these particular questions, having not yet developed cognitive abilities in these areas. It was 1921 and Piaget returned to Switzerland to propose a global theory of cognitive developmental stages — laying out age periods and their patterns — basically showing how knowledge is built.

Letters franz-kline_intersection_1962
19

Joseph Campbell was one of those thinkers who constantly asked himself, “What is the meaning of this?” In books, lectures and interviews, he made frequent skirmishes into the field of art. And like a lot of those who never took brush to hand, his thoughts were idealized and sometimes muddled. Campbell had attitudes about what was “proper” art and what was not. He thought the personal was dangerous in art. “When an artist’s images are purely personal this finally is slop and you know it when you see it,” he stated. He didn’t often say what “slop” was.

Letters james-v-harvey-4
11

James Harvey, not yet one year old, moved with his family from Toronto to Detroit in 1930. After studying painting at the Art Institute of Chicago in the 1950s and designing window displays in Detroit, James moved to New York to try and break into the art world. He took a job for $55 a week in the studio of industrial and packaging designer Egmont Arens and started showing his abstract expressionist oil paintings around town. For two years, he worked with a team to redesign the Philip Morris cigarette package — an also-ran to the post-war streamlining going on over at Lucky Strike.

Letters Lawren-Harris_Lake-Superior_ca.1924
17

A subscriber asked us this question for a university thesis: “Why do you make art?” I included it in a previous letter and some responses came in.

I knew we were onto something when another subscriber wrote, “The gift was recognized very early in my life. There were marvellous tools at hand: pencils, crayons, coloured pencils, poster paint, etc. Producing art was an extension of myself on some other plane or level — spiritual.

Letters Abbott-H-Thayer_My-Children
30

Artist and Purpose Guidance Coach Sam Kaczur recently put out a call on social media asking her friends, many of them artists, the following question: “Around the ages of 6-10, do you have a memory or pivotal moment in your life that you feel set the trajectory or tone for your future?” She offered some examples, like meeting an artist or scientist, discovering a talent, or winning a prize. From among the responses, a theme emerged that painted a picture of family and parenting. “My mother took me to the theatre,” “My dad beat me and so I wanted to be peaceful” and “I assembled my first computer,” were among the replies.

Letters Picasso_Woman-with-High-Arms_1936
20

Some people think she’s crazy. She’s a bronco-busting, motorcycle-riding, video-making, sky-diving, giant-picture-painting kind of girl. She makes loud noises in social situations. “Man, look at that tree,” she shouts. She can laugh like a logger and giggle like a baby. She disappears from view for long periods of time — nobody knows where she is.

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