As many readers of this blog know, one of the major turning points of my art, as well as my life, came in meeting Paul Hayes Tucker at UMASS/Boston.
As someone who attended 5 universities, and lived at another (that is a story for some other time), I have some experience with higher education. And Paul Tucker is the best. I tell everyone within 100 miles of UMASS/Boston to take a class from him.
Anyhow, Tucker is dead-on as far as Modern and Post-modern art are concerned, not to mention being the foremost (or close wherever the argument in art circles is this year) Monet historian in the world.
One of the most interesting ideas I ever stole from Professor Tucker (and I have boosted a lot) was the idea of Monet being a bridge between Modern and Post-modern art. That this idea of a man, painting a water lily pond that he had created himself through landscaping— a water lily garden that had train tracks running straight through the middle of it— who painted images with no horizon that simultaneously captured the surface (the lilies), the reflection of the sky, and the world beneath the surface (the roots, silt), was entirely original and completely postmodern in its construction. Monet was painting 5 or 6 realities, easily, in a single painting… all before quantum physics and simultaneity was even considered.
I am not going into a crazy quantum physics dialogue today (yes you can thank me later) but checking out some of Richard Feynman’s work, the book “The Elegant Universe” or some of the new write-ups on the supercollider getting ready to premier in France should suffice.
More stealing from Tucker… but what better metaphor for layered meaning, layered culture, layered consciousness, the modern trinity of thought a la Freud (id, ego, superego) or the more contemporary conscious, subconscious, super-conscious… what better metaphor for the relationship between two things or two people (you, me, where we meet) … or even what better metaphor for the holy trinity?
So, back to my work. Lay some dots on a painting where you are concerned with layered meaning and reflection, with image in relation to how you see things, for finding a reflection of yourself in what you are looking at, and you might just be painting a lily pond.
I think, and have thought, that these dots I float on the surface of these canvases are my attempts at water lilies.
As someone who attended 5 universities, and lived at another (that is a story for some other time), I have some experience with higher education. And Paul Tucker is the best. I tell everyone within 100 miles of UMASS/Boston to take a class from him.
Anyhow, Tucker is dead-on as far as Modern and Post-modern art are concerned, not to mention being the foremost (or close wherever the argument in art circles is this year) Monet historian in the world.
One of the most interesting ideas I ever stole from Professor Tucker (and I have boosted a lot) was the idea of Monet being a bridge between Modern and Post-modern art. That this idea of a man, painting a water lily pond that he had created himself through landscaping— a water lily garden that had train tracks running straight through the middle of it— who painted images with no horizon that simultaneously captured the surface (the lilies), the reflection of the sky, and the world beneath the surface (the roots, silt), was entirely original and completely postmodern in its construction. Monet was painting 5 or 6 realities, easily, in a single painting… all before quantum physics and simultaneity was even considered.
I am not going into a crazy quantum physics dialogue today (yes you can thank me later) but checking out some of Richard Feynman’s work, the book “The Elegant Universe” or some of the new write-ups on the supercollider getting ready to premier in France should suffice.
More stealing from Tucker… but what better metaphor for layered meaning, layered culture, layered consciousness, the modern trinity of thought a la Freud (id, ego, superego) or the more contemporary conscious, subconscious, super-conscious… what better metaphor for the relationship between two things or two people (you, me, where we meet) … or even what better metaphor for the holy trinity?
So, back to my work. Lay some dots on a painting where you are concerned with layered meaning and reflection, with image in relation to how you see things, for finding a reflection of yourself in what you are looking at, and you might just be painting a lily pond.
I think, and have thought, that these dots I float on the surface of these canvases are my attempts at water lilies.
Pics above are from About.com and Pictopia respectively.
In other news, I thought in this post-post-modern world, I thought it might be nice to challenge Monet and have a post-post-modernist lily pond. Indoors in Fort Point. The pic above is of some of my lilies sprouting this spring.
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