October 30, 2014

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9.00 am. An MA fine art tutorial. Owen’s studio rags. They are an unselfconscious residue of his palette, mark-making, application, and gesture; as distinctly his handiwork as anything he has produced, with deliberation, on canvas. When is a painting not a painting? Below, another ‘over-painting’ (as I now call them), made by cursorily applying a thin layer of gesso upon a ‘readymade’ painting (originally wrought by Dr Forster in this instance), creating, thereby, an entirely new and unpremeditated image (Diary, October 16, 2014). When is the artist not the artist?:

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10.30 am. My walk to the Old College studios to teach the third year painters, down Plas Grug Avenue, through the town, and across the Promenade:

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Some observations, principles, and lessons:

  • Painting is incapable of saying anything explicit. It’s a non-propositional art form like music and architecture, but unlike literature. But therein is its virtue: painting is consummately able to be evasive, suggestive, and evocative — hinting at, rather than pointing to, things.
  • Responsible, personal time management is of the essence of creative endeavour. Good ideas, consummate skill, and notable intentions require a temporal arena in which to be applied and developed. One of the hardest tasks faced by an artist is to establish a routine for consistent creative engagement within the framework of their busy lives. We would do well to learn from musician-performers in this respect. They are committed to regular and structured practise, without which their professional form would quickly deteriorate.
  • A limited palette is not a limiting palette. Quite the contrary. The number set 1, 2, and 3 has six permutations. How many permutations has a set of three colours?
  • A working knowledge of colour recognition, mixing, and harmonies would appear to be every student’s most pressing need presently. Too often, they arrive at the correct colour mix by way of what can only be described as a chance procedure.

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7.30 pm. I made adjustments to the text and PowerPoint for Tuesday’s Art/Sound lecture and completed the Sculpture Musicale blog. 9.40 pm Practise session 2. ‘Sufficient unto the day’.

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October 31, 2014