How An Artist/critic Thinks

HOW AN ARTIST/CRITIC THINKS By Paul Henrickson, Ph.D.

tm. © 2009

Personalities mentioned here are name)

(alphabetically by first

:Albert Einstein, Alfred Morang, Alfred Steiglitz, Bradford Smith, Carlo

Coccioli, Carlo Ponti, Damien Hirst, Danilo Donati, Dorothy Burke, Edward Burne-Jones, Eli Levin, Elizabeth Harris, Federico Fellini, Francis Bacon, Francisco Goya, Franz Kline, Georgia O’Keeffe, Glynn Gomez, Henri Matisse, Jeff Koons, Jesus of Nazareth, Judas Thomas, Karl Marx, Marcel Duchamp, Michael Naranjo, Mohammed, (The Prophet), Odd Nerdrum, Paul Cadmus, Paul Henrickson, Paul Shapiro, Petter Vennerud, Pierre Bonnard, Raoul Julia, Raphael Labro, Rembrandt van Rijn, Rolf Koppel, Salvador Dali, Shelby Boggio, Socrates, Sophia Loren, Thomas Eakins, Victor Lowenfeld, Zara Kreigstein.

REEVALUATIONS OF HISTORY

After four years short of eight decades I have finally and, I think, definitely come to the conclusion that what we call history is indeed a very delicate fabric something like lawn embroidered and pierced into delicate patterns. More recently, I came to this conclusion once again and I am not exactly sure why but it was in connection with an unscheduled visit on the part of a Maltese/English couple Jehovah’s Witnesses touring the neighborhood and distributing booklets. I was intrigued when for reasons not at all readily apparent the English lady eagerly pronounced how satisfying the eight-year-old marriage was. I immediately had an inexpressible image projected upon my mind’s screen and, in order to alter its basic outlines I uttered the following oddly related phrase to the effect that “the kingdom of Heaven is within you.” This brought on a corrective verbal explanation that the “within” should be read “among” meaning that Jesus was, then, the embodiment of Heaven on earth at that time and that, as a consequence, my understanding that the realization of heaven on earth was some kind of inner translation of the material into spiritual matter was in error . I was not in the mood to discuss the offering, most especially since the statements of Judas Thomas; “the twin” more convincingly describes man’s function in regard to his spiritual strivings. There are times when discussions on religious meanings confuse me as much as a clutch of newly hatched quail in a hay field. I am also disinclined to discuss the vagaries of language or to review the agenda some authoritative sources may have, or have had, in proclaiming what they proclaim and I can understand why some are tempted to piggy-back on the worldwide, civilization-building reputations of others such as Jesus of Nazareth, Muhammad, Karl Marx, and Albert Einstein all of whom seem to fall within the top ten of lists of the world’s most famous …and all of these are Semitic. My guess would be that were this list of four names submitted to “men on the street” that the claim of their being the world’s most famous would fracture. Yet another image rushed into mind with this proclamation of marital contentment which rather spiced the matter up. A one-time tenant of mine was being visited by her sons and their wives. I was invited to join them in a feast of crab and as we were seated in the small patio of the summer kitchen [6’ to the left and 6’ down is the dirt road that many pilgrims to El Sanctuario de Chimayo take on their Easter week-end trek, some carrying larger crosses, and others inevitably trying to make out with some attractive stranger]

nestled in the garden with a view of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains one of the wives, for a reason I cannot remember, began praising her husband’s abilities to pleasure and satisfy her. One needn’t mention how satisfying all this praise was to the husband who absolutely beamed while the mother commented in low tones to me while the other wife and the brother sat tight-lipped, silent and intensely sullen while the mother explained in ever lowering tones that the silent brother had recently gone through a double orchiectomy. On the assumption that that had been known to the happy wife doing all the praising I was at a loss to understand the cruelty. She might have kept her sexual pleasure to herself. But, as Judas Thomas and his doctrine tell us the body and the spirit are at war and that man’s most exalted aim is to shed the influence of the flesh which interferes with spiritual growth and to strive to return to his origins which Thomas tells us was with God. I perceive those outlines only vaguely but, in general, I sympathize with the description of spiritual progress being made through effort…and generally, it is, in my experience, an effort made “in the dark”. With all the above as a backdrop, plus a great deal more, I may begin to dissect the elements of perception required to create a “work of art” and the quite nearly elevated position required to comprehend one. Nothing, it seems, comprising my understanding of all this has ever proceeded in a logical or linear fashion but might be better compared to the nature of interlocking threads characteristic of knitting, or, perhaps, better still, a series of dead-ends characteristic of lace making or the design of garden mazes which may have originally been intended to make a game out of a frightening experience…or a frightening experience out of a game.

It occurs to me that the term “the mass-mind” may be somewhat misleading. While that term does seem to describe an amoeba-like group possessed of a vast array of conflicting characteristics some elements of which appear to exceed their own definitions, appear to venture out into curiosity and maybe, as well, even experimentation depending upon the balance of inhale/exhale, impression/expression and may even conquer new and differing aspects of territory…mental territory I am largely referring to. In my first four years of public schooling I experienced what appeared to be, in retrospect, unacceptable abuse. Some of this, mostly physical, inflicted upon me by my fellows, but also by some teachers, abuse which was certainly psychological and was distinctly injurious to my self-image. In the second grade I was accused by the teacher of stealing a penny. The penny had been given me by my god-mother who showed me how to make money by gently rubbing a lead pencil over the surface so as to gain an impression. In the third grade a very clever fellow student by the name of Dorothy Burke who, at seven years already knew her mathematical tables by heart, but, when nervous could not control her bladder and so, frequently enough, she would be sitting in a puddle of urine. Elementary school can be very anxiety producing. After such an incident and the urine wiped up and the art class began I went over to her seat (much against the rules, of course), sat with her and showed her how whatever it was might be done. The class and the teacher were immobile as I think I must have given them a glance warning them not to interfere….they didn’t. They watched. I had early on rejected the greatly motivated general goal of how well, how often and how amusingly one might trick one’s fellows into doing what the ridiculous, the silly, the useless and the dangerous. My resistance to this often got me into trouble and when I was ten years old and in the fifth grade I found myself encouraged to fight someone I liked. I tried resisting, but the mass-mind characterized by naughtyboy noises urged us both on. Later on after a draw was declared one fellow asked me why I didn’t try Iharder and said to me. “I was hoping for you.” “You were?” I asked “What for ?” I had seen absolutely no sense in the activity of a fight. Without understanding why I had rejected this suburban rough-necking that was, in the mass0mind, considered extra-curricular instruction in becoming “a man”. God knows how I might have survived had I lived in Dorchester, Quincy , or South Boston. It wasn’t until I got to Harvard Square, Newbury Street or Beacon Hill that I felt secure in more congenial environments free of individually restricting entanglements. The best of what is meant by the phrase “creative and mental growth” was, at that time in Boston, most likely to be found in those areas.

It may be this sort of experience which provided a value for me in Viktor

Lowenfeld’s explorations into the requirements for and characteristics of creative and mental growth. I was particularly struck by his having joined both the creative and mental growth, as It were, in one package and was particularly interested in his reference to the haptic experience and how someone blind is able to express an understanding of how the body works since the blind are not able to show us very well how it looks but when it works he shows us how it feels when it works as in this petroglyphs near Santa Fe, New Mexico which were executed, presumably, by artists who were not blind or the impressive contemporary work of Michael Naranjo of Santa Clara Pueblo, New Mexico who was blinded as a sighted combatant in Vietnam. sighted combatant in Vietnam.

Michael Naranjo, Indian Figure Early Middle Ages capital figure

Michael Naranjo

Petroglyph: showing haptic drawing of hand and penis indicating a hearty “’hello”.

Armenian Christian grave stone where the deceased is

While all these artists were, at one time or another, sighted, the indications of a record of haptic experiences are there. That understanding, that is the understanding that the distortions of the visual in favor of explaining the sensations of the muscular are a necessary event in order to clarify the meaning of the experience as a “felt” experience. Consequently, we may have justifications to conclude that the recording of a visual experience is not the only, nor necessarily, the most important function of what we call the plastic arts. So what came out of all of this with the Naranjo experience and the creative determination of Henri Matisse when he became victim to arthritis

was that the final art product shows evidence of the its genesis including the assets and limitations of the tools available. Therefore, what the critic should be looking for the evidences behind those results of the controlling mind. This, in turn, suggests that comments applied as descriptive evidence of an object and conclusions drawn from them require of the critic a substantial psychological awareness of what might be the probable causes, and meanings, of any visual

distortions that might be present. To a great extent it might be claimed that the history of western art is a history of distortions as those distortions give meaning to the work. Nevertheless, verisimilitude remains if not a goal at all times, at least, an important reference point. Sometimes, it appears we are unable to navigate intellectually without it. Now, what this “haptic” discovery did for me was to open up an entirely new view of man within his environment…it became clear that man’s environment provided a sensual ambiance. I rather felt that I had discovered I had tentacles…in short I had learned I had senses I hadn’t used, perhaps, because I had earlier been taught one shouldn’t, or that, through neglect they were not there. As a sociologically oriented example of “intellectual navigation”, that is, navigation using what are recognized as known facts Michael Naranjo had no eyes whatever, so there were no doubts as to his blindness. He had several pair of glass eyes, however, and the ones he used when I responded to his call for an interview --as critic to artist—were a bright blue. Michael is a pueblo Indian, with normally black hair and deeply brown eyes. On some level I understood that he had chosen a blue pair because he knew I was coming. I have blue eyes. I, therefore, somehow understood, that if I failed to comment on this subtle juxtaposition of the unusual, that is, a blue-eyed Indian, I would have failed my host to the extent I was a non-participant in the event. So I commented. “You eyes are very blue.” I said, as noncomitantly as possible and he smiled and immediately told me he had another pair showing the American flag which he wore when he felt particularly patriotic. This comment was a classic example of the gentleness of Indian humor . Speaking of history again, it seems to me that after one becomes an historian, after being an historian one must then become a competently wise psychiatrist, or, at the very least, a highly perceptive psychologist if he expects to join meaning to historically factual events… in this case, the art work being the fact. One of the benefits of this approach, it would seem to me, would be that society generally might learn how to appreciate the talented insights of the social outcast who sees things differently from the majority.

Speaking of social outcasts and the “mass-mind” treatment of them I have often wondered why Socrates , whom history pictures as being normally a most reasonable fellow, was willing to take the hemlock when with his intellect and flexible analytical powers he could easily have taught the authorities something and saved his life. I suspect there may be something absent from the body of understanding we have of that incident. In his unpremeditated defense, so far from seeking to conciliate his judges, Socrates defied them. He was found guilty by 280 votes, it is supposed, against 220. Meletus having called for capital punishment, it now rested with the accused to make a counter-proposition; and there can be little doubt that had Socrates without further remark suggested some smaller but yet substantial penalty, the proposal would have been accepted. But to the amazement of the judges and the distress of his friends, Socrates proudly declared that for the services which he had rendered to the city he deserved, not punishment, but the reward of a public benefactor - maintenance in the Prytaneum at the cost of the state; and although at the

close of his speech he professed himself willing to pay a fine of one mina, and upon the urgent entreaties of his friends raised the amount of his offer to thirty minas, he made no attempt to disguise his indifference to the result. His attitude exasperated the judges, and the penalty of death was decreed by an increased majority. Then in a short address Socrates declared his contentment with his own conduct and with the sentence. Whether death was a dreamless sleep, or a new life in Hades, where he would have opportunities of testing the wisdom of the heroes and the sages of antiquity, in either case he esteemed it again to die. In the same spirit he refused to take advantage of a scheme arranged by his friend Crito for an escape from prison. The above account came from an unidentified source on the internet

A bronze portrait I did of Concha Ortiz y Pino de Kleven from memory after I had been exiled from New Mexico. Because Concha’s husband had been Norwegian as I am, she’d rather thought I might have been her son. She mentioned this once when we met by accident in the hospital visiting Glynn Gomez her nephew. Concha had been politically influential throughout her life and I found her without question the most stylishly presented woman, Hispanic or Anglo, throughout New Mexico.

Glynn Gomez with an exhibition advert. Her efforts to arrive at a tolerant balance between the two major contending social groups, the Sephardic Hispanic and the Anglo, were admirable, but, sadly, unsuccessful.

I donot know whether the, at times, extraordinary behavior of Hispanic males, young, viril Hispanic males has histotic significance or not, but during the summer they will wear a shirt, or “T” shirt, or something loke that, but comes October and

the autumn chill and they are our with a tank top or bare chest. Richard Marques is a fellow who showed me some of the mental pathways of the Northern New Mexico Hispanic. We were good to each other and as a result a mystery to both Hispanic and Anglo was formed. As a group, the Hispannics in New Mexico are highly resentful of the Anglo and they simply despise the Mexican [Those Mexicans who consider themselves “pure Spanish”. who are not the illegal ones crossing the border,keep aloof from any with Indian blood, yet, in my experience, only the Indian is

and they don’t like Jews, although they are beginning to recognize that historically they are Jews…ethnically. trustworthy.]

Danilo Donati, (little gift of givers)(see photo) performed as Art Director for this film. When I first met Danilo he was a store keeper showing ceramic figures he had made. Danilo Donati Carlo Coccioli

to sell to the public. Carlo Coccioli

had brought me to the shop which was absolutely laden , stacked up, hanging down and scattered about with figures of many types one of which he gave me, of a winged angel with a sword, which I had kept safely since then, 1950, until 2001 when the shelf I had placed it on fell from the stone wall in my house in Xaghra. Later I learned that that was the year Danilo had died. I am tempted, but hesitantto suggest there might be a cause and effect…or a message. The Aborigines tell of messages beings sent by people close to them emotionally, or by blood, that get received by them in their bodies by means, perhaps, of a twitch in the muscle. I am unable to understand how our brief meeting could have produced that response, however. Nevertheless, when after more than thirty years of no communication whatever I asked Shelby Boggio, an Italian friend of mine in Santa Fe, to act as telephone communicator with Danilo for me it turned out that at the mere mention of my name Danilo recalled and communicated to Shelby events of that meeting I had long forgotten. I am not at all sure that I am capable of taking this thought any further at this time.

I have wondered why in my searching for understanding as to the why and the how of creative activity that geographical areas or social communities at times appear to develop “styles” or “habits of perception” that are remarkably different from each other. For example, I would say, in trying to differentiate the differencesin character of the creative life in Santa Fe from that of the creative life in Florence, Italy as I became aware of it a half century ago, would be that in Santa Fe collective social experiences were not fully brewed. The fact that at that time, and even today, Santa Fe is very conscious of its being made up of three cultures, the Indian, the Hispanic and the Anglo…and there is a tri partite effort to maintain the differences, even at cost ofsocial discord. When, for example, the Hispanic wanted to celebrate the Conquistador Diego Vargas, the Indians came in a peaceful assembly and limped across the plaza as a reminder that de Vargas had cut off the feet of disobedient Indians. The Hispanics now claim the Sanctuario de Chimayo as their own when, it is an historical fact it was an Anglo woman from Boston who had, through her urge to exhibit social consciousness, fought to save it from possible destruction when the property was up for sale and the then dilapidated chapel might not be wanted by the new owners. The cultural history of the area indicates very definitely that it is mainly Anglo women from Boston, Chicago, or elsewhere who strive, perhaps out of some romantic notion of the past, or of their role as exemplars of “mother culture” (no matter whose culture)

strive to preserve what has been achieved.

The discrete references to the Penitentes in connection with the discovery of the “miracle crucifix found in, 1810,

by a member of the brotherhood

It is often

fatal for an outsider to be present at Penitente religious exercises such as a realistic reenactment of the crucifixion and recording equipment isforbidden. I do not know how this photograph was taken, but it is alleged to be authentic. The film, starring RaoulJulia, entitled “The Penitentes”, a film, I have heard he did not like, I found very daring and in so far as I am able to judge, very accurate. This cultural division of interests persists, still rather noticeably, and more recent efforts on the part of the Northern new Mexico Hispanic to have the land grants returned to them, [some of them sold many times over], as their cultural property, a bill introduced and sponsored by both U.S. Senators from New Mexico, Domenici and Bingaman to investigate the claim that the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo had been breached and the sales, therefore, illegal, seems nonfunctioning at the moment. It should also be noted that the Indian Pueblos are sovereign political entities and are not, therefore, a part of the United States, so the cultural amalgamation that appears to characterize the Italy of today does not exist in New Mexico. From that observation it is then possible to conclude that Italy’s cultural expression is more sophisticated than that of New Mexico, not in the sense of its being more complex, for that of New Mexico is complex, but certainly in its being more refined, for the existing complexities have been more finely ground. I am considering to what extent and in what ways the nature of the environment may influence the individual’s artist’s production….in both quantity and character. One might speculate that after a period of time the combined perceptions of the native Indian, the converso Sephardic Hispanic, and the enterprising , explorative Anglo may develop an enriched expressive culture. I think it inevitable that this takes place, but its final outlines are a mystery to me. Somehow, this sort of human evolvement might explain why Sophia Loren and her

husband, Carlo Ponti, chose the work of

Francis Bacon for the decoration, or the exploration, for their private, domestic bar.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPbYzw-sTeI ….Perhaps, after all, it is not so coincidental that the Minotaur in this clip looks like a double of Shelby Boggio. [the labyrinth scene in Fellini’s ”Satyricon”. Danilo Donati, (little gift of giving) performed as Art Director]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAMuppW4mH8 This exhibits a rich mix of needs and satisfactions which, I suspect, may be possible in that area as a result of its varied history of which the creative artists are making a rewarding resource.

for this film.

Scenes from Fellini’s “Satyricon”

REAL EVIDENCES OF CREATIVITY If it is true that an artist’s departure from what we generally call “objective reality” are the real evidences of his creativity then, it might also follow that an artist is aware of the war between the flesh and the spirit, as Judas Thomas points out, and that what the artist records by way of actions in his work are both, and at the same time, symbolic as well as practical, therapeutic actions and that the behavior we call “creative” is merely and entirely the route the artist has taken to identify, describe and rearrange the characteristics of his lack of ease…his dis-ease. And the larger public’s awareness of the artist’s dis-ease often finds expression in the artist being called “mad”.

In this connection the work of the self-proclaimed socially disobedient, socialboundary pusher and race conscious, ego-satisfying self-promoter, Zara Kriegstein, originally from Berlin, now from Santa Fe. New Mexico where she, with sufficient talent for the job, has recognized and filled the niche of the community’s lack of self-understanding by creating painted collages of local functionaries where their head-line type local reputations readily identify them, somewhat on the order of cartoon characters These behaviors are referenced and detailed for public viewing. They are, in this regard, not unlike Paul Cadmus [see below]and from out of the past

Jan Brueghel. However, I believe that while Breughel’s painting may have reached his contemporary audience in somewhat the same way that Kriegstein and Levin reach the contemporary Santa Fe audiences this work, at least, seems less cynical about human interests and more descriptive of mundane

occupations. Even in Breughel’s “Peasant Dance” where the man dancing to the left has a prominent erection, formally echoed by the white curved triangle of his exposed shirt these subtleties are somewhat abandoned in the work of Kriegstein and Levin, or, perhaps, these observed differences are merely a function of the time laps of the centuries…perhaps even the psychology or the accumulated experiences of the of the observer. In any event they are more sociological than aesthetic in their nature. What is aesthetic in Breuhgel is the play of rhythmic movement one detects in the scattering of white, red, and yellow shapes over the major part of the canvas. Whereas, it sometimes appears, that there is a significant portion of Kriegstein visual commentary narrating the kriesteinalleged role of woman-kind and, somehow, an expression of “well, if one

can’t change what one is, take up the baton and, at least, conduct the symphony”.

(the subject matter of this work, however, is not Santa Fe, but elsewhere.)

On the same order of social commentary we have the work of Paul Cadmus and the Santa Fean, Eli Levin.

Paul Cadmus, “The Fleet’s In”

Eli Levin is one of the most modest and seemingly self-possessed persons in the Santa Fe art scene and while I think his work is parochially anecdotal, formally deficient and, quite possibly possessing more romantic attachment to the history of Santa Fe’s art community than to the challenges of creation he does verbally describe people in his book on the Santa Fe Bohemian community with admirable accuracy, his descriptions of several of the characters are “right on”. “Flair” is a term used, I think, to describe the sort of facility a person pretending to be a person well-known to the general public. These people with a talent for identifying , modulating and presenting descriptive movements, styles, ways of speech and the like of famous people have what I would call “a flair”. Paul Cadmus has a “flair’ for describing the characteristic poses of the publically sexually demonstrative. He also draws very well and it is this ability which lifts his works well above the average . Regretably, Levin does not draw well, neither did Alfred Morang, and Paul Shapiro seems not even to try but to content himself with a flair for re-presenting the developed styles of others. Shapiro is not a searcher. Perhaps searching in the presentation of plastic works of art is after all not a virtue… although I had always thought it was.

Eli Levin “Bar Scene”

Eli Levin.

Pierre Bonnard

In this work, a nude girl by a kiva fire, Levin has executed it very much in the manner of much earlier turn of the century artists in Santa Fe indicates, I believe, two things, 1) Levin is a traditionalist in subject matter, aesthetic treatment and, it would seem, some absence of anatomical sophistication. Compared to the “Bar Scene” above this standing nude is on safer traditionalist ground in its very limited use of color. While the color of the “Bar Scene” does , somehow, parallel the nature of many of the bar scenes in Santa Fe it would hardly relates at all to a painter such as Bonnard.

Paul Shapiro is a fairly effective aesthetic impersonator, not unlike a chameleon, sequentially taking on the appearance of Marsden Hartley, Barbaro, the Orientals, Pablo Picasso. But where, one must ask is Paul Shapiro? ON STAGE AESTHETIC DIVERTISEMENT. …or, “where are the clowns?”

Damien Hirst is, I another clown on the art scene, together with Raphael

think,

Labro and his patroness Dame Francoise Tempra.

And in his day, Salvador Dali all

of whom, rightly or wrongly, assumed the role of Til Eulenspiegel which was to euphemize their understanding of the ridiculous, presumably to point

up the “nonsense” in what they could not understand. Of those three, only Labro lacks technical expertise, but one should not suppose from this that such expertise is the primary aesthetic value in a work of art, sometimes it is a deterrent. On a more serious level Marcel Duchamp did what I consider to be an excellent job when he painted “Nude Descending a Staircase”, intended to mock, I suspect, the skewed insights of yet another clown, Pablo Picasso. And one must not forget that handsome Jeff Koonswho is ready, along with Rolf Koppel to exhibit just about anything that might capture attention. As for Koons I have detected no saving characteristics except his good looks.

Koppel , on the other hand, does have a measureable amount of aesthetic sensibility and in other areas has proved himself intelligent and while this “Selfportrait with Genitalia” speaks of one side of his interests the image to the right reaches further in the direction of a Donati/Fellini manner into the realm of parareality. Rolf Koppel, “Self Portrait with ..?..” and “untitled” are two of what seems to be extreme approaches to the human figure. The one grotesque, threatening and “evil”, the other, still concerned with the irresolvable mystery of the human body, but removed from confrontation, bearing the message, perhaps, of a remote association flavored, maybe, with the erotic…maybe not. The universe wears a crown of sweet maple in her hair.

As for Marcel Duchamp, who is said to have given up producing art in favor of playing chess,the following illustrations should make the point, I hope, that out of

the intent to ridicule came an unexpected, unprophesied benefit.

Marcel Duchamp

Edward Burn-Jones

Thomas Eakins

My suspicion in regard to Duchamp’s response to the art experiments of his time was that while he may have been disturbed by them, he may have felt there to be meaning, but was unable to identify it, so he ridiculed it, or tried to do so, in several paintings not, perhaps, even recognizing in his own work the formal values which elevate it, perhaps, over the Burne-Jones and elaborates on the studiously academic stance of Eakins. If this analysis has merit it may lie in the fact that it seems to indicate a point of view, a mind-set, that aesthetic consciousness may simply be a matter of having, or not having, brought order to chaos. If this is true then it seems no judgment is final.

In the social climate of free speech, with the plastic arts being considered a mode of speech, it could be logically expected that someone somewhere would need to call attention to his sexual equipment. Such immodesty has not been unknown. After all the female has been used as a cult object for centuries, and, in some periods, the male as well, so why should our contemporary time be any different. However, in the three examples presented here, that of Koppel. Koons and Nerdrum (“nerd”, by the way in the language of the gutter in Norwegian refers to the penis so whether Nerdrum is an accidental nomen omen, I do not know…but it seems to fit.) Whether this facet of sexual exhibitionism shares the same source as other public displays may be a matter for discussion.

Odd Nerdum: Self portrait

Paul Shapiro once was heard stating that he intended to be Santa Fe’s most famous painter. One wonders whether he meant that his work as a painter was going to make him famous or that some other performance might do it. It seems to me a highly questionable endeavor in any event as, normally, artists are not in competition with each other as much as they are in trying to overcome the drag of conventionality that inhibits the development of aesthetic insights.

Ford Ruthling has indicated that he does not consider himself to be an artist. Under the circumstances that is a safe and uncontroversial position. He has, however, quite elegantly rendered a series on Indian Pueblo pottery that was successfully employed as Unites States postage stamps…and quite handsome they were. However, In Ruthling, who is locally very famous, there is a high percentage of fatuousness…which. Like jello is difficult to grasp.

Alfred Morang was, in the late fifties a notable artist-figure-critic in the area. He and his wife, Dorothy, had, for some reason split up. It is not difficult for me to imagine why, for Alfred was living a rather dissolute life. He did write art criticism for The New Mexican, a daily newspaper. I had been able, at that time, to have an alcove show in a section of the museum, a subdivision of a larger room measuring perhaps twenty feet square. The larger room that had five or six such alcoves. I also visited him, by invitation, at his house which he shared with a rather unconventional woman whose name I no longer remember. I think however she may have been the subject of this painting since the dates (1951) seem to match up and what is important now, in 2009, is that the structure that holds this work together..barely..may be the same structure , perhaps, that allowed Alfred to minimally negotiate, rather uncertainly, the everyday transactions. It seemed then, as it seems now, that Alfred was trying to live

the life of an artist as a grade “B” Hollywood movie might have scripted it. It was disturbing to me then and, now, retrospectively, it promotes a generic frustrating depression. However, to the extent that this work reveals this characteristic so do the marks that any artist makes at any particular time in his career and these are the evidences a critic should use to determine the nature of the work and of the man. In addition to the marks an artist makes, for whatever reason he makes them , or under whatever conditions they are made, they do tell a story about the genesis of the work, there are also the manifest desires of the creative artist to point up potential visions he sees in the subject matter, and probably in himself. As for, example, one extreme of that continuum (personal response indulged vs personal response ideal -ized)one might detect in this series of photographs of a male nude that they are more than portraits of the model. In fact, they are hardly portraits of anything or anybody at all, they are, in point of fact, in a transitionally morphing stage between being the model and being a composition in light and shade…and somewhat closer to being the second than the first.

Henrickson: Studies of a model Something of the same happens with the following selection of Rembrandt drawings brought together to illustrate this loosening dependence of the artist on the appearance of the subject and the increasing independence of the marks themselves to exist on their own as they seem to do in the work of Franz Kline. Rembrandt: various drawings

Franz Kline: brush work

In the case of Georgia O’Keeffe one might see in Alfred Stieglitz’s photograph of Georgia’s hands an echoe of the sort of vision Georgia saw in the world about her whether that was characterized by flowers or by the hills of Abique.

Above are three related images, the first of a lily, the second of the hands of Georgia O’Keeffe by Alfred Steiglitz that look rather like a lily, and the third of a flower by Georgia O’Keeffe that might be a lily and the forth a note of Georgia O’ Keeffe’s that describes what characteristics of the subject matter attracted her which might also be said to be lily-like…and so much for the imagination of the critic.

I cannot resist yielding to the temptation to a fate which is divinely governed inorder to try to see some connecting meaning in the existence of the HAMMER OF THOR AWARD (see drawing, the original was of cast iron and sterling silver) which had been given the Norwegian film directors, Petter Vennerud and Sven Wam of MEFISTOFILM as a prise for their film “Life and Death” which had been presented along with several other films at the Santa Fe Scandinavian Film Festival in 1984. I had asked Bradford Smith to design such an award and left its conception and final apperance entirely up to him for I had no reason to believe he could not fullfill the commission. He more than fulfilled it for when I openedthe shoe box that contained

the three component parts and assembled them my response was as visceral as that when I first heard Stravinski’s “ Le Sacre de Printemp”.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNt0mvjoS08

Maurice Bejart at work. This dance interpretation of Stravinsky’s work closely approaches my perceptions of the event.

Additionally, Brad Smith was, without doubt until he moved the Chicago Santa Fe’s most productively creative sculptor and, perhaps, we might say “artist” in order to indclude the graphic arts as well, as one might detect in the following examples:

Bradford Smith

A bracelet Brad designed using souvenir remains, shark;s teeth, bear claws, sapphire ring, tortise shell, Victorian amethyst bracelet, etc.

Petter Vennerud Mefistofilm, Oslo, Norway

Svend Wam,

It is hoped that this essay has served to offer the reader a view of some of the dimensions of aesthetic behavior and how involvment in the production of and the critical analysis of aesthetic products can be a valuable humanizing experience.

THE CREATIVITY PACKET GOZO

WWW.TCP.COM.MT