Joseph Conrad on Art and Seeing

"And art itself may be defined as a single-minded attempt to render the highest kind of justice to the visible universe, by bringing to light the truth, manifold and one, underlying its every aspect. It is an attempt to find in its forms, in its colours, in its light, in its shadows, in the aspects of matter and in the facts of life, what of each is fundamental, what is enduring and essential -- their one illuminating and convincing quality -- the very truth of their existence.
...
My task which I am trying to achieve is, by the power of the written word to make you hear, to make you feel--it is, before all, to make you see. That--and no more, and it is everything. If I succeed, you shall find there according to your deserts: encouragement, consolation, fear, charm--all you demand--and, perhaps, also that glimpse of truth for which you have forgotten to ask."
-Joseph Conrad in Preface to The Nigger of the Narcissus

This short preface is perhaps my favorite piece on the nature, aim and purpose of art.

Jonathan Hardesty: A Young Master

(drawings by Jonathan Hardesty in 2002)
Though I had forgotten, the story of Jonathan Hardesty was definitely one of the main things that has kept me (and undoubtedly many people online) drawing over the past few years.

In 2002 Jonathan Hardy started this thread at conceptart.org saying "I am starting from rock bottom and I am going to paint at least one painting and do at least one sketch every day...probably two on the weekends. The order you see them in is the order that I am painting and/or sketching them...every day starting on 9/15/02. I am bearing my soul to everyone. I will post everything I do...whether it is awful or not. Most of the paintings and sketches, in the beginning, are going to look like crap but hopefully over the days/weeks/months/years they will start to get better."

And indeed he did:


(drawings by Jonathan Hardesty in 2004)
These just after a few years. (and yes the one on the left is a drawing)
You can see how, through persistence and diligent courage, he got there in his thread
(which he still updates:)
Journey of an Absolute Rookie: Paintings and Sketches

He now teaches in Richardson, Tx

an anthology of quotes on seeing

"What do we see when we go outside and look at the world? Has it become so familiar to us that we pay no attention to it at all? Or perhaps when we look at blue sky do we think of the refraction of light? When we notice the sun, do we think of a nuclear furnace? When we see a fox in a zoo, do we think of what we learned in biology class about bones and organs? And beyond this, when we step back and view the world, how do we see it? Blue sky, green fields, brown earth, blue water-does this set of images mean anything at all, or is it "just the way things are"? How do we view the world?"
-James Jordan

"I looked up and saw sparrows landing on a sign. Suddenly, the whole scene became completely abstract, as though I were seeing it through nascent eyes. I realized I could remove all preconceptions about these birds. That ability was very exciting."
-Richard Vander Wende

"It was less like seeing then like being for the first time seen, knocked breathless by a powerful glance."
-Annie Dillard

"We should look at green again and be startled anew (but not blinded) by blue and yellow and red."
-J.R.R Tolkien

"And art itself may be defined as a single-minded attempt to render the highest kind of justice to the visible universe, by bringing to light the truth, manifold and one, underlying its every aspect. It is an attempt to find in its forms, in its colours, in its light, in its shadows, in the aspects of matter and in the facts of life, what of each is fundamental, what is enduring and essential -- their one illuminating and convincing quality -- the very truth of their existence.
...
My task which I am trying to achieve is, by the power of the written word to make you hear, to make you feel--it is, before all, to make you see. That--and no more, and it is everything. If I succeed, you shall find there according to your deserts: encouragement, consolation, fear, charm--all you demand--and, perhaps, also that glimpse of truth for which you have forgotten to ask."
-Joseph Conrad

"I have learned that what I have not drawn I have never really seen, and that when I start drawing an ordinary thing I realize how extraordinary it is, sheer miracle: the branching of a tree, the structure of a dandelion's seed puff. "A mouse is a miracle enough to stagger sextillions of infidels," says Walt Whitman. I discover that among The Ten Thousand Things there is no ordinary thing. All that is, is worthy of being seen, of being drawn."

-Frederick Franck

"I was born with busy eyes.
It’s not my fault, it’s just the way things are.
... Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining, it’s just that they are hard to keep up with at times. One ends up doing a lot of explaining, usually about just what exactly the devil one is doing in restricted areas, on the wrong side of high fences or locked gates, at the top of stairwells clearly posted Not Open to Public.

... They always seem to be wandering over textures, judging light and the thickness of the air. Chasing motes and dandelion seeds, calculating the flight of birds. They are continually going astray. I never know where I’ll find them.
They’re a little shy, that’s why they skirt warily around the edges of other eyes, just in case they slip and plummet down to whatever deep waters are awaiting, but otherwise they’re fearless. No sky is too big to scan, no detail to small to focus on.
When in company, I am continually having to explain why I’m so slow. Well, I stammer, there was a statue back there, yes I know it's been there for ages and it’ll be there tomorrow, but that’s just the point. Maybe tomorrow it’ll rain, or there’ll be sun backlighting it or there’ll be different clouds. I just had to make sure I saw it properly today
...
SO much to look at, and only the two of us, they must think. So much moss on trees, so many trees in a forest, such a variety of leaves for all seasons, such endearing smile lines at the corners of mouths, such grace in hands and strides... It’s a full-time job to get all that seen. "
-John Howe

"For John, seeing is knowing (6:40; 11:45; 14:7), and knowing/seeing the Father and Son is eternal life (John 17:3). If there is no way for us to see the Father, there is no way that leads to life. We need some way to behold Him. The good news is that there is such a way, and that the name of that Way is Jesus."
-Peter Leithart

"It gets like that with cameras on vacations...It's because you don't want to miss anything. Just seeing something counts as missing it.

The result is you don't really see anything. You either skim over it because it isn't worth taking a picture of, or you take a picture of it. When you take a picture of it you feel as if you have it forever so you don't have to really look at it. You are free to move on, looking for the next thing you can't afford to miss."
-Thomas de Zengotita

Drawing and Seeing

"I have learned that what I have not drawn I have never really seen, and that when I start drawing an ordinary thing I realize how extraordinary it is, sheer miracle: the branching of a tree, the structure of a dandelion's seed puff. "A mouse is a miracle enough to stagger sextillions of infidels," says Walt Whitman. I discover that among The Ten Thousand Things there is no ordinary thing. All that is, is worthy of being seen, of being drawn."

-Frederick Franck

Stange books

This one I found at Salvation Army today, it's difficult to believe it's not an elaborate hoax.





And then this I saw at half-price books last week, it's a (mostly) normal chemistry reference book

John Howe on drawing, fantasy, and 'making sense'

"...if something moves you, there's a reason for it... and if you can spend the time trying to transcribe that reason, then I think you can gain a better understanding of not only what the thing is, but also what has suddenly pushed you to receive something from it."



John Howe posted an excellent 20min video of a presentation he did at IdeaCity 2006. Check it out here.

I've always enjoyed John Howe as much for his articulate and poetic language as for his wonderful images.

John Howe on fantasy:

"...I hope and truly believe that mythology, that legend are the arena where humanity has been fighting most of it's prolonged battles and struggles, ever sense we started to think about why we are on this planet.

I find making fantasy means that I have to distill reality, so that means I have to understand what reality is about in order to make fantasy in any way convincing and real."

He also talks about something I've always noticed in old black and white photos, they have a quality that's missing in todays photography, that they share with older painted portraits:
they took a lot of time to make, and you get a sense of a connection between the photographer and the photographee, but now "it's so fast you can just click away, you have a 500mg card, there's a stabilizer, but are you really getting the image or not? I don't know...because you've delegated that chore to the camera... and to sit down and actually draw something...and it doesn't matter what the end result is... to draw something is to sit down and spend time with something."

James Jordan on science and art

"Before Adam could begin to rework the Garden, he would have to study and understand it. His scientific investigations would be the foundation for his artistic endeavors, just as God's light preceded his actions. The more he learned about the acidity of the soil, the better gardener he would become. The more he knew about the chemical composition of oils, the better painter he would become."

James Jordan, pg 14 of Primeval Saints

Richard Wilbur on nature and culture

"I don't think I have any feeling that nature belongs to poetry more than urban materials. In fact, I had rather not make the distinction between nature and the city. I'd like to see cities as objects quite as natural as bee-hives. Cities are natural things for men to construct."

-Former Poet Laureate Richard Wilbur

Nature and Culture 2

Looking at a photograph of the sunset in china, I was utterly struck by how Chinese it was, stylistically, the simplicity of shape and color. I realized that much of the 'Chinese' style in architecture, art and culture in general comes from the style and feel of shape and arrangement of the mountains,tress, fruit -in a word nature- in which the Chinese people as a people and culture were born.

This makes biblical sense because:

Adam, the (first) man whose name means man, was made in the image of God out of the ground, the dust, the earth.
And we share certain characteristics and qualities of that dust/earth. (The number of us will be like the number of grains of sand. From dust man came, to dust he will return, We share the color of dirt, etc.) "And shares man's smudge and wears man's smell: the soil" (Hopkins).

So much of what we think of as cultural is natural... because:

Nature is cultural.
...and...
Culture is natural.

Nature is the artistic creation of Person(s) (the Trinity) and has was made in their uniquely unique style, ie it is cultural.
Culture is the God-ordained completion and fulfillment of the creation (nature) by man who is part of creation, ie it is natural.

It thus makes sense that people made and born onto and into different parts and types of (the) earth, out of different dust should "still make according to the law in which they're made" (Tolkien)

In a sense, Chinese architects design Chinese architecture (man-made natures/environments) because they are made from the dust, the earth, the ground of God-made Chinese architecture (which we call China).

Related posts:
Nature and Culture
Dust Colored People
Trees and Cathedrals
Mythopoeica

The Kindlings Muse

Interviews with N.T. Wright, Ravi Zacharias, Rich Mullins and the founder of Image Journal.
Discussions on interactive storytelling and the life of Walt Disney.
What C.S. Lewis thought of Fantasia and a discussion of Icons and Orthodox church architecture.

It's all here on my new favorite podcast The Kindlings Muse

When the child was a child,
..it walked with its arms swinging.

It wanted the stream to be a river,
..the river a torrent,
..and this puddle to be a sea.

When the child was a child,
..it didn't know it was a child.

Everything was full of life,
..and all life was one.

When the child was a child,
..it had no opinions about anything.
It had no habits.
It sat cross-legged,
..took off running,
..had a cowlick in its hair,
..and didn't make a face when photographed.

from The Song of Childhood by Peter Handke writer of the excellent film Wings of Desire.