reflecting on a painting

Something I wrote last year...

I have a painting in front of me. Not on the wall, but stacked up against my other finished canvases. I keep this particular piece there so that I can look at it whenever I work in this space. It is no longer "a painting I made". It now has a personality outside of me. The painting seems to echo something from deep within. I feel a little melancholic, yet elated; both at the same time. I feel a certain limbo when I look at the painting; suspended, in a place that’s neither here nor there. (Enroute?) I stare ahead of me, in this moment of rest where all else falls away. I imagine my line of sight to be perched high up on a mountain. Something about the angle jogs a physical memory. (I sense/ smell rain.) From this vantage point, the horizon is below me, and is a wide sweep of land. As I write these words — wide sweep of land — I feel a physical sensation again. I feel cradled. Alone, yet secure. I feel the distance of a journey. Where am I going? I’m not sure. I am neither excited nor reluctant to reach. Instead I am immersed in that moment. I feel at home right there, in the middle of nowhere. 

looking out/ looking in (part III): notes from the ordinary

The previous post was an homage to the question about gazing outward to look inward. The third and final assignment was to look at how this question shows up in the day-to-day. Here is what I wrote.

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I The pulse of ordinary life: 

Half asleep, I could hear a steady sound: ksshhhhhhhhhh 

(air conditioning? cars whizzing somewhere?). 

I thought of John Cage, in an anechoic chamber, realising there is no such thing 

as real silence.*

II Extraordinary ordinariness: 

The evening light on the dining table was liquid gold. Crumbs cast long shadows. 

Andrew Wyeth’s work came to mind: The Blue Door; dark recesses of the shed, radiant light on the door. 

Not a ‘perfect’ beauty, but an imperfect one. 

Wabi sabi.

III Eternity on the wall: 

The sun sets on the same wall each day 

regardless of the season. It’s a big window and a big wall. 

If the house were to live for an eternity, we can safely assume that the evening sun will 

always fall on that wall. 

IV White light flight: 

My eye caught a flock of white birds flying north. 

They seemed to be flying in slow motion; their bodies glistening with each flap of their wings. 

The monumental in the most ordinary of sights. 

Their formation looked like this:

 |> |> |> |> 

    |> |> |> |>  |> |>

|> |> |> |>

      |> |> 

      |>

V Chop wood, carry water: 

Most days look like this: 

wake up, shower, breakfast, work, lunch, work, coffee, dinner, sleep. Repeat. 

I wonder what it all means.

Zen masters say chop wood, carry water. 

VI The fruits of insight: 

Cézanne’s fruits vibrate with a palpable energy. 

I look at the fruit in my kitchen; 

the plums have to go. 

Life, even in death, is full of life.

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*  Kay Larson, Where the Heart Beats, John Cage, Zen Buddhism and the Inner Life of Artists, 2012. Note: In the anechoic chamber (which blocks all external sounds), Cage heard two sounds, a dull roar and a high whine that came his body. The first was blood rushing through veins. The second was the firing of neurons. Larson says, “In the anechoic chamber, Cage sought perfect silence and instead found the pulse of ordinary life.”

looking out/ looking in (part II): a view of the horizon

the wall (absent)
acrylic on canvas, 36x48", 2019, © priya vadhyar

Continuing from the previous post, the second assignment was about writing an homage to the theoretical question distilled from the art review. We were asked to create a collage of "beautiful sentences" from art theory, literature, music, the internet, etc., and to to play with those sentences while thinking more about the question. 

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Antony Gromley’s sculptures at the ruins of Delos seem to gaze outward. And in doing so, notes Rachel Spence, “…our eyes turn inward.” Virginia Woolf in To the Lighthouse also speaks of gazing outward and being transformed by the act: “Losing personality, one lost the fret, the hurry, the stir; and there rose to her lips always some exclamation of triumph over life when things came together in this peace, this rest, this eternity; and pausing there she looked out to meet that stroke of the Lighthouse, the long steady stroke, the last of the three, which was her stroke… Often she found herself sitting and looking, sitting and looking, with her work in her hands until she became the thing she looked at - that light, for instance.” 

Becoming. 

Becoming.

Becoming.

Becoming the thing she looked at. Does the sublime evoke a similar becoming? Does one become the horizon; the expanse of time and space? Does one lose personality (the minute details of one’s life) to become that vastness? Back at Delos, I imagine a visitor examining one of Gromley’s figures and stepping between the figure and the view of the horizon. The gaze is obstructed, and now the figure gazes at the visitor. Who is looking at whom? Marina Ambramović’s The Artist is Present comes to mind. Looking into Ambramović’s eyes, and being looked at by the artist in return. A mutual gaze. What kind of transformation are we witnessing? “Time went by and the man at the table was no longer weeping. He was leaning in toward the woman. Everything between the man and the woman became microscopic. Levin felt that something was lifting right out of the man and creeping away. … The woman seemed to become enormous, as if she stretched out and touched the walls and stood as tall as all six floors of the atrium.”* 

Transmutation. 
Metamorphosis.

Transformation. 

We are transformed not only by what we look at but also being looked at in return. Do powerful works of art do just that? Do they look back at us? At our inner world that is just as vast?“For there was an entire universe in that room, a miniature cosmology that contained all that is most vast, most distant, most unknowable. It was a shrine, hardly bigger than a body, in praise of all that exists beyond the body: the representation of one man's inner world, even to the slightest detail.” Anais Nin says, “We don't see things as they are; we see them as we are.”** 

Mirror.

Mirror. 

On the wall.

Why do we gaze outward to gaze inward? “I do think that there is a way in which the outer presence, even through memory or imagination, can be brought inward as a sustaining thing.”*** To ask questions to answers we already know? To remember when we forget? Again. And again. And again.

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* Heather Rose, The Museum of Modern Love  

** Paul Auster, The Invention of Solitude

*** John O’Donohue in conversation with Krista Tippett nonbeing.org

looking out/ looking in (part I)

'6 times left', by Antony Gromley. Image: Financial Times

I recently signed up for an online course, Theoretical Thinking and Writing in Art, taught by An Paenhuysen. Each week we have an assignment. For the first assignment I had to read an art review and distill from it a theoretical question. I had to pay attention to the language used and mull over how the writer expresses her thoughts. And then my own thoughts that emerge. Here is what I wrote.

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Article: Antony Gromley’s Haunting Sculptures on the Greek Island of Delos 

Financial Times, June 14, 2019, by Rachel Spence 

Is a work of art an isolated ‘object' to be ‘admired’ in any unspecified space? Or can location transform the work to reveal or heighten its meaning? Or can the work of art and location feed off each other to create a new reality? 

Reading Rachel Spence’s review of Antony Gromley’s show Sight, set in the ruins of Delos (Greece), one cannot help but feel that it is the latter that is true in this instance. Spence draws the reader in right at the start: a solitary figure (Gromley’s sculpture) on the peak of Mount Kynthos looking out at the Aegean sea. Immediately she evokes both a sense of the romantic and the sublime. The contrast between the smallness of the individual and the vastness of the beyond is unmistakable. Spence talks as much about the venue of the exhibition, the ancient ruins of Delos (a Greek island 'steeped in myth’), as Gromley’s work. Contemporary art meets ancient culture to create an otherworldly (or perhaps a more true-to-the-earth?) spectacle. The island’s ‘primal solitude’ mirrors itself in Gromley’s figures. Spence calls the island being an ‘evocative venue’ for Gromley’s ‘timeless vision’. She then goes on to talk about ‘retinal tricks’: Gromley’s figures that sometimes blend and sometimes stand out in the ruins and landscape of Delos. Spence’s imagination takes flight at the sight of these figures in the unlikely setting of an island with rich history. It also alters her perception of time as she considers one of the figures and remarks on Gromley’s ‘gift for temporal sorcery’. 

Spence considers how we view art, interact with it and are transformed by it. Gromley’s figures seem to gaze at the horizon; and in considering this gaze, Spence makes a note about Gromley’s show title, Sight, and how the figures gazing outward “turn our eyes inward.” I imagine a visitor examining one of Gromley’s figures and stepping between the figure and the view of the horizon. The gaze is obstructed, and now the figure gazes at the visitor. Who is looking at whom? The concept of ’darshan’ comes to mind: of seeing and being seen.

cézanne's mountain

Cézanne's mountain

orange

in the evening light ⏤

My feet no longer 
on the ground.

There is the singular, and then there is everything else. Looking out into the world, you are in a twilight state (half daydreaming, half aware); that in-between of states that brings out the hidden magic that is everywhere. Lights twinkle and things rush past you. Your eyes, unfocused, take in shapes and color, and create new relationships, new realities. The body (hair flying) laps up the wind, thirsty. There is music, every high and low note unveils layers of meaning and connections. The singular isn't only in the midst of all, it is all.

notes over the atlantic

Yesterday on my way to Mumbai. Somewhere over the Atlantic:

The light outside goes from pitch dark in the west to pale blue in the east where the sun is rising. The vast horizon offers a glimpse into the nature of things; the flux that always is. Where does something begin and where does it end? The sun keeps rising and setting at the same time. 

And then there is a landscape of clouds; mountains and valleys, caves and river beds. The rivers are dark and deep. Who knows what secrets lie in those depths? All I know is that way below the waters is a deeper ocean. The clouds are moving, shape shifting, undecided on what they want to be or can be. The possibilities are infinite.

the universe in a room

"S. lived in a space so small that at first it seemed to defy you, to resist being entered. The presence of one person crowded the room, two people choked it. It was impossible to move inside it without contracting your body to its smallest dimensions, without contracting your mind to some infinitely small point within itself. Only then could you begin to breathe, to feel the room expand, and to watch your mind explore the excessive, unfathomable reaches of that space. For there was an entire universe in that room, a miniature cosmology that contained all that is most vast, most distant, most unknowable. It was a shrine, hardly bigger than a body, in praise of all that exists beyond the body: the representation of one man's inner world, even to the slightest detail. S. had literally managed to surround himself with the things that were inside him. The room he lived in was a dream space, and its walls were like the skin of some second body around him, as if his own body had been transformed into a mind, a breathing instrument of pure thought. This was the womb, the belly of the whale, the original sire of the imagination. By placing himself in that darkness, S. had invented a way to dreaming with open eyes."

- Paul Auster, The Invention of Solitude

tomorrow

As I wait

for tomorrow's sorrow

on the windowsill alights

a sparrow

straw in beak.

the endless expanse

I have a memory

of a distant future -

I look up at the sky and see

an unending vastness 
mirrored.

I imagine that if you were to set your eyes on the endless expanse, there could be two possible reactions. You would either be terrified or you would feel a great calm. No matter what your reaction, you would understand what you were looking at. To conceive of its boundaries would be a futile attempt. And your conception of time and relative size would crumble. You would see yourself in these limitless depths and recognise your place in it all. It would seem like a meaningless accident or a grand miracle. Or both.

when you paint...

When you paint, you walk out the door...

...Into the hurried blur of the busy streets, the little shops and big buildings, the cars, and dogs walking their people. Later, you find yourself in a bus, which turns this way and that, until finally the city is behind you. The view changes to green fields and wild flowers, and a large sky that is a wash of blue. The view is wide, and it makes you not-think. You get off the bus when the urge strikes. Standing there, in the middle of nowhere, you look around to take in the view. Soon you are walking. Maybe something far away catches your eye. Now you find yourself climbing a hill and down the other side. There is a dirt road leading to a farm. Along this dirt road you see cows grazing. You stand there, enjoying the scene and the sounds of the earth. Some time later a farmer drives your way, and you hitch a ride. You say goodbye as you get off near the railway tracks. The winding track is quiet, without traffic and goes on for miles. On either side are tall trees obscuring everything else. You come to a tunnel. Inside the tunnel the air is damp and there is a deep darkness that seems to go on forever. But soon you come out into the sunshine. The clouds in the sky are moving just as you are. Up ahead, you see a dusty old sign post that says '...... Trail'. Intrigued, you take this trail through the woods. The birds are chirping, and a deer stares at you as you walk past it. The evening light, orange, peeps through the trees. Now, night is falling. You don't know where you are, but you sense you must keep walking in a certain direction. Suddenly you reach a clearing. It's a meadow. Stepping into this clearing, you see the lights of a town far away. Then you look up at the sky. The same sky that was a brilliant cornflower blue is now a deep violet. The stars are out, and they are twinkling.

When you paint, you walk out the door and then come back inside.

under dark skies

*

Under dark skies,

the sound of the ocean

and dancing flames

remind me of something.

*A layer of a painting painted over (detail). Like the memory of a passing cloud.

nowhere but here

A ruin in the wilderness

the tall grasses bending

a chirp and a rumbling train far away —

I have nowhere to be

but here.

the underbelly

the underbelly
watersoluble graphite on paper, 18x24", 2013

Like a magpie, I collect

unlikely treasures —

the electric tower against the sky

the unpainted building

the abandoned railway station.

silent, empty and wild

On the silent mountain

the snow

embracing the wind.

It's been snowing incessantly since yesterday. Outside, the snow is piling up into interesting shapes and the wind is blowing the powdery snow in every direction. The snow has created a hush, a dampening of sound. This makes me think of snow capped mountains, where there is no one. Only the wind blows, and the snow gives this invisible wind a dimension. I am thinking of the emptiness and wilderness. I am thinking of the vastness that puts one's life into perspective. There will always be (I hope) places like that - silent, empty and wild. 

remembering fierceness

On the brink of life 

the path was clear -

dusty feet, the orange sun,
paint,

the sound of the flute 

and cutting chai.

My mind has been wandering. Apart from looking back at the great year that was 2015, I've been thinking about the past 15 years.

It was in 2001 that I decided what I wanted to do with my life. I decided, or rather realised, that I wanted to be an artist. I was a student then, studying Economics. I liked the subject, but painting held my attention without me trying. Something changed that year. I remember the fierceness of that realisation. It gave my life meaning - a form that was truly me. The fierceness has since evolved into a calmer way of life. But it's good to revisit that fierceness to remember why you do what you do.
Happy 2016... May the force be with you!

where the true self roams free

*

Sometimes you have to shrink in size to really see a painting. To see the vastness of the space and feel the work. When you inhabit the painting, you can roam its high peaks and look out for miles. The horizon is far away. The light shimmers on that edge, while the dark pool draws you into its secrets. A shape is longer just a shape, but a being that stands with certainty.

*sketchbook entry, watersoluble graphite on paper

2014 and notes to self for 2015

It's that time of the year again; the yearly ritual of brushing off one's lassitude to look at life in the face. 2014 has been a good year. Some of the things I wanted to accomplish in 2014 were - create a body of work, exhibit in group shows, learn pottery, create a website and apply to juried shows. Creating a body of work was the most important goal, and so I paid it the most attention. I have spent many long hours (not long enough) in the studio. Despite the periodic frustration, doubt and procrastination, I did pretty well. I created a body of work this year and am still working on it. I exhibited thrice this year. (not bad) The pottery goal was fun. As for juried shows, I haven't been lucky this year. I didn't get around to creating a website for myself either. Perhaps 2015 will be the year for both goals.

I continued volunteering at Columbia Art Center (CAC) this year; my weekly appointment with the world outside the studio. As a volunteer, I've done some interesting projects/ tasks at CAC, but usually I help them with their inventory. In June this year, CAC asked me to give a talk to teachers and facilitators of a kids' art camp. I talked to the group about my work, after which we discussed subjects such as self-expression, success and failure, spontaneity, the creative process, the inner censor and taking risks. We ended with a painting project. It was a fun event. More than anything the experience told me that I could put myself out there. Scary, but fun.

2014 also marked the fourth anniversary of A Work in Progress. Four years! Sure I haven't given the blog as much attention as I should have, but still. With the new year I promise, dear blog, to shower you with more love. 

Now that there's no stopping 2015, I have a list of things I want to do this year. Paint on larger canvases, return to printmaking, go deeper into silence and stillness, exhibit in India, participate in exhibitions and apply to juried shows, create a website, and blog regularly. Work has taught me some important lessons this year and I want to keep these in mind in 2015: 

• When the resistance to begin work arises, dip into work regardless. The edges of any fear will begin to fade and the next step becomes inevitable. 
• Staying in the studio even when things are not going your way is vital. 
• Mundane activities like clearing your table can coax the answer hiding inside you to reveal itself. 
• Silliness and lighthearted defiance are great allies when the all serious ego tries to overpower you. 
• Everything takes its time.
• Everything flows into each other. Life is seamless.

I leave you now with some my favourite photos of 2014. Wish you a very happy 2015. May you have a year of creativity, joy, laughter, wisdom and peace. See you in 2015!

the lightness of invisible afternoons

the lightness of invisible afternoons,
watersoluble graphite on paper, 18x24" 2014, priya vadhyar

The warm breeze, the lull 

And the certainty of buried treasure ⎯
What I remember most 
Is the lightness of those invisible afternoons.