Last updated on March 17, 2017
“Aren’t the clouds beautiful? They look like big balls of cotton… I could just lie here all day, and watch them drift by… If you use your imagination, you can see lots of things in the cloud formations… What do you think you see, Linus?”
“Well, those clouds up there look like the map of the British Honduras on the Caribbean…
That cloud up there looks a little like the profile of Thomas Eakins, the famous painter and sculptor… And that group of clouds over there gives me the impression of the stoning of Stephen… I can see the apostle Paul standing there to one side…”
“Uh huh… That’s very good… What do you see in the clouds, Charlie Brown?”
“Well, I was going to say I saw a ducky and a horsie, but I changed my mind!”
― Charles M. Schulz, The Complete Peanuts, Vol. 5: 1959-1960
I went to an art Galerie with the ladies yesterday and I felt exactly like Charlie Brown. They looked at the pictures and saw British Honduras and the Caribbean, while I saw a ducky and somewhere in the distance perhaps it could have been a horse.
Paintings with color splashes, I just don’t get it. Give me something to work with, not just a sprinkle of color. I went to the bar and got me a Mimosa, it helped a bit with my imagination, but not much. A ducky is a ducky. 🙂
Back in the early seventies I was at art college studying sculpture. Many of my fellow students were would-be Anthony Caros (https://www.wikiart.org/en/anthony-caro`), they were making large, heavy, welded-metal abstract sculptures. We had monthly crits of each others’ works and there was a special language for these discussions. I began to branch out and made a big boat-like sculpture in resin and aluminium (http://hilarycustancegreen.com/Hilary_Author_Website/Sculpture.html#12). There was a dreadful silence when we came to give it a crit. Finally one student said: ‘It isn’t really a sculpture is it [realism was very passé at the time], it more like poetry.’ I was thrilled to pieces, but that was all anyone could fine to say about it.
I am in awe about your talent. I saw the picture of the boat and couldn’t help but smile, now knowing what has been said about it. But comparing art to poetry is actually a very nice compliment. It’s a statement, don’t you think?
BTW I got your comment with your email address, it was hidden in my spam folder. I sent you an email. I hope you got it!
Happy St. Patrick’s Day!
I agree, it was a lovely compliment (though it wasn’t meant as such). Email on its way to you.
Abstract doesn’t do it for me either. Mimosas on the other hand do. 🙂
hehehe! My thoughts exactly 🙂
Why does that not surprise me?
Ha ha ha. I hope you got a good laugh and a tasty mimosa out of it 😀
Nothing wrong with seeing duckies and horsies – sometimes people can be a bit too pretentious with ‘art’… 🙂
I have an artist friend who does abstract painting, and while the colors are lovely they’re still just colors and shapes to me. She’s stopped asking me what I think about her work. 🙂
I feel the same way.
I’ve visited art galleries sometimes and often find myself wondering what exactly a blob of framed expensive painting was all about?
https://youtu.be/IYkA1RML6p4
I thought you stopped blogging. I am delighted to see you.