And beyond...

David Huffman, MLK, 2008

Hi everyone--wonderful final class meeting last night. Your good work very much appreciated--it's particularly rewarding when so many project are engaged/engaging summations of the questions each one of you has set for yourselves over the term. True in every case--for which I thank you, again. It's also been a pleasure to see the group come together--you all know each other by this point--and know the history of each other's work--which has lead to some good comments and discussion. I hope you also know that as a teacher (me, in this case) that's one of the most rewarding things that can happen in a class...

Our intro covered quite a range--as usual this semester!--including looking at David Huffman's work (Studio Museum show reviewed by Holland Cotter in the NYTimes, painting above)--which somehow lead to watching the opening sequence to The Harder They Come (even if we never quite got to the Melodians playing Rivers of Babylon with the the telephoto shot I mentioned--for that, watch the film itself! Perry Henzel, 1972. A great work.) And then then the discussion of Pictures and Paintings (Charlie Rich on piano--Nate: "Looks like the Casino San Pablo")--in our case, the distinction between pictures and paintings. Which lead to a perusal of Jake Berthot's recent work--and the YouTube video with Berthot talking about painting... Now that I think about it, I think it fit the word FIELD pretty well...!

Jake Berthot, Untitled (Tree), 2013

Here's a line-item recap, last to first:

Jake Berthot - YouTube
Jake Berthot Doesn’t Need To Be Original (with the reproductions we looked at)
Charlie Rich ~ Pictures & Paintings - YouTube
Charlie Rich - Feel Like Goin Home - YouTube (his classic song) 
‘The Shadows Took Shape,’ at the Studio Museum - NYTimes.com Holland Cotter's review
The Harder they Come - Part 1 (1972) - YouTube (we watched the intro sequence--the bus ride) 
David Huffman: The Beauty of Affliction | YBCA - YouTube (we didn't have time to watch this)

_____

Here are notes from class discussion on the show (thanks, Lauren!)--which will be on Tuesday the week after Thanksgiving:

VS 280 Final Exhibition:

* The show will be on Tuesday, December 3, 6pm to 9pm, in 170

* Students should be sure to invite friends, family, classmates to attend (Tony: "invite your friends and relations"). Tony may invite a few school folks too...

* Tony will bring wine and a variety of snacks

* Everyone gets approx. 1 1/2 pin-up panels for their work to be displayed. Chose your favorite pieces from over the semester--the ones you'd like people friends to see... Give some thought to how you'll hang the work...

* Tony will have cart with pins and basic tools. If you need hanging materials in addition, make sure to bring!

* Jorge gets the south wall of the gallery for his large format work, needs to talk to Joe Gouig in Room 103 about getting lights set up on the track along that wall

This is an evening for us to get together one last time, with friends. Not a formal review--but we can certainly enjoy what everyone's done this semester. Look forward to seeing you on the 3rd!
_____

Also--Rae and Katia will be in touch with you about photos of your work to post on the class blog.

 

  

PROJECTS: Work from F2013

Here's a link to the site with each student's selection of work from over the course of the semester:

http://vs280.blogspot.com/

Week 11: FIELD

 

El Greco (1540-1614, View of Toledo

The new word: FIELD

And here's a link to the Julian Bell article I mentioned in class. See if you can follow--much that's discussed touches on things we've talked about... I don't usually give you things quite so recent, but in this case, yes...

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2013/nov/21/treacherous-art-scene

A balancing view would be John Berger's short essay, "Field," in About Looking (1971)

    _____

   Dark August by Derek Walcott

So much rain, so much life like the swollen sky
of this black August. My sister, the sun,
broods in her yellow room and won't come out.

Everything goes to hell; the mountains fume
like a kettle, rivers overrun; still,
she will not rise and turn off the rain.

She is in her room, fondling old things,
my poems, turning her album. Even if thunder falls
like a crash of plates from the sky,

she does not come out.
Don't you know I love you but am hopeless
at fixing the rain ? But I am learning slowly

to love the dark days, the steaming hills,
the air with gossiping mosquitoes,
and to sip the medicine of bitterness,

so that when you emerge, my sister,
parting the beads of the rain,
with your forehead of flowers and eyes of forgiveness,

all with not be as it was, but it will be true
(you see they will not let me love
as I want), because, my sister, then

I would have learnt to love black days like bright ones,
The black rain, the white hills, when once
I loved only my happiness and you.

Week 10: FIND

Su Hanchen, Children Playing in an Autumn Courtyard (detail), 1100's

The new word: FIND

...and a song, The Ethiopians - The Word Is Love - YouTube

And from the Meher Baba:

"Do your best, don't worry, be happy. I will help you"

(thanks to my friend R. W. for the quote!)

Week 9: RETURN

Morris Graves, 1940s

 A very good evening, you all. So many openings in the work--each one meaningful...

Here's another of the old poems. This one from Li Po, in a very free translation by Ezra Pound (the poem becoming Pound's own...which is how things work, sometimes...)

The new word: RETURN



Ezra Pound (translator)

          The River-Merchant's Wife (Li Po)

While my hair was still cut straight across my forehead
I played about the front gate, pulling flowers.
You came by on bamboo stilts, playing horse,
You walked about my seat, playing with blue plums.
And we went on living in the village of Chokan:
Two small people, without dislike or suspicion.
At fourteen I married My Lord you.
I never laughed, being bashful.
Lowering my head, I looked at the wall.
Called to, a thousand times, I never looked back.
At fifteen I stopped scowling,
I desired my dust to be mingled with yours
Forever and forever and forever.
Why should I climb the look out?

At sixteen you departed,
You went into far Ku-to-en, by the river of swirling eddies,
And you have been gone five months.
The monkeys make sorrowful noise overhead.

You dragged your feet when you went out.
By the gate now, the moss is grown, the different mosses,
Too deep to clear them away!
The leaves fall early this autumn, in wind.
The paired butterflies are already yellow with August
Over the grass in the West garden;
They hurt me. I grow older.
If you are coming down through the narrows of the river Kiang,
Please let me know beforehand,
And I will come out to meet you
      As far as Cho-fu-Sa.

Week 8: WANDER / ROAM

Huang Kung Wang, Dwelling in the Fu-Ch'un Mountains, handscroll detail

The new word: WANDER / ROAM

The poems--as an inspiration, or sometimes simply as an opening to what poets do--which may translate into what you do... There's a always a play between the what and the how. The materials being words, rather than charcoal or color.

Po Chü-i (from T'ang Dynasty China) wrote this more than a thousand years ago. He inspired generations of writers (and painters) who followed... The translator is David Hinton.

The story here cuts close--but the hope (even veiled) remains very great...

Setting a Migrant Goose Free
Po Chü-i

Snows heavy in Hsun-yang this tenth-year winter,
riverwater spawns ice, tree branches break and fall,

and hungry birds flock east and west by the hundred,
a migrant goose crying starvation loudest among them.

Pecking through snow for grass, sleeping nights on ice,
its cold wings lumber slower and slower up into flight,

and soon it’s tangled in a river-boy’s net, carried away
snug in his arms, and put for sale alive in the market.

Once a man of the north, I’m accused and exiled here.
Man and bird: though different, we’re both visitors,

and it hurts a visiting man to see a visiting bird’s pain,
so I pay the ransom and set you free. Goose, o soaring

goose rising into the clouds – where will you fly now?
Don’t fly northwest: that’s the last place you should go.

There in Huai-hsi, rebels still loose, there’s no peace,
just a million armoured soldiers long massed for battle:

imperial and rebel armies grown old facing each other.
Starved and exhausted – they’d love to get hold of you,

those tough soldiers. They’d shoot you and have a feast,
then pluck your wings clean to feather their arrows.

_____

(Po Chü-i,  translated by David Hinton)

Week 7: GUIDE

Gustav Klimpt, Palas Athene

The new word: GUIDE

We each have different connections with the past. Nate's music (music-becoming-form), Lauren's anchor--the fold-down image of her parents, attentively threaded, Christina's traces of Nairobi (each one necessary)--Ari's night flight to Philadelphia, Michelle's flower and grasses, Jorge's understandings of love and friendship (and loss), Katia's only-by-Katia's layering of marks. Suok's blues, Kat's whites, and Maël's--Maël's what--maybe Maël's calm restlessness... All points of entry into your individual worlds. 

Oh yes--Eulaila Rae--your many different facets. And many possible openings...

_______

ITHACA

C.P. Cavafy

translated from modern Greek by Rae Dalven

When you start on your journey to Ithaca,
then pray that the road is long,
full of adventure, full of knowledge.
Do not fear the Lestrygonians
and the Cyclopes and the angry Poseidon.
You will never meet such as these on your path,
if your thoughts remain lofty, if a fine
emotion touches your body and your spirit.
You will never meet the Lestrygonians,
the Cyclopes and the fierce Poseidon,
if you do not carry them within your soul,
if your soul does not raise them up before you.

Then pray that the road is long.
That the summer mornings are many,
that you will enter ports seen for the first time
with such pleasure, with such joy!
Stop at Phoenician markets,
and purchase fine merchandise,
mother-of-pearl and corals, amber and ebony,
and pleasurable perfumes of all kinds,
buy as many pleasurable perfumes as you can;
visit hosts of Egyptian cities,
to learn and learn from those who have knowledge.

Always keep Ithaca fixed in your mind.
To arrive there is your ultimate goal.
But do not hurry the voyage at all.
It is better to let it last for long years;
and even to anchor at the isle when you are old,
rich with all that you have gained on the way,
not expecting that Ithaca will offer you riches.

Ithaca has given you the beautiful voyage.
Without her you would never have taken the road.
But she has nothing more to give you.
And if you find her poor, Ithaca has not defrauded you.
With the great wisdom you have gained, with so much experience,
you must surely have understood by then what Ithacas mean.