³Mark and emotion, matched one to one. A unique emotional handwriting.
Technical skill as pathos. Aversion as a way to point to the horror.
Materiality at the extreme.²
A sketchbook composite from remarks by T. J. Clark about Jackson Pollack to
introduce a two day symposium on ³Modernism and Why It Wonıt Go Away.² UC
Berkeley:
Take a stick. Take a can. A can with white paint. Opaque white paint. Put
the stick in the paint. Figure the initial gesture: a circle, a ladder, a
lightning stroke. Make a white circle on a black rock. Erase the first mark.
No. Do not erase. Paint another circle around the first circle. One. Two.
Three. Four times eight. Open five cans: pink, brown, silver, blue,
lavender. Put a stick in each. On each fourth, shift the color. Migrate
quickly. Stop. Go. Witness. Slash. Go. Slash. Witness.
Make one ladder. Two ladders. Make the circles circle the ladder. Make a
second ladder. Make the circles circle both ladders. One, two, three, four.
Shift each ring into a different color. Throw down a lightening stroke. Make
it zig, zag through each circle, across each ring. Erase each slash.
Witness. Erase. Witness. Surround the entire rock. Color. Slash. Circle.
Ladder. Lightening. Say itıs finished when itıs finished. Black, color,
rock. No. Do not say itıs finished. One, two, pink, blue; three, four,
lavender, silver, brown. Stick. Stick. Slash, erase, witness, stick:
Imagine a page. Imagine a white page. Imagine dark. Imagine the dark stroke.
Imagine the dark stroke emergent. Imagine a ladder. Imagine a ladder broken.
Imagine foul. Imagine the territory destroyed. Imagine the territory
destroyed to save some other. Imagine the other destroyed. Imagine
destruction. Imagine the art of destruction. Imagine waste. Imagine the end.
Imagine sirens. Imagine the tongue burnt. Imagine ashes. Imagine war.
Imagine:
((April 9, 1999 - Crossing the Millennium (Project))
Stephen Vincent
Blog: http://stephenvincent.durationpress.com
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