attention
The task of the maker isn't to show us something new. It isn't a matter of invention, novelty, or ingenuity. The job of the making is to show us all the things we've looked at but have never truly seen.
It's about seeing again what you have seen already. Seeing more. Seeing better. Seeing differently.
It's a matter of revising, of re-vision, or re-vision-ing.
It's a new angle. A fresh perspective. It's understanding relationships and connections. Presence and negative space. Subtleties and nuances. The details and the absences. In what you show and in what you don't say.
Attention is incisive. It has a way of penetrating to the heart of something. A way of cutting away, through, and around anything unnecessary. To notice the intricate aspects of things.
A color.
A texture.
A shape.
To see characteristics as entities.
Everything seemingly static is made of events and unfoldings. Moments upon moments within moments within moments that make up the life of a thing. Moments of tension, and wonder, and excitement, and interest. Moments of sorrow, and joy, and melancholy. Art is what happens when you notice one. When you look at it closely. When you put a frame around it. When you give it the space and time to speak.
*special thanks to for a comment he left on a process video that inspired by part of this post.
P.S. ICAD Day 297-299 - all the collages featured in this newsletter are available for purchase here.
Beautiful work I am an artist you have share with me a real concept and I thank you
Fresh perspectives. Moments within moments. And art within art within art.
Right back at'cha—thank you so much for your inspiration.