Monday, August 31, 2009

"Conversation with Picasso" Reading


Picasso is a man who's paintings invoke in viewers the need to realize a motive behind an image. His work is fascinating and obscure at every stroke and brings with it the evidence of a mind that lies entirely within its own state of creation. Christian Zevros attempts to document Picasso's own words and it was very interesting for me to find out some of what Picasso thought of the creative process and his viewpoints on his own internal process which brought about his own paintings. "Heretofore pictures moved towards their completion by progression. Each day brought something new. A picture was a sum of additions. With me, a picture is a sum of destructions. I make a picture, and proceed to destroy it. But in the end nothing is lost...". In a most appropriate fashion, Picasso's thoughts, as written out by Zevros, are conveyed without order and without sequence. This layout was essential in making his words come across as seemingly hurried snippets of advice and information, attempting to have persons who come across these thoughts understand an internal purpose that, in its essence, is ever changing and just as alive as the person it occupies.
Possibly my favorite idea from this text, was that paintings should be appreciated in the same context as any everyday natural phenomenon. "Everybody wants to understand painting...Let it be understood above all that the artist works by necessity, that he is, he too, a least element of the world, to which no more importance should be attached than to so many natural things which charm us but which we do not explain to ourselves". Meaning is relative to the central purpose of his art which was simply to expel a natural creative process that was as much a part of him as a heartbeat. He took in life and from it created visions that are meant to simply be; and this is their glorious purpose. I agree with Picasso that creativity is a process that plays out differently for everyone, but humanities inner urge to fashion our own thoughts and sensations into something substantial does seem to be a part of our natural system.