Art—A Benediction to Life?

I have discovered within myself, the urge to paint, to sculpt, to write, to dance, to teach, to learn, comes from a deep need to preserve the perishable, that is, recreating the memory of an interpretation of sensory input, and so, a lie; a lie sensory beings, such as myself, find great difficulty acknowledging is not the truth. As an artist, even more so as a human being, I wish to get at that truth, but somehow, I sense as long as I look for it through the lens of an 'I' (a self), such truths will be elusive. Self-expression, what is it, really? Are we not all artists of our own life, each trying to discover the significance of the life we are living in relationship to who we believe we are? But without a personal self, why would we care?

As the artist of my life, I seek the divine; to express myself becomes a balm for what cleaves my heart: not finding what I seek. Over the last several years, I noticed my art suffers when I lose the understanding seeing IS the see-er, there is no 'self' doing the seeing, only the seeing is present—in essence, I forget myself; time flies by and what came by way of paint, clay, or words I have to re-assimilate as if I was not the one who produced the work.

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After I wrote the above two paragraphs, two thoughts came to me in succession: who (or what) is it that wants to be expressed, and am I limited to my senses as the only playing field? These questions lead me inevitably to the most important question: authority. Is art decided by mass agreement? What fixates the minds of individuals when the mix of humanity's stream of consciousness passes through an individual part of that stream and, in turn, regurgitates it back into the mix?

Authority? Does it not always lead down the road to hell? Hell being many things—boredom, hopelessness, sadness, and whatever suppresses the belief happiness is possible.

Here it is then, the mortal mind meeting its greatest vulnerability: who will remember (or care) what occurred 100, 200, 500 years ago, much less 5,000 or 10,000 years in the past? Whether is be hell or not, expressive or not.

I’m going to leave the ‘authority’ question for next posting. So, I guess, for now, I’ll enjoy painting, sculpting and writing for its own sake… not mine, nor the world’s, but in response to the inner desire (‘got-to-make-something’) tickling itself.

J. Anthony Noa

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Update on my latest work (from last posting)

Third glaze set and will add a fourth before I begin the final paint layer with the palette knife.