WHY - from Nancy Bell Scott

[Marie Wintzer]

I have received this wonderful piece by Nancy a few weeks back. Life hasn't been a long quiet river for her recently, and I know that this work was her first attempt at getting back to art, at finding her feet in the studio again, so I'm really touched and honored that she thought about me. 
Nancy is making great use of what I call her "islands", and to me this work is about connections being made and being broken. The inevitable cycles of life. Islands and continents drift apart, rifts deepen and fissures extend (sometimes abruptly and violently). At the same time new ties are created, new elements are added to the chain of interactions (what I see on the left of the card). WHY, well, I don't need to go there, you know that WHY that is relentlessly trotting in your mind some days...
I know Nancy is starting to send out mail again, and for what I have seen it is as fab as it ever was, I am really looking forward to more correspondence with her. Muchly arigatoo my friend!

[Marie Wintzer]

Nancy, thank you for taking the time to write out your thoughts on this matter. A very good read too, thank you!

DVS, I love those pictures. It reminds me how much I like dark neon lit streets. I can't wait until it gets warmer again to go out and take a few street shots.

[De Villo Sloan]

zwoh, speaking of jazz - found some superb shots from The Golden Age - note Billie Holiday, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, among others, the kind of jazz we were talking about earlier in the stream. B&w shots are great and opening shot of street neon is vispo for sure:

http://tomclarkblog.blogspot.com/

 

Also I grossly misspelled improvisation earlier. Spell Cick OTL

[Nancy Bell Scott]

Good afternoon, CP! Thanks for addressing the ether question (not to mention the others). Those words of Marie's sent me floating in their cosmic truth. Really! Then there's your definition, which makes me laugh but probably is true in different ways. Some of the rest is like being back in college--but as a senior, not a sophomore. :--}  If someone asks me what the intention of an artwork of mine is, sometimes I already know the answer and can express it verbally. Other times I can't say my intention because I worked abstractly and intuitively and words can be hard; sometimes a precise knowledge of my intention doesn't come to me--isn't realized by me--for months or even longer, when I look back and then can see the context from a distance.  And sometimes I just want the work to speak for itself and for people to find their own understandings.

The piece in Marie's blog felt strange to me--as if I was in the studio for the first time--it seemed undefined or something to me, and Marie can verify that after sending it I wrote her a message and sort of apologized for it before she even received it! But I love what she sees in it, and what a few others have written. We don't always know what we're putting into a piece, not consciously. I often learn a lot from hearing others' thoughts on what I send.

This probably muddies the waters enough for one day.

p.s. Fascinating piece and note from Marie ...

[Marie Wintzer]

I have noticed something, every now and then we bring up that discussion, probably because of a genuine interest in the topic, and somehow it always stops at the same point! Which is pretty much at the beginning! :-))) We're hopeless...

[cheryl penn]

Make that A PIECE!!!

BUT the note puts it in a context in which to BEGIN investigation - whether one ends up in the same place as the artist - thats another discussion :--)

[cheryl penn]

To illustrate my point - this is the latest pice I have received from Marie - it has an extreme interpretive variable.  Where to begin?

[De Villo Sloan]

Nyet! Nyet!

[cheryl penn]

Yes - thank you - its a great morning :-)

"I gather she believes everybody should respect the artist's intention and what the artist  intended is the final word." - correction - I think it is a good place to BEGIN a discussion - at times.  The artist who produced the work having the first word (if they would like to - some don't, and some never get asked - it seems good etiquette in a way :-) - BUT everyone has their own opinion on this.  I doubt one could ever END a discussion with it - because of all the factors which have come up in the discussion.

The Ether?

To quote Marie:

"Connections being made and being broken. The inevitable cycles of life. Islands and continents drift apart, rifts deepen and fissures extend (sometimes abruptly and violently)"

Great lines S.P.

For Me - and of course - here I can have the first word, but YOU take it to create your own version of Ether :-) - Ether:  an alternate existence created in the mind due to internet connections.

(Thats the short version) 

[De Villo Sloan]

Mon fleur de cerisier, vous devez me faire parvenir le timbre de l'impératrice immédiatement! et plus de la douille rouge royal!

[De Villo Sloan]

content/intent - that describes it, and we've filled light years of comment streams with that discussion already.

 

Cheryl started the ether thing. She can explain it, or not