Find Your Beacons

 

We are political beings. We can't escape it no matter how hard some may try or insist that they are apolitical. The act of existing and being a part of this world puts you in a position of thinking, being and reacting.

Art and artists are political. 

Why do we visit museums, look at artwork from hundreds of years ago or paint our own? I believe that one of the reasons that we do this is to connect, and to relate to the experience of being human, of being alive, of making our way forward in the world. We look to art and artists (both dead and alive) for this shared sense of humanity. 

What helps me is to find my beacons. These come in the form of paintings, books, film and music. Above are some of the books that I am reading now.

Some thoughts by others on art:

"Art is a testimony of having lived-maybe the most convincing testimony." Enrique Martinez Celaya On Art and Mindfulness 

"...what we have, fortunately, in painting, is a kind of visual anthology of human consciousness in all its variety." -Wayne Thiebaud 

"It's by our imagination that we develop alternatives to our world. It also makes a condition where we can see what has been, what we might become, what we should be."

-Wayne Thiebaud 

"How shall I be a mirror to this modernity?" -William Carlos Williams

"If people concerned themselves with their art, they might do less harm. It might be a better world. So, if I cannot save the world, I might save myself." -Frank Auerbach 

"...How urgent should we be? Depends on how much time you have. What if I said your life is up? What image would you want to see put forth?...I would argue that time is always up...the role of images is not to reproduce the times, because the times are always unknown...the role of images is to reverse the times, to unfold them...I consider my project a conceptual, philosophical project, anchored by images, not reproductive of what bombards me but revealing of my place among them, as will, and perhaps more expectantly, revealing of the radiance of the world, radiance our cynicism has darkened."

-Enrique Martinez Celaya 

"I am a citizen of the world." -Charlie Chaplin

"To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places—and there are so many—where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.

And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory." -Howard Zinn

Who are your beacons?