dougwestendorp.com
Doug Westendorp
Contemplative Art
  • Home
    • Resume and contact information
    • Gallery of Student Work >
      • The Blue/Orange Project
      • Student Work (2) Yellow/Violet
      • Student Work (3) Final Project
  • El Camino de Dios
  • Blogs
    • Thoughts on Contemplative Art
    • Poetry Journal
  • Art Statements, 2011 - 2024
    • Art Statement 2021-2022
    • Artist Statement, 2018-2020
    • Artist Statement, 2011-2017
  • The Biomorph Series, 2023- 24
  • Square Mandalas
    • Ten Inch Squares
    • The Overspray Series
  • Gallery of Past Work
    • The Remnant Series >
      • New Remnants
      • Early Remnants
    • Oil Pastel and Oil Stick
    • Geometric Designs >
      • The "Scythe" series
      • The "Whisper" Series
      • Lattice Windows
      • "Ghost" Geometry
      • Panel Paintings
    • Graph Paper Drawings >
      • Pencil, 2014
      • Pencil, 2015
      • Pencil, March 2016
      • Pencil, June 2016
      • Pencil, October 2016
      • Pencil, 2018 and 2019
      • Pencil 7.5 x 7.5
      • Pencil 2020-22
    • Stone Poems
    • Disappearing Journal Series
    • Early Still Life Work >
      • Oil Stick on Paper
    • Themed Sketchbooks >
      • Monoliths, 2022
      • Feathers, 2019
      • Geometry, 2019
      • Geometry, 2015
      • The Crucifix Book, 2012
    • Installation Views
  • Self Published Books
    • Short Stories
    • Poetry Books
    • Existential Coloring Books
    • Portfolio Books
    • Book Design
    • Illustrations >
      • Brother Samuel's Journal
      • The Hermitage
      • The Sphere of Life
      • Dreamscapes

Carl Phillips

8/30/2023

0 Comments

 
I have to stop ordering books online, sight unseen. Last week I came across, My Trade is Mystery, Seven Meditations from a Life in Writing, by Carl Phillips, and sent for it. I liked the cover and the title, and the blurb on bookshop.org. But so far anyway, I’m disappointed. Not that it’s a bad book – it’s well written, and probably is a good book for many – but it’s not for me. Most frustrating to me is that he makes global statements about art that don’t apply to me. Like, “…[Writing a poem is] how I temporarily arrive at clarity and stability – emotionally, psychologically, intellectually… Art is one of the many ways to get there but for the artist it’s a chief way, and sometimes the only way.” Really. Clarity and stability. I guess I need those as much as anyone, but it’s certainly not why I write or draw. A couple pages later he writes, “All art springs from a human impulse, if not to resolve what’s not resolvable, then to contain, if only temporarily, what resists containment…” Seriously. All art. Hmm. “Each time I write a poem I feel as if I’ve laid something to rest, arrived at the stability of having understood a thing.” Wow. Laid to rest. His stability sounds like something to put in a grave. Or pinned to a board, maybe, like a butterfly, captured and laid out securely dead and on display. He even uses the word “capture,” as this capturing is assumed to be the intention of art. 
 
Well, I'm not out to capture anything, much less stabilize it with my understanding. If anything my poems are meant to release butterflies. Set them free. Let them fly. 
 
He goes on, on the same page (only page 11) to speak of self expression, like it’s a given, not even up for debate. “How we express ourselves and understand ourselves and the world around us…” Well, if poetry is for him an expression of himself and his understanding, can’t he just say that? Who is this “we” he refers to. Not me. 
 
Am I not a poet? Or an artist? On page 12 he offers (parenthetically, no less) that art is “the artist’s medium for expression and understanding.” If that’s not what my art is, and that leaves me out, I suppose I can live with that. If that’s the consensus he makes it out to be. But it makes it all that much harder to put (what I call) my poetry and my artwork out where it can be seen. It seems I have to start with explaining how not to read my poems. 
 
As I’ve been doing for many years anyway, I guess. As anyone who reads these blog posts must have noticed by now, I keep saying that my poems are not self-expression but self-less-expression. I point to the ancient Chinese poems that have nothing to do with personal expression or understanding the world. Or the poetry of Robert Lax that resonate as spiritual depth in a material world. 

0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Doug Westendorp

    I have written some poetry, and translated a few short poems from the ancient Chinese. 

    Archives

    August 2023
    June 2023
    May 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    June 2021
    August 2020
    May 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    October 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    August 2016
    June 2016
    April 2015
    March 2015
    May 2014
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    March 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    April 2012
    February 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.