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Doug Westendorp
Contemplative Art
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Towards a Personal Geometry

8/26/2019

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When Henri Matisse famously observed in the early 20th century, "Exactitude is not truth," he was addressing the issue of academic art such as that of James Tissot, Jean-Léon Gérôme, painters from the end of the 19th century, both now largely forgotten. He was not thinking about Geometric Design. Geometry is generally considered to be more truthful when it is more exact. I have no argument with that notion as it is engaged in architecture and decorative design, but in the last few years I've been engaged with questions of geometry in painting. Might Geometry be embraced as a structural element in paintings where its inherent exactitude is subsumed and brought into play on behalf of other, perhaps more expressive, goals?
Picture
Spray paint on panel. 8 x 8 inches.
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Stick-Split Symmetry

8/18/2019

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Picture
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The Soul is Like a Feather

8/17/2019

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PictureNew Remnant 34
We can very fittingly compare the nature of the soul to a very fine feather or very light wing. If it has not been damaged or affected by being spoiled by any moisture falling on it from outside, it is carried aloft almost naturally to the heights of heaven by the lightness of its nature, and the aid of the slightest breath. But if it is weighed down by any moisture falling on it and penetrating into it, it will not only not be carried away by its natural lightness into any flights in the sky, but it will actually be carried down to the depths of earth by the weight of the moisture it has received.
In the same way our soul, if it is not weighed down with faults that touch it, and the cares of this world, or damaged by the moisture of injurious lusts, will be raised (so to speak) by the natural blessing of its own purity, and carried aloft to the heights by the light breath of spiritual meditation. Leaving things low and earthly, it will be transported to those that are heavenly and invisible.

St. John Cassian


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"A Good in Itself"

8/14/2019

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PictureNew Remnant #8, 8 x 10 inches. Walnut ink on cut clayboard, with chicken feather.
"St. Thomas Aquinas says that art does not require rectitude of the appetite, that it is wholly concerned with the good of that which is made. He says that a work of art is a good in itself, and this is a truth that the modern world has largely forgotten." -- Flannery O'Connor

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The Pure Sensation of Being Alive

8/7/2019

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PictureNew Remnant 32, stick split symmetry. 8 x 8 inches, painted paper on wood with painted stick.
"To become attuned to art is to become attuned to the pure sensation of being alive, because you are seeing it embodied in all of its mystery."
-- Kent Jones

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Toni Morrison

8/6/2019

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"...and an artist lives, of course, in the spirit."

8/4/2019

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A quote from Annie Dillard:
"A nun lives in the fires of the spirit, a thinker lives in the bright wick of the mind, an artist lives jammed in the pool of materials. (Or, a nun lives, thoughtful and tough, in the mind, a nun lives with that special poignancy peculiar to religious, in the exile of materials; and a thinker, who would think of something, lives in the clash of materials, and in the world of spirit where all long thoughts must lead; and an artist lives, of course, in the spirit. So.)"
From Holy the Firm

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    Author

    I am an artist. I live in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

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