notes on art...
| All M.C. Escher works & text (c) Cordon Art B.V.-Baarn-the Netherlands. All rights reserved. Used by permission. |
Anyone who applies himself, from his early youth, to the practice of
graphic techniques may well reach a stage at which he begins to hold as
his highest ideal the complete mastery of his craft. Excellence of
craftsmanship takes up all his time and so completely absorbs his
thoughts, that he will even make his choice of subject subordinate to
his desire to explore some particular facet of technique. True enough,
there is tremendous satisfaction to be derived from the acquisition of
artistic skill and the achievement of a thorough understanding of the
properties of the material to hand, and in learning with true
purposefulness and control to use the tools which one has available -
above all, one's own two hands!
I myself passed many years in this state of self-delusion. But then
there came a moment when it seemed as though scales fell from my eyes.
I discovered that technical mastery was no longer my sole aim, for I
became gripped by another desire, the existence of which I had never
suspected, Ideas came into my mind quite unrelated to graphic art,
notions which so fascinated me that I longed to communicate them to
other people. This could not be achieved through words, for these
thoughts were not literary ones, but mental images of a kind that can
only be made comprehensible to others by presenting them as visual
images. Suddenly the method by which the image was to be presented
became less important than it used to be. However, one does not of
course study graphic art for so many years to no avail; not only had
the craft become second nature to me, it had also become essential to
continue using some technique of reproduction that would enable me to
communicate simultaneously to a large number of my fellow men that
which I was aiming at.
If I compare the way in which a graphic sheet from my technique period
came into being with that of a print expressing a particular train of
thought, then I realize that they are almost poles apart. What often
happened in the past was that I would pick out from a pile of sketches
one which seemed to me suitable for reproduction by means of the same
technique that was interesting me at that moment. But now it is from
amongst those techniques which I have to some degree mastered, that I
choose out the one which lends itself more than any other, to the
expression of the particular idea that has taken hold of my mind.
Nowadays the growth of a graphic image can be divided into two sharply
defined phases. The process begins with the search for a visual form
that will interpret as clearly as possible one's train of thought.
Usually a long time elapses before I decide that I have got it clear in
my mind. Yet a mental image is something completely different from a
visual image, and however much one exerts oneself, one can never manage
to capture the fullness of that perfection which hovers in the mind and
which one thinks of, quite falsely, as something that is "seen". After
a long series of attempts, at last - when I am just about at the end of
my resources - I manage to cast my lovely dream in the defective visual
mould of a detailed conceptual sketch. After this, to my great relief,
there dawns the second phase, that is the making of the graphic print;
for mow the spirit can take its rest while the work is taken over by
the hands.
I myself passed many years in this state of self-delusion. But then there came a moment when it seemed as though scales fell from my eyes. I discovered that technical mastery was no longer my sole aim, for I became gripped by another desire, the existence of which I had never suspected, Ideas came into my mind quite unrelated to graphic art, notions which so fascinated me that I longed to communicate them to other people. This could not be achieved through words, for these thoughts were not literary ones, but mental images of a kind that can only be made comprehensible to others by presenting them as visual images. Suddenly the method by which the image was to be presented became less important than it used to be. However, one does not of course study graphic art for so many years to no avail; not only had the craft become second nature to me, it had also become essential to continue using some technique of reproduction that would enable me to communicate simultaneously to a large number of my fellow men that which I was aiming at.
If I compare the way in which a graphic sheet from my technique period came into being with that of a print expressing a particular train of thought, then I realize that they are almost poles apart. What often happened in the past was that I would pick out from a pile of sketches one which seemed to me suitable for reproduction by means of the same technique that was interesting me at that moment. But now it is from amongst those techniques which I have to some degree mastered, that I choose out the one which lends itself more than any other, to the expression of the particular idea that has taken hold of my mind.
Nowadays the growth of a graphic image can be divided into two sharply defined phases. The process begins with the search for a visual form that will interpret as clearly as possible one's train of thought. Usually a long time elapses before I decide that I have got it clear in my mind. Yet a mental image is something completely different from a visual image, and however much one exerts oneself, one can never manage to capture the fullness of that perfection which hovers in the mind and which one thinks of, quite falsely, as something that is "seen". After a long series of attempts, at last - when I am just about at the end of my resources - I manage to cast my lovely dream in the defective visual mould of a detailed conceptual sketch. After this, to my great relief, there dawns the second phase, that is the making of the graphic print; for mow the spirit can take its rest while the work is taken over by the hands.
enhanced for netscape 2.0