Silence is a way to peel back the layers
Photo: Subashini Nadarajah © Genesis+Art
Genesis + Art Studio
St. Croix River Valley, Wisconsin
To be alone in our studio is not enough. We must free ourselves from the phantoms and our inner critics who pursue us wherever we go. “When you start working,” said the composer John Cage, “everybody is in your studio — the past, your friends, enemies, the art world, and above all, your own ideas — all are there. But as you continue painting, they start leaving, one by one, and you are left completely alone. Then, if you are lucky, even you leave.”
Having shut the studio door, we find ourselves alone before a canvas, a sheet of paper, a lump of clay, a computer screen. Other tools and materials lie around, close at hand, waiting to be used. We resume our silent conversation with the work. This is a two-way process: we create the work and then we respond to it. The work can inspire, surprise, and shock us… The solitary act of making art involves intense, wordless dialogue between us and with the painting itself.
In a world of overwhelming change and uncertainty we find art helps us hold both the knowing and the unknowing in a delicate dynamic. This highly creative tension is one of the primary skills we need if we want to live with courage and wisdom in an unstable climate. We seek to find truth by living an authentic life, holding the joys and sorrows of human existence, and translating it into an artistic language that connects us. Without the raw, undiluted expressions of art there would be little understanding of the human soul. We believe the arts, motivated by love opens us to wonder, expands our imagination and offers resilience. It has the power to draw us into reflection and connect the space between us.
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