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Here is a beautiful image created by photographer Stuart Hutchinson.
One of the besetting problems for photographers (it seems to me) is that people always want to know what it is a photograph of.
This stems from two false beliefs. The first is that old myth that the camera never lies. The second is that a camera is a device for recreating the view in front of it. Both are nonsense of course. We've looked at them in previous posts. But their power is that they can stop us from seeing what has really been achieved and produced.
In this case, they can stop us seeing a truly beautiful image.
Let's look at this with fresh eyes.
What we see is a picture space divided roughly in two. Below the dividing line the space is filled with a shimmering blue. At a distance the blue is piercing but move closer and it becomes more graded and subtle. The shimmering is caused by what seems to be an unstable surface. It isn't exactly moving, but it certainly isn't static either. It is blue; it is many blues; it is blueness.
Above the line the space is filled with living colour. It has pinks and yellows and its own grades of blue as well.
A dark, spidery structure straddles the line. Its complex framework is at odds with the fields of colour. It emphasises their line of separation. The blue begins to swallow it; the yellow and pink make it stand out sharply. But there is no tension or movement; it is simply there.
We're starting to see this as a compelling composition now.
We've said it before but let's say it again. Images like this are created by an artist seeing them first, by knowing equipment and techniques, by making judgements. That's true for painting, photography, sculpture and all the rest.
Stuart Hutchinson exemplifies the photographer as artist.
Go to see his work if you can:
at Colonnade House until 1 March;
It is said that, when it comes to learning calligraphy, the first 30 years are the most difficult.
Mercifully, not every calligrapher waits that long before we see their work. Often though, when we do see it in art shops, we are tempted to dismiss it. We might look at the text and think how so-and-so would be heartened by it, and buy it as an inexpensive gift.
Nothing wrong with that as far as it goes, except that we could see so much more.
Here is a piece by artist Laura Swatridge.
A suggestion: for the moment, don’t read the text or admire the skill.
Look at it simply as an image, as a beautiful thing. A white space is the setting for curls and flourishes, laid on the surface in graduations of magenta. They seem to almost bounce around in a friendly jostle. We could imagine them moving, animated. Flowing might be a better word. Suitably framed and on a wall, this would make a very pleasing piece of art; a beautiful object.
We could stay with that experience, and be none the worse for it.
But it’s safe now to look at the text as text, now that we’ve made time to appreciate this as a piece of art. The text shares a quality with painting, photography and engraving – it was created by a human hand and a human mind. In a world largely dominated by machine-generated images and words, this is an increasingly precious quality. It is uniquely human and humane. For me, this adds to our appreciation of the beauty of the whole object. And we can allow the words to bounce around in our heads as they do on the paper. We can give them permission to be out of context, ambiguous and anything they damned-well want to be.
(Of course we might want to reflect on the words too – and why not? Isn’t that what words are for? To be understood and thought about? But then we are drifting away from the beauty of the whole piece).
Calligraphy is not an elegant or ornate way of writing.
Calligraphy - like all art - re-presents the world to us.
You can see more of Laura’s work at the Montague Gallery in Worthing
or at
Website Address: http://www.lauraloves.art
Instagram: Laura Love Letters
Instagram: Laura Loves Pets
Facebook: Laura Love Letters
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