511
captured individuals far off against the sea.
25
A website titled “wetcanvas” poses the
question, “How Many Paintings Exist in the World?“.
26
One recent collection suggests the following break-down in perceptual categories: “Painting with the Flow of the World,” “Realism and Beyond,” “Post-Pop
Landscapes,” “New Romanticism,” “Constructed Realities,” “Abstracted
Topographies,” and “Complicated Vistas.” It is certainly a good beginning.
27
One
even more confusingly, fervently embraced collection can be found in Gerhard
Richter’s thousands of images (photographs, sketches, and collages from 1962 to
2006) of his breathtaking Atlas.
28
All of these sites within the cartography of the world are so distant from, yet
inherent to, two intently gazing Ringless Chinese Pheasants (Phasianus decollatus)
painted by Joseph Wolf (1820–1899).
29
They are looking at us and no description
(human) quite comports with the inquisitive—fearful—agitated—excited—luminous—terrified—awestruck—self-contained—height-of-brillant pellucid innocence in their eyes.
So many similar images teem around our minds, inviting ethics, senses, philosophies both familiar and exotic. We live within and between them, forming our judgments of imagistic congestion from the instant of our birth, and even, at the end, in
coma, or last instant subconsciousness, we are still there formulating. With so much
neurological chatter, the question of true wilderness persists: What is it, and has
humanity ever actually been at peace there? Is it a place, a feeling, a lost world
entirely? Or does it somehow call us into a near or distant future? They are silly
questions because language, or any one of these multitudinous human expressions
actually know what is going on, even if none of us truly know. We are lost, trying to
find something with whatever anatomies and tools at our species’ disposal.
Given the range of our proficiencies, why are we so bent upon footprints, handprints, destruction, erasure, obfuscation, violence? That was the form of Beethoven’s
“Tempest” Piano Sonata No. 17,
30
an urgent commentary on the storms of our presence. The Reverend William Joseph Long (1867–1952), some of whose early books
25 Lambda print mounted on aluminum with Plexiglas face; edition 1/5, 47 × 59 inches (119 × 150
cm), Hall Collection, http://www.hallartfoundation.org/exhibition/birds-eye-view/artworks/
thumbnails, Accessed May 22, 2020. See also, Landscapes After Ruskin – Redefining the Sublime,
Introduction by Lynn Gumpert, Essays by Joel Sternfeld, Dale Jamieson and Chris Wiley, Hall Art
Foundation, Reading VT, 2018.
26 https://www.google.com/search?q=how+many+paintings+in+the+world%3F&rlz=1C5CHFA_
enUS893US901&oq=how+many+&aqs=chrome.0.69i59j69i57j69i59l2j0j69i60j69i61l2.1343j1j
7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
27 See Landscape Painting Now – From Pop Abstraction to New Romanticism, Edited by Todd
Bradway, Essay by Barry Schwabsky, Contributions by Robert R. Shane, Louise Sorensen, and
Susan A. Van Scoy, D.A.P., New York, 2019.
28 Edited by Helmut Friedel, Thames & Hudson, London, 2006.
29 See Monograph of the Phasianidae or Family of the Pheasants, by Daniel Giraud Elliot and
Joseph Wolf, Volume II, Published by the Author, New York, 1872.
30 See, for example, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KMGcOYHSs0, Accessed May 22,
2020.
54.2 The Proliferation of Gazes
captured individuals far off against the sea.
25
A website titled “wetcanvas” poses the
question, “How Many Paintings Exist in the World?“.
26
One recent collection suggests the following break-down in perceptual categories: “Painting with the Flow of the World,” “Realism and Beyond,” “Post-Pop
Landscapes,” “New Romanticism,” “Constructed Realities,” “Abstracted
Topographies,” and “Complicated Vistas.” It is certainly a good beginning.
27
One
even more confusingly, fervently embraced collection can be found in Gerhard
Richter’s thousands of images (photographs, sketches, and collages from 1962 to
2006) of his breathtaking Atlas.
28
All of these sites within the cartography of the world are so distant from, yet
inherent to, two intently gazing Ringless Chinese Pheasants (Phasianus decollatus)
painted by Joseph Wolf (1820–1899).
29
They are looking at us and no description
(human) quite comports with the inquisitive—fearful—agitated—excited—luminous—terrified—awestruck—self-contained—height-of-brillant pellucid innocence in their eyes.
So many similar images teem around our minds, inviting ethics, senses, philosophies both familiar and exotic. We live within and between them, forming our judgments of imagistic congestion from the instant of our birth, and even, at the end, in
coma, or last instant subconsciousness, we are still there formulating. With so much
neurological chatter, the question of true wilderness persists: What is it, and has
humanity ever actually been at peace there? Is it a place, a feeling, a lost world
entirely? Or does it somehow call us into a near or distant future? They are silly
questions because language, or any one of these multitudinous human expressions
actually know what is going on, even if none of us truly know. We are lost, trying to
find something with whatever anatomies and tools at our species’ disposal.
Given the range of our proficiencies, why are we so bent upon footprints, handprints, destruction, erasure, obfuscation, violence? That was the form of Beethoven’s
“Tempest” Piano Sonata No. 17,
30
an urgent commentary on the storms of our presence. The Reverend William Joseph Long (1867–1952), some of whose early books
25 Lambda print mounted on aluminum with Plexiglas face; edition 1/5, 47 × 59 inches (119 × 150
cm), Hall Collection, http://www.hallartfoundation.org/exhibition/birds-eye-view/artworks/
thumbnails, Accessed May 22, 2020. See also, Landscapes After Ruskin – Redefining the Sublime,
Introduction by Lynn Gumpert, Essays by Joel Sternfeld, Dale Jamieson and Chris Wiley, Hall Art
Foundation, Reading VT, 2018.
26 https://www.google.com/search?q=how+many+paintings+in+the+world%3F&rlz=1C5CHFA_
enUS893US901&oq=how+many+&aqs=chrome.0.69i59j69i57j69i59l2j0j69i60j69i61l2.1343j1j
7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
27 See Landscape Painting Now – From Pop Abstraction to New Romanticism, Edited by Todd
Bradway, Essay by Barry Schwabsky, Contributions by Robert R. Shane, Louise Sorensen, and
Susan A. Van Scoy, D.A.P., New York, 2019.
28 Edited by Helmut Friedel, Thames & Hudson, London, 2006.
29 See Monograph of the Phasianidae or Family of the Pheasants, by Daniel Giraud Elliot and
Joseph Wolf, Volume II, Published by the Author, New York, 1872.
30 See, for example, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KMGcOYHSs0, Accessed May 22,
2020.
54.2 The Proliferation of Gazes