Friday, October 10, 2008

Marathon meeting day...

There is little time to write here as I'm moments away from a whole day of 30 minute individual meetings with grad students--fun to look and talk and dissect and maybe (if I'm lucky) give some helpful insight. I look forward to tonight--dinner with good friends, great conversation about the state of the world with glass of wine in hand and roast chicken in our bellies....

But to get my head ready for looking at work and in preparation for some discussion on collage I'm planning for next week's posts, a great quote from Kurt Schwitters:

“Every means is right when it serves its end…What the material signified before its use in the work of art is a matter of indifference so long as it is properly evaluated and given artistic meaning in the work of art. And so I began to construct pictures out of materials I happened to have at hand, such as streetcar tickets, cloakroom checks, bits of wood, wire twine, tissue paper, tin cans, chips of glass, etc. These things are inserted into the picture either as they are or else modified in accordance with what the picture requires. They lose their individual character, their own special essence, by being dematerialized they become material for the picture.”

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