Tuesday, February 03, 2009

"It took me 40 years to learn that painting is not sculpture"

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I spent my leisure time today y gazing at various master paintings after I'd read a chapter about Paul Cezanne titled "The Process of Sight". In it the author explains the way our visual cortex processes light in a two part process. We subconsciously attempt to make sense/form/structure out of every beam of light that we 'see.' Cezanne was the master at creating only enough visual information for our brains to process, complete and then interpret his art. He was able to achieve such nuance and complexity with so few strokes. I was absolutely fascinated to consider that with the stroke of a thin grey line on the blank canvas, he creates a mountain. Notice how much dimension the pistachio tree has by his emphasis on the curvatures.

Pistachio Tree at Chateau Noir - P. Cezanne

1 comment:

Mary J DuVal said...

Thank you for sharing this. It is very thought-provoking. I have to remind myself how beautiful simplicity can be.