Inspiration
Inspiration
Children | An inspiring journey
Children
A wonderful poem about children, this inspires me to get as close as possible to the essence of a child:
And a whoman who held a babe against her bosom said:
Speak to us of children.
And he said:
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself. They come trough you but not from you, And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts, For they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you. For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday. You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth. The Archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far. Let your bending in the Archer's hand be for gladness; For even as He loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.
From: 'The Prophet' by Kahlil Gibran
An inspiring journey
The clear color use, the loose brush strokes and especially the atmospheric paintings of the impressionists impress me a lot.
It sounded wonderful to visit a number of places that have inspired the impressionists so much. Especially Monets lily pond,
one of his greatest sources of inspiration, I just had to visit. What fascinates me most about Monet is that after wandering for many years
and painting numerous places, he dicovered that what he seeked was at his home. As if he really got home then. Al this time he hunted the moment,
now he could paint the moment, now that he really got home.
Monet already did this in a beautiful way in the painting Camille Monet sur son lit de mort were
he painted Camille, his first wife, on her deathbed giving an impression of her passing. Monet explains: "I found myself observing her tragic sleep
and almost mechanically checking the subsequent tints that death put on her rigid face. Blue, yellow, grey, I don't know. It had come that far.
But before I could think to paint those beloved curves, already the organic reflex responded to the shock the color caused. Reflexes forced me to an
unconscious act". This is how Monet explains the feeling of being chained to his visions.
It has become a magic impression of a magic moment. The magic of the changing moment.
I Find it interesting how this becomes an absession for Monet. When visiting the lily pond, the weeping willows had just turned green, and
the blue wisteria were about to florish. You know that all things grow, blossom and fade away, but you don't see it happen. For the eye, nothing changes and
in the light everything changes. This can be seen in the pond. The reflection in the water is never the same for a moment, but the changes between
the moment are uncatchable. Monet tries to catch that moment or, even better, the moment between the moments. The passing, the moment of changing figures.
In the painting, Camilles face is fading, chancing to a form that is hard to catch with the eye. This is the moment between moments. Monet doesn't just
paint her death, but he paints life itself.
To me, this is what makes Monet a true artist.