The idea had never occurred to me before today that the things which inspire us artistically might actually strike quite deep roots in our minds. These continue to flourish perhaps long after the original experience has been left behind, and has been given expression through art work. The completion of a picture does not necessarily mark the end of one’s relationship to the experience that gave rise to it.
At the Italian language class I attend in Leeds we were asked yesterday to do a piece of writing for assessment, and the topic allocated was a place that has particular significance for us. Not surprisingly the place chosen had to be in Italy, but other than that no guidance was given to us as to any other things that might shape our choice. Today I sat down in order to try to get some initial ideas. I don’t want to leave the task to the very last minute, but to root it in some reflection, so that my piece might have some real interest for the reader. To my surprise a location came to mind pretty well immediately, and struck me instantly as the right choice.
I decided that I would write about the small village of Timau, in the Friuli region of Italy, up in the north-west corner of the country close to both Austria and Slovenia. The motivation for my choice is not hard to find. This is the place in which I first encountered the “open-air museum” of the Great War, on top of the mountain called Pal Piccolo, in the summer of 2013. My experience on that occasion stimulated another visit the following year, and developed into the series of pictorial reflections I produced eventually, dealing with Italy’s experience during the Great War.* Subsequently I went back again with my wife.
Until today I don’t think that I had appreciated the depth to which that contact had penetrated into my psyche, and the richness of the emotional “tone” that was conjured up by memory. I don’t think that I will return to that theme again in my painting, but it did make me appreciate the importance of significant emotional roots as the basis for artistic creation. That set me thinking again about the post I wrote in this bog a few days ago, in which I traced the roots of my recent artistic “drought” to the fact that the ideas I had been vainly attempting to develop were all concepts, and were motivated by intellectual factors rather than by an emotional response to some experience.
At least I believe that I know now in which direction I ought to be heading, even if at the present moment I cannot name a destination.
*These can be viewed in the gallery entitled “Presente!” elsewhere in this website.