I was struck, while reading an article by Samual Reilly about the painter Caroline Walker, by his observation that “one definition of painting might be the it is an extended act of noticing.”* That really does appear to hit the nail on the head. It even works in relation to my comment in an earlier post on abstract art. Perhaps in the case of abstract work the artist’s “noticing” is directed, not outward to the subject that its being observed and painted, but to the development of the painted image on the canvas. There’s something to ponder there, I think.
*Samuel Reilly, “Home and Away”, Apollo, May 2025, p. 52.
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