The natural way to approach the interpretation of any work of art is to start at the beginning. This might well appear to be natural, but in fact that is not necessarily what actually happens. Where we start is, in fact, normally the end. What do I mean by this?
When we confront any piece of art, whether it is a painting, a poem, a statue of a sonata, what we encounter is the end point of a creative process. What we experience might well be a very long way from where it started life in the originating impulse of the artist. Given these finely finished objects it is natural to believe that they embody the original vision of the artist. We suppose that there has been a point at which the artist experienced some kind of creative idea and what followed was a process by which this originating seed was given form.
On the basis of my own experience I ask myself how often things actually proceed in that way. Often the beginning of a project is thoroughly obscure, and its trajectory might well pass through several false starts and changes of direction. So: to expect that it is possible to begin to understand a piece by starting at the beginning and simply following the journey to its realisation isn’t always possible. The finished work is not necessarily the realisation of a purpose that was there at the outset. There are occasions when, after a period of groping about, believing that there must be something in there, the image appears quite suddenly and unexpectedly. As an artist I have found myself on more than one occasion asking, “Where the heck did that come from?” I believed that I was pursuing a quite different purpose.
Answering the familiar artist’s question, “How do you know when it’s finished?” is not necessarily, “When I feel that I’ve realised properly my original intention.” The image that stands in front of you might well present itself as a complete surprise, and “knowing when it is finished” might consist of having the wisdom to abandon the originating idea, and recognise the value of what actually stands there. How many projects have been ruined by the artist’s immobility to let go of their originating image?
I wonder whether this is what T.S. Eliot actually had in mind when he wrote that, “In my end is my beginning”.