A Cutting from Vogel and the White Bull-On Images

Looking at the painting across the room Elisa realized it was starting to come together. The multi-colored background that surrounded the man’s head looked like the patterns in the Persian rugs that lay on the floor of her mother’s home. It was odd how painting worked. She had started with a white canvas that she seasoned with a red wash. Then, she took a white crayon and drew the figure as precisely as she could. At this point, her painting looked realistic. She then began using white and black paints to define the subject’s physicality. From then on it was a matter of adding paint to create the emotional expressions she was trying to convey to the viewer. She did not call the images, but they came nonetheless, unbidden to the surface of her thought and found themselves upon the canvas. The images inhabited the four corners of the canvas, held in by the framing device. Sometimes one side was stronger than another. Imperceptibly, as she continued to work, the other side eventually grew in strength and a balance was maintained. It was through this process the images emerged and became plastic, more of a sculpture than a drawing. She loved the physicality of the work. The painting grew until a moment arrived when the work of art was complete. Sometimes, however, the work did not grow. Something went wrong and the creation took a wrong turn. At that moment, she would have to stop and scrape the paint from the canvas and begin again. It was usually a fault of consciousness. The error occurred usually at some moment when she began to think of the painting intellectually.