Don't bring sticks to stick lovers
I recently got to see a really cool exhibit in San Diego that put Georgia O'Keeffe (my all time fav) next to Henry Moore. While they only met once (that we know of) the two artists were both playing with abstraction in really interesting, related ways. They both loved organic, natural forms, and collected objects from nature — rocks, sticks, bones and the like. A big piece of the exhibit was full size recreations of their studios, and next to them the sign read:
“Both artists frequently rejected gifts of stones from friends and visitors, preferring their own discovery of a particular shape, size, texture, and color.”
As someone with a growing collection of natural objects I find interesting (including a “good stick bucket”) this note made me think about how we gather things to use in our work (art or otherwise) and how much of that is about the process of gathering, not just the aesthetics or information contained within the actual things themselves.
It also made me think about the ways we try to connect with one another. Isn’t it a lovely thing to bring someone a stick because you know they like sticks — even if you don’t really understand why? And then, of course, the place where those two things chafe at one another — the desire to find things for yourself, and the desire to provide things for the people you love — is its own interesting sticky little spot to linger in, isn’t it?
Textures! Emotional, physical, spiritual.
