Images

What is an image? In my academic studies I keep coming across the difficulty of arriving at a common definition of ordinary things. In art, I feel I can let the image itself speak. So, firstly, I believe an image is a voice. An image is a window opening on a visual mental landscape. The image is not the thing I am looking AT, but a representation of what someone has noticed. So, the image is more than a window, it is a WAY for one mind to look into a bit of another mind. The image is more like a place or location where explorers can make contact, like a cabin on a walking trail.

The creator(s) of an image may put more in or less, than what is actually there. Like talking, painting is active and selective, shaped by experiences and identity. Addition and subtraction serve to clarify, and just like an authentic voice comes from deep within the body, and rings out clearly to be heard, an authentic image can be recognized by carefully observing and “listening” to the traces of the body imprinted on the images. In the making stages of images, the artists emotional responses have time to arise and flow.