Poetry produces intensity from precision, parsimony, and sometimes rhyme. Forced rhyme compromises sincerity. Absent rhyme often signals self-obsessed ramblings of a feeble mind---unlike Updike's. Rhyme slipped nonchalantly---mid-sentence, mid-stanza---punctuates thought the way only the spoken word can, thus giving thoughts physical expression. Broken lines and split sentences are spurious pauses. They discourage the reader from racing through the seamless verse. A poem is akin to a music score; it must be spoken to be appreciated fully.
When one is receptive of confession, Updike's poetry infects one with the capacity for the thought-soaked feeling. The poems' intensity (the better ones', at any rate), however, prevents them from captivating a distracted mind. Prose, with its more nuanced intensity, is better at winning the reader's confidence and nurturing his pensive mood.
25 July 2010
22 July 2010
Yves Saint Laurent: Rétrospective
(Petit Palais, 17 July 2010)
An individual is remembered for an impeccable final product---not a concept, not a prototype. It takes talent to see the possible. It takes genius to recognise the indispensable in the possible, and to see it through. Yves Saint Laurent recognised as indispensable the trouser suit known possible at least since Marlene Dietrich. He introduced dresses animated by women, instead of designing dresses defining women, who, in turn, would hope that no one else would be able to afford the same definition. Yves Saint Laurent's dress is a vocabulary, bound with dignity.
With the emergence of mass production, individual creativity replaces purchased creativity. It is not enough to hang art. To distinguish oneself, one must be art. Inhabiting an elegant dress is a helpful induction.
On mannequins, dresses tell more than they do on photographs or screen. One can see them in low light (uncharitable to cameras) as they are intended to be seen---at a ball, at night. One can see them close-up, in three dimensions, appreciate their texture and volume. Only then dresses, as sculptures, come to life.
An individual is remembered for an impeccable final product---not a concept, not a prototype. It takes talent to see the possible. It takes genius to recognise the indispensable in the possible, and to see it through. Yves Saint Laurent recognised as indispensable the trouser suit known possible at least since Marlene Dietrich. He introduced dresses animated by women, instead of designing dresses defining women, who, in turn, would hope that no one else would be able to afford the same definition. Yves Saint Laurent's dress is a vocabulary, bound with dignity.
With the emergence of mass production, individual creativity replaces purchased creativity. It is not enough to hang art. To distinguish oneself, one must be art. Inhabiting an elegant dress is a helpful induction.
On mannequins, dresses tell more than they do on photographs or screen. One can see them in low light (uncharitable to cameras) as they are intended to be seen---at a ball, at night. One can see them close-up, in three dimensions, appreciate their texture and volume. Only then dresses, as sculptures, come to life.
Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève
(Palais Royal, 16 August 2010)
It has taken Alfred Hitchcock twelve hours to set up the scene in the flower shop in "Vertigo." The scene is less than a minute of the film. This is all one must know about the creation of art in order to appreciate it. "Jours étranges" insists on telling substantially more. It puts the creation of art into the perspective of life. The result is neither art nor life, but fundamental science---as opposed to engineering. The result is a model, not a final product. The model's value is in teaching the audience to recognise art and to avoid artless life.
"So schnell" subtracts from the conventional art form element after element: music, grace, narrative. The exercise helps the viewer define his own boundaries of art and of beauty. Beauty is economy, purpose, and communication. When intentional, beauty is art. A dance without music (as a poem without rhyme) can be art---liberated, uncompromisingly precise, and direct.
Often, however, a choreographer benefits from the discipline imposed by music. Music reminds dancers to coördinate with each other because they must coördinate with music. Harmony in music (as rhyme in poetry) enables the viewer to anticipate imminent moves, thus turning the viewer into a collaborator. Anticipation amplifies movement by making it seem inevitable. The inevitability distinguishes dance from sport.
It has taken Alfred Hitchcock twelve hours to set up the scene in the flower shop in "Vertigo." The scene is less than a minute of the film. This is all one must know about the creation of art in order to appreciate it. "Jours étranges" insists on telling substantially more. It puts the creation of art into the perspective of life. The result is neither art nor life, but fundamental science---as opposed to engineering. The result is a model, not a final product. The model's value is in teaching the audience to recognise art and to avoid artless life.
"So schnell" subtracts from the conventional art form element after element: music, grace, narrative. The exercise helps the viewer define his own boundaries of art and of beauty. Beauty is economy, purpose, and communication. When intentional, beauty is art. A dance without music (as a poem without rhyme) can be art---liberated, uncompromisingly precise, and direct.
Often, however, a choreographer benefits from the discipline imposed by music. Music reminds dancers to coördinate with each other because they must coördinate with music. Harmony in music (as rhyme in poetry) enables the viewer to anticipate imminent moves, thus turning the viewer into a collaborator. Anticipation amplifies movement by making it seem inevitable. The inevitability distinguishes dance from sport.
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