Walt Wangerin is working on a great series of posts at his blog. They make for a fascinating window into the mind of a world-class writer. He’s laying out his case for craft and it’s worth paying attention to. Here’s an excerpt:
As far as I am concerned, art occurs. It happens. It is always an event rather than an object — though it is by means of objects that art takes place.
The painting, then, that hangs in a nighttime darkness on the museum wall is not itself art. It is a medium for art. When the light comes on, when a viewer steps before the shapes, the textures, and the colors composed upon the canvas, when the viewer enters the thing by playing her sight from part to part of the painting — that progressing event is art.
Likewise, when this post is closed and unread, it has the potential to become art, but it still awaits the moment of its happening. It waits for a reader. It waits for you.
Art is its own peculiar form of human communication.
Read the full article at his blog via the links below.
An Ethic for Aesthetics (Intro)
An Ethic for Aesthetics: What Is Art? (1/6)
An Ethic for Aesthetics: The First Covenant (2/6)
Pete Peterson is the author of the Revolutionary War adventure The Fiddler’s Gun and its sequel Fiddler’s Green. Among the many strange things he’s been in life are the following: U.S Marine air traffic controller, television editor, art teacher and boatwright at the Florida Sheriffs Boys Ranch, and progenitor of the mysterious Budge-Nuzzard. He lives in Nashville with his wife, Jennifer, where he's the Executive Director of the Rabbit Room and Managing Editor of Rabbit Room Press.
1 Comment
Tom Murphy
Love this line. Art requires, by definition, needs community…
“Likewise, when this post is closed and unread, it has the potential to become art, but it still awaits the moment of its happening. It waits for a reader. It waits for you.”
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