Art

Many years ago, I harbored ambitions of being an artist. And not just a painter of pictures; in common with all the few ambitions I've had in my life, I wanted to be the best. I had some natural skill, talent I believe they call it. And, through accident, I had spent a while at university being taught how to draw.

A few years later, I realized that I had a choice to make. My painting had developed to the point where I was reasonably proficient and I had, through force of circumstance, found a drawing style that was all my own. The problem was that I had two ambitions and they were beginning to interfere with each other. I knew that I could also write. Of course, being who I am, just writing wasn't good enough for me; I had to be the best since Shakespeare.

Now, being the best at anything is hard enough. To attempt to do this in two fields at once is well nigh impossible. And I was beginning to understand this, young as I was. I had to choose.

Writing won because I knew that I was better at that than the painting. I also knew, having come to understand the art world at the time, that I was in total disagreement with the experts of that world. That was a battle that I was not prepared to take on.

Since those days I have grown much older and I no longer care whether I am the best at anything. I am happy if people read what I write and that's all. But I am glad that I had my dalliance with art, for the experience has left me with some thoughts on the whole business that have yet to be seriously challenged. Knowing that Harry and probably others have thoughts and experiences in this area, too, I thought that I'd lay these theories before you and let everyone trample on them, give them a good roughing up and explain where I'm getting it wrong. So here we go.

The way I see it, all art (in the general sense to include writing, poetry, music and the visual arts) is communication. To be art, the thing must communicate. If it does not, then it is something else, that which we call design. Something may be very pretty and look good hanging on your wall but, if it doesn't grab you and say, "Listen to me!", then it's not art but design.

Art might actually make you feel bad. You might look at a picture and experience feelings so terrible that your reaction would be, "I'd never hang that on my wall." And that would be fair enough; to be confronted daily with something that makes you feel uncomfortable is not something to be desired. But the painting is art; it has communicated with you.

So my premise is that, to be art, it must communicate.

If we turn to the specific thing that we call "art", that is, drawing and painting, we can now begin to sort the real thing from the false. Does the picture make you feel anything? If it does, it may well be art. Of course, this is complicated by the fact that we are dealing with subjective judgements here. A painting might have an effect on one person and not another. And this is where we stumble upon another suggestion of mine.

Great art reaches us at a very deep level, a level so deep that it affects us all through our common humanity. Other art will speak of things that are conscious, that could be said in words. So, if we look at a Vermeer, we will find that there is something about it that draws us in, that makes us know that the scene we are looking at is beautiful. We cannot say why it affects us in this way; we only know that it is so. In effect, the painting is reaching inside us, beyond our conscious understanding, and plucking strings that we had no idea were there.

If we then look at a painting of a kitten playing with a ball of wool, once again we can be affected. Many ladies will say, "Awwww, isn't it cute," for instance. But, in saying that they have revealed everything. The message in the picture is a conscious one that we can understand. And, by saying what the picture means to us, we have accidentally proved that it need never have been painted; we can say it in words.

And that is another important point I wish to make: that if something is capable of being put into words, then go ahead and say it. The purpose of art is to say something that cannot be verbalized. This is why I laugh when I see modern artists explaining their work. The painting, or whatever it is, must stand alone; if it needs someone to stand next to it, telling us what it's supposed to mean, then I'm afraid it just isn't art. Since it can't communicate, throw it out.

Do not mistake me; I am not one of those who would trash all of modern art as incomprehensible. There is some good stuff out there, it's true. But we must find some way of differentiating or this chaos will continue.

In the latter part of the 19th century, artists began to study how painting worked, how colors affected us, how shape and form could convey meaning. The impressionists were the first to get to grips with color. Early in the 20th century, the cubists experimented with form, attempting to reduce to a common denominator so that they could communicate by symbol rather than image. It was a heady time of trying out new ideas and seeing what happened.

The critics jeered at first, then began to understand and eventually applauded. Picasso rose to be the greatest artist of the age. But something else was happening at the same time.

Art was being dissected, its component parts removed and studied separately in an effort to understand how it all worked. Each piece was extracted and worked with to see what effect on us it had. But then we all forgot what the purpose of the exercise was; we forgot to put it all back together again.

The result was artists like Mondrian, the feller who reduced it to painting squares of color. I'll probably be shot for saying this, but Mondrian was a designer, not an artist. His paintings communicate nothing. To say that the color red, for instance, has such and such an effect on us, is not to produce art but science. If you do not use that effect within a complete statement, then you are telling me only what science could have told me anyway. You've found the principle, now use it!

The great artists of the past understood and used all the effects of color, shape, form and texture to create a whole, something that could speak deep meaning to us. And they did this instinctively, without having to study the various component parts of their art. We have so studied it that we have forgotten that it's only when an artist puts all the parts together into a coherent whole that art is created. A pile of bricks is not art. It's a pile of bricks.

So this is how I approach an art gallery: I walk through it. Quickly. And I will only stop when a painting says, "Wait! You have to look at me. I have something to say." Try it. You'll find you're through most galleries in a matter of minutes. But when a painting does say that to you, then you are rewarded beyond measure.

In the British National Gallery, there is a section devoted to the Dutch painters of the 16th to 18th centuries. Not all of the artists are well known. Yet every one of those paintings is impossible to walk past. They all insist on being looked at. And how beautiful is what they're saying! I do not know how they do it, but those old Dutch geezers knew a thing or two about painting. One can look at the light in those paintings, the supreme technique, the composition, everything about them, but nothing explains this hold they have on one, how they draw us in and make us feel. That is art.

Right at the end of the section is a large still life painting. It is a very complex scene, a table top with everything imaginable piled upon it. There are feathers and glasses, gold goblets and fruit, lace napkins and dishes, everything piled on just anyhow. The picture grabs you and makes you look. You see the perfect way in which the glass has been depicted, the way the light reflects in the metal of the implements, how the fruit are bursting with sweet goodness and the feathers so tactile in their softness. It is awe-inspiring, both in the mastery of technique and in the life that pulsates from the scene. You turn to the guidebook to see who painted this marvellous picture. And they don't know. The picture is, in fact, an exercise, an exercise set some poor apprentice painter in Holland three hundred years ago. He was learning his trade, his craft...

Now that is art.