The search for narrative

One of the biggest realisations I made during my two years at Cambridge was the need for a return to subject matter. I think Brian Graham and Andy both made little statements that really stuck in my head. I have finally lost faith with my obsession with Modernist ideals regarding pure abstraction. The total autonomy and self worth of painting for its own sake feels to me now to be an empty and self aggrandising philosophy. I have allowed this notion of subject matter to filter through my mind for some time, not sure of exactly where to latch onto. Initially I went back to old friends like Keats, or the notion of music as a source. All I found was indirect avenues towards abstraction. I finally realised that my subject has to be visual in its root. That does not mean painting something which stands in front of you. It does mean, however, taking an idea, a source which sparks off visual rather than philosophical notions. The intellectual rigour will then hopefully emerge from that rather than some preconceived abstract notion searching for a visual answer. Without such a tangible source I think there is a danger of stumbling in the dark looking for something which was never there. (Only a month or two since I stopped writing and already I have fallen into pompous crap) The French painting paper I did made me realise that perhaps figural narrative is a place I can start.

I have been reading Ted Hughes Crow as advised by Andy. Christ its epic. Has really triggered off some ideas about the potential for poetic narrative in painting. By poetic I think I mean something which is none specific, but which looks to trigger suggestions of a causal narrative plot which is more universal. For me this is where I think my painting should be going. I don’t believe in the supposed total lose of autonomous meaning, which has led us to suggest that every painting needs maximum explanation through comparison to another discourse. Equally, however, I don’t believe that a painting can be a doctrine. It’s nature does not allow a didactic tone. As a container of messages it moves more naturally towards suggestion. The fact it is silent. Therefore we need to move towards narrative which deals with something less stable, less tied down. Okay, waffling now. So the crow and what it is making me think.

I have taken from Andy the idea of no longer be restricted by a particular narrative. Rather taking a range of sources and allowing them to feed each other to create a new poetic narrative. That being one which can expand and contract without necessarily fully revealing itself, if that makes sense. I think I also like the idea of the narratives developing in both writing and painterly form. Informing each other but able to also grow independently. So it is neither illustration of the written narrative or explanation of the painting.