ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, September 15, 1996 TAG: 9609140003
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
MEMO: ***CORRECTION***
Published correction ran on September 17, 1996.
A feature in Sunday's Extra section incorrectly identified the
portrait painter who answered the question, "What is Art?" The artist
whose quotes begin, "Art is insanity at the highest level, is Patsy
Arrington Dorsett.
``The essence of all beautiful art, all great art, is gratitude.''
- Friedrich Nietzsche
IT'S like pornography, in at least one sense - we know it when we see it, though we may not like it.
Art dates back at least tens of thousands of years, to the cave drawings of animals and hunters by our ancestors. Probably the urge to create began with the species - and it shows no sign of ending.
Yet describing it is like attempting to describe creation itself: It is frequently beautiful, but often ugly. It is often uplifting, and not infrequently depressing. It is clear-eyed vision and wild-eyed insanity - false by definition and true if it's worth anything.
It is undefinable - and yet no one seems afraid to try.
Over the past several weeks we talked to people in Southwest Virginia who believe that they make art - and asked them the same question:
What is art, anyway?
Beginning on Page 3, you'll find their answers.
Here is what they said:
Jere Lee Hodgin, director, Mill Mountain Theatre:
"Konstantin Stanislavsky (Russian actor and director) said the goal of art is spiritual communication with the audience. And that may sound cosmic and esoteric, but I do believe that - whether I'm directing 'Crazy for You' or 'Hamlet' or 'Rumors.' I think art is about looking in the mirror and holding the mirror up for people. It's something that enables both creator and the audience to have a greater understanding of who we are.
"I think it helps us not judge. I think it helps us accept."
Sookie Campbell, nail artist, Nails by Sookie:
"It's something within that expresses yourself, your soul. It shows your personality and what you do. That's what I consider art."
George Clements, owner, George's Affair with Flowers:
``I feel art is man's work which make us look twice or linger. It should inspire our emotions.
``I consider what I do to be art. Personally, I feel my work is distinctive because I try to make things look as natural as possible. I try to make them look like they didn't come from a florist, as if they came from nature, as if they grew together, though that's not really possible. I try to keep things light and airy.''
Peter Wreden, maker of jewelry and wearable art:
``Art is awareness. It takes us out of the stupor of everyday life."
Doug Patterson, actor:
``It's something highly individual. Some people might like comedy, or drama, or realistic painting, or abstract painting. Art is individual taste, individual feelings.
``I'm actually a pretty shy person, and acting is a way to get into another character. [Even as a kid] I always liked seeing people be other people. I would hope I'd touch people, either by making them laugh or cry. Or by helping them to remember something: `Oh yeah, I knew someone like that once,' or `Oh yeah, that's like my uncle Joe.'
``You hope the audience will leave different from when they arrive. If you can make them laugh, that's a great success. You try to get them to think about something they hadn't thought about before. They're somehow more aware.''
Greg Vaughn, commercial photographer:
"Everything can be considered art. Who's to say what is and what isn't? I think writers and chefs - even people who cut hair - are artists. If it changes somebody's opinion or stirs up some kind of emotion, then it's art. As long as it gets somebody thinking, or if it catches their eye and makes them feel a certain way. Art can even make people buy products. That's what I do.
"I think my photographs are more artistic than the paintings hanging in art galleries because my stuff is seen by hundreds, maybe even millions, of people. If it's in an art gallery somebody will eventually buy it and hang it in their living room and maybe 20 people will see it. They're both legitimate, except one ends up reaching more people than the other.
"A lot of fine artists think photographers are cheating. They're snobby that way. They think that because we're taking pictures of an image instead of drawing it, we're not real artists. They think real artists only use oils."
David Wiley, music director, Roanoke Symphony Orchestra:
"The arts say much about us as a community and as a culture, saying in effect 'This is what we are.' The arts, including music, embody the hope for a better future for our children and our civilization. Involvement in the arts promotes important human qualities , including character, self-discipline, perceptiveness and creativity. I try not to imagine a world without people possessing these values."
Patricia Kyle Lawhorn, portrait painter:
"Art is insanity at the highest level. It is a person creating a problem - and solving it. It's inventing a problem, the hardest problem possible, to solve. It's worse than alcoholism, drug addiction, You can't satisfy it.
"Artists are very visual. They see things. They smell things. When it rains on the road, you see color, you don't see asphalt. It's all about controlling color. It's not about money. It's the challenge. But you've got to have money.
"Art is an unsatisfiable itch. You know what my husband says every time I teach a class? 'You're creating another monster.'"
Allison Burrows-Greeley, beautician, The Cutting Edge:
"I don't know what art is. It doesn't have that much to do with beauty, when you think about it. There's ugly art. ... I suppose it's taking a raw material and making something beautiful. It's taking something raw and making something out of it."
Mark Scala, director of education, Art Museum of Western Virginia:
"Giving form to one's experiences, ideas, passions. I think it also has to do with seeking an understanding of one's relationship with the world."
Judith Clark, arts consultant:
"Art is the human expression of the spiritual dimension of life. At its best, it transcends perceptions of sight, sound and thought and connects the finite with the divine."
Barbara Grenell, weaver:
``It's a personal expression that appeals differently to different people.''
Diane Rhodes, florist, Chi Chek:
"It's a very individual thing, a personal expression. It's everywhere. 'Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.' Well, art's like that, art is in the eye of the beholder. What may be art to one person isn't art to another."
Dan Foster, instrument maker:
``Art, I think, is man's interpretation of his human experience. I think a lot of art comes out of the agony of living, trying to make do.''
Joni Pienkowski, painter:
"I guess you could say what makes it into the museum and books is usually art.
"There are artists with a capital A, and then there's everybody who wants to be one. So often artists are considered technicians for picture-making. For me, real art has to do with my concepts, not somebody else's."
Ron Clifton, sculptor of natural and found objects:
``Art is something an individual can do and leave behind. ... My art is made out of everything that was thrown away. I use a lot of high tech parts. I tell people I really don't have to use my brain to make my art - I have all the smart people in the world make my art - I'm just the lunatic who puts it together. When I'm making my art, I do not think. If you're thinking and trying to make art, you're working against yourself. Just let it flow."
Lucinda Roy, novelist, poet, painter, Virginia Tech professor:
``It seems to me art occurs when there's a rare kind of communication between the art and the audience. It's forging of that bond between two or more people; what holds them together is the work. It's the artistic force that binds them together in a kind of communion or spiritual union. If it works, they all come away better people. It's almost as if the art doesn't exist until that communication occurs.
``Writing can take people to a kind of rare and wonderful place and make them understand more about themselves. If you look at a wonderful work of art, hopefully it will give a much deeper understanding of where you are in time and place.''
Clyde Shaw, cellist, the Audubon Quartet:
"To be caught in part of a beautiful work of poetry, or to stand in front of a great painting, it's the same experience. One experiences that moment of aesthetic arrest, and you know you've been had."
Nancy Ruth Patterson, writer, teacher, director of Roanoke's CITY School:
``Art is an inspiration that takes on a life of its own. The greater the art, the longer the life.''
LENGTH: Long : 178 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: 1. Ron Clifton. 2. iWayne Deel. Sookie Campbell. 3. Joniby CNBPienkowski. 4. Cindy Pinkston. George Clements. 5. Jere Lee Hodgin.
6. 1996 File. David Wiley. 7. Peter Wreden. 8. Clyde Shaw. 9. Doug
Patterson. 10. Lucinda Roy. 11. Nancy Ruth Patterson.