From Studio Notes, January 2006

◄  #6, January 2006 
January 16, 2006. Lac Ouaureau.
Afternoon.
“Ashes to ashes, dust to dust…”
I will make variations on a theme.

First, I gathered ashes from the wood stove in the cottage to be the substance of the image of my old man’s sexuality.

Second, I smeared heavy gel in broad strokes across the paper, then sprayed the ochre and black dust of old days.

It could well be that at the end there is only a smear—not the dawn of tomorrow but rather the dust of yesterday… For the old, are these not the same?

 *

And this painting will be only a smudge of ashes and dust. What more do you want?

The act of painting by dialog with the picture is a clumsy way to practice philosophy. But, then, philosophy has not been about first and last things since the end of Existentialism. So, I’ll have to paint instead.

Now then, for first and last things like “Why do you live, why do you die?”. The painting replies, “It’s always there, in the depths.”

*

Night.
I have been told I should feel the image in my body while painting it, and I have made my phallus out of ashes—but in the depths, the painting has demanded I embed the cross of life.

Finale.
It will not die.