some notes taken at the joan mitchell exhibition at san francisco museum of modern art
“this is a tree. I mean, it’s my idea of a tree which has nothing to do with a real tree.”
evenings on 73rd street
the orange is funny. 73rd street always felt brown to me. or a kind of grey brown like the fur on a real world-hardened squirrel.
maybe the gestures are hints at the people crowding the streets? the colours of their clothing flashing between buildings.
the red fits, but the orange I can’t quite make sense of. especially the one jagged hook in the center…like the men catching fish off the pier where I was walking this morning.
mud time
the violet pushes out here, like a secret being revealed or the first hours of dawn when the sun hasn’t made it quite over the horizon.
mud time like the stuff that caked my shoes as I trudged around le mont saint michel, the tide sliding in, claywet.
the clay is there too—that slick french clay that holds you like glue. your shoes almost pull off as you yank your foot free. the sound it makes… something like a slit throat.
that’s what the greens here are. the earth trying to swallow you back up.
untitled, 1961
“she risked the painting collapsing into unsightly chaos”
vétheuil
two people, one devouring the other.
OR
leaning down to kiss.
incredible how often those things overlap… or are even the same.
salut tom (for tom hess)
the yellow is almost warm but in a reserved kind of way. like when spring has sprouted but winter chill hangs on.
memory
nostalgia
sadness
la vie en rose
when you try to be relaxed but there’s that sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach.