This is one of my all-time favourite documentaries. It’s about Elizabeth (Liz) Wiltsee, a brilliant young woman who excels in every school subject, has a 200 IQ and a special love for literature/writing. It’s the story of a bright light’s slide into paranoid schizophrenia, and a possible mystical experience when homeless towards the tragic end of her life.
Explores the influence of early film, poetry, and dance on the Cubist revolution:
Some passionate monologues by the actor portraying him:
THE WAR OF ART
Dear Reader,
Something you may be unaware of
is the way the various genres
within each of the arts closely resemble
religious movements, established or new.
You see, from the artist’s point of view,
if one is to devote so much of one’s time
to a particular set of principles or theories,
one simply cannot afford to be egalitarian,
unless, perhaps,
for the sake of political correctness.
The belief that “this approach is better
or more worthy than that approach,”
along with the passion to express it,
is all that will get the artist through
the many long vigils and collateral damage
it may do to them over the long term.
An artwork may be thought of
as a message which, decoded, will read
It is the artist’s belief that a work of art
ought to be constructed thus.
Whether or not the audience agrees,
the artist’s faith will continue to sustain itself
by means of the art-making ritual.
Just because it’s popular,
doesn’t mean it’s worthier.
The recognition of peers and critics,
while desirable, is not a prerequisite
for moral victory.
I draw your attention to this,
only so that you may become aware
that there is indeed
a constructive way to wage war,
an impersonal way to make love,
and a secular method through which
the finer feelings may continue
to be enlivened, or dare I say,
resurrected.
~
I have been writing some poems recently which loosely make reference to the movie Dark Water.
I wanted to take this term and broaden its definition a bit to allow for some poetic license. The American version was adapted from the original Japanese,
which was itself loosely based on an actual spooky real life story.
The writers of the American version have taken some artistic license themselves, and I can’t help but see the whole movie as a metaphor for the kind of psychological healing journey that people recovering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD, undertake. I can also see in it a kind of spiritual alchemy in which dark water is a code name for some kind of mercurial catalyst. In the movie, it is a kind of medium through which a dead child makes its presence known, and seems to bring about hallucinations both aural and visual.
The psychiatrist Charles Whitfield promotes the theory that PTSD is the cause of most disease, and that finding the true self is the key to healing, and when asked what the true self is, he states that it’s the inner-child, which has been lost, or you might say “drowned” by some kind of physical/emotional trauma.
The initial part of the artistic/creative process often invokes the carefree playful spirit which can just go at it without judging. The judge enters the process later on.
As we know, many an artist has relied on one expedient or more to help them see things differently, and kick-start this process.
Dark Water could be the artistic medium: the ink, or paint, the printed word, or music score.
It could be the intoxicant/expedient/catalyst: tea, coffee, liquor, or opiate.
It could be the Jungian shadow, the Freudian sub-conscious, or the Yin to the Yang.
It could be that beautiful reflection that Narcissus drowned in.
It could be that medium through which the deadened soul can speak.
The following poem is meant as a tribute to the French symbolist poet Arthur Rimbaud.
I read an article recently about the photos he took of himself while in Africa, which he apparently developed in “filthy water,” the evidence of which is in the little specks you can see on the prints.
The fact that they were developed this way means that they will inevitably fade completely.
At this point I would like to call attention to his Lettre du Voyant, in which he outlines his poetic manifesto and makes mention of “the Comprachicos” which is a term Victor Hugo used to reference various groups in folklore who would intentionally restrain and muzzle growing children in order to make them look freakish so that they could then be sold to lords and ladies to used as court fools. Rimbaud states that the Voyant, or seer, must make the soul (inner-child) monstrous (a kind of intentional trauma,) which is the common trait of the Enfant Terrible, or Rebel. His idea of a “reasoned deranging of the senses” to attain the unknown, along with his alchemy of the word, help to broaden the concept of Dark Water a little further.
The process is really just a different take on the myth of Prometheus (or Frankenstein,) and there is definitely that sense of the creator as a criminal/rascal/trickster who steals the fire/light. We could also think of the Dark Water as the substance which, at the same time, fuels and controls the fire.
In the movie there’s also an interesting paradox of the below being up above.
DESCENT (A TRIBUTE TO ARTHUR RIMBAUD)
Dark Water
in which
to develop
the vision
Dark Water
with which
to become as
another
Dark Water
with which
to derange all
the senses
Dark Water
with which
to detail
the descent
Dark Water
through which
the drowned soul
re-emerges
Dark Water
with which
to conduct
lifted light
Then delib’rately fade
fade
out
of
sight
~
I’m pleased to announce that anyone in the world wanting unsigned prints of my past work can now choose from the variety that I have put up for sale here on Society6.
They offer art prints in a variety of sizes to suit. They don’t sell originals on this site, but most of the originals of these are still for sale, so just contact me through the contact page on this site if you’re interested.
The link again:
Melancholic Woman
Oil on Canvas Paper
210/270mm
With this work I was drawing from a few different influences, specifically Evelyn William’s brand of expressionism, as well as Picasso’s blue period, and early Russian Christian art. This kind of Noir lighting is a big step away from my usual style, where I mostly try to employ even light. There is also an intentional distortion of certain facial features, most notably the enlargement of the eyes and shrinking of the mouth. The use of straight lines, as opposed to curves, for the eyebrows and bridge of the nose was also intended to help intensify the feeling of the piece.
I have uploaded some old recordings of mine to YouTube.
This one is for all the young aspiring artists who are getting a hard time from their parents, not explicitly, but just in the little connotations in the things they say from time to time. The idea of this poem was to unravel and amplify these connotations as much as possible:
I will post some more of the tracks soon.
GD Bates 