Thoughtful Thursday-Slow Muse

Slow Muse is a terrific blog by artist Deborah Barlow—thoughtful, intelligent, and from the heart. Her interest and sources are wide-ranging. I leave a visit to her blog with inspiration from her words and a list of artists and writers to explore. Here is how she describes it:

Slow Muse is about the raw material that influences a visual artist. The intake comes in from every imaginable corner—the earth, the body, space, books, poetry, ideas, technology, music, cuisine, architecture, wisdom traditions. What ties all of these observations together is my passion for art that makes you stop and pay attention.

What we need more of is slow art: art that holds time as a vase holds water: art that grows out of modes of perception and making whose skill and doggedness make you think and feel; art that isn’t merely sensational, that doesn’t get its message across in ten seconds, that isn’t falsely iconic, that hooks onto something deep-running in our natures. In a word, art that is the very opposite of mass media. — Robert Hughes

I particularly liked her April 14, 2013 post, Paying Attention. It starts with a quote from Susan Sontag—

Do stuff. Be clenched, curious. Not waiting for inspiration’s shove or society’s kiss on your forehead. Pay attention. It’s all about paying attention. Attention is vitality. It connects you with others. It makes you eager. Stay eager.
–Susan Sontag

then goes on to discuss Buddha’s Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love and Wisdom by Rick Hanson, and quote from Agnes Martin— “Painting is hard work.”—and Alison Bonds Shapiro's article, Paying Attention. Deborah closes with this:

This approach to being with whatever shows up (Shapiro references her teacher Frank Ostaseski‘s admonition to “welcome everything; push away nothing”) asks for a kind of detachment that is often counter to the intimacy that develops between artist and artifact. We are, in that role as maker, both judge and jury, creator and destroyer. But there are moments when accessing that detached acceptance of everything would feel like a useful tool to have in my quiver.

Visit Slow Muse