77. One
How we stay in context. The power and price of seclusion. Moving between verbal and visual. Next essay, next film.
But Sickert takes his brush, squeezes his tube, looks at the face; and then, cloaked in the divine gift of silence, he paints—lies, paltriness, splendour, depravity, endurance, beauty—it is all there and nobody can say, But his mother’s name was Jane not Mary. Not in our time will anyone write a life as Sickert paints it. Words are an impure medium; better far to have been born into the silent kingdom of paint.
—Virginia Woolf, “Walter Sickert: a Conversation,” 1934
After a long run of storms, the heat finally broke in NYC. Right now it’s just 69º F, with continuing rains. The windows have been open all day for the first in a while. The coolness of the breeze is a welcome contrast to the dragon’s breath that’s been greeting New Yorkers at their thesholds.
Not that I’d been crossing many; I’ve been holed up in the studio. Agnes Martin once said, "I have put myself ahead of my work and have suffered in consequence.” Controversial perhaps, but increasingly, I too find it hard to “balance” work with other things if I want to break ground on a project. I have to choose, then categorically commit.
This past week I withdrew from my summer bacchanal of friends and shows and happy hours and grocery stores (one of my more benign vices) to put the work ahead. For five days I saw no one, spoke with few, cooked and ate most meals at home. I read, consumed films. Every morning I ran, listening to nothing.
It wasn’t a complete retreat by any means: I avoided tv but watched a few Olympics replays. I dipped into Instagram now and again. I went once to the Met, where glass-encased dresses reminded me, creepily, of women’s bodies in coffins. I indulged in an apéro at a bar.
However imperfect these periods of withdrawal, even a handful of days can feel interminable, especially in a familiar environment lacking novel stimuli. It makes a person go inward (let’s face it, a little crazy). The reward is a unique sort of continuity and clarity for the work. Hyper-sensitivity sets in on the second day: colors become dopily saturated, book spines go into relief, oil from a lemon feels slick in a way previously unremarked. Photographs on the fridge take on an otherworldly quality, invoking sadness.
But then finally. The words, and pictures, come.
This issue is probably going to go behind a paywall after a few days.
It’s relatively dense, and while I enjoyed sharing what went on behind the scenes, I also feel more exposed than usual. Lastly, I discovered that some folks have been selling my work, lifted from previous issues, without permission.
As for the current issue, I’m curious if density and exposition at this level appeal to non-Members. So I’m publishing it openly for now.
I talk in detail about the importance of financial support for TLB, in the last issue.
In the studio
If you’ve been following along, you know that I’ve been wandering for a while, as I tend to do between films.
I try not to rush things, keeping muscles warm with vignettes while I explore, ruminate, and consume. In time, the next film arrives. Usually it’s in the manner of an avalanche, the chain reaction triggered by the unlikeliest (because ostensibly trivial) inspirations: reflections on an exhibit wall, a fleeting moment in another film.
This time, silence and disconnection also contributed to a solid first draft of my next essay, and what feels like good bones for my next short film.
Interspersed with thoughts on context-switching below are glimpses of the studio + recent sketches, inspired by the aforementioned visit to the Met.