Showing posts with label painting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label painting. Show all posts

Friday, June 20, 2014

Like the Poet Needs the Paint

If there’s one thing about Chinese poet Wang Wei (699–759) that makes him stand out among other poets of the T’ang Dynasty, it would be his unique combination of poetry with painting, and his integration of painting and poetry, summed by a later poet in the phrase: “poetry in painting; painting in poetry.”

“In his poetry there is painting and in his painting there is poetry.”
—Sung poet Su Shih.

The poet’s personal milieu brings forth poetry. Wang Wei had lived with or under manageable personal circumstances. Times during his day were relatively prosperous. Under such circumstances, along with the poet’s serene temperament, and his internalization of Buddhist’s religiosity and resignation, Wang Wei’s poetry thrived and articulated perfect calm and transparency.

Wang Wei’s works, 400 of them extant, are said to be affirmations of the Buddhist faith, an element which played a major part in the intellectual and spiritual life of T’ang Dynasty. Along with poets Lin-Tsung-yu’an and Po Chin, Wang Wei was considered serious student of Buddhist thought, significantly giving expressions to their religious views and ideals. Their works would even qualify to be the true Buddhist poetry, one which is distinguished from that which merely dabbles in Buddhist terminology.

Wang-chu’an Poems is a collective body of poems collaborated by Wang Wei and Pie Ti, whose sensibility reflects Wang Wei’s taste. The work was also drawn from the experiences of the two friend poets when they stayed in Wang’s self-earned estate in the south-eastern capital.

Containing 20 poems by Wang Wei and the companion poems of Pie Ti—it is a treasure trove of impressions, preferences and observations of Wang Chu’an, the estate whose name means “wheel stream,” after the place where it was built.

In a letter to friend P’ei Ti, Wang Wei shares some warmth which he must have found with P’ei’s companionship in the hills of Wang-chu’an. Very well he tells P’ei’ Ti that his companionship with him had been because he knew they would jive toward seeking quietude or perhaps enlightenment: "Perhaps you would then be free to roam the hills with me? If I did not know your pure and unworldly cast of mind, I should have not presumed to ask you to join in this idle and useless activity."

Wang Wei’s pieces also belong to the true Buddhist poetry in which the philosophical meaning lies much farther below the surface. Its imagery simultaneously functions on both descriptive and symbolic levels. Thus it is not at all possible to pinpoint the exact symbolic content of the image.

Representing a great advance over Tao Chien in the tradition of tien-yuan poetry, a precursor who had a large following at the time, Wang Wei turned the five-syllabic meter into a more supple tool of self-expression through parallelism, inversion, careful placing of pivotal words and variations in the placing of the caesura in each line. 

Yin & Yang. Considered one of the greatest High T’ang poets, Wang Wei’s works often take a Buddhist perspective, combining an attention to the beauties of nature with an awareness of sensory illusion. His work is an interface of reality and fantasy or imagination, traceable to the twin influences of Buddhism and landscape painting. Wang Wei’s poems are distinguished by visual immediacy on one hand and by meditative insight on the other.

Wang Wei’s poetry appeals to the reader because the poet is able to explore the world of nature and men; the poet virtually communicates directly with the reader; and the poet gets to express what is seldom expressible in any language—the profound insight of a poet to “see into the life of things.” 

Wang Wei’s inspiration for landscape. An earlier poet named Hsieh Ling-yun (385–433) who lived 400 years before Wang Wei’s time must have provided the inspiration for the Wang-chu’an poems, as is obvious from the names of his hills and mounds—Hua-tsu-kang Ridge, Axe-leafed Bamboo Peak—places celebrated by Hsieh Ling-yun himself.

This poet has keen eye for detail, whether describing the simple rustic life on a farm or writing about the joy and peace he found in nature. His poems blend the most concrete vocabulary with the abstract, empty, being, non-being, etc. Such effort he takes to create a special atmosphere—

The birds fly south in unending procession
These hills again wear the colours of autumn
Their green leaves fluttering over an eddying stream
Pliant yet upright, these bamboos adorn slope and peak.

Depicting the real scenes or panoramas where he consciously chosen for introspection, Wang Wei’s Wang chi’an poems attempt to sketch these places—the way details of colour, light, sounds and scent are carelessly interspersed—thereby virtually creating impressive panoramas and perspective.

What makes Wang Wei’s poems most interesting is that the poet is able to explore, or play around the world of nature and man; he is also able to get his message across the reader; and he is able to articulate the grandness of a poet’s insight—“to see into the life of things,” one which is hardly expressible in any language.

Deep in the bamboo grove I sit alone
Singing to the brimming music of the lute
In the heart of the forest I am quite unknown
Save to the visiting moon, and she is mute.

~“Bamboo Villa”

Saturday, January 08, 2011

Guernica*? Bako, Gueta. Gueta Garbo.

[Guernica*? No, Gueta. Gueta Garbo.]
Usip-usip Ninda Niño Manaog sagkod Cesar Gueta 
[Interview with Cesar Gueta]

Ano an pagpinta segun ki Cesar Gueta? What is art for Cesar Gueta?
Art is my lifelong engagement. Making an artwork for me is beyond the visual. I consider other aspects like metaphors and complexities of life—love, tragedy, etc.


Ta’no ta nagpipinta si Cesar Gueta? What motivates Cesar Gueta to paint?
What’s important to me is my feeling. I actualize it with the use of my mind and hands. My heart dominates the rest of my senses.

Kun igwang ibang pagkakaabalahan si Gueta apwera sa pagpinta, ano ini? Ta’no? What would Cesar Gueta do if he wouldn’t paint? Elaborate.
I could engage myself in product designing, architectural works or academe.

Kun dai naimbento an pagpinta, ano kuta an ginigibo ngonyan ni Cesar Gueta? If art were not invented, what would Cesar Gueta be doing?
I would have been a priest.

Sairisay an mga impluwensya ni Cesar Gueta? Siisay an saimong hinahangaann, kinokopya, o gusting malapawan sa kinaban nin pagpinta? Nata’ man sinda? Name the painters whom you idolize, copy or desire to dethrone. Why?
Cezanne was a forerunner of impressionist art. Scott Burdick is a modern impressionist (who uses) purely brush strokes.

"Manobo," Oil on Canvas, 2" x 2"
Ano na an nahaman ni Gueta sa pagpinta? Karapatdapat ka man daw? Cite your highest achievements in visual arts. Do you deserve them?
In my 3 decades in art in which I had my ups and down—I could say engaging in art has made me a better person.

Ano an dai pa nahaman ni Gueta sa pagpinta? Maaabot mo an mga ini? Pa’no? What have you not yet achieved in visual arts? Will you achieve them? How?
Destiny leads me wherever my heart goes. I believe in myself and family’s support for this endeavor—this is a journey that is never ending.

Igwa na daw nahaman na Guernica si Gueta? Kun dai pa, nuarin daw ni? Have you made your obra maestra? If not yet, when will this be?
In some art competitions, I made original entries that people consider remarkable.

Ano an grand plan ni Gueta sa pagpinta? What do you want to achieve as a painter? (Being a painter is one ambition, though.)
I never have a grand ambition in life. In my career as a painter, my fulfillment is when my artworks touch the lives of many. 

Para sa mga bohemio sana man daa an (pag-in)arte. Nagtutubod ka digdi? Pakipaliwanag.
Art is for bohemians—elites, etc.—only. Do you believe so? Please explain.
Art foretells history. If historians are considered elite, so is art. But that is not the case; art is a statement of time. 

Pa’no magiging kapakipakinabang sa sociedad an parapinta? How does a painter become socially relevant?
He does when his artwork touches many lives.

Ta’no ta kaipuhan ta’wan nin atensyon si Cesar Gueta, kun iyo man nanggad baga? Why (do people have to) pay attention to Cesar Gueta, if at all?
If the writer writes, it’s the painter that paints.

*A painting by Pablo Picasso, Guernica shows the tragedies of war and the suffering it inflicts upon individuals, particularly innocent civilians. This work has gained a monumental status, becoming a perpetual reminder of the tragedies of war, an anti-war symbol, and an embodiment of peace. 

Cesar Gueta, "Subliminal," 2010
Cesar T. Gueta is a Legazpi-City based painter specializing in the use of water color as medium. He is currently an associate professor in Fine Arts at the Aquinas University College of Architecture and Fine Arts (CAFA). He is also a product design consultant for export for the Department of Trade and Industry. The 36-year old artist honed his natural talent in the arts during his formative years in childhood, making arts as a child’s play. His artistic talent was further enhanced during his time in college at the Aquinas University CAFA. He joined various national art competions, making it to the finals of the Shell and Metrobank National Arts Competition in Manila sponsored by the Spanish Embassy for his painting entitled “Domestic Helper”. Gueta sees his combined knowledge in Architecture and Fine Arts as an advantage, seeing things in a different perspective, and knowing that “art is a living inscription of time, visual statement of recent history and a reference for future use.” Gueta hails from Monreal, Masbate. (Bionote from dagospo.com)



Check out Cesar Gueta's watercolorworld. Visit http://www.dagospo.com/ or http://cesargueta.webs.com/.

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