To arrest motion
We are surrounded by arrested motion, and we hold the keys to unlock it.
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC, June 2014
“The aim of every artist is to arrest motion, which is life, by artificial means and hold it fixed so that a hundred years later, when a stranger looks at it, it moves again since it is life.” — William Faulkner
I could really identify with this quote, because even without being an artist, I’m always trying to arrest motion with my camera. When I take the time to look back over photographs from years past, it amazes me how much I would have completely forgotten without the pictures that help me remember.
When I read Faulkner’s quote, I realized that is why I so love art galleries. Viewing art is a chance to peek through the windows into other worlds. The really good artists, whether they use paint or photography or sculpture or words, capture the motion in the subjects of their creativity, and bring it to life again and again within the mind of every person who experiences it. Since each of us will see or read a work through the lens of a life that is also unique, the art really does move again, growing and changing from one beholder to another, never quite the same.
If your life feels unsatisfactory or downright sad, try getting some perspective by visiting other lives available to you through the arrested motion of art. If you are reading this blog, you have the means to access the world’s greatest museums right at your fingertips. Or re-visit your own life, through photographs, letters and other mementos. If you are feeling happy or contented or frustrated, try arresting that joyful or angry motion through creative work of your own, whether it be a photograph, a craft project, a letter or a journal entry.
Those of us who believe life is eternal can readily appreciate that this immortality is evident in many ways, including the lingering fragrance left behind by souls long ago passed from this life. Thanks to art, we can see as they saw, and join them in appreciating and understanding the wondrous as well as the deceptively ordinary. Have you unlocked any arrested motion lately? If so, what did you see? Where did it take you?
This post was first published seven years ago today. The original post, comments and photo are linked, along with two other related posts, below. These links to related posts, and their thumbnail photos, do not appear in the blog feed; they are only visible when viewing the individual posts by clicking on each one. I have no idea why, nor do I know how they choose the related posts. That’s just the way WordPress does things.
- Posted in: Uncategorized
- Tagged: art, capturing, eternity, immortality, life, literature, memories, motion, museums, paintings, photographs, sculpture, seeing
Defeat Despair 
A friend of mine is a pastor and an artist who is inspired to paint spiritual messages. My favorite one was done on a large canvas and when she removed the drapery to reveal the painting to me, it was so beautiful and meaningful that tears ran down my face. Maybe you would like to see it too. https://glorygazing.com/inspired-paintings/inspired-paintings-group-1/caressing-sovereignity/
Lately I’ve been re-reading some of my old journals from several years ago and looking at old photographs I took. If it weren’t for them, I wouldn’t remember a lot of things that happened. I wonder if the younger generation will have such things to bring back special moments in their lives. Their cellphones and computers store masses of photos and messages, but how will they sort through them all in 20 or 30 years? How do you sort through all the thousands of digital photos and gazillion texts and messages? And what if they weren’t backed up on some sort of ‘cloud’ and then they went poof? I like things that you can physically handle!
Judy, thanks for the link to that remarkable painting. And yes, there is much that would be forgotten without photographs, or for that matter, journaling and other forms of writing. Since I myself have tens of thousands of digital photographs (the low costs make it easy to take far too many) I know firsthand the difficulty of meaningful organization, despite facial recognition tools and other automated helps. I was shocked when I read that some digital photo programs intentionally delete a photo a very brief time after it is taken. But in reality, having too many to sort can accomplish almost the same disregard.
I agree, there is nothing to replace something tangible that can be held in the hand. That’s why I still use postal mail quite a lot. There’s a magic to knowing something traveled from halfway around the world to end up in my hands. All the more so if it comes from a country I’m unlikely ever to visit in person. Thanks for being here!