Shut The Door And Listen From Outside
Steven S. Powers / Winter 2020 Catalog "Shut The Door And Listen From Outside" is a statement from Oblique Strategies, which is a set of cards each with a suggestion, directive, or constraint created by the artists Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt to encourage lateral thinking and to break creative blocks. With this in mind, as an art dealer or collector, one may think, how will this look if I see it indirectly? From a room away? Through a window? Obscured through a crowd of people? Or as I quickly scroll through Instagram? This question is not a shallow proposition—we often see a particular artwork from an off-angle or perspective—not in optimal presentation. Indeed, if we think about it, we likely first approached an artwork we came to love because it looked good "from outside." It had something special going on from a small section we gleaned through a crowd of people, or the composition came into focus as we came towards it from another room. As an artist, we may interpret this as another way of seeing. To purposely not see clearly or overtly—to create something anew based on partial information or hazy suggestions seen or heard. Or another way to look at a work in progress. View it from the side, across the room, or without glasses to see a fuzzy tonal map—does it still work for you?
Steven S. Powers / Winter 2020 Catalog
"Shut The Door And Listen From Outside" is a statement from Oblique Strategies, which is a set of cards each with a suggestion, directive, or constraint created by the artists Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt to encourage lateral thinking and to break creative blocks.
With this in mind, as an art dealer or collector, one may think, how will this look if I see it indirectly? From a room away? Through a window? Obscured through a crowd of people? Or as I quickly scroll through Instagram? This question is not a shallow proposition—we often see a particular artwork from an off-angle or perspective—not in optimal presentation. Indeed, if we think about it, we likely first approached an artwork we came to love because it looked good "from outside." It had something special going on from a small section we gleaned through a crowd of people, or the composition came into focus as we came towards it from another room.
As an artist, we may interpret this as another way of seeing. To purposely not see clearly or overtly—to create something anew based on partial information or hazy suggestions seen or heard. Or another way to look at a work in progress. View it from the side, across the room, or without glasses to see a fuzzy tonal map—does it still work for you?
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Spirit Drawing<br />
Slate, chalk<br />
Circa: 1910-20<br />
Size: 6 1/4" (w) x 10" (h)<br />
Portrait of a man on slate with a message from<br />
beyond in red chalk. This is the very best preserved<br />
example of one of these slates that I have seen.<br />
Transcription below.<br />
“Dear Caran(?), Possessor of Earth Life, again I reach out from the<br />
Land of Souls to you my dear --- of earth, I bring to you the joy<br />
and comfort and health and peace of mind that you need in old<br />
age, but you are just ripening like the beautiful fruit -- and the<br />
orchard by and by gravitate to when you belong to the Shores of<br />
Eternal Bliss and happiness, be of good cheer for I will receive<br />
you into the summer C---- with upon --- and bid you welcome to<br />
our heaven (?) over him and to be again as our whole family<br />
never --- to part. For my love for you has grown in its purity and<br />
as a Husband and Father I pray aimed a --- for you all angels.<br />
Bless you, for I am always with you, Smith Stehl”
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