I was up late last night stalking my major advisor and found an abstract that she wrote of one of her recent exhibitions.
The work, labeled “Ports and Ships” is described with such rhetoric that it gives a grounding voice to her series of photographs:
Here are photographs of cargo vessels, anchored in ports or waiting in position to enter their port of call, loaded with unknown goods, tightly integrated into a logistical system of mind boggling complexity that answers to pressures of time and related profit.
Jesus, isn’t that an amazing first paragraph?
Oftentimes you’ll read artist statements or hear presentations where the “artist” churns out bullshit as thick as mud. It’s like digging through a dense fog just to reach the fundamental ideas behind a project.
But in this case, every word is picked out thoroughly. Used with just the right amount of caution and brevity. It’s a piece of art in and of itself.
It makes me jealous that people like my advisor are able to allow words flow freely from their pen or lips. I will sit in on lectures from renown architects and will be captivated by the lyrical dance that comes from their mouths, painting a picture that so righteously ground their ideals.
One could argue that you don’t need to be a great artist. You can be one through the power of your words and the conviction of your arguments for your decisions.
More light-heartedly, read this and you too can learn to talk like an architect.
