How does one create sacred space?
I’m thinking of the Tibetan Buddhist monasteries that I encountered in Ladakh — how utterly stunning they were, and so completely saturated with thick presence. If I were to create an installation that would be the direction.
There’s a way that I think of my paintings, my associations, where there is an implicit circular structure, the way the space is held in the rectangle, a holding place, womb-like. That circular structure reminds me of Byzantine icons and Eastern mandalas. I also think of analytic cubism, particularly of Braque, where he seems to be exploring void more than Picasso who is so much about form. The presence in the void. The breaking down of forms, cracking them open. “There is a crack in everything — that’s how the light gets in.” — L.C. The breaking of the vessels.
Titian, Corot, Morandi, Cezanne, Giacometti, de Kooning, Diebenkorn, Auerbach, El Greco, Tibetan thankas, Turrell
It’s not enough to express an idea — how does one conjure up a space?