Praeterita

Performance artist Marina Abramovic is having a retrospective of her work at the Lisson Gallery in London. Here she talks about the show and about some of the decisions that led her to create specific pieces of work. I can't that I like her work, though of course she would say that her work in not meant to be "liked", only responded to. But what she does is absolutely sincere, and beyond the intellectual inquiry into 'what does it mean to be an artist', she also creates, accidentally or not, art that does compel and move the spectator.   Subscribe to Praeterita in a reader

My wife, Patty, teaches in the fiction writing department at Columbia College Chicago. I am co-teaching a specialty class with her called Journal + Sketchbook: Ways of Seeing, and quite often in the classes Patty tells the students to slow down. The students are required regularly to read aloud from their journals, and if they are reading too fast, Patty says: "S-l-o-o-o-o-o-w, down!" If they ask whether they can use their laptops to produce work, Patty tells them that it's better if they write longhand, in their journals. Why? Because this forces them to s-l-o-o-o-o-w down, to think more about what they are writing, to feel more connected to their process. In the drawing and sketchbook part of the class, I generally start the students off with quick, gestural drawing, beginning with 10-second drawings and only gradually working towards giving them more time. But I agree with the order to s-l-o-o-o-o-w down. Making visual art can be about the quick, spontaneous gestu...