Dear Martim,
It’s a puzzle to me how artists encounter each other, and even what we mean when we say ‘artist’.
I’m not even sure how we met when you were living in London, and perhaps there’s that slightly foggy space where you realise that you are the son of somebody I first met when they were an art student here.
I love that the middle word hidden in ‘conversation’ is ‘verse’. Precisely how you and I fell into a light digital exchange I am not sure.
I have been looking through the images, the form and the content, so to speak and making sense of what the substance is that we discuss.
It seems to me that we are both very puzzled about ‘looking’ and why that is different from ’seeing’ and, in turn, what is it that humans ‘make’ from all that. The postcard lasted for a hundred years, perhaps there will be history written of it which explains the processes of its invention, the choices we make and what one sent to whom. They could be ‘quiet’ or provocative, sometimes amorous. The way we all ‘speak’ to each other now is in the fast lane. I remember texts being somehow rather exotic 25 years ago, but you and I often text in short bursts, often only as an exchange of images. Looking at these I recognise some sort of fellow feeling, something that we may have read or seen, and frequently where text and image are indistinguishable. There’s trust in these exchanges and a mutual curiosity. Perhaps that is in the history of all con verse ation, the way that things are affirming or puzzling.
Recognising that you and I perform this reminds me of all the other interactive aspects of being urban, or is that ‘urbane’? The way we witness other people in other circumstances and they witness us, the whole ’sighting’ which city life involves. It’s not without skill, that gentle way you teach a child not to stare!
In art making there are some strange craft impulses embedded but, in truth, art is not an isolated craft activity. Perhaps what we talk about is the complete strangeness of the act of recognition, again a word in english which is fun to take to pieces, re cognition.
We are both aware of children, you because you have them, and I because I have four granddaughters around the same age as your family. I think that witnessing their spontaneity, their utter cleverness, the complete sophistication to elide one thing with another is an extraordinary thing to witness.
My instinct tells me that it is that particular ‘childish’ impulse which we both exchange. Sometimes, as an old man, I feel anxious that I’m just being ‘boyish,’ when in fact I know that these energies are the absolute aquifer of cultural energy.
Keep sending me things, they are a pleasure.
Richard Wentworth, London 2024
Martim Brion 