Peter Lanyon
Shy Deep, 1959
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Peter-Lanyon-At-Edge-Landscape/dp/1901785041
Here are extracts from the above book about the Cornish landscape artist Peter Lanyon. I found many parallels with his work and thinking but also new ideas particularly about the landscape being in constant state of flux.
Interested in natural phenomena – the weather. “I like to paint places where solids and fluids come together such as meeting of sea and cliff, wind and rock”. Paints the quality peculiar to the feeling and experience of a place – immersion and attachment.
“My paintings are not abstract nor are they landscape. They use abstraction as a method and landscape experience as a source. They reject the conventions of landscape but remain recognisable in the country. They are concerned with environment rather than view and with air rather than sky”
Concepts of existentialism and phenomenology – susceptibility to outside forces.
Henri Bergson – theory of duration – time as perpetual flux not a series of static moments, identification with the space by walking in it; making contact. Subjective and objective (artist and environment) are a single continuum. The landscape is not static it is constantly changing and the artist moves around within the space to experience and investigate it.
Einstein – relativity theory and the nature of existence.
Wanted art in which the spectator was an active participant. Sought to recreate experiences of place so the viewer could re-experience and interpret in their own way.
I like this bold painting.