Martin's work here and on the canvas is deceptively simple. Not really about silence but about the possibility of grace and knowledge within.
This book recommended for all artists and lovers of art, life, and silence.A wonderful voice behind the paintings How many great painters have been eloquent on their work or methods, or, for that matter, on art or culture in general? In recent times, only Ad Reinhardt compares with Agnes Martin, who has that rarest of gifts among the non-literary, a voice. In a series of articles, some of which were apparently talks given to art students, she delves into consciousness, creativity, judgment, personal development, self-assurance, transcendence, meaning, value. She takes on the big subjects with language that is gloriously unpretentious in a style epigrammatic and occasionally poetic.
Visiting an exhibition of her pencil-grid paintings a few years ago, I experienced the transformative power of her paradoxically simple physical means to create shimmering, magical spaces. The staying power of that work has inclined me to believe that she's one of the greatest painters of the second half of the twentieth century. This book of her writings is a delightful enhancement to that discovery.
