Imagination and Language Part 01: Solitude

copyright Moshe Ladanga 2007

I have long been an admirer of Rilke, first introduced to me by Katrin before she went on a seven-day trip to Sagada. The now-classic pocket-size Shambhala Press Edition of Letters was my first Rilke, and it was a gentle and subtly persuasive introduction to solitude, the core of my artistic practice.

To relish one’s ability to detach and contemplate things is not just a natural state, but a skill that needs to be nurtured and developed; it is a space that expands, no matter where you are in the world, no matter how you are in this life. I have treasured this gift and have even fought it.

So what does Rilke’s notion of the artistic practice have anything to do with the theoretical issues of imagination and language in art? I dare say it is the key issue, the unturned stone. The omnipresence of globalism and collaborative experiments in contemporary practices indirectly reinforce the need to slow down, to reflect, because the collective rush in my opinion is a quite human reaction to the tightening circle of information, of knowledge, not, as many are saying now, to the enthusiasm that “interconnected-ness” brings.

Yes, revolutions in art owe largely to the influx of difference, diversity, but institutionalizing a social phenomena will not only engender it, but kill it. Sometimes we forget that most theories come from observation, and this precious human facility is the one that takes time, and like a path in the woods, the riches of insight can only be gleaned after traversing the pattern of shadows.

It is an effort to be alone. Unlike the days before the internet, before cellphones, I find myself fighting constantly to be aware of my voice, to hear without prejudice the thoughts I have as I walk. Does anyone remember that fleeting subconscious moment that we have when we encounter a realisation- it felt like stepping into a light-struck place in a dense wood. Today, we often pick through our thoughts as one would pick through clothes; I must think this way, must not think like this.

Imagination and language cannot be deconstructed as Derrida would have brilliantly put it (by putting it to the page, inscribing it to form). Yes, there is an  inextractable, even inscrutable connection, but once we look, one goes into gear. Arthur Koestler, one of my heroes, once described human consciousness as an essentially metaphorical one. As we try to make sense of what is outside of us, we already create- every moment is one of invention.

As an artist, this is important to me. No matter how many pedagogical branches grow from the current trend of specialised art theories, there will always be that moment of consideration, a beginning of a circle. It is the daily choice of stepping into it that I am keen on, and to keep it I have to know what is happening. To speak of what things are, one must see as one is.