California Fall

The Little Dry Waterfall

“Another way of putting the account that I am against is to say that it is one that assimilates the kind of meaning that pictures have to the kind of meaning that language has. For it is right to think that, very broadly speaking, linguistic meaning can be explained within some such set of terms as rules, codes, conventions, symbol systems. But pictures and their meaning cannot be.” “What kind of account of pictorial meaning do I substitute for that furnished by the linguistic model? The proper account of pictorial meaning is, I believe, a psychological account. The marked surface must be the conduit along which the mental state of the artist makes itself felt within the mind of the spectator if the result is to be that the spectator grasps the meaning of the picture.”

Richard Wollheim, Painting as an Art, 1987 Princeton University Press

California in early fall, still hot and dry. This waterfall is in the Sonoma Botanical garden. It is bubbling and sparkling in the baking sun. Then they turn off the pump at exactly 5:00 pm and is goes completely dry. It is here a double illusion. This is not a waterfall. “This is not a pipe.”

I am just starting to read and unpack the Wollheim book. We will see how it goes. He certainly has a challenging grasp of rules, codes, conventions, symbol systems of linguistic meaning. Occupying my thoughts is the role of meaning, conscious decisions versus intuitive spontaneity and the battle with the desirable unpredictable whims of the medium in painting. I am not sure of how applicable the book will be to my journey with Daedalus.

Enjoy the sun and the sea below.