Etel Adnan, “Untitled” (2014), Oil on canvas, 10 ½ x 13 ¾ inches (27 x 35 cm) (© Etel Adnan, Courtesy Galerie Lelong & Co.)
Recently I came across the art of Etel Adnan and have been smitten. It’s not just beautiful. It is more than beautiful. It seems to exist at that point where pain and joy connect. Without one, the other would not be so powerful or create such profound beauty, such important sensitivity.
The power comes not from the delineation of a message, telling of a story, expression of likes and dislikes, but the experience of it all without words. There is a Buddhist line in a text: “Good and bad, happy and sad, all thoughts vanish into space like the imprint of a bird in the sky.” Before they vanish, or maybe afterwards, there is great art. The acknowledgement and experience of the alternatives of every situation and feeling. That place of non-thought, just being with the pain and the joy, the good and bad at once.
The intersection, convergence of pain, suffering and the celebration of the goodness of being alive, of survival: that, to me, is where art communicates.
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