Deirdra McAfee

No one understood more trenchantly the nature of art work, or the long process of failure and resurgence it involves, than the painter Agnes Martin (1912–2004), who said, “I paint with my back to the world.”

She understood pride—the self-involved, ambitious ego—as the enemy. “The people who think they’re superior and capable,” she commented, “they’re only capable of repeating what’s been done”[link below].

Her writing about art making seems simple, even cryptic, yet it is profound: Martin believed that the artist’s sensibility must become free even of the artist.

No work can be perfect, but good work evokes what Martin called the memory of perfection. The artist’s experience of freedom in the work evokes the audience’s own experiences of freedom, of joy in living.

We make art because we are called to do so, Martin believed, and we continue because we must. She considered artistic failure, disappointment, and what she called helplessness, and even defeat, necessary. They require of artists an impersonal, disciplined continuing that opens us to the unexpected and original and allows us to say what has never been said.

Martin's comments, in a lecture given almost fifty years ago at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Philadelphia [link below], remain striking today:

The process of life is hidden from us. The meaning of suffering is held from us. And we are blind to life. We are blinded by pride. Pride has built another structure, and it is called “Life,” but living the prideful life we are frustrated and lost. It is not possible to overthrow pride . . . because we ourselves are pride.

But we can witness the defeat of pride because . . . pride is not real . . . sooner or later, it must go down. When pride . . . is lost we feel very different. . . . We feel very different being for a few moments free of pride. We feel a moment of perfection that is indescribable, a sudden joy in living.

Our best opportunity to witness the defeat of pride is in our work, in all the time that we are working and in the work itself. Work is self-expression. We must not think of self-expression as something we may do or something we may not do. Self-expression is inevitable. In your work and all the time you are working, yourself is expressed. . . .

There is the work in the mind, the work in your hands, and the work as a result. In your work, in the way that you do your work and in the results of your work, your self is expressed. Behind and before self-expression is a developing awareness in the mind that effects the work. This developing awareness I will also call “the work.” It is a most important part of the work. There is the work in our minds, the work in our hands, and the work as a result.

In your work, in everyone’s work, in the work of the world, the work that reminds of pride is gradually abandoned. Having, in moments of perfection, enjoyed freedom from pride, we know that that is what we want. With this knowing we recognize and eliminate expressions of pride. . . .

We go everywhere looking for [art], both artists and non-artists. It is very mysterious the fast hold that it has upon us considering how little we know about it. We do not even understand our own response to our own work.

Why do we go everywhere searching for works of art, and why do we make works of art? The answer is that we are inspired to do so. When we wake up in the morning, we are inspired to do some certain thing and we do do it. The difficulty lies in the fact that it may turn out well, or it may not turn out well.

If it turns out well, we have a tendency to think that we have successfully followed our inspiration, and if it does not turn out well, we have a tendency to say that we have somewhere lost our inspiration. But that is not true. There is successful work, and work that fails, but all of it is inspired.

. . . here I want to speak of failures. Failures that should be discarded and completely cut off. I have come especially to talk to those among you who recognize these failures. I want particularly to talk to those who recognize all of their failures and feel inadequate and defeated, to those who feel insufficient—short of what is expected or needed.

I would like somehow to explain that these feelings are the natural state of mind of the artist, that a sense of disappointment and defeat is the essential state of mind for creative work.

In order to do this, I would like to consider further those moments in which we feel joy in living. To some, these moments are very clear, and to others [they have] a vagueness that can only be described as below the level of consciousness. Whether conscious or unconscious, they do their work and they are the incentive to life. A stockpile of these moments gives us an awareness of perfection in our minds, and this awareness of perfection in our minds makes all the difference in what we do.

Moments of perfection are indescribable, but a few things can be said about them. At such times we are suddenly very happy, and we wonder why life has ever seemed troublesome. In an instant, we can see the road ahead free from all difficulties and we think that we will never lose it again. All this and a great deal more in barely a moment, and then it is gone. But all such moments are stored in the mind. They are called sensibility or awareness of perfection in the mind.

We must surrender the idea that this perfection that we see in the mind, or before our eyes, is obtainable or attainable. It is really far from us. . . . But our happiness lies in our moments of awareness of it. . . .
The work is so far from perfection because we ourselves are so far from perfection. The oftener we glimpse perfection, or the more conscious we are in our awareness of it, the farther away it seems to be.

Or perhaps I should say, the more we are aware of perfection, the more we realize how far away from us it is. That is why art work is so very hard. It is a working through disappointments and a growing recognition of failure to the point of defeat. But still one wakes in the morning and there is the inspiration and one goes on.

I want to emphasize the fact that increase in disappointment does not mean going backward in the work. There is no such thing as going backward in anything. There is increased and decreased awareness, that is all, and increased awareness means increased disappointments.

If any perfection is indicated in the work, it is recognized by the artist as truly miraculous, so he feels that he can take no credit for its sudden appearance.

What does it mean to be defeated? It means that we cannot go on. We cannot make another move. Everything that we thought we could do, we have done without result. We even give up all hope of getting the work, and perhaps even the desire to have it.

But still we go on, without hope or desire or dreams or anything. Just going on with almost no memory of having done anything. Then it is not us.

Then it is not I.

Then it is not conditioned response.

Then there is some hope of a hint of perfection.

Without hope, there is hope.

And without desire, there is hope.

We do not ever stop because there is no way to stop. No matter what you do, you will not escape. There is no way out. You may as well go ahead with as little resistance as possible. . . .

Going on without resistance or notions is called discipline.

Going on where hope and desire have been left behind is discipline.

Going on in an impersonal way without personal considerations is called a discipline.

Not thinking, planning, scheming or planning is a discipline.

Not caring or striving is a discipline.

Defeated, you will rise to your feet, as is said of dry bones. [Ezekiel 37, 1–14]
These bones will rise again.

Undefeated, you will have nothing to say but more of the same.

Defeated, you will stand at the door of your house to welcome the unknown, putting behind you all that is known.

Defeated, having no place to go, you will perhaps wait and be overtaken.
As in the night. To penetrate the night is one thing, but to be penetrated by the night, that is to be overtaken.

Defeated, exhausted, and helpless, you will perhaps go a little bit further.

Helplessness, even a mild state of helplessness, is extremely hard to bear. Moments of helplessness are moments of blindness. One feels as though something terrible has happened without knowing what it is. One feels as though one is in the outer darkness, or as though one has made some terrible error—a fatal error . . . .

The panic of complete helplessness drives us to fantastic extremes, and feelings of mild helplessness drive us to a ridiculousness. We go from reading religious doctrine and occult practices to changing our diet. Or from absolute self-abasement or abandonment to every known and unknown fetish. . . .

But helplessness, when fear and dread have passed, as all passions do, is the most rewarding state of all. It is a time when our most tenacious prejudices are overcome. Our most tightly-gripped resistances come under the knife, and we are made more free.

Our lack of independence in helplessness is our most detrimental weakness from the standpoint of art work. Stated positively, independence is the most essential character trait in an artist[, and] helplessness is the most important state of mind. . . .

Of all the pitfalls in our paths and the tremendous delays and wanderings off the track, I want to say that they are not what they seem to be. I want to say that all that seems like fantastic mistakes are not mistakes, and all that seems like error is not error; and it all has to be done. That which seems like a false step is just the next step. . . .

Perfection is not necessary. Perfection you cannot have. If you do what you want to do, and what you can do, and if you can then recognize it, you will be contented. You cannot possibly know what it will be, but looking back, you will not be surprised at what you have done.

For those who are visual-minded, I will say: there seems to be a fine ship at anchor. Fear is the anchor, convention is the chain, ghosts stalk the deck, the sails are filled with Pride, and the ship does not move.

But there are moments for all of us in which the anchor is weighed. Moments in which we learn what it feels like to move freely, not held back by pride and fear. Moments that can be recalled with all their fine flavor.

The recall of these moments can be stimulated by freeing experiences, including the viewing of works of art.

Artists try to maintain an atmosphere of freedom in order to represent the perfection of those moments. And others, searching for the meaning of art, respond by recalling their own free moments.
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See "On the Perfection Underlying Life," in Writings, Dieter Schwarz, ed., Cantz Verlag, Ostfildern, Germany (bilingual edition). Also available at the link below.