This time I am reading Art as Therapy by
Alain de Botton and John Armstrong. I mean, I really read few other books at
the same time like Dunbar - the Hogarth version of King Lear, a Polish book
about a spirited Polish painter Stryjenska and others as well. Just listing
some of them made me aware that such eclectic reading may cause a great
confusion in my thinking. It most likely does but my attention span shortened
somehow and this has influenced my ability to complete a book in a single
stream. My chaotic reading has its pluses, I would like to say. Like coming
across Glenn Murcutt and getting sidetracked to look at architecture from a new
perspective. My preferences have been mostly for European architecture with
Gothic as my favourite church style. I know that most of the people would not
share my liking of old churches. I am not sure where it came from, but I get
mushy and nostalgic when I think of old European towns their market places,
town-halls, palaces and churches. Always churches. I remember when I discovered the
Pelplin Basilica. My husband and I were traveling from Warsaw to Gdansk by car.
Looking through my tourist guide I found out that we were going to pass one of
the national treasures in Pelplin. As it was time for lunch I did not have much
problems to convince my husband to make a little detour to see the place and
have something to eat in this small town. The church was closed but there was a
possibility to open it on requests of tourists. I made such a request and the
huge doors of the cathedral opened for us. Somebody turned the lights so we
could see the interior. It was magnificent, the paintings, the sculptures and
most of all the vaulted ceiling from the XIII century.
I was spell bound. My
companion did not quite share my artistic euphoria so we did not spend all that
much time there, but some years later I went to spend few days in the place and
had an opportunity to see the church at more than one occasion and many more
beautiful things there. Like shrine
Madonnas or one of the original Gutenberg's bibles.
I can feel the next post
taking a shape in my head already. But this will be one of my next posts and this
was only a “small” introduction to write about that beauty has many names and
many representations. Thinking about all those treasures that the history and
various artists have left for us to admire one may think that the young
countries do not have that much to offer. So, Australians travel to foreign
countries to find more beauty there than we can see around us. Often, we even
do not notice this unassuming beauty that Australia offers in abundance. And
here I read about Art as Therapy covering subjects of: Methodology, Love,
Nature, Money and Politics and discover artists I never heard of and find out
much more about those I thought I knew well but really did not. At one point to
my surprise come across a picture of War Memorial in Canberra. The caption says
– One is moved by the sacrifice, but unsure quite in whose name it took place.
On the next page there is a picture of Glenn Murcutt House in South Australia. Here
the caption says: An Australia to love – and, if it comes to it, die for. The
picture of this country house shows the corrugated iron, big cylindrical water
tanks, and the shed and the garage doors. All the elements beautifully belong
to one another and the whole composition is magnificent in an unassuming way.
So clever, so aesthetically pleasing and so Australian. Suddenly I saw
something different to a Gothic cathedral but making me feel quite similar as
when entering a monumental church and in owe thinking wow…. I wish I could see
the house in reality. Maybe one day?
P.S. My list of books “in reading” has
grown again; I just got To Kill the Mocking
Bird from the library.
