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Making a Mark Pollock Martin and Mark Rothko and even Jackson of expression, depicting what is not yet fully Making a Mark Pollock . all those abstract expressionists who denotational. But the very thing that draws me clearly have something to say but either cannot to asemic writing is the place it rises from. For Christine Brooks Cote or refuse to come right out and say it. Some me it embraces the mystery between silence— things are better experienced than explained.) what is yet to be spoken—and the semantics Then came the suggestion that we devote of known language. What is represented are an issue of the Quarterly to mark-making. the feelings or ideas that the word, or markings, We would include some of Karla’s artwork as suggests to the artist and to the viewer.” well as excerpts from her essay about asemic writing. After some back and forth, we settled MARK MAKING IS CENTRAL TO THE CREATION on a title—“Making a Mark.” Surely, artists and even the idea of art. Any time a brush or would find many ways to respond to that pencil strikes a surface, a mark is made, perhaps theme. How would writers interpret it? I had a dot, a line, or a shape. There is, in fact, a no reason to worry. group of artists referred to as mark makers, and many of them also fit within the abstract LET’S BACK UP JUST A BIT. WHAT IS ASEMIC expressionist category: the aforementioned writing? In an excellent piece entitled “Asemic Martin, Rothko, and Pollock, as well as Willem Writing and Radical Deconstruction: The de Kooning (both a painter and sculptor), Lee Philosophy of Non(Sens),” writer and artist Krasner, Helen Frankenthaler, Cy Twombly (who Todd Burst draws from poet Michael Jacobson was influenced by the tradition of calligraphy when he says that asemic writing is wordless in his art-making), and more. But we should not writing, visual literature without meaning. It is limit our view of mark makers to any specific a shadow, an impression, and an abstraction of group. Think of Vincent van Gogh’s thick dabs conventional writing. It is “a visual experience of paint put in place with a brush or palette that lies beyond meaning. It is writing that knife. George Seurat, the impressionist whose expresses itself as such and goes no farther.” paintings were done with millions of tiny dots. Sounds like someone clearly has something to Going back many hundreds of years, Japanese say but can’t come out and say it. Maybe there calligraphers and enso painters were masters are no words for it. Maybe the words haven’t of mark-making using a brush and ink. image info yet come to mind. Maybe words are simply Indeed, looking back through art history, insufficient. As an aesthetic object, asemic we see that marks can range from those writing easily and seamlessly becomes artwork. that are gestural and abstract to those that HE IDEA FOR THIS ISSUE’S THEME, way: strong color, dark palette, abstraction, In the short essay that accompanies her are figurative and precise. And that tells us “Making a Mark,” came from artist calligraphic marks, geometric forms, texture, artwork in this issue (pages 46 through 55), that at some level, of course, all art is mark- and poet Karla Van Vliet, whose simplicity coupled with intensity. I know I’ve Karla describes her connection to asemic making. No matter what period we consider, Twords and images have been part of Still found something wonderful if I can look at writing this way: “At first, I am heady about it all starts with someone using some tool to Point Arts Quarterly for a very long time. it endlessly and have no impulse to name it the subject, how it inhabits an essential space place a dot, line, dab, or shape on a surface. About a year ago, Karla sent me some and no need to use words to talk about it, And not just painters—sculptors make marks Check out this great video featuring samples from her most recent collection of but only want to experience it and allow it to by pushing or pulling or sanding their medium. asemic writing: “Asemic Writing and Other artwork—explorations of asemic writing. The soak into my pores. Photographers manipulate light and movement Pleasures,” by Francesca Biasetton. images pushed all my buttons—in a good (In case you’re wondering, I love Agnes to make marks, marks that may be bright or in 4 | Still Point Arts Quarterly Summer 2020 • Issue No. 38 | 5 Christine Brooks Cote Making a Mark disease or accident. No one can escape it. Prakash these marks made real by the actual staining of Kumar Mahato covers this in his poem “The Pain.” menstruation. Every pain has left a mark “My dear, women aren’t allowed to Though not all externally visible enter the temple during this time. It’s But when a tough time comes impure. You are impure during this My pain whispers to me time. You will pollute the goddess.” I We are meeting again stare at her in disbelief. I am impure? And I endure it with affection But I just showered and put on fresh For all it has done for me new clothes. I am impure because It has made my fragile body strong something is happening to my body My bones, harder that I didn’t even ask for? My intentions, firm • And my beliefs, unshakable Dave Gregory writes about being mesmerized • by face painting as an art form and learning that Roudri Bandyopadhyay, in “Forbidden Blood,” “Anyone can find beauty, but the real joy, the writes about the marks placed upon women by richest reward, lies in its creation, in crafting a societies that for thousands of years have not universe from whatever materials are in reach.” image info allowed them the same opportunities as men; shadow, clear or blurry, sharp or grainy. The FOR EXAMPLE, IN THIS ISSUE, DR. THOMAS thrill is to see how artists connect the various Davison writes about his experiences teaching marks they make to create the final work of art. prisoners, people who are forever marked—by a crime they committed, yes, but many were WHERE ELSE CAN WE GO WITH THIS IDEA OF marked long before their crime-committing “Making a Mark?” This simple phrase carries days by poverty, abuse, or drugs. multiples meanings. Think of the marks put down by nature—the carving of land done by I snatched up the piece of broken moving glaciers, valleys created by rushing yellow chalk and wrote my name in water, cracks in rocks created by frozen water, big bold yellow letters. I spun around rubble created by earthquakes and wind, the to face my class and strolled across swooping lines created by falling stars. Think of a white line painted on the scarred the ways people leave their mark—by being kind wooden floor with the words NO and generous and loving, or, quite differently, INMATES ALLOWED PAST THIS by causing pain and suffering. Think of the ways POINT! people are marked—by crimes they commit, • by past behaviors they can’t shed, by the color of their skin, the place they’re from, the beliefs People carry with them marks that result from they hold dear. The various essays and stories pain—emotional pain caused by abuse or neglect and poems in this issue explore these and more. or trauma; physical pain caused by violence or image info 6 | Still Point Arts Quarterly Summer 2020 • Issue No. 38 | 7 Christine Brooks Cote Making a Mark burn, traces of permanent marker from me. It has marked me in profound ways my son’s protest posters, a blackened four- that I no longer try to escape. inch scrape dug by my daughter’s runaway Exacto blade, . Then there are kind and generous people who leave their mark wherever they go. Bethany • Bruno tells us about her unforgettable Uncle Gregory Stephens brings up the complicated Bob, and similarly, Joe Kowalski tells us about topic of being marked by our culture and Daria Washington. upbringing . and what we go through to accept it or reject it. THIS IS ONLY PART OF THE STORY. THERE ARE countless ways to think about mark-making. As When I ask myself the metaphysical always, I hope you enjoy reading and browsing question, “What are you doing here?” through this issue. May you find something that my thinking is shaped by that scriptural inspires you, energizes you, or amazes you. Then, tradition in which my parents raised go out and make your own mark. E image info The second artist wore beige canvas the page, black marker in her right hand, cargo pants, sandals, and an oversized an earnest look on her face. She had no white T-shirt. Like a butcher’s apron, fear. Me? I was breaking a sweat. For it grew more colorful as his work what felt like years, I could not dare to put progressed. He painted galaxies, my pen to paper. My daughter looked over masterworks of light and infinity. at me and whispered, “Mommy, aren’t Natural contours of chins, brows, and you going to draw a dragon with me? This cheek bones gave depth to planetary is so much fun!” surfaces; freckles were repainted as • starscapes; tiny spacecraft perched on noses, surveying the heavens beyond, Then there are marks left by time—physical full of asteroids, meteors, black holes, and emotional. Mary Lane Potter, in her piece quasars, red giants, and white dwarfs.
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