Ocean-Marks

Rochester Institute of Technology

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Theses

Thesis/Dissertation Collections

5-1-1976

Ocean-Marks

Donna Sylvester

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Recommended Citation

ROCHESTER INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

OCEAN-MARKS

A THESIS SUBMITTED TO

THE

FACULTY

OF

THE

SCHOOL OF

ART AND

DESIGN

IN CANDIDACY

FOR

THE DEGREE OF

MASl'ER OF FINE ART S

BY

DONNA SYLVESTER

ROCHESTER,

NEW

YORK

MAY

1976

Approved

6/11/76

/

"?

#

Contents

List of Plates iii

Text 1

Footnote References . 3J4.

Plates

15

List of Plates

Time Piece I

l

Time Piece III ... 16

Time Piece VII <

17

Time Piece V 18

Time Piece VIII

19

Time Piece X 20

Time Piece IX 21

Time Piece XI 22

Time Piece XIII

23

Time Piece XII

2k

For

Billy

"The secret of _{seeing is} to sail on solar wind. Hone

and spread your spirit till you yourself are a _{sail, whetted,}

The written thesis wants to be

fragmentary,

flowing

together,

the document of _{my time in} Rochester.

Ideally,

it

would communicate the

discovery,

_{the growth, the} expansion of

vision that I experienced here. But words are not sufficient.

Essentially

these things are of the spirit, unable to be tran

scribed and transmitted verbally.

At this _{moment, I} am poised between worlds.

My

time in

this particular space is almost _over,. _and

my time in the next

space, whatever it _may

be,

is uncharted and unknown. From this

middle ground I can write _nothing except what I _already

know,

what I have _already experienced. At

least, then,

this document

can function as a _map of the past to

jog

_{my memory} about where

I have been.

But,

like a _{map, it} contains _{only the obvious,}

physical

landmarks,

the sign _posts, the street names. Unfor

tunately,

there can be _nothing in the notation _concerning the

spirit of the place. I can record neither its true character

nor _{the way it feels to be there.} Within the map, one can pin

point a specific location. But to experience the actual _place,

"Work towards and _away from the critical moment that

takes place in a kind of

trance,

solutions

happening

undreamed-2 of-by-_{conscious-mind} the

moment when _everything fuses."

Making

visual images is _giving

identity

to the

impulse,

the _energy inside _me, the _{uncatagorized,} unnamed life-force.

And when the making-act is _over, I look at the object and under

stand it in a _{way that} was impossible before it was made visible.

Then I give it some name. I attach _{associations, fragments that}

float to me and surround it. I fuse the visual image and the

thought-_shards each _{from my} psychic _{well, but heretofore} un

connected _consciously and

they

become one.

That connection never happens for me before the act of

making; it comes afterward. The act of _{making is essentially}

a non-conscious effort. _{All my} consideration and preparation

come before and after. But at the moment of _making, at the

second of

impulse,

there is nothing except _{the making} itself.

I am _empty of all rational consideration and conceptualization.

I am simply

doing

it.

There are _many

times, however,

when the _{making does} not

flow so smoothly. Those are the

frustrating

times when I am

forcing

and

trying

and _struggling

frantically

to create. And

am full of the

trying,

_obviously there is no space left for

anything else. On the other

hand,

when I contain _nothing, when

I am open to what is around me and _{let that fill my} space

then I am

really

seeing. _{At that moment,} when I am immersed

3 "The _{man, the art,} the workrit is all one."

I came to art school unprepared _{for the reality} of the

situation.

My

expectations were overly simplistic. I thought

it was a place where some _magical, mystical rite transformed

a mere student into an "artist." I learned that was false.

Primarily,

I did not understand the

jargon,

the vocabu

lary

through which people seem to relate to their own work and

everyone else's. _{In critiques,} I felt overwhelmed and intimidated

by

the talk about a rational _process, a logical sequence of acti

vity that begins with the inception of an idea and concludes

with the finished piece.

Obviously,

_{my way} of _working was not

so _easily verbalized in such a step-by-_step methodology. And

at that point, I could not yet claim _{the validity that} I so

readily bestowed on others _{for my} own unarticulated process.

Since

then,

I have learned that acceptance of myself as

image-maker is of paramount importance. I now understand that

my work has

integrity

and merit because it is a part of _ray being.

Much of the verbiage that intimidated me at the outset was just

a smokescreen and a barrier to the real issue anyway. There is

not a valid _way of working and an _{invalid way,} a "right"

and a

"wrong." _{There is}

"The right art,"

cried the

Master,

"is purposeless,

aimless.' _The

more _obstinately you

try

to learn how to shoot the

arrow for the sake of

hitting

_{the goal,} the less you will suc

ceed in the one and the further the other will recede. What

stands in your _way is that you have a much too willful will.

You think that what you do not do yourself does not happen."

It was _necessary to struggle through those months of

lithography

trying

in desperation to cultivate the right

spiritual qualities within _myself,

trying

to force together

elements that

by

their nature were irreconcilable.

Suddenly

I learned that such things do not happen as a result of direct

pressure and striving. And at a moment when I was least ex

pecting

it,

the intaglio breakthrough happened. At a moment

when the anxiety over litho had subsided, when the frustration

of so _{many failures had}

finally

released _{my pent-up energies,}

the

image-making,

the plate _{making flowed naturally} and

freely

"Method is created of the painting, and obstructions

fall away

during

creation."

For a _very

long time,

I was unable to reconcile the

technical demands of the printmaking media with what I wanted

to accomplish as an artist.

Finally,

I made an important and

basic discovery. It is impossible for me to work within a

particular medium in an _{exciting way} while _{manipulating from}

the outside and

imposing

rigid preconceptions onto the event.

I have to supress _my need to control what is

happening

and let

the medium lead me. I have to discard all the known boundaries

of previous experience and suspend _my

belief,

in a sense. I

have to immerse myself

totally

in what is

happening

at the

moment.

Luckily,

the medium of intaglio allowed me to partici

pate in an extraordinary event.

Suddenly

there was just the

acid and _{my plate,} and _something unforeseen occured.

Everything

connected somehow and there were ocean-marks on the zinc. I felt

as though

they

did not come from _{me, from my}

decision-making

center, but rather passed through me in a _{current, emanating}

"I must go the opposite _way of Proust who found eternal

moments in creation. I must find them in life.

My

work must

be the closest to the life flow. I must install myself inside

of the _{seed, growth,} mysteries. I must prove the possibility

of

instantaneous,

immediate art.

My

art must be like a miracle.

Before it goes through the conduits of the brain and becomes an

"...the sea-_{salt and the} sky

have made me forget the importance of man

have invited me to turn _my back

on the chaos of our activities

have shown me _eternity in the little waves

of the harbour

which repeat themselves

without _repeating themselves..."

Wols7

The acid incises intricate

handwriting

on _my plates

flowing

over the zinc surface in waves like the ocean. The acid

and the ocean are both part of the same liquid

force, flowing

across _surfaces,

leaving

marks.

Drawing,

_recording,

destroying,

redrawing. On and on like the marks drawn

by

the tides on the

beach. The

liquid,

ongoing flow of

time,

like an

hourglass,

a multitude of _{changing sand-patterns,} always _moving,

drawing

and redrawing. The acid flows and transcribes its movement

again and again. The plates are _records, artifacts of the

neverending cycle, etched in metal, printed on _paper,

hung

on

10

"Immensity

is within ourselves. It is attached to a

sort of expansion of

being

that life curbs and caution _arrests,

but which starts again when we are alone. As soon as we become

motionless, we are _elsewhere; we are

dreaming

in a world that

11

"My

house is

diaphanous,

but it is not of glass. It is

more of the nature of vapor. Its walls contract and expand as

I desire. At

times,

I draw them close about me like protective

armor.. . But at _others, I let the walls of _my house blossom out

in their own _space, which is

infinitely

extensible."

I feel the outward _{expansion, the clouds,} the _{sky, the}

boundlessness. Through that _mysterious, celestial _{space, I}

escape beyond the concrete _world,

drifting

outward forever.

I feel the inward _contraction, the _closure, the _encap

sulation, the safety within dense fields of color. I am sur

rounded and buffered

by

the _{clean, blank borders.}

Taking

_refuge,

I flee in toward my center.

The vastness of the universe and the vastness of _my

soul seem to be poles of the same infinite spectrum. The vast

ness of the _{unknown, the void, the} nothingness beyond the

farthest solar system and within _{my deepest} self is what I

12

"You don't run down _{the present,} pursue it with baited

hooks and nets. You wait for

it,

_{empty-handed,} and you are

filled."11

Most of the

time,

_{my head} is filled with chatter.

My

brain keeps a _{running commentary} on what _{I'm seeing} and feeling.

I can experience _{practically nothing} without the ubiquitous

verbal translation.

Once in a while

though,

I experience an _{extraordinary}

moment of silence.. For some unknown _{reason, the} calculation and

explanation center shuts down. And I am _{open, seeing,}

feeling,

experiencing without veils.

Everything

is pulsing through me

at once.

For me, the prints are a visible record of this phenomenon.

But

they

are pale and insignificant in comparison. The actual

moment is what is important to me. It passes through me and I

am left stunned,

trembling,

utterly aware. I _{live for that moment,}

that

feeling,

that connection. I want to experience it again and

again.

Now I am preparing to leave this place.

My

Rochester time

is over and I do not know what will follow. In spite of the un

certainty,

though,

I am ready to begin again. There will be new

13

momentary unity. There will be countless new connections be

cause the cycle of growth and

discovery

is neverending. While

trying

to silence the noise _{in my}

head,

I will remain as open

as I can. I will see and I will feel experiencing as much as

Annie

Dillard,

Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

(New

York: Harper

&

Row,

Inc., 197U),

p. 35.

2

Mark

Tobey,

Tobey: Catalogue for the Exhibition on the

Occasion of His

80

Birthday

(Basel,

Switzerland: Galerie

Beyeler, 1970),

p.

57.

^ugen

Herrigel,

Zen in ttie Art of

Archery

(New

York:

Random

House, 1971),

p.

5l.

\Lbid._, p. 3U.

Lin

Yutang,

The Chinese Theories of Art

(New

York: G. P.

Putnam's

Sons,

1967),

p. 1U2.

Anais

Nin,

The

Diary

of Anais

Nin,

vol. 2.

(New

York:

The Swallow Press and

Harcourt,

Brace &

World, Inc., 1967),

p. 235.

7

Werner Haftman et al._, Art Since

Mid-Century,

vol. 1:

Abstract Art

(Greenwich,

Connecticut: New York Graphic

Society,

1971),

p. 153.

^Daniel

Tucker,

from a conversation.

Gaston

Bachelard,

The Poetics of Space

(Boston:

Beacon

Press, 1969),

p. I81i.

10Ibid.,

p.

51.

i:LDillard,

Pilgrim at Tinker

Creek,

p. I0I4..

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Related

Bibliography

Adam,

Michael.

Wandering

In Eden. New York: Alfred A.

Knopf,

1976.

Bachelard,

Gaston.

The Poetics of Space. Boston: Beacon

Press,

1969.

Dillard,

Annie. Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. New York: Harper &

Row,

1971*.

Haftman,

Werner et al. Art Since Mid-Century. Vol. 1; AbstractArt.

Greenwich,

Connecticut: New York Graphic

Society,

1971.

Herrigel,

Eugen.

Zen in the Art of Archery. New York: Random

House,

1971.

Lin Yutang. The Chinese Theories of Art. New York: G. P. _Putnam's

Sons,

1967.

Nemser,

Cindy. Art Talk: Conversations with 12 Women Artists. New

York: Charles Scribner's Sons. 1975.

Nin,

Anais. The

Diary

of Anais Nin. New York: The Swallow Press

and

Harcourt,

Brace ..&.,

World, Inc.,

1967.

Sontag,

Susan. From The Asthetics of Silence. In The Language

Experience,

pp. 70-77. Edited

by

James F.

Hoy

and John Somer.

New York: Dell

Publishing

Co., Inc.,

197k.

Tobey,

Mark. Tobey: Catalogue for the:Exhibition ?on the .Occasion

of His

80th

Birthday.

Basel,

Switzerland: Galerie

Beyeler,

1970.