The Art of Process- notes

Speaking From Experience

Mark Jesinoski

My thoughts on process were largely derived from my experiences as an artist, in the context of my process of growth as a psychologist (in training).  My artistry predated my education, and thus my development as an artist began before my development as a clinician/theoretician/scientist, etc.  I have, through my learning experiences picked up a language for something I did and learned experientially.  In some ways this ass-backwards approach has defined much of my learning.  I remember a particular moment in graduate school where a professor and mentor exhaustedly said to me, “mark, you just have to experience something before you learn it don’t you?”  True true.  Even with a PhD. in Psychology my learning typically goes, ‘experience, process, insight, then investigation.’  The writing of this missive took that form and so I offer this brief introduction as a prelude to clarify what you are about to delve into. 

  As I developed as a painter and a psychologist so did my conceptual understanding of not only my approaches and processes as a painter, but my process as a human being, and as another preface, to the content therein.  Where my paintings at age 20 were largely guided by unconscious drives, needs for communication and love, and simply as a means of learning about myself and my environment, my paintings in the present are largely guided by a more deliberate proportion of the interplay between process and content.  As I have grown experientially so have I slowly sought out the literature to see what language exists, beyond my own, to lend context to these experiences, insights, and images floating through my head.  I should say I do this somewhat begrudgingly as, by the very act of seeking a language for a process, I bias that process and constrain it to human language.  Keep this in mind, as this transforms something organic and existing regardless of humans labeling it, into something symbolized and therefore restricted.  With this ringing in your ears I would like to note that there are many thinkers who came before me who put what I learned experientially into the written form and communicated these ideas in the writings of philosophy, spirituality, and in more modern times, psychology.  In writing this missive I began with my experience, art, and insights and dove into the literature to both learn more and simply to give credit where credit is due.

My hope in this text is guided by a desire to translate the language, theory, and my insights on the ideas relating to process to the art community, couched in a simple desire to share, connect, and perhaps validate my own understanding; I want to turn the pictures in my head into something communicable in a form other than art.  In addition, in my understanding of the art community, based on my experiences, observations, and research, I see a gross overuse of old psychological ideas and a gross underuse of modern revolutions in psychology and philosophy, which are ironically tied to the oldest of spiritual and philosophical traditions and practices.  I observe many a peer and/or art critic often so distracted by content they are missing the proverbial mass beneath the tip of the iceberg. Content is fixed and limited, process transcends.  Where content’s relevance is derived from the need to communicate, give meaning, context, etc., process is the underlying stuff that supplies the fabric for content to attach and become relevant.  I firmly believe that in a world where content in the arts has been reduced to literal shit on canvas or oversized sardines in glass cases, modern revolutions in the arts will come by revolutions in process, with content the by-product. 

Another aside, I do not in any way mean to minimize the importance of metaphor via content as clearly metaphor has its relevant place in the arts.  In fact as this text develops you will see content is every bit as important to process.  The two are happily married and give birth to the stuff of our existence…It is not shit on canvas I am concerned with per se, simply that it is often of little consideration how that shit got there in the first place. 

And so we begin.  Bear with me as I write in run-ons, thoughts upon thoughts, and ideas within, or upon, ideas, as this is the world as I see it, live it, read about it, and paint it.  If you’re expecting a clean theory replete with structural models and properly formatted subheadings this is probably not for you.  These are ideas and the stuff of science and dreams communicated by written words and images, through the expressions of human thought and desire.  I do believe knowledge comes by many means, only one of which is symbolic language.  Thanks for joining me on this journey. 

Mark Jesinoski