(originally posted on www.ko-fi.com/bjornlarssen)
If I could own one work of art, it would be Cathedra by Barnett Newman.
I’ve never been into abstract paintings. I find Rothko interesting mostly because I wonder how he got so many people to fall for it. (Did you know that towards the end of his life he received an order to decorate a ship with his paintings, and he had his students paint them all under his direction? But you can bet the students didn’t get to sign them.) So, seeing this painting on a photograph didn’t exactly excite me.
Until I stood in front of it.
And then a bit closer.
Then even closer.
Until there was nothing but the painting.
*
If you ever visit Amsterdam, go to the Stedelijk Museum. Find Cathedra by Barnett Newman. And get so close to it that you can’t see anything else even in your peripheral vision, that there is only the painting, like you are in it. You’ll notice an infinite number of shades of blue that cover each other, drip, shine, hide, nearly take off only to decide to remain unmoved. You will, hopefully, feel what this painting makes me feel:
Peace.
This painting is extremely complex and elaborate and at the same time it’s just blue. So much blue that there is nothing else. It breathes quietly and slowly, like an ocean of tranquility. It seems to tell you: there is no reason to rush anywhere else, to go anywhere else. I am why you need to exist right here and right now. I am the warmth and the fluidity and the lack of needs, for I fulfil all the needs and all my needs are fulfilled. Unless your bladder is full, mate, in which case step away. (Or unless you’re a child.)
I think I even understand why it’s called Cathedra instead of Untitled or Blue XVII.
If this painting was a song, it would be a bit like this, only not at all.
PS. I am considering moving the blog to ko-fi, as I post more updates there than here. (I haven’t decided yet.) I am mostly active on Bluesky these days – find me there! And a newsletter is coming someday soon.