Paint Doors

My daughter recently posted this photo of painted doors in her blogpost about a recent trip to Brattle Book Shop in Boston.  These painted doors brought to mind an experience I had some years ago, while visiting the American Visionary Art Museum  in Baltimore.  There I found a compelling exhibit by African American artist Mary Proctor, who considers herself a messenger, rather than an artist  Her work is inextricable from the circumstances inspiring the creation of her art, which in turn inspired me to write the following (excerpted from my poem titled "American Visionary Art Museum"):

Inside the burning house
a woman trapped, seething
prayed for escape
from senseless cremation.
And God said: Paint doors.

While visiting museums, I often find myself jotting notes, impressions, and musings.  I just can't seem to help myself.  The visual images serve as portals of entry into strange, beautiful, and sometimes shocking other-worlds.  Several such experiences stand out as particularly intense for me, and some have resulted in poems (a few published, others not....yet).  The Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam features a large collection of his art, arranged chronologically--illuminating the many periods of his artistry, his life, and his illness.  The Salvador Dali museum in Figueres, Spain is a visceral experience from the externalia of the building to the collection of comic-tragic-genius-absurdist surrealism found inside.  At the Deesses Diosas Goddess exhibit at the Institut de Cultura.in Barcelona, I was compelled to sketch the many shapes of her ancient incarnations, from prehistoric times to the Roman period.  The half-day spent viewing Joseph Cornell's shadow boxes at the Peabody Essex Museum lingers as a vivid memory not yet translated into verse.  Inside/Out: New Chinese Art, at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, offered up the haunting installation titled "Thoughts of Flowers go Deeper than Looking" by artist Chen Hui-chiao, for inspiration (see my website for the poem titled "Pins and Roses" ).

If you'd like to try an exercise for writing art-inspired poetry, see my website page on Writing in Museums.

To learn more about visionary door-painting artist Mary Proctor, go to her website Missionary Mary.

For information about Ekphrastic Poetry, a term used to describe art-inspired poetry, go to Ekphrasis: Poetry Confronting Art, at the Poetry Foundation's website.

And if you have a story you'd like to share about a writing experience inspired by art (whether in a museum or encountered in any other manner), I'd love to hear from you.