Robert Munning

More important than a work of art itself is what it will sow. Art can die, a painting can disappear. What counts is the seed.
- Joan Miro -

I had been traveling for 7 months  through Asia and it was my first day on a different continent. I didn’t know which adventures were still laying ahead, but that first day in the city of Buenos Aires  I decided to visit the museum Bellas Artes. I stepped into one of the main halls, seeing this huge painting which looked so realistic from a distance, but showed all this fantastic abstract brushwork up close. The emotion in the painting moved me. It was Bouguereau’s ‘The first mourning’. I spent quite some time in front of that painting that day. When it was time to walk back to the hostel, I decided I wanted to become really good at this 'painting-craft' myself. If paintings can make such big impressions it must be a worthy endeavor.  

Oilpainting 'Sensing the birches' by artist Robert Munning

Sensing the birches / oil on acm panel / 40x50 cm

To me the process of painting

is  an exercise;

of being fully in the moment.

It shouldn't be done carelessly.

Every stroke should count and have meaning.

When done so,

a painting holds the energy

of the moment it was created.

It emanates through it.

.A photo can hold a certain energy,

but it pales in comparison

to the aliveness of a painting.

A painting is not just a picture;

a composition

done by a collection of brushstrokes of paint.

It's more than that.

It's a little bit of magic.

 

- Robert Munning -