08 September 2008

Walking

"Art is, after all, only a trace - like a footprint which shows that one has walked bravely and in great happiness." (Robert Henri)

More, much more, about the history of walking is here:
"Thinking is generally thought of as doing nothing in a production-oriented culture, and doing nothing is hard to do. It's best done by disguising it as doing something, and the something closest to doing nothing is walking. Walking itself is the intentional act closest to the unwilled rhythms of the body, to breathing and the beating of the heart. It strikes a delicate balance between working and idling, being and doing. it is a bodily labor that produces nothing but thoughts, experiences, arrivals." (p.5)

Interestingly, the book has a little pathway at the bottom of each page, along which run quote after quote - about walking, of course.

"In my room the world is beyond my understanding," wrote Wallace Stevens in "On the Surface of Things", "But when I walk I see that it consists of three or four / Hills, and a cloud."

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

i clickrd over here though spirit cloth, and lo! i just ordered this book last night! what an odd coincidence! the book looks really wonderful, i can't wait to get it. cheers!