Vanessa Prager: See + Hear

Vanessa Prager, Sundae, 2014, oil and plaster on wood, 12 x 12 in.

Really nice quote in the latest Juxtapoz art mag from the talented young LA-based expressionist painter Vanessa Prager. Interviewer Kristin Farr said to Prager: "I like your observation that 'art is the gentlest way of enlightening people.' Do you think the world needs a certain kind of illumination?" Prager responds:

It's not really for me to say what kind of enlightenment people need. It's so personal to the individual. But I firmly believe that most people are good and kind and mean well at their core; they just get wrapped up in things and start to see, and then become, darkness. But when they aren't entangled in their problems, when they can stand back from it and look at it all from a distance, they can start to get on board with solving problems instead of just tearing things down. Enlightenment brings people clarity, and art, if it speaks to someone, has the power to give them a little lift, a little boost toward their own enlightened direction.

Beautifully said. It brought to mind Jack Kerouac's short poem, that, in my memory, goes something like: Don't use the phone / Send a poem / People are never ready.