art before nature

They were painting the seashore even as it was receding under them.

Sam Francis' Aphorisms

This is a selection from a small book by the artist Sam Francis called APHORISMS. The entries tilt more toward short poetry (with line breaks) or perhaps being composed as back-of-an-envelope jottings on art/aesthetics, rather than ‘aphorisms’ as we tend to think of them:

The eye is
the light
of the body

*

Death has
no surface
only depth

*

I paint time
I am ruin rolled
I am rolled

*

Color is born
of the interpenetration
of light and dark

*

Color is a series
of harmonies
everywhere in
the universe
being divine
whole numbers
lasting forever
adrift in time

*

Red contains every color
even red

all colors in this
painting consist of

all other colors

*

The space at
the center
of these paintings
is reserved
for you

*

There are as many images
as eyes to see

*

As you know
energy can have
never begun
and yet is
taken up
again and
again and
lasts forever
and forever
until it is
taken up
again

*

We are always at the center of space
we are always at the center of time
we are always as far
as possible from both
east and west
we are always as far as possible from earlier
and later

—Sam Francis, APHORISMS (The Lapis Press, 1984)

paper money

Prints are the paper money of famous artists. A currency issued from the treasury of their reputation and esteem.