On Meeting a Biographer, a reverie.

I recognized the biographer of Joan Mitchell, Patricia Albers, coming out of the main library today. She had a name tag on, so I could run up and thank her for her book.

It probably disturbed her reverie, and San Franciscans usually don’t accost writers on the street-bad form- but her writing is great, and Joan Mitchell was here at the MOMA not too long ago. Her paintings- she passed in 1992.

Joan Mitchell is one of the famous people that drops by sometimes, when my mind is quiet. It’s imagination- or is it??

I was thinking of her paintings one evening and I thought, you know, what would be good, would be to be IN the painting, you know, to be walking around amid the color and forms and dimensions. Like a universe in there. Of course. To be within.

So at that moment, quiet evening at home, reverie, living room, I felt the pleasant tingles down my spine-energy- so I said thank you, and she said (or was it my imagination) “Go ahead- knock yourself out”- in a way both blasé and playful, and she was smiling and blowing smoke. For a second.

I believe some creative artists respond to their audience, those truly interested in their work. One doesn’t have to “be” somebody. You open the door, and inspiration may follow.

So you could say we’re friends.

My experience recurs when I’m aware of artists in the center of their work, within it, part of it, multidimensionally. Then, she’s there. See?

I snapped a detail from my walk through the Joan Mitchell exhibit last year. An art curator was in hospice at Maitri last year, and I intended to frame some details, but we agreed that nothing comes close to the experience of the actual painting- it’s not an artifact, it’s a personal experience, like visiting Yosemite. A picture of a painting isn’t It.

But the detail turned out to be the pathway in.

Joan is funny. She’s not mean. She’s generous.

The curator told me he met the artist at a dinner and though he was ”terrified” because of her reputation for histrionics, they got along well.

I never gave him the details I snapped, but he didn’t need them. I told him about the show and his eyes lit up.

Professor Albers wrote that for Joan Mitchell, letters were colors, sound was taste, emotions were right out of the tube: like illuminist poet Arthur Rimbaud, she had synesthesia, so, with Joan, one is confused at first, until the maelstrom, in stillness, in immensity, and with plunging infinite detail, invites you in.

I kind of laughed because seeing the author brought this encounter to mind. Then the light changed and The City moved on to the next moment, moving life in every direction.

Knock yourself out.