Artist Statement 1999
By John Daniel Teply
A conceptual panorama of the Washington, Oregon, and California coastline. In sections, it will eventually include include 1,320 individual 2ft × 4ft paintings (as well as the collaboration of 1,320 artists.) Addresses issues of time (conception), generational awareness, and individual (artist and viewer) connection to land, place, environment and ocean protection).
Many of us became artists because we experience pleasure and beauty in the world. We want to share and express this. Because of these feelings, we are pained by the vulnerability, the degradation, and often the loss that we witness of the land and the ocean. When in the presence of land and ocean, we recognize an intangible element of marvel and mystery
that we revere. For some of us it is a connection to perfection, life, and existence outside of our bodies. For some of us, it is a communion of spirit and love. A profound beauty is revealed. In the political struggle to preserve what we value in the land and the ocean, we are told that Beauty, Respect, and Civility has no purpose, or that an art based on those values is ineffective in the struggle to persuade actions. The way of Mars, we are told, is the way to make change.
For the Seventh Generation is an Art and Activist group like none other. By the project we demonstrate that artists have an alternative. Artists can work together to create responsible and creative solutions in a format of interesting and sensational art and beauty. We show people "what it looks like." And that is the important job for artists. To creatively manifest
alternatives. To show people what different ways of behavior can look like. We are making a powerful activist art that expresses what we value, hold dear, and revere. This, the virtue and love of place, is what will compel people to protect the land and the ocean.
The ancients perceived Love and Beauty as a force of nature, Aphrodite being the Goddess. She is also the goddess of storms, lightning and the changing sea. It was her power that brought the shifting sky, the calmed sea, the green of spring, birds, bees, as well as that which satisfied, and was Good and True for humans. She is integral in the making of "Cosmos" from "chaos." Her retinue included the three graces-Splendor, Joy and Abundance. In contrast, Mars is the God of war, his children are Fear and Alarm, Eris, the Goddess of Discord and the mother of Trouble, is his sister. As we make our choices for the kind of life we want to live, and the kind of community and nation we live in, it is important to be aware of the kind of energy we beckon.
As a people, if we fail to perceive the transcendent values and gifts that surround us from the natural world, then all will be lost. When there is a failure of this kind there is work to be done by artists. It is the work of a "midwife" to sensitivity and presence. As artists, we are the ones who can do this job.
Original artist statement by project founder John Teply, 1999
Many of us became artists because we experience pleasure and beauty in the world. We want to share and express this. Because of these feelings, we are pained by the vulnerability, the degradation, and often the loss that we witness of the land and the ocean. When in the presence of land and ocean, we recognize an intangible element of marvel and mystery
that we revere. For some of us it is a connection to perfection, life, and existence outside of our bodies. For some of us, it is a communion of spirit and love. A profound beauty is revealed. In the political struggle to preserve what we value in the land and the ocean, we are told that Beauty, Respect, and Civility has no purpose, or that an art based on those values is ineffective in the struggle to persuade actions. The way of Mars, we are told, is the way to make change.
For the Seventh Generation is an Art and Activist group like none other. By the project we demonstrate that artists have an alternative. Artists can work together to create responsible and creative solutions in a format of interesting and sensational art and beauty. We show people "what it looks like." And that is the important job for artists. To creatively manifest
alternatives. To show people what different ways of behavior can look like. We are making a powerful activist art that expresses what we value, hold dear, and revere. This, the virtue and love of place, is what will compel people to protect the land and the ocean.
The ancients perceived Love and Beauty as a force of nature, Aphrodite being the Goddess. She is also the goddess of storms, lightning and the changing sea. It was her power that brought the shifting sky, the calmed sea, the green of spring, birds, bees, as well as that which satisfied, and was Good and True for humans. She is integral in the making of "Cosmos" from "chaos." Her retinue included the three graces-Splendor, Joy and Abundance. In contrast, Mars is the God of war, his children are Fear and Alarm, Eris, the Goddess of Discord and the mother of Trouble, is his sister. As we make our choices for the kind of life we want to live, and the kind of community and nation we live in, it is important to be aware of the kind of energy we beckon.
As a people, if we fail to perceive the transcendent values and gifts that surround us from the natural world, then all will be lost. When there is a failure of this kind there is work to be done by artists. It is the work of a "midwife" to sensitivity and presence. As artists, we are the ones who can do this job.
Original artist statement by project founder John Teply, 1999