1. the art of making a world
ART111

2. “…beauty is often where you don’t expect to
find it; that it is something we may discover
and also invent, then reinvent, for ourselves;
that the most important things in the world are
never as simple as they seem but that the
world is also richer when it declines to abide
by comforting formulas. And that it is always
good to keep your eyes wide open, because
you never know what you will discover. The
drive to live life more alertly being an
instinctive need, whether you are an artist by
trade or by desire, the art of seeing well is a
necessary skill, which fortunately can be
learned.”

3. Picasso,
Weeping
Woman, 1937

4. Picasso,
Le Demoiselles
d'Avignon,
1907

5. Picasso in his
studio

6. Pierre Bonnard in his studio, photographed by Cartier-Bresson

7. Bonnard,
The Breakfast
Table, 1930-1

8. Pierre & Marthe
Bonnard, 1920

9. Pierre Bonnard, Nude in the Bath

10. Pierre Bonnard, Marthe in the Bathtub

11. Pierre Bonnard, Marthe in the Bath (detail)

12. Bonnard,
Marthe Entering
the Room, 1942

13. Pierre Bonnard, Jardin Vu De La Terrasse

14. Bonnard,
Woman in a
Green Dress in a
Garden

15. Bonnard,
Last Self-Portrait,
1944

16. Joan Mitchell,
1925 – 1992

17. Mitchell,
After April, Bernie,
1987

18. “We are all vaguely tormented with a
desire to know a world which appears
to us a dungeon…I should feel as if I
could not depart in peace out of this
narrow sphere unless I endeavored to
explore my prison. The more I examine it,
the more beautiful and extensive it
becomes in my eyes.”
Astolphe de Custine

19. Kimsooja, Looking
into Sewing

21. Henry Darger
1892 – 1973

22. Henry Darger’s home

23. Henry Darger

24. Henry Darger

25. Caine’s Arcade, East LA

26. Caine’s Arcade, East LA

27. “No work of art is more important than the
Christian’s own life, and every Christian is
called upon to be an artist in this sense. He
may have no gift of writing, no gift of
composing or singing, but each man has the
gift of creativity in terms of the way he lives his
life. In this sense, the Christian’s life is to be an
artwork. The Christian’s life is to be a thing of
beauty in the midst of a lost and despairing
world.”
Theologian Francis A. Schaeffer

28. Read:
• Chapter 1, “The Art of Making a World”
Respond on Verso:
• Reflect on the reading.
• Reflect on how you can (or already are)
creating a world for yourself. Do you see
“art” in this? How can you make this
more “artful”?
• React to at least one of your peer’s
responses: ask follow-up questions; add to
the comments; challenge a viewpoint; etc.