Formal Garden in the Fog

The formal garden is just beginning to come to its second flowering.  The tulips, daffodils and iris are over, or almost over.  You can just see a few in the middle distance.  The peonies are just starting to open up in the foreground.

Continuing the fog metaphor, Joseph Conrad said,  "It is not the clear-sighted who rule the world. Great achievements are accomplished in a blessed, warm fog." 

This is an interesting quote.  It is certainly true that the clear sighted are often not the ones in control of ruling the world, and it may also be true that some great decisions are made in a blessed warm fog, but when people who are not clear sighted rule, the fog of their decision making does not appear to be "blessed".  


The leaders of the Middle East for the past 20 or 30 years certainly have not been making decisions in a "blessed" warm fog.  Short sighted rulers seem to be governed by a hot fog of self serving megalomania. They remain in power because those governed are in the midst of a fog of fear and resignation.  The internet has proved, in this case, to be the sun that broke through that fog and gave courage to those oppressed.  Suddenly they saw the long view and the fog lifted.  What happens as a result of this sudden break with their past reality is bound to be very chaotic, as we don't adjust easily to such great rents in our sense of what is real.

PURPLE GARDEN IN THE FOG

All colors have their own place on the continuum from dark to light and purple is the most pure at the dark end of that continuum, making these Allium  glow in the dark.

Since I began painting this group of work centered around fog, I have been thinking of all the ways perception, influenced by one parameter only can be altered.  Fog is a good metaphor as it diminishes the distance you can see radically and yet keeps the immediate surroundings recognizable.  You see just beyond your own nose.  You don't get the big picture.  Those around you see the same things you do, so you agree about what reality is.

Our perceptions are always colored by one fog or another.  Some large examples are the fog of prejudice, ignorance, envy, greed or fear.  But we  all have our own set of convictions that keep us in a fog.  Whatever the fog  that puts a veil over our eyes, it keeps us from enjoying the long view, but may be very satisfying in its limited way.

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