Occasionally I get inspiration block. I suppose many of you are the same way, especially on Mondays.  To tell the truth, I’m taking a break from reading about the theoretical bases of art and trying to implement my own vision.

While I was thinking of what my experiment of the day would be, I thought about Arthur, my pet avocado sapling. A few weeks ago, I thought he was dying after a botched transplant operation. I tried transplanting him from the bottle he was born on to a flower pot. Apparently I was using the wrong dirt, but The Healing Garden gardener set me straight on that and now Arthur is doing quite well.

Displaying information

The display of information is important in many fields of endeavor. For instance, in certain arenas it is critical for someone to be able to tell if there is a dangerous situation depending upon the interplay of dozens of factors. There has been a lot of research about how to present information. The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, by Edward Tufte was an early publication that discussed ways of graphically presenting different kinds of information.

What does that have to do with today’s experiment?

I was looking at Arthur and his new leaves and wondering how I would represent him and his life.

Today’s experiment

Essence of Arthur
12″x9″ 140# Cold Pressed Watercolor Block

I don’t think it is necessary to decode my representations. They seem fairly straightforward.

Comment

If the symbolism in my sketch above is not immediately obvious, it might be worth an explanation:

I made a quick sketch of Arthur and his leaves. The purpose of a leaf is to change sunlight energy into energy that the rest of the plant can use. I used yellow for the sunlight and blue for the usable energy of the plant. The mixture of yellow with the blue gave me the familiar green of the leaf.

Arthur Sketch
12″x9″ Standard Weight Sketching Paper

Paul Klee describes directionality in drawing (beginning on page 59 of The Nature of Nature, Volume 2 of his Notebooks). He uses the design of a lobster or fish trap as an example of how to channel the movement of lobsters or fish in the desired direction. The inner workings of these traps are essentially funnel-like, with a large opening at the entrance and a smaller opening at the exit. Visually, it is no great surprise that an arrowhead, essentially a schematic representation of a lobster trap, should also indicate a direction.

I used blue-colored arrows to indicate downward motion of the nutrients and upward-pointing red arrows to show the movement of ‘growth substance’ upward to the new leaves.

Arthur’s substrate is represented by a brownish color surrounding his network of roots, including his tap root that is burrowing deep for support.

On page 97 of Klee’s volume, mentioned above, he illustrates schematically, the passage of time by a representation of the path of the earth around the sun. This is what I used to show the passage of time, resulting in an avocado, the fruit of Arthur’s labors after years of developing.

Conclusion:

Don’t be alarmed if my symbolism was not immediately obvious to you. Although this is not an Aesopian post, there is a lesson that could be learned.

I began posting in early 2013 with a mission to blog about autism and related issues, based on my experience with my older autistic brother. This might not be obvious to those of you who have only seen my recent posts about visual expression.

In order to understand people with autism, it is necessary to be observant and discover the symbols or behavior of such an individual. It can be an arduous process of detective work. Sometimes it just doesn’t pan out (as in my case). I don’t need to tell those of you who are aware of autism and its effects about how difficult communication with an autistic person can be. You know this in painful detail. However, those who are not aware, should keep in mind that not all symbols – even the simplest – are obvious to everyone. Patience can be rewarded with human connection.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful to be able to find some overlap between worlds? Wonderful? Yes indeed. Frustrating? Undeniably. Possible? Perhaps.