20 October 2009
I’m going to be out of town the next few days, enjoying the Maine foliage. It’s an opportunity to share a backlog of posts I’ve not been posting. I’ll let this tip of the hat to Morton Feldman serve as introduction. Most of these will be quiet & weird.
“Earlier in my life there seemed to be unlimited possibilities, but my mind was closed. Now, years later and with an open mind, possibilities no longer interest me. I seem content to be continually rearranging the same furniture in the same room. My concern at times is nothing more than establishing a series of practical conditions that will enable me to work. For years I said if I could only find a comfortable chair I would rival Mozart.”
“There’s an aspect of my attitude about being a composer that is like mourning. Say, for example, the death of art . . . something that has to do with, say, Schubert leaving me.” He also admitted, “I must say, you did bring up something that I particularly don’t want to talk about publicly, but I do talk privately.”
Both quotations via Alex Ross. Thanks.
Posted by Alec Hanley Bemis
Tags: Alex Ross, Mark Rothko, Morton Feldman, Rothko Chapel