Stuck on a sentence (Apr. 23 '25)
On Bluesky, poet Jorie Graham has been posting Helen Vendler quotes on the one-year anniversary of Vendler's death. I've been stuck on this one since reading it:
"One could say that artists are people who think naturally in highly patterned ways."
I'm not entirely convinced of this, but it's interesting... Is art about finding or creating patterns? One could say so for music, for 2D composition, but for performing arts?
Who is considered to be an artist here? A composer or a performer? Both?
As a dancer, my mind wasn't working in patterns, but as a choreographer – yes.
But then what's a rhythm or a combination of steps but a type of pattern?
I always considered a critic to be a pattern finder, and perhaps that's why Vendler believed artists were pattern makers – and she leaves room for artists to be unintentional or natural pattern makers. So this sentence rings true from a critic's perspective, but I'm not sure it's so clearcut from an artist's...
