Tags
art, Chinese, David Hockney, Gary Snyder, Grand Canyon, Jack Kerouac, landscape, mountains, National Museum Wales, poetry, Rhondda, spirituality, Wales, William Wordsworth
“The still, sad music of humanity,
Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power
To chasten and subdue. And I have felt
A presence that disturbs me with the joy
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
…..”
from Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey, 1798 by William Wordsworth
After a visit to John Piper: The Mountains of Wales – Paintings and Drawings from a Private Collection (exhibition at the National Museum of Wales in Cardiff until 13 May) I started thinking about what mountain landscapes have meant to us in art and culture. Piper’s Neo Romantic 1940’s images represent the remnants of the 18th century tradition of the ‘sublime’, dark and gloomy, another realm. This is also the darker Tolkien vision of Mordor inspired by the Llanberis slate quarries of North Wales. These mountains emphasize the insignificance of man, an ‘other’ but of a forbidding kind, somewhere to escape from rather than to, although the notion of being uplifted is there in the original meaning of the sublime.
Mountains as a source of liberation, and of spiritual enlightenment drew the next generation. I remember my mother telling stories of her evacuation from Cardiff to the Rhondda valley during World War 2 and how she roamed the surrounding hills – an escape from urban life and also presumably from parental supervision.
David Hockney, with his move to California, was to follow Gary Snyder and Jack Kerouac in finding mountains a road to enlightenment as well as an escape from convention and restriction. Enlightenment was to be found in Oriental spiritualism and transposed to their home landscapes. Their emphasis was generally on the airiness and openness of the landscape rather than the heavy oppressiveness of the earlier sublime. Snyder translated the Chinese Cold Mountain poems of Han Shan:
“I settled at Cold Mountain long ago,
Already it seems like years and years.
Freely drifting, I prowl the woods and streams
And linger watching things themselves.
Men don’t get this far into the mountains,
White clouds gather and billow.
Thin grass does for a mattress,
The blue sky makes a good quilt.
Happy with a stone under head
Let heaven and earth go about their changes.”
I was struck by the fact that nearly all the landscapes in Hockney’s Royal Academy exhibition, apart from his Yorkshire ones, were of mountains. From ‘Flight into Italy – Swiss Landscape’ of 1962 and ‘Rocky Mountains and Tired Indians’ of 1965 to the vast horizontal canvases of the Grand Canyon accompanied by photocollages the road journey is writ large.
A Bigger Grand Canyon, 1998, National Gallery of Australia. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Although his very recent vast vertical iPad prints of Yosemite are shown in a narrow space where they do bear down on the viewer, these do also have the feel of Chinese scroll paintings with wreaths of mist around pines and rock cliffs.
Layered Mountains and Dense Woods, by Zhuran, 10th century. Dimensions are 142.7 x 54.8 cm. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
“Such moments when Mind and Matter hold perfect communion,
And wide vistas open to regions hitherto entirely barred,
Will come with irresistible force,
And go, their departure none can hinder.
Hiding, they vanish like a flash of light;
Manifest, they are like sounds arising in mid air.”
from ‘Of inspiration’ in Lu Chi’s essay on Literature, translated by Shih-hsiang Chen in the Penguin Classic ‘Anthology of Chinese Literature’.
These verbal and visual influences filtered through to me in the late 60’s and on into the 70’s when I did printmaking at Goldsmiths’ College.
My mountain landscapes then were Wales though and the Lake District. Spiritual interests verged into the Celtic as a result and I did a series on stone circles.
Later I was to explore the American landscapes of the Rocky Mountains and New Mexico as well as the Blue Ridge Mountains, including Chimney Rock Park where the film ‘Last of the Mohicans’ was filmed. By this time Native American spiritualism was more of an influence. Interestingly the book ‘Cold Mountain’ by Charles Frazier and the real mountain it is based on are also in the Blue Ridge Mountains. The locations for the film version however were mainly in Romania.
I only have a few recent ‘mountainscapes’ and these seem to reflect a renewed interest in the more ethereal and non specific.
Related articles
- David Hockney’s landscapes: the wold is not enough (guardian.co.uk)
- Poets on Peaks, a Dharma thing (thewhimsey.wordpress.com)
A really interesting post.
The question of the attraction of mountains always gets me wondering what causes it. For me, part of the appeal is that uplifting feeling of being up high & looking out over a vast expanse – part of the sublime which I suppose our brains are wired for. It gives you a sense of freedom & the awareness of being an integral part of nature because you are immersed in it.
On the other hand, not everyone seems to feel this, so it would be interesting to know to what extent it’s biological & how much cultural. Maybe I should read the Gaston Bachelard book you mention.
Also some people prefer to be down in the valleys & of course from practical living purposes you can see why; I wonder how many people feel safer in a valley & how many feel more a sense of oppression? That also would depend on the particular valley I suppose.
Before I continue rambling on any more, I should add that I like your watercolour, especially the bottom one. Although it’s ethereal you’ve managed to retain a certain crispness & clarity which I like. Maybe that’s an evolution from printmaking?
It is great to get other people thinking too! Of course it is always difficult to generalize and I think responses to landscapes are probably a mixture of biology and culture. They do seem to have changed a lot over time and in diffeent cultures but individuals vary a lot too. Bachelard is interesting but not an easy read! Mountains of the Mind by Robert Macfarlane (mentioned in another comment) is also good on attitudes although more pragmatic I think. You have made me think of John Berger (the art critic and writer) too who has lived in the Savoy mountains I think for years and has written about his life. I might look at what he has said.
My work sometimes is quite graphic which probably does come from my printmaking. I think it depends on the technique too – how watery or not? I tend to vary quite a lot!
I found so much to ponder in here (you noted along with Whistles in the Wind even more aspects), and yet, I cannot help but wonder if it is because it is so obvious that you felt it unworthy or noting, but a good reason for the imagry of mountains could simply be their omnipresence. They are there. You can walk for miles and seem to only get a little closer to one, yet it is always there.
And this isn’t even going into the treasures shrouded in darkness they house, the potential for the earth ti shake and send shards of a mountain raining down on the world below… Mountains are so many things.
But I really loved this piece, even with sleep calling me forward… now I will dream of…mountains.
Lovely response – thank you so much and you are right about the ever present and multiple meanings of mountains.
Great post Diana. Enjoyed the range of references and particular Gary Snyder/Jack Kerouac. Always loved The Dharma Bums and Snyder’s translations of Han Shan. Another book that I’ve always meant to check out but haven’t as yet is Robert (The Wild Places) MacFarlane’s Mountains of the Mind: A History of A Fascination. I enjoy his writing in Wild Places so think his mountains book would be interesting. Also love the atmosphere created by your paintings – wonderful.
Thanks for the comments – I have got Mountains of the Mind, and I did look at it for this post. It is certainly worth getting hold of as he is always interesting and wide ranging. I got a bit lost in some of the mountaineering bits as I don’t quite have that interest in mountains. My only experience of real mountain climbing was going up Helvellyn, which was quite challenging enough!
The words are deep and very moving. Beautifully done.
Thanks – I’m glad you enjoyed the post.
Thanks Karen, for your kind words. It is so good to strike a chord and of course I do this to share with those who might appreciate my thoughts so you are very welcome to share further!
I do have an image of you writing on a ranch in the wilds for some reason – an Annie Proulx like figure!
Any post that begins with my beloved Wordsworth will keep me reading but this post is such a beautiful essay that it will keep me remembering for sometime. Wonderfully written, Diana.
Growing up in the Rocky Mountains of Wyoming and Montana, living above a mile high, I knew timberline intimately, a refuge often sought. Still is, although I am thousands of miles away tucked into a subtropical climate; I return to early years of wandering among mountains often. So, in a way, my mountains, these days, are more ethereal than specific, too.
Shared this post on Twitter and FB as it is so beautiful. Hope you don’t mind.
Karen
Hi Diana, this is a great post. I can relate to it as I took off to the Atlas mountains in Morocco and travelled through the gorges, their high walls of deep red and orange stone were powerful and the palm plantations with their sage green tops were set off by the contrasting purple hue to the mountains, in early spring snow still sits on the summits. I may well post a painting I did on my site later.
Glad you liked the post – I have not been to Morocco but the colours sound similar to those in the Hockney Grand Canyon paintings. I look forward to see your painting!
I’ve never really thought of mountains specifically like this – it’s always a more general ‘nature’, wide expanses, forest and so on. Really interesting, especially the darker John Piper aspect, as something to hold in awe/fear. Escape and freedom found in nature is often associated with unforbidding landscapes, like E M Forster’s use of Italy and so on. Now that’s got me thinking of D H Lawrence and Women in Love and the alpine, mountain escape, which ended in disaster!
Maybe it’s our insignificance in the face of mountains that’s key, taking us down to skin and bone – if nature is medicine, mountains are the strong stuff? Like Wordsworth’s healing and so on. I’m rambling – blame the thought-provoking post!
There is a lot going on here which could be explored further! I like your literary associations as I hadn’t thought beyond the poetry. I think all elemental kinds of landscapes probably have emotional effects on us and as you say they do emphasize our insignificance!
Wonderful post – interesting to think all these thoughts about mountains. They are so often a place of pilgrimage – they must evoke a very human desire.
Glad you liked it. I found a reference to Gaston Bachelard, the French philosopher, from his book ‘Air and Dreams’ saying a desire for altitude was a universal instinct, so I guess that is one reason for our love of mountains. I think the pilgrimage link is obviously very tied to the spiritual associations and literally becoming physically nearer to heaven or the realm of the gods.