Alan Ilagan

(* to The Picture of Dorian Gray)

The artist is the creator of beautiful things.

To reveal art and conceal the artist is art’s aim.

The critic is he who can translate into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful things.

The highest, as the lowest, form of criticism is a mode of autobiography.

Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault.

Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For these there is hope.

They are the elect to whom beautiful things mean only Beauty.

There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.

The nineteenth-century dislike of Realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass.

The nineteenth-century dislike of Romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass.

The moral life of man forms part of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality of art consists in the perfect use of an imperfect medium. No artist desires to prove anything. Even things that are true can be proved.

No artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style.

No artist is ever morbid. The artist can express everything.

Thought and language are to the artist instruments of an art.

Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for an art.

From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is the art of the musician. From the point of view of feeling, the actor’s craft is the type.

All Art is at once surface and symbol.

Those who go beneath the surface do so at their own peril.

Those who read the symbol do so at their own peril.

It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.

Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex, and vital.

When critics disagree, the artist is in accord with himself.

We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it immensely.

All art is quite useless.

- Oscar Wilde

When your youth goes, your beauty will go with it, and then you will suddenly discover that there are no triumphs left for you, or have to content yourself with those mean triumphs that the memory of your past will make more bitter than defeats. Every month as it wanes brings you nearer to something dreadful. Time is jealous of you, and wars against your lilies and your roses. You will become sallow, and hollow-checked, and dull eyed. You will suffer horribly . . .  Ah! realize your youth while you have it. Don’t squander the gold of your days, listening to the tedious, trying to improve the hopeless failure, or giving away your life to the ignorant, the common, and the vulgar. These are the sickly aims, the false ideals of our age. Live! Live the wonderful life that is in you! Let nothing be lost upon you. Be always searching for new sensations. Be afraid of nothing…

– Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

The moment I met you I saw that you were quite unconscious of what you really are, of what you really might be. There was so much in you that charmed me that I felt I must tell you something about yourself. I thought how tragic it would be if you were wasted. For there is such a little time that your youth will last – such a little time.

– Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

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The infamous project from the summer of 2001…

MAN*BOY

{Coming This Week to The Projects}

Even now I cannot help feeling that it is a mistake to think that the passion one feels in creation is ever really shown in the work one creates. Art is always more abstract than we fancy. Form and colour tell us of form and colour – that is all. It often seems to me that art conceals the artist far more completely than it ever reveals him. – Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

…you will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you have never had the courage to commit. – Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

Ordinary people waited till life disclosed to them its secrets, but to the few, to the elect, the mysteries of life were revealed before the veil was drawn away. Sometimes this was the effect of art, and chiefly of the art of literature, which dealt immediately with the passions and the intellect. But now and then a complex personality took the place and assumed the office of art; was indeed, in its way, a real work of art, Life having its elaborate masterpieces, just as poetry has, or sculpture, or painting. – Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

COMING SOON

The Legendary Project from 2001

{See The Projects Page…Next Week}

I’m not one of those “Buy Local!” self-righteous preachers who avoids the mainstream chains at all costs (unless we’re talking clothing), but once in a  while I’ll find a local business that delivers something not offered anywhere else. The other day I found myself on New Scotland Avenue, where I haven’t been in quite some time, and I saw the storefront for Isn’t It Sweet – (my special superpower is finding a soft-serve ice cream joint out of the corner of my eye no matter how fast Andy is driving.)

It was lunch time so I asked him to pull over. The sun was shining and it was the perfect day for a twist. I entered the tiny store and was immediately captivated by all the chocolate. Packages of peanut butter and chocolate frogs caught my eye, followed by chocolate-covered everything. As I made my way to the back, more towering confections of chocolate – merry-go-rounds among other whimsical treats – surrounded me, delightful both in their rich, sweet aroma and tradition-defying design.

Behind the register, an extensive ice cream and milkshake list dangled temptation before my eyes, and the only way I’ve ever dealt with temptation is to yield to it. (Thank you Oscar Wilde.) Over forty different flavors – how is one supposed to choose?

A friendly gentleman pointed out the ice cream cakes in a glass-fronted freezer behind me now, as well as more chocolate-covered goodies, battering away at my will-power and presenting too many opportunities for indulgent behavior. Before my eyes could rest on the listing for Boston Shakes (which would have definitively destroyed any remaining discipline), I ordered a small twist cone in one final self-preserving effort that left me drained of all strength.

I picked up a pair of chocolate frogs for Andy and made a hasty retreat out of that gloriously sinful chocolate factory. I don’t know how I escaped with the same waist size, but I did it. And now I can’t wait to go back.

For the strong among you, Isn’t It Sweet is located at 575 New Scotland Avenue. Go in at your own swimsuit-season peril.

Ordinary people waited till life disclosed to them its secrets, but to the few, to the elect, the mysteries of life were revealed before the veil was drawn away. Sometimes this was the effect of art, and chiefly of the art of literature, which dealt immediately with the passions and the intellect. But now and then a complex personality took the place and assumed the office of art; was indeed, in its way, a real work of art, Life having its elaborate masterpieces, just as poetry has, or sculpture, or painting.

– Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

Even now I cannot help feeling that it is a mistake to think that the passion one feels in creation is ever really shown in the work one creates. Art is always more abstract than we fancy. Form and colour tell us of form and colour – that is all. It often seems to me that art conceals the artist far more completely than it ever reveals him.

– Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

You do anything in the world to gain a reputation. As soon as you have one, you seem to want to throw it away. It is silly of you, for there is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.

– Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

He used to wonder at the shallow psychology of those who conceive the Ego in man as a thing simple, permanent, reliable, and of one essence. To him, man was a being with myriad lives and myriad sensations, a complex multiform creature that bore within itself strange legacies of thought and passion, and whose very flesh was tainted with the monstrous maladies of the dead.

– Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

…you will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you have never had the courage to commit. – Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray