Paper cut painting, acrylic on masonite.
“Wind has many definitions. In the most literal sense it is the movement of air, which we experience as gentle breezes, warm chinooks, powerful gales, or destructive tornados. But wind is also breath; idle talk or gossip; meaningless rhetoric. One can catch wind of some news, or whisper words into someone’s ear, or use their breath to create music through a wind instrument. We give our words unto the wind and hope that it carries them where they need be.
Wind also relates to energy, sometimes restrained and captured in the form of wind turbines, and sometimes unrestrained and uncontrollable (run like the wind). Wind is sometimes used in reference to an influence or tendency that cannot be resisted (winds of change) or an impending, immutable situation (which way the wind blows). In this, it seems like wind is associated with fate. In mythology the wind is often personified as a god or goddess, as a way to explain the often unpredictable and destructive force.
Wind is a basic element of life… In Chinese philosophy, life force energy is called Qi and its literal translation is breath; it is the steam rising from rice as it cooks. Similarly, in Hindu philosophy ‘prana’, life force or cosmic energy, means breath or air.
Reinhold Pinter explores the many variations of wind from gentle summer breeze to raging tornado; from whispered secrets to the distribution of ideas.
Wind is a touring exhibition developed by the Alberta Society of Artists for the Travelling Exhibition Program (TREX) It will be on display in the Learning Commons from January 24 – February 16.
Please feel free to drop by to view this exhibit.