Bill Jensen
stillness/flowing
Bill Jensen
Bill Jensen
stillness/flowing
cheim & read
All Things Unanimity (for Bill Jensen)
phong h. bui No one knows from the beginning why the sound of this rippling, prim water surface of Turtle Lake in Minnesota sent forth his journey to a specific place or space that Has neither name, shape nor form, and time does not even exist. No one knows from the beginning his hands were large enough to carry the sound of The water, and how remarkable his heart beat resonates with it, for this simultaneity Has shown him a particular path to life and all of its nearly invisible seepages. A friend told me he had no choice but to surrender his longing to the rhythm of this similar Sound that once altered Wang Wei’s vision of the world across the Pacific ocean, centuries ago. An old monk, half-naked without knowing, touching his left foot against one particular rock, Mistaking it for a pillow of cloud floating in the sky. Nearby, an erotic implication is Too great, for the delicate outlines tracing over body regions, front and back torsos, buttock, Arms, legs, all becoming unnamable configurations transfixed against the radiant sun and moon.
Divinity, transgressive spirit spinning dualism from West to East, spreading on thin tissues of Skin, wrapping around hamstrings, fibula, bones, tremoring like particles of dust Settling on tops of Earth’s precious minerals. Blue Cupola, St. Sebastian, Louhan prompting smooth porcelain membranes, made even before Neolithic time. They’re next to the rough, irregular terrains, like unbounded cave walls negotiating Between painted and sculpted images, made by his hands and time, weather, moisture, Among other enduring and unexpected phenomenon. Orchestrating his masonic tools, Wonderous hawk, buttering trowel, metal float, spatula, tray, spiral formation–cuddling, Troweling substance–soaking, tempering speed–scratching, space break–caressing. Sucking matter–spotting, absorbing materials–skating, he mixes his own color pigments With moon’s luminescence, glimpses of the blazing sun shining in-between cracks of Overlapping planes of opacity. An arrival of euphoria he has waited for since birth. Oodles of snails' and insects' footprints, his hand prints too— it’s nature’s automatism, Bathed by Summer rain with occasional thumbs pressing for things to reveal on some mysterious synthetic projective geometry. Eternal palimpsests, etched on this side of geography, Especially for those whose lightness is held by amazing trepidation. Here it begins with poking A gargantuan bubble, breaking a long, sustaining silence for all exceptional beings. Like warmth heating cold energy in Mount Wutai; Mara’s temptation, Resistance, aggression, constant feeding to the invisible. Like Qiu’s wars of unification, Hot dark matter, far and near fields of vision, propagating countless random distributions of Mercury, leaping on and off the central axis whenever needed.
Father Daughters, Oracle Bones, wheelbarrow, tar pits, molten lava, all dissolving by Cliff sides of Hushed Mountain. Wheel Rim Compass contains its multitudes, deemed for Wang Wei’s mythical quatrains, ready to excite the next generations of Buddha Poets. Equal length of circular halos, celebrating Buddha’s fart. Building mammalian heart in Mid-air with Bitter Chant, subclavian artery–breathing, the famous dividing septum, left and Right atrium, aortic arch–swelling, hunger ghosts, messenger ghosts, fine wind, clear morning, It’s time to rejoice our ancestral treasures, for our vulnerability is our strength before The world’s formidable forces of destruction, while remaining humble before our season of fruitage. He was rapping with Hokusai about his manga while thinking of the Book of Way: Great image has no form. Radiating absence, spikes of vibrancy, contemplating tenderness, Innumerable white ropes, all regal, as terrified as flashes of lightning; As calming as the lake of mind. Here, Vastness/Flowing means endlessly posing questions: Why can’t internal discontinuity be the means to return to emptiness? Why can’t emptiness be filled with nothingness? Why can’t nothingness be emptied with absence? Why can’t absence be as concrete as presence? Why can’t presence be as vast as the Atlantic ocean? Why can’t the vastness of the Atlantic ocean be as intimate as Turtle Lake? Why can’t the miraculous end be the splendid beginning? Let nature run its course without human intervention. It is here his work truly begins.
Transgressions (Second Study), 2019. Oil on linen, diptych. 26 x 49 in. / 66 x 124.5 cm.
Transgressions Transgressed, 2019-2020. Oil on linen, diptych. 39 1/2 x 75 1/2 in. / 100.3 x 191.8 cm.
Bitter Chant VI, 2018-20. Oil on linen. 32 1/2 x 25 in. / 82.6 x 63.5 cm.
With Child II, 2019-20. Oil on linen, diptych. 28 1/4 x 49 1/4 in. / 71.8 x 125.1 cm.
Bitter Chant XI, 2020-21. Oil on linen. 40 3/4 x 32 1/2 in. / 103.5 x 82.6 cm.
Bitter Chant VIII, 2020-21. Oil on linen. 36 x 32 in. / 91.4 x 81.3 cm.
Bitter Chant VII, 2019-20. Oil on linen. 40 x 32 in. / 101.6 x 81.3 cm.
Bitter Chant IX, 2020-21. Oil on linen. 40 x 32 in. / 101.6 x 81.3 cm.
Ch’an Bones (Lazarus), 2018-20. Oil on linen. 60 x 43 in. / 152.4 x 109.2 cm.
Sista/Sista, 2020-2021. Oil on linen, diptych. 40 x 79 in. / 101.6 x 200.7 cm.
Father, Daughters, 2020-2021. Oil on linen. 40 1/2 x 30 1/2 in. / 102.9 x 82.6 cm.
Stillness/Flowing Study, 2019-20. Oil on linen. 28 x 22 3/4 in. / 71.1 x 57.8 cm.
Stillness/Flowing, 2021. Oil on linen, triptych. 56 1/2 x 124 in. / 143.5 x 315 cm.
Wheel Rim Compass I, 2019-20. Oil on linen. 40 1/4 x 32 in. / 102.2 x 81.3 cm.
right Wheel Rim Compass II (for Wang Wei), 2019-20. Oil on linen. 39 1/4 x 31 in. / 99.7 x 78.7 cm. next page Vastness/Flowing, 2020-21. Oil on linen, diptych. 60 1/2 x 82 1/2 in. / 153.7 x 209.6 cm.
Wheel Rim Compass IV (for Wang Wei), 2020. Oil on linen. 37 x 28 in. / 94 x 71.1 cm.
Blue Cupola, 2020-21. Oil on linen, triptych. 59 x 120 1/4 in. / 149.9 x 305.4 cm.
Wheel Rim Compass VII (for Wang Wei), 2021. Oil on linen. 20 1/2 x 18 1/4 in. / 52.1 x 46.4 cm.
Wheel Rim Compass VI (for Wang Wei), 2021. Oil on linen. 36 x 32 in. / 91.4 x 81.3 cm.
Oracle Bones (Fire Spirit), 2017-20. Oil on linen. 28 1/2 x 37 1/2 in. / 72.4 x 95.3 cm.
Dark Enigma, 2019-20. Oil on linen. 32 x 25 in. / 81.3 x 63.5 cm.
Hushed Mountain (for Ron Gorchov), 2020-21. Oil on linen. 36 x 32 in. / 91.4 x 81.3 cm.
Redon, 1976-77. Oil on canvas, 20 x 16 in. / 50.8 x 40.6 cm.
In 2019, Margrit and I bought back an early painting of mine, Redon, 1977. From the very first sighting, the painting has impregnated a lot of the new work, starting with the center panel of Blue Cupola, and then on to the Wheel Rim Compass series. “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks, but an old dog can teach an old dog tricks.” — Bill Jensen, December 2021
i paint I paint so that the cosmos can remember itself I paint so that the cosmos can see itself I paint so that the cosmos can be with itself I paint so that I can make contact with the cosmos I paint so that I can be with the cosmos I paint so that others can be with the cosmos
Bill Jensen Haiku, 2021
bill jensen (born 1945, Minneapolis) came into prominence in the late 1970s in New York. His work was exhibited at the New Museum, the Brooklyn Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art (including 1981 Whitney Biennial), and the Museum of Modern Art. In 1987, he had a solo exhibition at the Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C., which traveled to the Lannan Museum, Lake Worth, FL, in 1988. Recently, his work was shown at the New Bedford Whaling Museum in conjunction with its Albert Pinkham Ryder exhibition in 2021, and at MoMA PS1 in New York in 2016. Jensen earned his BFA and MFA from the University of Minnesota in 1968 and 1970, and moved to New York in 1971. He has lived and worked in Williamsburg Brooklyn since 1976. Jensen’s work is in the permanent collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Dallas Museum of Art, the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C., the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, the Boston Museum of Fine Art, the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C., the Tate, London, the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.
Published on the occasion of the Cheim & Read exhibition Bill Jensen: Stillness/Flowing January 20 — April 2, 2022 design John Cheim poem Phong H. Bui production Stephen Truax photography Alex Yudzon printer Graphicom isbn 978-1-944316-20-4 Artworks and poem © 2021 Bill Jensen cover Wheel Rim Compass III (for Wang Wei), 2019-20. Oil on linen. 26 x 20 in. / 101.6 x 81.3 cm. endpages Photograph of the artist from Ryder, a film by Stephanie Wuertz and Sarah Cowan, 2020.