Talking About Faces, In Paint Poem by Denis Mair

(in response to a painting by Abdelhaq Djellab, posted today)
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It is in our nature to delve endlessly into the implications of a human face, so when a painter conducts figurative experiments with colors and lines and depth, the process is like a quarrying stone, but also like fetching water. It is like drawing power from a dynamo, but also like composing a musical series. When he uses representation to explore the implications of a face, it is like talking back to the universe, instead of always passively listening to whatever faces are thrown at him. It is not just talking back to the universe, it is inviting the universe to talk through his eyes and brush. It is being a subdomain of the universe that talks back to the universe. It is hard for the universe to talk back to itself, because so much passes through the net of talking and listening. The talk of the universe is Sisyphean, because it has to be done by entities, and they have to deal simultaneously with the difficulties of expression and the threat of imminent cessation. For each type of fish one wants to catch, there is a different kind of net.