Tuesday, July 22, 2014

On Composition

"Composition applies to things intentionally constructed or unintentionally combined, things artificial as well as natural, a landscape painting or the nutritive ingredients in a soil. Stein composed her work out of whatever ingredients she came upon, from commonly used words, everyday objects, personal sensations, and local affairs, to major historical figures and events. These all constituted a continuous surround around her. This surround did not feature Stein as the “center” or the code through which everything passes. Instead, she wrote in an aesthetics of surrounds, observing them and living in them. This sense of composition is a near synonym to environment as the context and condition of the life one is living, the “continuous present,” as Stein declared."

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