Art Is for Seeing Evil (2022)
The essay argues that art's role is not to beautify or escape reality, but to confront and make visible the evil and suffering inherent in human existence, drawing on philosophical and artistic examples to contend that true art forces viewers to see what they would rather ignore.
Background
- Agnes Martin (1912–2004) was a Canadian-born abstract painter known for minimalist grid paintings that evoke serenity, emptiness, and transcendence. She is often framed as a mystic or optimist.
- This essay pushes back on that sanitized image. Martin's work, it argues, emerges from a lifelong struggle with schizophrenia — she suffered hallucinations, paranoia, and delusions, and was hospitalized repeatedly.
- The core claim: Martin's grids are not a vision of peace but a discipline imposed on chaos. Art, on this view, is not for expressing beauty but for wrestling with — and seeing — evil, madness, or disorder, then giving it form.
- The essay connects her to the long tradition of art as a confrontation with the darker parts of existence, from Greek tragedy to Goya to modernism. A key reference: "The loneliest moment in life is when you have just experienced that which makes you realize that you are fundamentally alone," a line often cited in discussions of art and existential isolation.