Luciano Bartolini – in the room they were paintings

On tiptoe
by Elisabetta Bucciarelli

Along the path of existence, some more than others take on roles express the Collective Psyche. True or false, it doesn’t matter. Because the idea that a special person (musician, writer, poet, painter) is able to give us back our “parts”, lost, forgotten or undiscovered and recognized until that moment, it is definitely a true prodigy. So it is difficult to believe in it. Yet sometimes, in front of a song, a poem, a book or a painting, this happens to us. “Instantaneous understanding”, as James Hillman called it, grasps us. It is an intuitive reaction that makes us hold our breaths, being impressed and at the same time being harmoniously involved, almost being inserted in the artwork. The mythical thought attributes this force to a form of extraordinary power which is contained in the thing itself. In the music track, in the poetry, in the painting. A power that can only be a result of what is partly or completely already known to us. Does it mean that in the painting (or any other artwork in general) it is reproduced something that formerly belongs to us all? Lying dormant in the memory, in the forgetfulness or in the distraction? So we intend to believe in the existence of what Jung defined as the collective subconsciousness? I think, yes. It is relatively easy to recognize in a painting what is depicted on it, the Mind “reads” and, when it is fulfilled, it calms down, giving way to the heart, to the feeling, to the intellectual, emotional and artistic judgment. What if it is the intuition to recognize everything (I know this thing/sign/color/movement, of course I know it… but I don’t know what is it, where I have already saw it, maybe it was already done by someone… but who?) so it’s here then the resentful mind goes into overdrive, writhing and heating up, but not being able to decode. It just can’t. The only opened line of communication is that of the soul. There are some who refuse it a priori. Others get carried away without any question or study and will to discover the roots. To focus. Try to comprehend. But either way, the seed has been sown, be it cultural, intellectual, emotional or spiritual, and it has found a small place in the life of each of us. If it is the soul to grasp, we are sure that it doesn’t know the mediocrity, and It can’t be confused. It might ask for support: where I have already seen/heard/read, where I have already experienced what I see now? The soul, above all, is always traveling, (and as always) it doesn’t scream, it doesn’t complain, it never dies. It is something profoundly vital, it loves the beauty and takes all the best from the life. Everything effortlessly and on tiptoe.