Vanessa,

Thanks for popping in with your excellent perspectives--You give us a bit of perspective on where the artist is coming from, what the artist is reacting to, and what kind of things that the artist is talking about--and you are right, this is a good thread. I just read it again--

Bald Eagle,

I think that you listen too much to what people say about art--the thing to remember is, a work of art speaks directly from the artist to the viewer, that is, you--the artist creates it, and you look at it and react to what you see--to read a bit into John Cage (who I quoted above) the longer you look, the more you see--You can't make rules for what artists will say, what they will use to say it, any more that you can set standards for what people will say in conversation..of course, you don't have to like or agree with everything(or anything that is said), and people tend to forget this, and think, if they don't "appreciate" a work of art, then something is wrong--