Slow looking

The Blute-Fin Windmill (Glasgow Museums)

It's been a while since my artist son and I got together without domestic stuff weighing us down and slowing the pace of our lightning brains and scintillating conversations.

So we've arranged to meet in the French Gallery at Kelvingrove and take in some paintings, and the first thing I do wrong is start reading the labels, my thinking being that an uneducated viewer like myself needs guidance on what he's supposed to be looking at.

'No! No!' he tells me. ‘What you already know about a painting isn't relevant on your first encounter. It's just you and the artwork. Look at it. Engage with it. Notice things. Put them into words, if it helps. It’s called Slow Looking. 

'So take your time and tell me what you see here,' he nods towards a small work mounted at eye level and framed by ornate brass, as most of the paintings in this gallery seem to be.

'It's a windmill,' I tell him. 'Up on a hill against a blue sky with fluffy clouds, viewed from what looks like an allotment that has a rickety old garden shed, lit by the sun. I like the shed. It’s bright and homely. In fact the whole scene sort of glows.'

‘Very good. What else can you see? Look more closely.'

I step in and notice French flags on top of the windmill and a viewing tower beside it. 'Why are there French flags on the windmill and a viewing tower beside it?' I ask him.

‘Because this is The Blute-Fin Windmill, Montmartre, painted by Vincent Van Gogh,’ my sister reads from the label, having either failed to get the memo or decided to ignore it, as aunts often do.

‘This windmill was a popular tourist attraction,’ she reads on. ‘Because of the magnificent views it gave over the city of Paris.’

I stare expectantly at my son, waiting for him to repeat the admonition to engage with the artwork before reading anything about it. But of course he doesn’t. Correcting dads when they’re wrong comes naturally. Correcting aunts would be rude.

‘I’ve noticed something about these little figures milling around the windmill,’ I tell him. ‘Viewed from a few feet away they’re clearly people. One's even holding an umbrella. But up close they’re just splodges of colour. How does a painter do that? Is it planned precisely or does he just go blob, splash, dash and see what happens?’

He pauses, trying to put into words a skill that exists quite happily without language. ‘It’s not really either of those,’ he says. ‘You sort of feel your way into it and the feeling transmits itself to your hand without going through your  … intellect. You get the essence of the thing and your hand moves.

‘You can even look at it afterwards and wonder how you did it – and sometimes you just don’t know.’

‘So does that mean art can’t be taught?’ I ask.

 ‘Can anything really be taught?’ he replies.

‘I guess not,’ I say. ‘You just have to learn stuff yourself, don’t you?’

A little splodge of colour beside me grows much more animated than Van Gogh’s on the viewing tower. ‘You do remember I was a teacher for 30 years,’ it tells me. ‘Are you saying I didn’t teach anybody anything, in all that bloody time?’

My son gives me a long look then shakes his head sadly. ‘You're still learning about slow looking, chief,’ he says. ‘But you're the best I've ever seen at slow thinking.’