Finis Terrae (Land’s End)— Coming to Principle Gallery, June 2025
Nothing is secure but life, transition, the energizing spirit.
–Ralph Waldo Emerson, Circles (1841)
There is a lot to discuss from the 1841 Emerson essay, Circles, from which the words above are taken, much of which is applicable to the new painting above them. But that will have to wait for another day. Today we’ll focus on just this small part of his essay.
This new painting is 15″ by 30″ 0n canvas and is included in my upcoming solo show, Entanglement, opening June 15th at the Principle Gallery. I chose its title, Finis Terrae (Land’s End), because the term Land’s End, in whatever local language is spoken, is employed in a variety of locales around the world to signify the furthest point one can venture in a particular direction before reaching the sea. I saw that small rocky island with its blue house as being such a place, an endpoint, a place where one has reached the end of one realm and can only proceed by venturing into a different and unknown realm.
A transition point from one state of being into another.
I often think of those first ocean voyagers who left the Land’s End of their countries and proceeded out into the ocean without knowing where they might end up or what might lie in store for them. Theirs was a venture into the unknown and in order to survive and continue their journey, they had to make the transition from a life bound by soil and stone, forests and fields, a land with its own rhythms and cycles, to a watery life ruled by the wave and the wind, one under the unrelenting gaze of the sun and the moon.
Much of what they knew from their prior life on land now meant little in the new world in which they traveled. They lived by different rhythms now with different parameters and concerns. In order to survive, they truly underwent a transition from one state of being to another.
I see a similar kind of transition here. It’s not necessarily about departing land on a sea voyage. No, it’s a different sort of voyage, more of a spiritual quest that seeks a sense of unity with the greater powers of the universe, which is the basis for much of the work in this show.
For some, there comes a time when they recognize–though they will never fully understand it–the endless power and chaos of the universe and realize that they and everything they see and know are products of that churning tangle of energy. They come to know that at some point they will depart this realm to rejoin with that greater power.
They will leave this Land’s End and head out into the unknown for a reunion, a homecoming, of sorts.
A transition from one state of being to another.
And that’s what I see in this painting. It is neither sad nor happy. It just is as it is. It has a shifting sense of what it is, one that reflects back to me my own mood at any time. And I like that reflective quality. That may be the source of the vast appeal this piece holds for me.
As with Emerson’s essay, there’s a lot more that could be said. For now, let’s leave it here with a song from English folk singer June Tabor, whose songs I have shared here in the past. This song is called, of course, Finisterre. It is a beautiful tune and concerns a departure from a port called Santander, in Land’s End, Finisterre, Spain. Wonderful atmosphere in this song. Thought it paired well with this painting.
Redtree Times 