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Frederick Franck, Dove
It is [the] flash of realization
of not-two-ness,
that is both the center and the endpoint of our human experience.
The purpose of 'looking' is to survive, to cope, to manipulate … this we are trained
to do from our first day. When, on the other hand, I
SEE,
suddenly I am all eyes, I forget this
ME, am liberated from it and dive into the reality that
confronts me.
 
The Zen of Seeing
Frederick Franck |
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frederick franck
ink painter - writer - sculptor - draftsman -
teacher
Rather than any of the
labels above, Frederick Franck liked to call himself an image-maker.
He was a true Renaissance Man, writing books and creating images until his death at 94.
His first book, The Zen of Seeing: seeing/drawing as
meditation, was my introduction to
drawing-as-meditation, as something much more profound
than the end product called an artwork.
He went on to write over 30 books, including The Awakened Eye,
to which the title of this site pays homage.
Franck loved to quote
Zen master
Hui Neng:
The meaning of life is to see.
It wasn’t just any old seeing that was referred to
however;
he knew what it meant to encounter nondual awareness.
For him it was a direct impulse from heart-seeing to hand-scribbling with no loop through the
labeling and categorizing part of the brain. It was
seeing without the shadows of conditioning, and
marveling at what turned up on the paper.
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There is
no other reason for drawing than the awareness of the eye awakening from
its half-sleep. There is - I am convinced - no other good reason for
art, all the art-popes and theories notwithstanding...
Paradise, for Zen, is accessible now and here, for it
is our everyday world, but perceived by the awakened eye.
To be
liberated from the pathology of avidya (which in Sanskrit
literally means not-knowing, ignorance, in the sense of
un-intelligence, i.e. stupidity!) is to be awakened or enlightened, to
see realistically, to find one's place in the organic Whole, to see with
the awakened eye.
You are not copying nature, but responding to nature in
full awareness, to the way nature expresses itself in that object.
Frederick Franck
more on frederick franck
artisans
nonduality
original face
seeing/drawing as meditation
the 10 'commandments'
the way of nen
wildsight - the innocent eye
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