Taoists think so, believing we must empty ourselves that we might be filled, rid ourselves of misconception and prejudice that what is true might come flooding in.
Artists know the power of empty space. If we were to sketch something as ordinary as tomatoes in our garden, we would draw negative space, creating the outlines of the empty places. Sketching slows us down and makes us look closely. It is a form of meditation.
The abstract spaces are just as real as the concrete, and they have infinite depth.
We live in emptiness, bound on all sides by the concrete, but that is only in one dimension. In negative space, we are limited no longer to the vines and the fruit.
Possibilty dwells in emptiness, in the unforseen, the unexpected, and the unimagined.
copyright 2010 J. O'Brien, all rights reserved
