Josh Jensen

“Be that self which one truly is.” — Søren Kierkegaard.

I’ve come to believe that painting and psychotherapy are asking the same question. I’ve been rereading Carl Rogers “On Becoming a Person”, and I realize how much my view of art lines up with his view of psychotherapy.

A compelling abstract painting is formed out of a relationship. Initial marks are the beginning of the conversation. When I pay attention to what happens, I’m listening back to what the painting says about itself.

I will often walk around a painting for twenty minutes before making the next move, looking and “listening” from different angles and orientations, trying to discern what this painting is and what it wants to become.

The hardest part isn’t making decisions, It’s discerning which decisions come out of fear of messing it up and which come out of wonder and possibility. There’s resistance, excitement, anticipation, frustration, and everything in between as I work toward what it already is rather than what I think it “should” be.

Rogers believed that much of our suffering comes from trying to become who we think we ought to be rather than paying attention to who we actually are. I wonder if paintings struggle in much the same way. Everyone wants to be good. All artists want to make “good art.” But if good art insists on being like other art, can it really be itself? Can a person be themselves while needing to be like someone else?

painting isn’t about control and isn’t completely surrender. It’s a relationship that forms something that is continually growing experiencing, and not static. “And now, with the help of God, I will become myself“ -Soren Kierkegaard

“There is Another World, And It Is This One”

37” x 60” x 2.5”,

Mixed media on raw canvas, framed and available!

“Ahead of All Parting”

The title comes from a poem by Maria Rilke. Poem included below for your viewing pleasure….

49“ x 49“. Available!

Be ahead of all parting, as if it had already happened.
like winter, which even now is passing.
For beneath the winter is a winter so endless
that to survive it at all is a triumph of the heart.

Be forever dead in Eurydice, and climb back singing.
Climb praying as you return to connection.
Here among the disappearing, in the realm of the transient,
be a ringing glass that shatters as it rings.

Be. And, at the same time, know what it is not to be.
The non-being inside you allows you to vibrate
in full resonance with your world. Use it for once.

To all that has run its course, and to the vast unsayable
numbers of beings abounding in Nature,
add yourself gladly, and cancel the cost.

“A New View”

21” x 33“

Acrylic on raw canvas, framed, and available!