Rolf Stenersen on art and Klee

Paul Klee, he’s the picture book to rule all picture books. The ladder and the bridge to a world I don’t recognize within me. Klee wrote that the goal of an artist was to make us see things that are invisible. He has enabled me to see something more than I could have seen without him.

Especially in the final years of Klee’s life, he writes me runic messages. Reveals dark red angst, but also hope and faith. I knew that death was black. Empty and cold and devoid of light. Klee painted the fires behind the black grilles rose-red. What did he know? What could he see?

Others ask what a scholar thinks. I would rather see what an artist senses. We know so much about what we humans say and do, and so little of who we really are. Go to Klee to learn about what’s hidden. You could spend a long time there, wondering. I am glad there are so many Klees I still haven’t seen.