This picture just captivates me.
On one level I am drawn to its wonderful creativity. I bought the door stop pictured below for my office door out of sheer respect for whoever the person was who thought of it. This kind of creativity needs to be rewarded.
I have to tip my cap to this artist of the chain link fence picture as well. On another level, though, this picture goes so much deeper than just creativity. What is it saying to you? The chain link fence, ubiquitous, a comparatively cheap and efficient way to keep something in or keep something out, strong, you can see what is on the other side, yet you cannot reach it. The design of the fence itself is a model of conformity and permanence. Its tightly wound wire states very emphatically that “you can’t get out.”
Yet in this picture, not only can someone get past this fence now, the fence itself is breaking free. The very instrument of control, force, and restriction is itself becoming instruments of freedom. Dead weight has become helium. Anchors have become wings.
It is easy to see ourselves in the picture, both in the lock-step control of the lower part of the fence and in the links breaking free in the upper part of the fence. Optimism spills out from the picture, even if only to feel good for the links flying into the distance. “Good for you,” we whisper. “Good for you.” So powerful are the images of the links as wings that even the total grayness of the picture cannot keep us feeling gray. Somehow we see the gray as a color of the rainbow.
Of course, we need not only whisper, good for you. The links taking off to who knows where can be us. Those freedom loving links can represent our new way of being, our new view of the world, our recognition that we can choose to leave a tightly wound focus on control.
It would be interesting to use this picture as part of an assignment in school. I can see it easily being used in creative writing for Language Arts, or for activities in Health class, or Social Studies, or Bible. What are some thought questions that could open the discussion in a class setting? Such questions might include –
What is this picture saying?
What did the artist want to convey?
The caption under this picture said that We Live the Feeling of Our Thinking. What does that mean?
Did someone need to cut the links to free them or did they free themselves?
Does this picture suggest that fences are bad and that being free of them is the goal?
Is there such a thing as a good fence?
What would make a fence less good, or even bad?
What do you think? How could this picture be used in a classroom or in a choice theory workshop? How could the picture’s creativity and insight really be plugged into?
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This image captivates me too. There is so much going on. The barren foggy landscape and worn out fence makes me feel a need for a warm coat and hat. The wire pieces freed from the fence are flying toward a brighter portion of sky. This gives me hope. The caption implies that this sense of freedom has a whimsical nature and might be as simple as thinking differently. Thanks Jim
I thought about the caption for a long time, wondering as to its accuracy. I came to the conclusion that it is accurate, maybe especially for me, since I am a feeling person. I think, though, that everybody processes life this way. We can greatly influence (even control) our thinking, yet we seem to experience that thinking at a feeling level. I continue to think about (and feel) this phrase. It seems to be growing in significance for me, helping me to see my behavior just a bit more clearly.
Dr. Roy, have you read the Robert Frost poem, “Mending Wall”? I think you might like it.
I have read it twice (so far) and am thinking about it, thinking hard actually. Not an unpleasant hard thinking, but a pleasant concentration. The end of the poem is significant to me, where he sees his neighbor working so hard to mend the fence between them.
I see him there
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
He moves in darkness as it seems to me,
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father’s saying,
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, “Good fences make good neighbors.”
He seems to be pulling back the curtains that shield him from his neighbor’s thinking, the thoughts that have created the “him.” He has become like stone, savage-armed, set in his ideology regarding neighborship. He moves in darkness, yet not darkness of the night, but darkness of the head. In the end, rather than really thinking about what his father believed about fences and neighbors, he hugs his father’s saying and goes about keeping the wall(s) in place.
Wow! Thank you for sharing this!