The paintings for my exhibition are almost ready. . . . Meanwhile, I want to share with you some of my ideas concerning them.

You will notice that there is much less of the calligraphy which I used in the recent past. The straight, vibrating lines against which the calligraphy had been placed now take sole command of the canvases.

As you know, my approach to a canvas is based mainly on intuition. Nevertheless, once these vibrating lines had appeared, I thought I recognized them as presenting a parallel to my present way of life. I thought, perhaps they appear now, so separated and alone, because while teaching at the Art Institute, I am living alone for the first time in many years. But I am serenely alone, not lonely: the paintings suggest this 'aloneness', not a negative 'loneliness'. I began to examine the difference between the two terms. Western man has made too much, I think, of the cult of togetherness. Motherandchild, manandwife, we speak of these as though they were units. But I consider such fusing neither possible nor desirable. My paintings' parallel lines, each one separate but not isolated, seem to me to symbolize man’s true state. They convey to me the mystery of his varied exertions, which parallel the activities of his fellows without merging him with them or obscuring his individuality.

Perhaps I might have developed the idea of 'alone but not isolated' without the Chicago sojourn. For, more and more in recent years, I have found it necessary to step back from the turmoil and confusion of life seen too close, in an attempt from a distance to find the calmness of its inner core. I believe the artist should not be content merely to recognize and portray Chaos; I think he must try to convey what is beyond it.

These are the concepts I recognize while looking at my new work. Evidently they have been, from the start, the stimuli to which I was responding. But the work is completed, and when I have finished with it, it is equally finished with me. As I said years ago, when a painting is completed it becomes an independent entity, indifferent to its source. . . .

Have I made clear what I wanted to say? I hope my paintings speak better than my words.