It’s a tendency of mine, when in the presence of work by folks with Chinese, Japanese or Korean names, to go looking for calligraphic influences. The discipline of ink brush painting, which is part of the standard curriculum in many places, will lend a sense of sureness to the composition. In the case of Ms. Lai I can also sense the feeling of Japanese screens in the spatial architecture.

Jay Hoffman and I are discussing my own work in something of these same terms (or at least I think that’s what’s happening). And I have a definite prejudice against the “merely beautiful” in part because so many of my colleagues use it to justify the nice and pretty.

But sometimes I think I’m also reacting to the word “merely” and the cultural dummying down of the idea of beauty.

So like you, I would want to add other elements to the lyricism, to speak of the work in other terms than the pleasurable, to play down the sheer pleasure of being in its presence.

Perhaps, though, the lyrical, based on a strength of intellect and artistic experience, is sufficient to make an art that stands on its own. The intellect involved might have a great depth and breadth, so that the beauty comes out of it but isn’t necessarily attached to any part of it but comes because of the weight of the artist’s experience and intellect.

I fear I’m just blathering. What I meantersay might be something like, once in a lifetime or two, perhaps a work is so astonishing beautiful that it simply needs to be discussed in those terms, without further ado about underpinnings.

I don’t know. I think Helen Frankenthaler’s work sometimes strikes me that way.

As a reviewer, of course, you do have to be very careful about what you say — you could seriously damage the artist’s reputation if you went on too much about pleasure and lyricism. And of course, you have to fill up the column with words, too. But that’s a problem of audience, rhetoric, the culture we live in, and so forth. A writer is always working with more or less malleable external perceptions. But I guess I’m asking if, in the privacy of your own home, you think that astonishing, amazing, uncanny, unequaled lyricism could be an adequate presence for a work of art.

And without some specific art in front of us, perhaps the whole discussion is impossible.

I see her work as both lyrical and intellectual. I do see the structure, the pattern of the music.

Once, I relax into my summer, I may even be able to sing along.

I suppose I meant mainly a trap for the viewer or reviewer. The artist knows what she’s doing. Lai’s paintings are indeed lyrical, but they’re deeply intellectual as well (I don’t know about “severely”). It seems disingenuous for to ignore that.

Regarding the description of artworks as beautiful as lyrical more generally, I would say that its okay, but I would feel obliged to add qualifications. Its as if lyricism by itself or unchecked is not enough or merely decorative. I suppose this could reflect a prejudice against decoration or against the traditional work of women. But I also realize that I could get in trouble for describing work by a women artist as lyrical without qualification.

I would appreciate hearing more of your own view.

Your comment “the lyricism can be something of a trap” bothers me. Is it a trap for the viewer, who sings along instead of noticing the rigorous underpinnings? Or is it a trap for the artist, who might like the melody so much she forget to gird her structures? Or is it a trap for the reviewer, who might be seduced when she should be thinking severely intellectual thoughts instead of whistling cheerily?

I sound facetious, but I am actually interested in your point of view, because if you substitute “beauty” for “lyricism” (which is easy to do), it’s a frequent critical comment about quilted textiles. So how does the artist/viewer/critic get around the “beauty” or “lyricism.”?