In many works of art which I admire and love I experience an emanation of quality so difficult to define that I can only call it 'magical'. Magical, in that some paintings have a presence to which one's senses respond in a way which cannot be explained on rational grounds by dissection or analysis. It does not seem possible to define this sensation. To have the experience one must be in a receptive frame of mind - similar perhaps to that of the artist at the moment of creation. Looking at a bright sky one becomes aware of those amoeba-like floating forms and shadows within the eye itself. Try to examine them, to bring them into focus, and they slip and slide away. They are always there, but just out of reach. It is hard to describe these forms or to prove their existence, but nevertheless once experienced they are undeniable. And so it is with the quality I call 'magical'. If a work of art can be said to have a vital core, a heart, then I believe that somehow this indefinable and elusive element of 'magic' will have as its territory a place very close to that heart. It is rare, and very, very difficult to achieve. It seems to me that the importance of this aspect of art is too often neglected in writing about the visual arts - especially contemporary work. Perhaps because it is not easy to express verbally those qualities which are essentially visual. But preoccupation with novelty and fashion, endless partisan battles, long descriptions of the physical appearance of specific works, and overemphasis on means, processes and techniques, can relegate to the background the fundamental 'raison X8tre' of an artist's offering. Filters are used as a means of eliminating anything which does not serve one's purpose at a given time. The less one uses filters the more the whole is revealed. When a spectator approaches a painting with his own particular set of filters or theories be they historical, political, intellectual or whatever - he either finds what he is looking for or dismisses the work as irrelevant. He has deprived himself of the possibility of any fresh experience or revelation by looking only for confirmation of that which he already 'knows'. Is the expert who 'knows what he thinks' so very different from the layman who 'knows what he likes'?