Carl Mehrbach's Art Blog - Making Art

Carl Mehrbach's Art Blog

I Will Get There From Here

5/13/2021

Drawing 05·11·2021, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches

I am working to get to the promised knowing. It does exist. It is available to me. Every day I am working hard to get there. It is about in-my-face, in-your-face, bold-face truth. This drawing is another step in that direction. Today is another day walking toward the promise.

Whoopee

5/11/2021

Drawing 05·09·2021, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches

Joy in art is joy simple. Whoopee!!!

Giving Up the Rain Forest for the Desert

5/9/2021

Drawing 05·08·2021 No.1, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches

Drawing 05·08·2021 No.2, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches

sThis is about me getting you to see me for who I am. No, I do not want to steal your soul, but I do want you to pay attention to me. My recent work is more attention demanding. This is intentional because it is required. Why plod along making work for myself when I can make work to communicate with you? These two drawing center themselves, request clearly, speak clearly. Why was it so difficult fo me to get this moment? This is the moment I understand clarity of purpose is actually artfully intelligent. The Beatles did it. Beethoven and Picasso did it. The best at their craft understand this. I wonder, why did I wander the complexity of the rain forest when I wanted the simplicity of the desert?

Front & Center

5/8/2021

Drawing 05·07·2021, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches

dI am fascinated by the appeal of front and center composition. Quick engagement of the viewer depends on straightforward engagement of the viewer. This is accomplished by using straight-on centered forms, easy and simple images, compositions built on one fully comprehensible shape. Picasso and Rothko mastered this, proved this, over and over again. Today I show my effort in this direction, made yesterday. Also I show a Picasso and a Rothko to illustrate my point.

Pablo Picasso, "Head of a Man with Hat", charcoal & collage on paper, 62.2x47.3 cm, 1912

Mark Rothko, "Red", oil & paper on canvas, 838x654 cm, 1968

Failing Oblivion

5/7/2021

Drawing 05·05·2021, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches

Oblivion is not a place or time, it is a horizon that cannot be reached. Awareness is everything. I am more awake than ever. Being fully awake is the opposite of full oblivion. Both, perhaps, are impossible. In any case, with each drawing I awake to more possibilities that make sense in my march, step by step, to optimal self-expression. This drawing is one such step.

Spotlight on Main Street

5/5/2021

Drawing 05·02·2021 No.1, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches

Drawing 05·02·2021 No.2, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches

My Main Street ain't your Main Street. It is ALL mine. That's the reason no one could, or would wish, to make images that I make. My task, my job, is to spotlight my personal Main Street. Yesterday's drawings shed light on this thoroughfare, the road I wish to walk. I do walk alone. I open doors, one storefront followed by the next. I seek to purchase stuff for sustenance, for living exhilaration. I organize my choices for living well in my own personal town.

The Muster in Six

5/2/2021

Drawing 05·01·2021 No.1, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches

Drawing 05·01·2021 No.2, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches

Drawing 05·01·2021 No.3, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches

Drawing 05·01·2021 No.4, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches

Drawing 05·01·2021 No.5, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches

Drawing 05·01·2021 No.6, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches

Six drawings made six insights. These drawings were made seeking truth, emotional feedback, one after the next, each reacting to the previous.

Three and Three Again

5/1/2021

Drawing 04·30·2021 No.1, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches

Drawing 04·30·2021 No.2, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches

Drawing 04·30·2021 No.3, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches

Three in research for more and more and more closer to realizing self-determination as law, not as question. These are answers. More questions are coming. More answers will be given.

and then there is ∞

4/30/2021

Drawing 04·29·2021, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches

∞ is here in problems to solve, answers to be given. I wish for ∞ time to investigate as well.

To be at Sea is Enough

4/29/2021

Drawing 04·28·2021, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches

"The Opposite of Indifference" (2021 No.4, state 03), oil on canvas, 49x53½ inches, {"The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference. Because of indifference one dies before one actually dies. To be in the window and watch people being sent to concentration camps or being attacked in the street and do nothing, that's being dead. His or her neighbor are of no consequence. Their hidden or visible anguish is of no interest. Indifference reduces the Other to an Abstraction." - Elie Wiesel, "US News & World Report" (27 October 1986)}

This is what it is to be an artist. Always at sea, always surrounded by vast possibilities of calm or storms or sharks or dolphins or whales. Always full of magic, full of wonder. Daunting. This is daunt in a good way, intimidation by life. I make art to express my unabashed wanderlust. I wonder because I wander. Questions and answers are impossible to ignore. Surviving overwhelming waves of wonderment is a never-ending task. Thus art must be made to stay level, not to capsize.