I am not going to write a lot today because I feel charged and ready to get back in the studio. Two days ago I was overwhelmed by the snow and my being forced to deal with it (driving, shoveling, etc). It was not a fun day. Yesterday I did get into the studio, but almost fell asleep in my drawing chair, so tired was I from the previous day. I also spent some time organizing a "Facebook" page.
Here is where I am today: I am obsessed with self-potraiture. Yesterday's first drawing was made in front of a mirror (very unusual). I will continue my obsession and paint on the 32 X 38 inch canvas I prepared with a burnt umber ground. Yesterday's self-portrait drawing annoys me with its realism, which is not all that real. I am not trying to make a physical likeness as much as an emotional likeness. I have been failing because I have been taking too much from my visual reality. Consequently, I like yesterday's second drawing more than the first. This goes to the heart of my struggle. I am trying to find a way to make art which discovers and expresses simultaneously. I cannot achieve this goal if I rely too much on my present visual experience. I looked at my work over the last several months while preparing my "Facebook" page; I am happy with only a little of it. The drawings do not have the compositional force I desire. I know this statement is vague, but I am the one who must deal with it, so clarification will come only through work. All I can say is, "Stayed tuned!" Last night it snowed wet, warm, crystalline, icy particles, almost like sleet. Today I will see an optometrist and have my yearly eye exam; obviously I am very finicky about my vision, always trying to tweak my prescription to see more exactly from all ranges. Every visual activity (reading, drawing, using a computer, painting, driving a car) requires a different depth of field. Yesterday I stretched a 32 X 38 inch canvas, preparing it for my next self-portrait. Last evening I placed a medium value, warm, burnt umber ground on the canvas, using alkyd medium, in hopes it would dry quickly, and be ready for me to paint on today. This morning it was wet.
This bring me to today's plans. First I have to shovel the snow and prepare the cars for travel. I will have limited time in the studio. I will not be able to start the new self-portrait because its ground is wet, so I will probably make a couple of drawings. Then I will be off to the optometrist. Let me tell you why I need to begin another self-portrait, so soon after completing two of them. I find my ability to find form and connect it to expression better than ever before. I also want to keep the size of the head larger than life, and get its entire form in the canvas; the last two self-portraits cut off the top of the head and pinched the forehead, requiring me to distort the top of head by diminishing its size (in the first drawing I post today you can see this kind of distortion in the man's head). And, I want to try using a ground, something I have not done for several years. The burnt umber ground will allow me to immediately interact with a mid-level value, so both light and dark values can instantly be in play. Usually I have to struggle to deal with the overwhelming white of the canvas, and rarely feel comfortable with the overall composition until all the white is covered with new paint. Here are the drawings from yesterday: Today's title alludes to my simple life. Simplicity refers to my lack of planning. I enter days without a lot of clarity. The need for momentary clarity is leaving me. It leaves me discovering in the moment. One moment drives me to the next, like driving a car in a pitch black night, on a winding road, through a landscape of mountains. My headlights allow me to see only a little way beyond my precent position. Every moment brings new views as new vistas are lit with every turn. It is a nice way to live, better than living with anxiety. I am not sure how long I can maintain my current mood, but I will enjoy it for now.
BTW, the driving at night image is not mine, but John S. Dunne's, the philosopher and theologian. I studied with him in college, and he has had a lasting influence on me. Here is yesterday's drawing: It feels as if I am gathering my apples, getting them ready for market. My plan looks to next summer as the time to gather my work, completed over the last year, and exhibit it. I have just begun a series of self-portraits. These seek a means toward self-expression, which is what I do in all my work. The self-portraits are different because they deal with the problem of reality becoming an expressive artifice, rather than an imagined image, artifice in its creation, becoming reality. Yesterday I completed "Self-Portrait, March 2011" and also one drawing. I am happy with both of them. This kind of happiness is a rare event. It gives me optimism.
Often I have written of the impossibility of proper reproduction of my artwork. It is not just me. In the the March 7, 2011 issue of The New Yorker Peter Schjeldahl reviews the new biography by Meryle Secrest, "Modigliani: A Life." Mr. Schjeldahl writes about viewing reproductions versus authentic works of art when he relates Ms. Secrest's reaction to viewing Modigliani actual art, after seeing it in reproduction. This from Peter Schjeldahl's review: "She recounts her own responses to the first-rate Modigliani portraits and the torrid 'Nude on a Blue Cushion' (1917), which the banker Chester Dale gave to the National Gallery of Art, in Washington, in 1963, finding them vastly more nuanced and subtle than she had been led to believe by reproductions. This is an ordinary epiphany, with regard to paintings viewed in person." A reproduction of Modigliani's "Nude on a Blue Cushion" is shown below reproductions of my work from yesterday. As usual, I want to make it clear, I am unable to properly show the nuances of my work in these blog posts. Much of my life endeavors have been driven by my need to redeem myself from failure; I am unforgiven. Failure is not simple or unique, it is part of my inability to satisfy completion. Many of the tasks I have set upon to accomplish remain unfinished. I could list many, but a comprehensive list would not spell out my feeling of lost possibilities; living itself is evidence of loss. I am unsure why I am so aware of my inability to satisfactorily complete anything I attempt, but the gap between possibility and reality nags me endlessly. Being unforgiven is not a good thing, as it plagues my daily spirit. Everyday I awake very early with a need to find rest from my desire to make whole that which is impossible to make whole. I labor to make concrete something which will satisfy my existential pang for self-knowing. This is just a set up for failure, as knowing oneself is a shifting base of knowledge; the more one knows the more one is aware of what one does not know.
Yesterday I saw the movie Unforgiven. I saw it as part of my course studying Robert Altman's films. It was compared and contrasted to Altman's McCabe & Mrs. Miller. Unforgiven is a Clint Eastwood film. Unforgiven touched me deeply. It is about a man on a relentless, unfulfilling journey. The main character fails to satisfactorily complete his mission, as he looses his best friend along the way, as he had lost his wife in an earlier effort to calm his life into peace and harmony. The main character knows he has not fully utilized or exploited his abilities and character. A great work of art makes one know oneself better. Clint Eastwood's film, Unforgiven, is a great work of art. Yesterday's drawing is another excellent one. The drawings I have shown here over the last two days are among my best. I tell you this because I find it impossible to reproduce their richness here. I hope you get to see these in person. I am working toward a major exhibit of my work, when scheduled you will be informed. Intense, is the need I have, to find an expressive manner to display myself in a painting. First, please look at the drawing from yesterday, then I post the initial version of "Self-Portrait - March 2011." It, and "Self-Portrait - February 2011," will both be revisited.
Art and life are becoming organic behavior, free from imposed prerequisites, and therefore limitations. I don't know where I am going, and I don't care where I've been. I am doing life and making art. I am paying attention to my daily needs.
Yesterday began with a warm-up drawing of a man's head; I knew I was returning to "Self-Portrait February 2011." This first drawing is nothing great, but it was followed by a good one, a drawing of two figures. Photos of these drawings are posted after the image of the current state of "Self-Portrait February 2011." The Self-Portrait is searching for a means of expression. I feel it has become too realistic. This does not mean I am going to bend it away from its current direction. I will begin a second Self-Portrait of the same size, but with my need to express without the encumbrances of realism. It seems I have two needs within me: realism and expressionism. Both require satisfaction. This is natural and organic. I am not going to fight my impulses. I am going to follow every direction which opens to me. I am going to take Yogi Berra's advice: "If you come to a fork in the road, take it." I don't know if you've noticed, but Mondays are normally days of low volume. It is the day I do the financial stuff, money in and money out. I always get into the studio, and sometimes for several hours, but this week was not just the normal stuff. I prepared for my 2010 income tax as well. Just one drawing was made, and it is a competent one, but not thrilling. This drawing looks like a still from a motion picture about two men and the woman they love. Technique is good, composition is good, but overall it is a boring drawing. It did what I needed for the day; a little exercise so I'd be prepared to go back in and do important work today.
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April 2024
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