 Drawing 06·29·2019, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches Funny it is, I find this, the last day of my solo exhibition at Bromfield Gallery (Boston), a Good Thing! I just want to get back to my daily routine of making art. I am almost there. Next week my last solo show of this summer begins at Lyme New Hampshire's Converse Free Library (opens July 8). The library will exhibit mostly drawings, and a couple paintings. The Summer Juried Exhibition at AVA Gallery (Lebanon, NH) will exhibit my painting "How's It Gonna End" and a drawing (opens July 12).
Yesterday's drawing is massively worked. It took three days! This complicated manner of working on drawings is a new thing for me. Intuition is driving my steps. My path is revealing itself, surprise by surprise.  Drawing 06·26·2019, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches  "Doublethink" (2019 No.3, state 4), oil on canvas, 58x58 inches {"Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them." -George Orwell, "Nineteen Eighty Four" (1949)} I like this drawing very much. But the painting, Doublethink, is me in doublethink. It is full questions, most of them unanswered. I love the time I have to doublethink, triple-think, think-a-myriad. Life is good.
Entrance must have immediacy. My drawings are beginning to understand this. Today's drawing does this well. Doublethink disturbs because that red form separates itself. It is looking for coherency. This may come through atmospheric effects or through formal effects. I am unsure. Not being sure is exciting. It means testing and questioning and finding answers not known before. Life is good.  "Doublethink" (2019 No.3, state 3), oil on canvas, 58x58 inches {"Doublethink means the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them." -George Orwell, "Nineteen Eighty Four" (1949)} The biggest pain of living is lapsing into the pain that is time-driven. Acknowledging time makes one want to hurry. Time has an arrow that pokes holes in the present. Holes are absences. Nonexistence is the consequence. Here I am. I have returned to painting Doublethink. Doublethink is appropriately titled because my return brings the baggage of pent-up wanting. Doublethink is in a good place. It is re-educating me. I stepped into it, which is the most difficult part of the journey. It feels like a first step, but it is actually the third step.
 Drawing 06·22·2019, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches In life there is struggle to see clearly. The murkiness of people, things, and emotions obscure easy access. Muck, rubbish, and dirt get in the way of truth-telling; clarity is found by consistently pushing the falderal out of one's way. Such is my journey. Reason is not enough. This is slow because the rubbish is much. Yesterday's drawing dealt with this dichotomy. There is left and right; there is heaven and earth. There is darkness and light. The left is shadowed, invokes a search for nuance. The right is easier on the eyes; it invokes simplicity and strength. The monument on the right is clear. The monument on the left struggles to be seen. Both monuments are pyramids, one tall and lean, one fat yet sturdy in its dark surroundings. Obvious, there is play between murkiness & limpidity.
 Drawing 06·21·2019, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches Something magical is happening. While in process, as I work, my mind understands. It communicates, disseminates. My art springs directly from core intuition and knowledge, perhaps even emotion is involved. There is caveat, in regard to emotion, because, of the three, it feels most remote. Of the three (intellect, intuition, emotion), emotion is the most difficult for me to visually depict with acuity. This does not surprise me. I am working my way down to the essential me, the instigator of all. Fear and flight, love and hate, passion and desire; emotion is most difficult to depict with lucidity. The more I do this, the more I make-art, the more confident I am; I have the right stuff, the talent, to make it real on canvas and paper. This surprises me. I need longevity to make it fully happen. I know not the path I am on. It is not laid out in front of me. I am required to take one step at a time. The chisel is at work. Each step chips away one more bit of the crap that obscures my truth in being and existence.
Yesterday's drawing is exceptional. It is both playful and serious, light and dark; new forms occupy a classical composition. It is what the world needs now.  Drawing 06·20·2019, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches Self discovery does not occur on one moment on one day. It is a never ending process. Becoming oneself is possible and impossible. It is possible to be more oneself with every effort toward self-realization. Complete selfhood cannot be achieved. It is the journey that excites. Similar to discovery new geographies, insights in selfhood give exhilaration in living.
Yesterday's drawing is very different than the one from the day before. I feel fear when my drawings go so dark; scary when I tend toward blackness. I am a believer of light as omnipresent. Perception of shadow is dependent upon light, less of it, but still there. I am hoping to paint today. I continue to deal with my exhibitions, promoting them, preparing to take one down and put one up. I will be glad when the studio, the making of art, is my primary artistic concern. Soon...  Drawing 06·19·2019, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches My exhibition scheduled has been annoying. I dug into an intensive time of showing art, not making art. Yesterday I found some relief. I have begun to fill in missing links. Here comes my stuff! Yesterday's drawing did come with insight and solid decision-making. I felt at the top of my game. Simply, I was attentively present! This bodes well for much good art to come.
 "How's It Gonna End" (2019 No.2, state 16), oil on canvas, 60x33 inches {"And I want to know the same thing everyone wants to know, how it going to end? Drag your wagon and your plow over the bones of the dead out among the roses and the weeds. You can never go back, and the answer is no, and wishing for it only makes it bleed." -Tom Waits, song lyric} How's It Gonna End has ended! Today you see its 16th state. This wondrous solution occurred as much in my mind as on canvas. The last two months of my studio life has been more about preparing works for exhibition than making work. All the while I was doing other stuff the painting How's It Gonna End sat there on the work-wall. I saw it every day. Somedays I looked hard, other days I did not pay attention. Slowly I deciphered its need. It wanted to be resolved through simplicity. The day came when I needed to do it. The true solution came from my working the canvas itself. I eliminated some of it, then I exaggerated what was already there. Bingo! Done!
The inflection point came when I knew all is prepared for my exhibitions. I relaxed. The solution to How's It Gonna End came quickly and easily. Suddenly I feel in control of my artistic life again. More good things will come soon... after I deliver my works to Bromfield Gallery on Monday June 3. |
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June 2022
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