 "Compunction" (2022 No.12, state 05), oil on canvas, 57⅛x66½ inches  Drawing 01·08·2023, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches It ain't easy being here. I have found a way to make Art my own. So what? Enormous work is required to answer properly. Today's images are true. Truth has hit me. I feel confused because I am daunted by the work required to make my truth real. My acceptance of my responsibility has isolated me. I am afraid of isolation. This is about me alone with my loneliness. I see differently. I am the only one who can make my images. I am by myself. This is scary.
 "Camouflage" (2022 No.6, state 11), oil on canvas, 41¼x58½ inches  Drawing 07·09·2022, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches Names change, I change, my artwork changes. It is all the same. I, me, mine! The painting, prior title "Arena", has become "Camouflage". Yesterday's drawing is more complex than some of may recent drawings. I am testing limits. Dense black light to forms in sunny light, in the painting, Camouflage". In the drawing I inquire about holding viewer attention despite many complex forms; forms are held together by rhythm, negative space, and spatial play. At this moment, I believe I have the wherewithal to make these questions become answers.
 "Gunfire Across My Consciousness" (2019 No.5, state 8), oil on canvas, 48.5x32.5 inches {"My mind is just like a spin-dryer at full speed; my thoughts fly around my skull... Images gunfire across my consciousness... I jump in awe at the soul-filled bounty of my mind's expanse." -Christopher Nolan, Irish Writer on his reasons for writing "The Eye of the Clock", in November 8, 1987 "Observer"} Working on perceptions, one day at a time, one perception at a time, absorbing, then reacting to perceived questions, whether true or false; this is the way to build wealth. It is an uphill journey. Stepping, stumbling, but overall gaining. Higher I go; this journey needs health as well as wealth. The painting I did yesterday was revelatory. Some doubts were quenched, my gains are real, I found happiness in my ability to do this. "Gunfire Across My Consciousness" is almost complete. All the drawing I have recently has led me to believe that truth can be found.
 Drawing-11·25·2015, pencil on paper, 20X16 inches Yesterday's drawing: Pretty weird? Consider this: The drawing does show a flying balloon! Maybe I was thinking of that famous parade full of flying balloons, Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City. Probably not. One thing I do know for sure: I have the ability to follow self-suggestive invention. This stuff spills out of me like rain from a dark cloud. Yesterday's drawing celebrates my acquired skills. Failure of technique is no longer an excuse for me. I can do anything I imagine. If I fail it will be a failure of imagination and/or energy.
  Drawings from 6/7/2015, both are pencil on paper, 16X20 inches It is like I said yesterday, and the day before. I am involved in a search for relevant material to paint. I am, as a contemporary artist, caught between two demands. There is my need to find and illustrate personal myths. Also, there is my desire to accept, and participate, in the freedom of formal solutions open to today's visual artists. I wish to make work that is historically relevant by moving the formal qualities of painting forward through cross-examination and interrogation. My drawings are helping me creep and strip and fall to a reality that is mine.
  Drawings from 6/6/2015, both are pencil on paper, 16X20 inches One of Paul Gauguin's most important paintings asks "Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?" I am in the throws of the same dilemma. This is probably the reason I have not painted for over a week. I am storing up questions. I am about to answer them through painting. My last two paintings are stones in this path ("Leap" and "Lava"), but they fall short. They are approaches. They are not an end-game. I know, of course, there is no end-game! But, we would not be fully human if we did not have the optimism to believe it possible.  Paul Gauguin, "Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?", oil on canvas, 1897-98  Drawing-06·04·2015, pencil on paper, 16X20 inches I am not sure of the exact meaning of yesterday's drawing, posted above, but it could be two of me. The left guy is erect, confident, with large, open hands; he is strong and ready to go. The right guy is leaning back, leaning away, head sideways; he appears fragile with his small, closed hands. The right guy definitely lacks confidence. I am feeling very good about my artistic development. I will never be fully satisfied, but I am relishing the journey. I believe, for the first time, that I have gathered the necessary tools to do whatever needs to be done. I have reached a high degree of mastery. I have confidence I can achieve that which I can conceive. Through my art I want to interact with the world. This blog exists because I want to communicate. However, this blog's limitations are obvious. Therefore, I accept the necessity to engage in the business of art. I need to get my art out there, into venues that may be seen by those who are emotionally engaged in the visual arts. I also wish to make my art accessible to all and everyone. This brings me to today. In the past I have had many exhibitions, shown my work in important galleries, and been juried into competitive shows. During the past four years I have stepped back from that sort of engagement and I have been writing this blog, exhibiting my work here. Late last year I began to feel the need to step back into the brick and mortar world of gallery exhibitions. I put out a few feelers and applied to several juried competitions. Nothing happened. Call it rejection. So, today I begin to think as a businessman who happens to have visual art as his product. Every Friday I am going to devote time to this effort. Today is Friday.
 "Lava" (Painting-05·03·2015, state 8), oil on canvas, 52X60 inches It is beginning to feel more like contemplation and less like intellectualization. Yesterday's drawing shows me going back and forth between my contemplative-acting intuition and my question-asking intellect. The first drawing is me producing a casually flowing drawing, which ends with an intellectualized, verbal question. This conflict may exhibit problems that occur when the id and the ego are in combat. The second drawing is straightforwardly about combat. The transition from drawing #1 to drawing #2 may exhibit this mental confusion, but it may also be about the world's combative confusion. The strongly male component that instigates present world combat is apparent. Thus the extreme maleness of the figure in drawing #2. Artistically, the figure plays against an abstract background. This is more important to me than any contemporary, or classically mythological, message I am trying to convey. BTW: Today's reproduction of the painting, Lava, is the closest I have gotten to the original. In yesterday's blog post, Lava's reproduction is too color intensive, i.e. it is more color saturated than the original.   Drawings from 5/24/2015, pencil on paper, 16X20 inches
 Drawing-05·23·2015, pencil on paper, 16X20 inches One of the most important activities of an artist is admitting defeat. Another activity is trying and failing. Failing is not always about lack of ability, or lack of understanding. It is most often about trying to go places that are not familiar and that will never be familiar. Advice often given to young writers is, "Write what you know!" This is good advice for visual artists as well. Admitting defeat is more about admitting "a lack of emotional connection," than admitting "ignorance." Does that make sense? Let me be more clear. I am not ignorant of how bananas are made, but they do not instigate any important emotions in me. A powerful work of art can be made with bananas playing a central role, but I haven't done it. I admit defeat. Georgio de Chirico used them well in his painting, "The Uncertainty of the Poet" (see below). To finish, the drawing I made yesterday exhibits information I understand. I have no bananas today!  Georgio de Chirico, "The Uncertainty the Poet", oil on canvas, 1913  "Asparagus" (Painting-02·14·2015 state 9), oil & acrylic marker on canvas, 52X60 inches Too late in the day. I have too little left in me to post more... suffice to say I am having trouble adequately reproducing the painting Asparagus. More tomorrow.   Drawings-03·14·2015 Nos. 1 & 2, pencil on paper, 14X11 inches
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At MEHRBACH.com you may view many of my paintings and drawings, past and present, and see details about my life and work. Archives
September 2023
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