 Drawing 03·29·2020 No.1, graphite on paper, 16x20 inches  Drawing 03·29·2020 No.2, graphite on paper, 16x20 inches Insight and disease are not mutually exclusive. However, this pandemic, this disease, this Coronavirus, is helping me see more clearly. Insight is upon me. I have slowed to a pace of inevitable knowing. Peculiar it is, the greatest creativity occurs in the most stressful of times. It feels similar to a bicycle crash I once endured. I lost control of my bike; I was speeding down a tarmac road; the road was covered in a glaze of sand left over from winter salt & sanding; during a turn the front wheel slid on the sand. As I spun and churned toward the tarmac, I made decisions on how best to hit the surface of the road; a fraction of a second turned into an extended time; I was able to make a creative decision to save my life. I pushed the bike away so I could roll, rather then remain beneath the soon-to-be horizontal bike to be forced to scrape myself to the bone. I was wearing a bike helmet, which cracked, but otherwise I had nothing on but a T-Shirt and thin nylon pants. I ended bruised, with minor scrapes. I am taking scrapes in this virus outbreak. So far, my loved ones, when infected, have recovered. Me, I may, or may not, have had the Coronavirus. I experienced a period similar in symptoms to Covid-19, but no test to verify.
Yesterday was an exciting time in the studio. I had insights a-many. I believe many past works were confused in purpose. I have a simple objective; I wish to express simple truths; I wish to express being here and now. In response to this realization, my drawings are becoming basic truths; these drawings are more simple than previous ones, more direct, more felt, more readable by their viewers. This time of stressful quandary is rewarding me; I am experiencing good within the distractions a world dominated by disease.
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 "Your Decisions Matter" (2020 No.2, state 3), oil on canvas, 52x55½ inches {"It's essential that you believe as if your decisions matter... reality isn't important; what's important is your belief..." - Ted Chiang, "Exhalation", 2019} Fantasy and reality become the same in a painting. Such it is with the painting, "Your Decisions Matter". In this painting I see reality. I can feel reality; I also see fantasy. Big blockbuster TV series do much the same, like Game of Thrones. It ain't real; that depicted never happened, but it mimics, rhymes with stuff we know exists. That is the way my art is going. This painting, aptly entitled "Your Decisions Matter", is proof. I had to work many years to get clarity. All my work, the hundreds of paintings, the thousands of drawings, led to this. I know better who I am. I know better the means to express myself. This is reality. I feel safe. I can now come out.
 Drawing 02·25·2020, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches Discovery continues. Today I post a drawing that is another one of my efforts to find emotional circumstance in the manufacture of three-dimensional artifice. Artifice invokes emotion; here because of the obvious lie, i.e., this 3D image is on a two-dimensional piece of white paper. This not a piece of sculpture in 3D space. Pencil marks on flat paper are able to create emotional reality; simple technique can surprise with emotional complexity. This drawing's emotional complexity surprises me because many of my previous drawings have more animated marks, more complex forms, yet they fail my emotional profundity test. More often than not, forms and marks clutter drawings yet fall short in emotional meaning. This speaks to the magic that is full realization; achieving profundity is not painless, not unambiguous, is complicated.
 Drawing 01·16·2020, graphite on paper, 16x20 inches It is a mystery to me the vast degree of difference in sight and understanding, one person to the next. George Bernard Shaw told a story in his autobiography, writing that his eye doctor told him that he sees with normal vision; Shaw asked the doctor, "So I see like everyone else?" The doctor replied, "No, less than 10% of people have normal vision." I feel the same about my work. I believe I see with normal vision. My works visually communicates deep understanding, both intellectual and emotional. Yet I find people who celebrate the clarity of my vision far fewer than those who react to it in any substantial manner; they simply walk by. This is my quandary. I will continue my journey. I continue to hope my work will become more universal in its communication, its social intercourse, thus allowing me to share communion with others.
 "Inertia to Movement" (2019 No.6, state 1), oil on canvas, 64.5x64.75 inches {"Emotion is the moment when steel meets flint and a spark is struck forth, for emotion is the chief source of consciousness. There is no change from darkness to light, or from inertia to movement, without emotion." -Carl G. Jung (1875-1961), "The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious", 1955, translation R.F.C Hull} Yesterday was an important day. I began a new painting, "Inertia to Movement". I have been seeking a more direct approach to exuding emotion in my work. Mostly my search has been through drawing, but yesterday I took a big step in finding emotion in painting as well. This first state of "Inertia to Movement" exhibits simplicity in search of clarity. I will walk carefully in the making of this painting, step by invented step. My intention is to be fully mindful, fully present, during its pathway to full blossom.
 Drawing 05·10·2019 (state 2), pencil on paper, 16x20 inches This blog informs my art because it is here I view my work with fresh eyes the morning after it is made. My blog is a personal, mental disruptor. Everyday I leave the studio feeling I have done good work, thinking it the best I was able to do on that day. The next morning I come here. I upload photos of the images I made the previous day. I am always surprised. They are right, or I missed something. I know when they must be altered, fixed. Today I show you the drawing began on 05·10·2019 but now revised; this is its second state — my subtle alterations have made it much better.
The distractions that are preparing for an exhibit are annoying. The stream of consciousness that is art making is disrupted. This is not all bad. Insight is often found through the disruption of normal behavior. Last year, after I returned from my major exhibit in Brooklyn, I made great, insightful paintings. I fully expect this will happen again after I am done with this exhibition season. Actually, those insights are happening NOW. Seeing my work on the white walls of a gallery is enormously informative. Also, I have been unable to work on the painting, "How's It Gonna End", because I had to put my energy into framing and touching-up older paintings. This distraction has forced me to see necessary changes "How's It Gonna End" is requesting. Order is occurring because of chaos.  "How's It Gonna End" (2019 No.2, state 10), oil on canvas, 60x32 inches {"Life is sweet at the edge of a razor; And down in the front row of an old picture show the old man is asleep as the credits start to roll. And I want to know, the same thing everyone wants to know, how's it going to end?" -Tom Waits} I have an idea, an insight! There is a solution in front of me; "How's It Gonna End" is gonna end! That is a very good thing. It is very good because I had been working in an unfathomable dark mood. Confusion pervaded me. I needed a solution. I needed something that worked. I needed something that felt right. I needed clarity. Now I tell you the best thing about being an artist: Solutions exist! A solution brings the feeling of clarity. Clarity brings the feeling of self-worth. Is it all a sham? It does not matter. It doesn't matter because feeling good, feeling optimistic, is not a sham. It is real!
 Drawing 01·19·2019, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches Never perfect! Always failure! Always a modicum of success! The next is always better. Examining work is good. Examination informs; it helps me see necessary adjustments; it makes clear the difference between proper notes and those out of tune. I learn. There is a lot to like in yesterday's drawing. Learning is endless. I am on a path; a faithful path to better work.
 "Burnt Norton" (2018 No.8, state 24), oil on canvas, 66.5x70.5 inches {"What might have been is an abstraction remaining a perpetual possibility; Only in a world of speculation what might have been and what has been point to one end, which is always present." -T.S. Eliot, "Burnt Norton"} Burnt Norton (the painting) sat upon my work wall, untouched for 10 weeks. A little something nagged me, so I left it there, out in the cold. Yesterday, I fixed it! I call it complete! Old dogs always come back! This one is better for the wait, better for the want. I love this dog!
 "2017 No.14" (state 8), oil on canvas, 47x44 inches    Sophistication is demanding. The more I know the more annoying making-art becomes. It is labor intensive. The painting 2017 No.14 is in state 8 and it has a ways to go. These drawings shown today are from two days ago. They are following a direction I do understand. Their clarity is refreshing to me. I came across a couple of relevant quotes. I do not remember where I read them, but it must have been in an article about artists who died last year, in 2017. The quotes are from a poet and a playwright, both of whom I greatly admire and respect. I leave you with these... "Most reckless things are beautiful in some way, and recklessness is what makes experimental art beautiful." -John Ashbery, Poet (1927 1917) |
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April 2020
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