 Drawing 04·11·2021, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches  "No Living Thing Can Exist Without It" (2021 No.3, state 6), oil on canvas, 56x56 inches, {"Art always serves beauty, and beauty is the joy of possessing form, and form is the key to organic life since no living thing can exist without it." - Boris Pasternak, "Doctor Zhivago" (1958)} Nowhere but true. That is my direction. It is coming, it is happening, there is no end in sight, but things can change. I don't want to write, "Things will change," because that is my biggest fear. To be clear, I have no fear of change in my art, I have fear of change in my mindful living, moments by moment.
 Drawing 01·06·2021, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches Yesterday's studio session began with this drawing. I completed it. Then I had to go throw my garbage away at the town dump. On the way, I turned on the car's radio. A virulent, and violent, onslaught on the capital building had begun. Our republic's center was being attacked by supporters of a very sick man. His followers were doing the ask of this very sick man. This was familiar to him, and to all of us, but its intensity surprised the rational minds in our society. This very sick man has continually asked his cult-like followers to do his dirty work, the work required for him to acquire power and money. Yesterday's turmoil was a quick burn, but it mirrored this very sick man's entire life. This was abnormal, this mongrel horde pushing our democratically elected leaders out of our society's designated safe place to manage our country, in peace and in war.
Yesterday morning, I entered my studio feeling very positive, in control of my personal ambitions and struggles. That felt right and good. Then midday turmoil distracted me, lasting into the night, as our country struggled to get back to the rational task of governance. Today I feel good again. It appears more people today see clearly, and correctly, then yesterday. My drawing, here, shows insight into the play of space I wish to make fully embrace with my intellect and my emotions. I will return to the studio today. Today I will struggle more, I will work toward my ambition of complete self-expression.  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 01·22·2019, pencil on paper, 20x16 inches Am I too complicated? Will it be impossible for me to melt my perception down into a simple image? Do I challenge the viewer, and myself, with complications? Am I creating obstacles that prevent easy comprehension? OR, do I have so much to say that there is no way to say it simply?
This dilemma definitely does not have an easy answer. Yesterday's drawing took hours to find and to complete. It was good exercise. I am better for it. I am stronger. As I look at it now I wonder on its message. Does it say profound ideas that are me? I want to be seen for who I am. I want to reveal my concerns, my joys, my sense of humor, my reality. I fear death and I fear life. Am I making myself clear?  "Seriously?" (2018 No.10, state 5), oil on canvas, 49.8x61.5 inches {"All higher humor begins with ceasing to take oneself seriously." - Hermann Hesse, "Reflections", ed. Volker Michels, 1974}  Drawing 11·28·2018, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches Reality is fluid. Corrections are always possible, but not always efficacious. The painting Seriously? has many corrections to come, as does Chaos, Stillness & Prayer (the painting whose beginning immediately preceded Seriously?).
I find yesterday's drawing very good. One measure of excellence is perception while in action — this one, during its making, made me feel full of knowledge. I believe that's a good thing. I always fear self-delusion. Vincent Van Gogh feared self-delusion too; look where that got Vincent!  Drawing 10·07·2018, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches This art-making is not getting easier! The more I know the more complex and difficult it gets. There are no easy solutions. Each solution is exciting in its process and eventual success. It is success of the process that keeps me going. It is fear of its time intensiveness that makes me nerve-wracked. I am getting older. Life is here, but I need a few lifetimes to get this done.
 "The Intervening Tick" (2018 No.6, state 4), oil on canvas, 49x33 inches {"Is that where wise men want us to live; in that intervening tick, the tiny slot that occurs after you have spent hours searching downtown for that new club and just before you give up and head back home?" - Billy Collins, "The Present", from "New Ohio Review" 2017}  Drawing 07·14·2018, pencil on paper, 16x20 inches In yesterday's blog-post I expressed fear over the upper sky-like portion of my recent drawings. In those drawings the "sky" was untouched. i.e., White Paper! There is no "White Sky" in the drawing I show today. Today's drawing makes me anxious; It makes me want to move on to my next painting. Two paintings are on my work-wall, both in the process of problem solving. Yesterday The Intervening Tick took a great leap toward realization (see its state 4, above). Chocorua is almost done (it requires a little bit of brightening & a little expansion on its upper edge). When either of them, The Intervening Tick or Chocorua, move off my work-wall, I will begin 2018 No.7 (not yet titled).
 "2017 No.6" (state 8), oil on canvas, 66x60 inches I hate it when things do not work the way they normally work. I fear I will be unable to find a worthwhile solution to a painting or drawing. Then there is my fear that it will continue to snow and Spring will never come. All of these conundrums of living have some merit, except the last. In the last ten days we have had two major snowstorms. They were difficult, and taxing, because of the required cleaning up for us to get in and to get out. But today it is sunny and warm. The snow is melting. It is the sixth day of Spring and it is doing what it is supposed to do. This brings me to the painting 2017 No.6. I thought it was very close to being done. It is, but it is going to require more time to complete than I had anticipated. This bothers me because I want to move on. Yesterday I worked on the patterned "flooring." It is asking me to refine its pattern and its outline. The right border of the patterned area is not right. Now a complaint: To clean up the recent snowfalls I used a snow blower, one that is small and has a series of blades that throw the snow slightly to the side. It must be pushed into the snow since it has no self-propelled wheels. To remove the snow from the walkway I pushed and pushed it, over and over again, repetitively, using my right leg as the motivator. Now I have an injured right leg. Not injured in terms of normal, day to day, activity, but in terms of my favorite exercise, running. This makes me know I am mortal, fragile, physically aging. Yuck! My body is not reliably coming back to normal. Spring is being reliable. Spring will come no matter what, but my leg may need Physical Therapy to fix. The wonder of today came when I walked into the studio. Yesterday's drawings are excellent. My leg hurts, but the drawings are good. There is light showing through the cracks in the darkness! Me thinks I have complained too much!      Impossible to know it all, but I want to know it all. This is my passion. I am a problem solver. I am a problem. I do not understand everything I want to understand. More confusing than that: I don't know what I do not know. I just know there is a chasm in front of me and it is very dark and lonely down there. I want to light the darkness. I need to light the darkness. Yesterday I visually yelled at this chasm with three drawings. The addictive part of art-making is its give-back. With every completed work I feel I have lit the darkness a bit more; I understand more than before.
Today I will begin a new painting.  "2016 No.4 (Painting-03·15·2016 state 6), oil on canvas, 57X50 inches When I awoke this morning I believed I would be writing about the occasional transitional failure. I thought yesterday's work had failed. Writing this blog, posting these images, has saved me from despair. These works are OK! They are transitional, yes. But, they are authentic in their enlightenment. I know more than I did the day before! I problem-solved. I made real the spatial ideas I wrote about in yesterday's blog post. I have a need to drive the artifice of space laterally, back and forth, in and out. Yesterday I tested this need. Today images crackle with the plunge into space that I so desire. Instead of the melancholy feeling of deficiency, I now feel better for the effort, and the results, I show here.  Drawing-04·10·2016, pencil on paper, 16X20 inches |
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