The title of today's post is my advice to myself. And with it I show the beginning of a new painting, "Man with Women." It is a large canvas, 60 inches tall. Below the painting I show two drawings from yesterday, both on 11 X 14 inch paper. My drawings have become like batting practice for a baseball player. I need to do it every day to remind myself how to behave properly when stepping to the plate, the big time that is painting. My paintings are not only much larger than my drawings, they require many hours of work, while a drawing takes an hour or two. Sustaining the proper modus operandi throughout the many hours of a painting is much more difficult than doing the same through the one or two hours of a drawing. This is my challenge. If I can do this with this painting, "Man with Women," it may become my first truly mature work. All the stuff I've done till now has led me to this, as is always true, but the difference is in my self-knowledge. I have taken many roads to nowhere, but trusting in my abilities and my knowledge, without questioning, by just doing it, means I am somewhere true. So much for my pep talk. After all, this is athletics.
Yesterday started simple enough. The first drawing is a small one, 12 X 9 inches, of high quality, but nothing that break downs a wall. Merely practice. This past week my in-studio time has been sporadic. I don't feel completely in control of my ideas. I continue to avoid paint, but it will return soon, possibly today. Drawing #2 is very good too, and larger at 14 X 11 inches. The second drawing is similar to the first drawing in its simple gathering of previously discovered knowledge. It is in drawing #3 (20 X 16 inches) that I find new conditions. The qualities of the surface and light are different. I do not, however, find this drawing appealing. It looks like a first stab to me; the kind, I imagine, one puts out at the beginning of a knife fight to test one's opponent. These rehearsal stabs are me training myself for a return to painting. I am beginning to be convinced I do not require substantial subject matter to produce significantly expressive paintings. This is a major transformation in theory, previously expressed by everyone from Mark Rothko to Willem de Kooning. I am a late bloomer, unlike our astronomical spring, which has turned exuberant already! My recent drawings have been me braking down all I know so I may break-up my knowledge, toss out the useless ideas, and move forward to better express myself.
Yesterday was a long day in the studio. Today, no, I won't be there. Let me not dwell on me not being there, but go right to yesterday's work. I show yesterday's three drawings in reverse from their creation, #3, #2, #1, which is, coincidently, from largest to smallest (16X20, 14X11, and 12X9 inches). Of the three, I like #2 the best. More important, than likes and dislikes, is their position in my expressive life. I am being pushed up against the wall of avoidance by these drawings. Their quality is high, and I need to paint. I can only assume that this past month, without painting, is me gathering the information I need to paint. I can feel it in my guts. It is going to spill out very soon. Last night I saw the play "Red," about the painter Mark Rothko. The program notes said much of the language and ideas came from the writings of Rothko, and interviews with his assistants. I was not thrilled by it, but I did walk away with verification. The creation of art is mostly contemplation, and less action. In the play, Rothko says studio time is 90% contemplation and 10% placing paint on canvas. My drawings are my contemplation. My painting has been my 10%. I do not think this is correct. My art is discovery while creating the image. All this contemplation through drawing has given me the means to do with paint as I have done with pencil. It is time to make my painting as much a part of my contemplation as my drawing.
The major drawing I completed yesterday (shown above) is more complicated, and more rich in content, than any drawing I have done in the past year. All other recent drawings look like rehearsals compared to this one. It is in the largest format I am currently using, 16 X 20 inches. It is probably a 10+ hour drawing (you can see earlier versions of it in the posts of 03/16/2012 and 03/14/2012). This is another of my graduation parties. What am I graduating to? Well, as the regular reader of this blog knows, lately I have been reluctant to paint. No more. In fact, today I will begin to stretch a canvas a day until I have several blank canvases sitting in the studio. The considerable size of a canvas is daunting, especially the large canvases on which I work. I want canvases to be as accessible as blank paper, and no more valued than a piece of paper. My reluctance has been due to my fear of failure. Not failure in being able to draw, but failure because I have been unable to sustain consistent, and substantial, invention of content. I have been disappointed with my imagery. I have given too much importance to imagery, and not enough to uncomplicated and straightforward process. I am, first and foremost, a simple painter, who just wants to make expressive marks on the canvas. I feel I have failed. So I went back to drawing to work it out, to strip away the distractive and false quests I has set for myself. Where do these come from, these fabricated quests? Too much education can muddle one's mind. I know too much of my own history, and that of western art. Enough resentment; I will begin to paint anew.
This is a time of my gathering presence. After all, I have gotten the fundamentals down. I draw with fluidity, and seamless contact with my intuition. I have always questioned the subject matter of my work: Does it make sense to draw what I draw? I am beginning to accept this question as unimportant, but I am not in full acceptance of that premise. As I write this I feel insecure. Being insecure is being human, but it is a constant, and heavy, burden of me the artist. Insecurity is the major reason I make art.
Yesterday's two drawings exhibit my newfound acceptance of insecurity, and the need to have more 2-dimensional space to look for truth. I posted yesterday's second drawing first (above). It took several hours. It is on the largest paper I am currently using (16 X 20 inches). That's a lot space to cover with 0.7 mm pencil stroke! More importantly, the development is similar to that of a painting. The room to seek and hunt in such a large space is wonderfully open. My better acceptance, and the larger space, has opened a door. I walked through. The drawings are better. More importantly, I am totally absorbed when I draw: me and drawing are one. This total engagement is new: my personality disappears, the ego is gone, there is nothing between me and it. Yesterday's drawing #1 is on my old standard, a 12 X 9 inch piece of paper. This first drawing was a good warm-up, but it did feel cramped and restrictive. Trying not to think out-loud, I followed my needs and went to the larger 16 X 20 inch format, which is now more comfortable for me, with its room to move. I am learning with analytical silence, following my intuitive needs. Recently I have felt dazed and confused, with no intellectual clarity about where I am going. Yesterday's second drawing says "this is OK." It felt good and right.
The figures in my drawings are overwhelming the space. A few days ago I enlarged my drawing format to 16 X 20 inches for just one drawing (see post of 03/02/2012). I have to return to that larger format. Yesterday's three drawings, each on 11 X 14 inch paper, show cramped forms within tight spaces. I need more room to move and play. Then there is painting. I have always gravitated toward larger paintings, feeling most comfortable when the size is at least 50 X 60 inches. Willem de Kooning often chose 60 X 70 inch canvas, Picasso's favorite size was 38 X 50 inches.
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April 2024
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