Work is required. That's all I got. My anxiety surrounding the work I am required to do is very present. Yesterday's drawing is a good one, but it also has a lot of open space, a lot of negative space. Do each of those negative spaces sing their propers notes, notes that radiate emotion and intellectual satisfaction? Blank spaces bring fear; they scarily call for resolution, either by mind or mark. Yesterday I chose mind over mark. Successful? I think I will go the other way today. I want to see which way is more satisfactory, open spaces filled by the mind, or mark filled spaces filled by a road map of specks and speckles.
The Irish writer, Christopher Nolan (born 1965, not the well known British screenwriter) said, when speaking of the reasons for writing The Eye of the Clock, "My real motive is to describe how my brain-damaged life is as normal for me as my friends able-bodied life is to them. My mind is just like a spin-dryer at full speed; my thoughts fly around my skull while millions of beautiful words cascade down into my lap. Images gunfire across my consciousness and while trying to discipline them I jump in awe at the soul-filled bounty of my mind's expanse. Try then to imagine how frustrating it is to give expression to that avalanche...." Today I begin a new painting, which will be entitled, "Gunfire Across My Consciousness". "Chaos, Stillness & Prayer" (2018 No.9, state 8), oil on canvas, 54x36 inches {"Art has something to do with the achievement of stillness in the midst of chaos. A stillness which characterizes prayer, too, and the eye of the storm.... an arrest of attention in the midst of distraction." -Saul Bellow, "Writers at Work: Third Series", 1967} I will not relent. This is poetry. As poet I continually revisit, alter the script yet conserve the basic idea; My process is consistent enhancement of meaning. That is my job. This work of mine will not become genre, nor will it become extinct. Like Rotrouenge, it is lyrical and has repeated elements that may be called refrains. However, I believe in contrast; the repetition of marks and/or forms is contrasted against the entirety. I also believe my work is mostly similar to Rotrouenge because "...the original genre may have lost its distinct identity." Yesterday I revisited the painting "Chaos, Stillness & Prayer" (2018 No.9). Today I show state 8. It is now essentially complete, yet requires a once-over to affirm its completion. Yesterday's drawing continues my research into hard versus rounded forms. Rotrouenge (from Wikipedia) Rules have been made because history has been made. I grew up with intense interest in visual arts, especially painting and drawing, I studied art history. I looked for models. I looked for information. I gathered it, assiduously and thoroughly. Here I am, playing differently than any model I have ever seen in art history, or in contemporary art. I am myself. Yet, I have not rid myself of the laws I learned from art history and from art school studies. Yesterday's drawing is amazing in its play with form, composition, mark-making, value-contrast, atmospheric and local effects; but it has a deep foundation in the stuff that came before. Is this good or bad? That is a question I continue to answer. This is the process! I have established myself as myself. Now I question the validity of my answers. I am wondering, "Is this drawing remarkable because it plays with rules I invented myself?" OR "Is this drawing just another variation on the rules I have been given by those who made art before me?" Question #2: "Does it matter?" I need to know. Thus I proceed.
"Burnt Norton" (2018 No.8, state 7), oil on canvas, 55.5x66 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. Footfalls echo in the memory." -T.S. Eliot, "Burnt Norton"} Happiness has not yet arrived. This ain't easy. The painting, Burnt Norton, ain't yet right. It is taking a toll; an emotional toll. I am in a humongous effort. There is desolate, lonely weight upon me, but I am optimistic. Confusing? This is a mountain worth climbing. The required humongous effort is this: I am at the bottom of a mountain. It is very far to the top and I am looking up! I do not want to be distracted by my feelings. I do not want to be overwhelmed by the difficult, arduous, strenuous journey that lies before me. Being here and now, taking one step, then another, is my responsibility. I will achieve this. However, when contemplated, I am daunted by being in this position, at the bottom. I will stop contemplating; I will act! Before I take another step, I leave you, and myself, looking at a wonderful drawing by Vincent Van Gogh. The more I study Vincent van Gogh's work the more I find kinship between him and I, between his artistic endeavors and mine. I am talking about consistency in research & development, the constant quest for greater depth of knowledge, and our ardent desire to be relentless in finding personal visual truth. Vincent and I share a yearning to connect with every single bit, snippet, shard of paper or canvas that we use as ground for drawings and paintings. We want to touch these surfaces with marks denoting we have been here, that we have touched every scrap and portion of every bit of surface with thought and feeling. "Along for the Ride" (2018 No.7, state 2), oil on canvas, 57.5x49.5 inches) {"The fact remains that getting people right is not what living is all about anyway. It's getting them wrong that is living, getting them wrong and wrong and wrong and then, on careful consideration, getting them wrong again. That's how we know we're alive: we're wrong. Maybe the best thing would be to forget being right or wrong about people and just go along for the ride. But if you can do that — well, lucky you." - Philip Roth, "American Pastoral"} In my previous blog post I wrote about being wrong. I wrote how important it is to be wrong; being wrong is the most human quality. If you missed this idea it is because you did not fully read the title caption beneath the painting Along for the Ride, which yesterday hit state 2. It is Philip Roth who made this lucid; In his novel, American Pastoral, Philip Roth wrote, "The fact remains that getting people right is not what living is all about anyway. It's getting them wrong that is living." This wrongness applies to art-making too. Wrongness is living art; Wrongness is the inspiration that drives art-making. There would never be a second painting if an artist got it right the first time. Never ridicule any painting; never ridicule any piece of art. All art is authentically human. The best art, I agree, universally connects us.
The painting Along for the Ride excites me. I will enthusiastically work on it again today. Yesterday's drawing is another step forward in my search to find a way to connect everything within a composition: every point, every mark, every form. The revelation of personal religious zeal is the heaven that is found within the momentary realization that the mark made is earthly correct. As I accept this premise my art becomes more me and more real. More real is surprising since its abstraction from the experiential data allows it to resemble the world I have experienced without mimicking that world. Here I am today showing you one more drawing on my road toward acceptance. This is what I do.
Today's drawing is self-real, yet also plays falsely within its own stated reality. Do you see the mark approximately one-third from the left and one-third from the top? It is simply a mark amongst a plethora of forms. The forms pretend to be three-diemsional, but the mark is just a mark, a splotch on the page. It is a required mark. Without it the back and forth force of this composition would be relentless, and questionable. It would lack grounding. This mark grounds it. It allows the forms to play with energy against the mark's static, solid touch to paper. There are things about an advanced Van Gogh painting, or drawing, I really like. The representational quality is good, but it is the abstracted visual play which engages me most. While making yesterday's drawings I was occasionally reminded of Vincent Van Gogh's use of line and stroke. As Vincent marked his drawings, and his painting, he thought rhythmically, always cognizant of the overall music within forms and the surfaces of everything, from the three-dimensional quality of the forms themselves to the two-dimensional marks on the surface of the paper or canvas. These drawing's echo Vincent's quality of mark. They make me realize that I am very engaged by the abstraction in his best works. I am constantly involved in similar qualities, but I will not go so far as to say I emulate Vincent Van Gogh's mannerisms.
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April 2024
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