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.
I awoke very, very early this morning—disquieting it was. There was vague stomach queasiness as well. This is all about exuberance over my recent gains in risk and quality. Yes, I have only been drawing, so the risk taking has been restricted to a limited category of art-making. But the work has been brilliant, one after the other. This challenges me to take the next important step. I ask, am I able to bring the approach I am now exercising in my drawings to painting? I am enjoying open and direct channeling of my intuition to the physical results in my art. Thus, my ebullience! Fear and ebullience are mates. Knowing ebullience is transitory brings fear. My ebullience is based upon insights, which are permanent, but must be developed in order to remain viable. And, painting's complexity has always scarred me.
Yesterday was a Monday. As usual, this day of the week found me dealing with a lot things outside of making art. Late in the day I did get to the studio to make a significant revision to the major drawing shown in yesterday' s post.
The color temperature of the image of the revised drawing is different than its previous image. The revised version is a much better drawing, and it is, of course, on the same paper. It does not look the same because of the new lights in the studio. Among yesterday's outside of art-making activities was a change to the major bank of fluorescent lights in the studio—the old larger diameter T12 fluorescent tubes were exchanged for the newer T8 bulbs and their ballasts. The new light is whiter, and stronger, with less energy use. Thus the color change. I will white balance my camera today, under the new light, so this will not be a problem with my photographed images going forward. 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. 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.
Two days of R & R and I feel better. Yesterday had me back in the studio and finding my ground again. This means drawings, one after the other. I also took a step toward larger work, as I began a 16 X 20 inch drawing, a move up from my usual 9 X 12 inch and 11 X 14 inch formats. Today's first two drawings are on 11 X 14 inch paper. The last drawing (at bottom of post) is the 16 X 20 inch drawing, which I did not complete, and I will return to it today.
As usual, yesterday was a Monday and I did the routine financial stuff and other mundane requirements of upkeep. I do, however, feel very good about the three drawings I made. There is motion here. I am going places that I have not gone before. This month's Art in America magazine contains an article about the Dutch artist Mark Manders. His ideas and images make great sense to me. Manders is a sculptor. When I first meet a person they often ask me to describe my art. I cannot do this well; they have to look, so I refer them to my website, MEHRBACH.com. Mark Manders' work is equally indescribable. After my drawings I post photos of two of his sculptures. In looking at them I was reminded that I make art to explore a part of me which is more complex and strange then supplied by everyday images. The struggle to express myself goes far beyond what I have visually experienced. My job is to use novel technical means in combining images imagined and experienced. Only through visual invention do I have a chance to express that which I question, know, feel, and wish to explore. Mark Manders does this well.
It just happens. I just have to show up and it keeps happening. It is not quite that simple. You have to bring all of your baggage into the studio too. The baggage is everything you know, everything you feel, all your damages on the surface of your intuition. Walking up to the canvas is one thing, the act of marking the canvas is another. Drawing is the great practice. I am enjoying this so much because of the skill embedded within me, surfacing in every mark I make. I enjoy dotting the eye and lighting it up as it turns in its artificial space. That's a skill. This little act is the reason I return again and again; because feeling the power of a skill is an enormous reminder of the extraordinary quality which is living.
My recent work describes me seeing better. You can see it, but it is not something I wish to describe in words. Follow me here, follow me visually. Watch the expansion of comprehension occur.
There is this human desire to "get there." It isn't going to happen. Each drawing, each work of art, is just a stepping stone along a path leading to no particular place, but a place of firmer knowledge then where I am right now. In other words, as I wrote yesterday, I am being swept down a funnel, and a vast sea awaits me, but I shall always be in the funnel. Perhaps "the funnel" is, therefore, a poor analogy. Instead of getting squeezed, I am opening up. I am, however, slipping and sliding, stripping out the misdirections. The funneling process is me allowing myself to be frictionless. I am allowing the fall, I am allowing myself to be swept away by the flood. The funnel is the narrowing of accepted truths. The water of the flood is the enormous amount of relevant knowledge.
Yesterday produced two interesting drawings. The first feels traditional, yet is high in quality. The forms are extremely well felt. The second is about space, and using the human head as a round form, compositionally moving the viewer in and out of the picture plane while simultaneously designing the two--dimensional rectangle. This interest of mine, the 3-D versus the 2-D, brings me back to Cezanne. To make my point, two Cezanne Still-Life paintings are shown after my work. The first is just apples, like human heads running across the page. The second Cezanne is much more complex, powerful in its forms, rhythms, color, and spatial play. The technical finesse of this painting is as demanding as anything achieved by another master of three-dimensional rendering, Pablo Picasso. I have a feeling I will soon make a Still-Life painting myself. |
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May 2024
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