The sun has just risen over the Atlantic and tide is rolling in. We took a last-minute beach adventure; much-needed after the harsh re-entry into routine after the long holidays. What remains of the week is a frenzied roster of events and tasks; that peculiar state of daily life as parents and professionals. I'll enjoy the drive back once we're clear of the 70 miles of incessant billboard vulgarity which defines so many beaches. I hope for light traffic and blue skies.
...And later, reflections of the sun in the ripples of the pool as my little mermaids dive and glide beneath the surface. Skills honed last summer as we dutifully put in our daily hours poolside in Florida. They grow each day now, shooting up like sprouts after heavy rains.
Reflections on the year past and the weeks ahead, each year accelerating with my daughters ever closer to a day when they will move away and begin their own lives. If I do my job well, they will do so with confidence and wonder; and yet it breaks my heart to think of that day. Therein lies the rub of parenthood itself.
Reflections on the windy sea as Helios makes his ascent. Choppy waves move fast to shore and the artist's mind is lost in contemplating line and surface, form and fluidity. In a few short days I'll return to Spartanburg for the opening reception of the show. It still feels surreal and distant. A friend said she was coming and it made me realize that I had forgotten there would be people I knew there Friday night. Solitary is the practice and the Way. So much so it is surprising when it is peopled.
Wave wash sound of water caressing sand. I'll sit in my library tonight and feel recharged; our spontaneous escapade much needed after the harsh re-entry into daily routine from our long holiday break. Over two weeks back into it and we are all struggling still. I question why; perhaps too often. I suppose I wonder what purpose these Industrial Age structures of school and work actually serve any more. We are operating on 19th century paradigms which are long-since obsolete. Like the provincial sensibilities which make abstract art a hard sell even 100 years into the uniquely American story of it, as a nation we all-too-often mistake nostalgia and narrow mindedness for tradition.
some nights
I visited the Abstract Invitational exhibit last night. Seeing my work in that space felt very gratifying and very humbling. I was struck by how different the exhibition looked at SAM as opposed to the Elizabeth Harper gallery where it previously hung. The museum, -the Chapman Cultural Center as a whole, is top shelf. The citizens of Spartanburg should be proud; they are poised to enter into the global discussion of art with this space.
Any doubts about my seriousness as a painter are obliterated with this show. Any questions as to the significance of my work are laid to rest. I brought it, and no one can ever take away the moment I had with the show last night.
I'll be back a week from today for the official opening of the exhibit and I'll give a brief artist's talk. I'm glad I've now been in the space and seen the show, it makes the opening easier. I met some nice people last night, hopefully I'll meet more next week. I'm hopeful some of my friends from far away may surprise me and fly in, but the support online has been overwhelming as it is, and I know SC is not a destination for many who haven't been here.
It's before dawn and the house is still and in the darkness I drink my coffee and type these words and I'm still trying to understand that last night was not a dream. These little (and not so little) validations keep me going, for I know the road will never end for me.
floods
The rains came and my roof leaked, soaking most of the Eastern wall. The paintings in progress appear be OK, seasoned as they are from extreme temperatures and varying humidity. Sometimes the primitive nature of the studio gives me pause, but I love working in there when the temperatures climb and in the hot, still nights.
I will see the show for the first time this Thursday. As part of Spartanburg's Art Walk, I hope there will be some traffic. I'm curious to see how it will be received, though not having seen the show in the space, it will be an experience for me as well.
The black paintings are promising. I was able to experiment with some 10" square canvases and the results are powerful. It's hard to get a handle on what it will look like big, but I feel very positive thus far. I was able to get down another coat of gesso on the 4 in play, and the surfaces are coming along nicely. I know I'm onto something. I don't recall every feeling this way about emerging work in the studio.
I will see the show for the first time this Thursday. As part of Spartanburg's Art Walk, I hope there will be some traffic. I'm curious to see how it will be received, though not having seen the show in the space, it will be an experience for me as well.
The black paintings are promising. I was able to experiment with some 10" square canvases and the results are powerful. It's hard to get a handle on what it will look like big, but I feel very positive thus far. I was able to get down another coat of gesso on the 4 in play, and the surfaces are coming along nicely. I know I'm onto something. I don't recall every feeling this way about emerging work in the studio.
higher ground
I met the writer D A Adams for coffee this afternoon on his way through town. We have been friends for half our lives, having met in a poetry workshop in college. He's one of those lifelong friends that whenever we meet the time and distance immediately fade. Our intense conversations always leave me transformed and questioning. Coffee turned into 4 hours without either of us noticing. Of him I can say many things, but suffice to say he is a gentleman and a professional. His writing transcends genre and speaks to me personally and profoundly about the human condition.
Today also begins the unfortunate anniversary of the birth, short life, and death of another close friend's child. The mother's blog and Facebook posts are often gut-wrenching and brutally real in a way that makes them extremely difficult to read and nearly impossible to respond to. Years after, the pain remains ever-present for them, and while one tries to be good friend, there comes a point of realizing there's nothing one can do. I'll never feel what they feel; at least I hope with every fibre of my being that I will not, and this by its very acknowledgement creates a chasm so vast that there is only blackness and the seeming hollowness of kindness to offer. I feel for them and I think of Ellie through the years and I wish they did not feel alone in their pain and that I could somehow reach through it.
The black paintings are about our humanity. Seeing and interpreting the last day of Christ within the context of epic poetry, epic story, made me appreciate it anew. I'm still not religious, nor will I ever be again, but the story speaks to me. When I saw my first crude efforts I immediately understood how heavy the works will eventually be. Even those 2 paintings hit me like a Mack truck to the chest; but they were not what I wanted, so I destroyed them. Whatever spiritual or transformative paintings I may or may not have painted to-date are nothing compared to these. These are something else entirely. I see it in my head and I cannot rest. They will not leave me alone.
So maybe the pain I cannot find the strength to speak to in the case of my friends' child is somehow a part of this. Maybe the eternal conversation between good friends is more than the simple act of reunion and is, instead, a regenerative spiritual process; a rebirth. Our inadequate distinctions between joy and agony seem to only limit a true experience of either. Those moments when we allow ourselves to feel deeply and without limits are the moments when our souls awaken from the horrific slumber of daily life. So I celebrate the writings of a grieving mother even as I sometimes recoil from them. I embrace the unending love and connection of a friend as I am aware we may not see each other for months or even years. Our feelings are somehow better when they are inappropriately laid bare, and naked, and present, because we dilute them in our everyday grind. And on those same lines if art (or Art) doesn't somehow connect with and engage that, then it is not, nor can it ever be art. It is, to paraphrase the prophet, an empty sound; like cheap tin.
Today also begins the unfortunate anniversary of the birth, short life, and death of another close friend's child. The mother's blog and Facebook posts are often gut-wrenching and brutally real in a way that makes them extremely difficult to read and nearly impossible to respond to. Years after, the pain remains ever-present for them, and while one tries to be good friend, there comes a point of realizing there's nothing one can do. I'll never feel what they feel; at least I hope with every fibre of my being that I will not, and this by its very acknowledgement creates a chasm so vast that there is only blackness and the seeming hollowness of kindness to offer. I feel for them and I think of Ellie through the years and I wish they did not feel alone in their pain and that I could somehow reach through it.
The black paintings are about our humanity. Seeing and interpreting the last day of Christ within the context of epic poetry, epic story, made me appreciate it anew. I'm still not religious, nor will I ever be again, but the story speaks to me. When I saw my first crude efforts I immediately understood how heavy the works will eventually be. Even those 2 paintings hit me like a Mack truck to the chest; but they were not what I wanted, so I destroyed them. Whatever spiritual or transformative paintings I may or may not have painted to-date are nothing compared to these. These are something else entirely. I see it in my head and I cannot rest. They will not leave me alone.
So maybe the pain I cannot find the strength to speak to in the case of my friends' child is somehow a part of this. Maybe the eternal conversation between good friends is more than the simple act of reunion and is, instead, a regenerative spiritual process; a rebirth. Our inadequate distinctions between joy and agony seem to only limit a true experience of either. Those moments when we allow ourselves to feel deeply and without limits are the moments when our souls awaken from the horrific slumber of daily life. So I celebrate the writings of a grieving mother even as I sometimes recoil from them. I embrace the unending love and connection of a friend as I am aware we may not see each other for months or even years. Our feelings are somehow better when they are inappropriately laid bare, and naked, and present, because we dilute them in our everyday grind. And on those same lines if art (or Art) doesn't somehow connect with and engage that, then it is not, nor can it ever be art. It is, to paraphrase the prophet, an empty sound; like cheap tin.
anew
I spent my last day of 2013 in the studio. Tonight I will drink with good friends and ring in the New Year, safe and stationary for the evening. Through the magic of the internet, I won't be anywhere near a computer or smartphone when this posts, but I wish everyone a happy 2014.
I'll walk into the studio in the new year ready to do battle. I know the way ahead, it is clear to me now.
In just over 2 weeks the SAM show will open, and I will see my work hanging in an art museum for the very first time. I hope this bodes well for the new year, we painters are a suspicious lot. I remember meeting a fairly famous sculptor back in the Spring at an opening at June Kelly who, finding himself surrounded by a motley crew of painters remarked that painters have to take the hard way. For sculptors, he said, if it works we go with it. But you painters have to struggle. If it comes easy you always reject it.
I suppose that's true. Knifing those two paintings yesterday was the only option. I could look at it as 3 months work down the drain or I could see it for what it is; 3 months worth of practice and setting my own bar. What emerges from destruction is often better than what was before. In my case, I've never denied the link between creation and destruction. Indeed, my process is often violent and chaotic to reach the pictures I paint.
I'm glad 2013 is over. I'm not one for the past. Today is the greatest day of my life. This is the greatest time. My daughters' age now is my favorite age they have been, and this has always been the case. I can't look ahead too far into the new year. I have my plots and plans, but in the end I will be where I need to be. I feel the work is about to go somewhere really powerful and so I want for nothing.
I have a feeling that this series will be accomplished much more quickly than I originally thought. I can't wait to watch it come together.
scrap
I took a utility knife to two 6' x 6' canvases tonight, destroying 3 months worth of work. I have no problem admitting failure, nor do I fear it. Failure teaches. Coming out of it, I skinned both frames with new canvas and skinned two additional. I've got sizing on everything and it's all drying.
There's a seduction to destroying one's own work; especially when it hasn't been seen. The world will never know. Some aspects of my process are secret, and I've learned to keep them that way. There may come a day when someone wants access, but for now, I'm free to do as I please.
I solved the problems, and I've addressed the failures and the dramatic use of a knife was to ensure that I wouldn't flinch. I had to burn my ships at the shore. I know where I'm going now, I can see the way. There's this moment before another leap when I feel all alive and tingly and short of breath. That's when I know it's really something. I've never seen work like this before.
I'm halfway through my day job break. I accidentally read a calendar entry from work yesterday and it took all my facilities to push it back out of my consciousness. This year has an exit strategy; a line in the sand.
Interestingly, I'll have four canvases in essentially the same stage of development. I see the attack. I know how I'm going to approach them, but the next few weeks are all surface prep. I have 10 small (10" x 10") canvases coming this week to work out the process on. I'll show them to the Greenville dealer if they are any good, but for now they are tools. I'm not feeling poetic tonight. I'm in a place of uncertainty and I'm anxious to see how this all goes down.
The year unwinds. This is my favorite time of the year, the space between christmas and new year's. The world seems slow and optimistic. I haven't a clue what is going on in the world, or at the day job, or politically or anything else. I'll paint, I'll spend time with friends and I'll find a way to make this space expand into months instead of weeks.
The SAM show is on the horizon now. No word on the opening date, but likely the 16th or 23rd of January. I hope it goes well, and I hope it's well-received.
There's a seduction to destroying one's own work; especially when it hasn't been seen. The world will never know. Some aspects of my process are secret, and I've learned to keep them that way. There may come a day when someone wants access, but for now, I'm free to do as I please.
I solved the problems, and I've addressed the failures and the dramatic use of a knife was to ensure that I wouldn't flinch. I had to burn my ships at the shore. I know where I'm going now, I can see the way. There's this moment before another leap when I feel all alive and tingly and short of breath. That's when I know it's really something. I've never seen work like this before.
I'm halfway through my day job break. I accidentally read a calendar entry from work yesterday and it took all my facilities to push it back out of my consciousness. This year has an exit strategy; a line in the sand.
Interestingly, I'll have four canvases in essentially the same stage of development. I see the attack. I know how I'm going to approach them, but the next few weeks are all surface prep. I have 10 small (10" x 10") canvases coming this week to work out the process on. I'll show them to the Greenville dealer if they are any good, but for now they are tools. I'm not feeling poetic tonight. I'm in a place of uncertainty and I'm anxious to see how this all goes down.
The year unwinds. This is my favorite time of the year, the space between christmas and new year's. The world seems slow and optimistic. I haven't a clue what is going on in the world, or at the day job, or politically or anything else. I'll paint, I'll spend time with friends and I'll find a way to make this space expand into months instead of weeks.
The SAM show is on the horizon now. No word on the opening date, but likely the 16th or 23rd of January. I hope it goes well, and I hope it's well-received.
uncertainty
il primo fallimento [the third station], (in progress), December 2013
There is no satisfaction in art. Not in the making, and not in encountering. At the very least, a work of art should leave you uncertain. There should be some amount of anxiety. Martha Graham called the creative process a "divine dissatisfaction." Artists live in a state of uncertainty; we are by our very nature not satisfiers .
Failure is essential to the artistic process. Without repeated and progressive failure, there can be no growth, and without failure whatever you're making isn't art. I like to be surprised in the studio. I prefer a state of ambivalence where I may even be frightened or hesitant about what I see; what I've done.
The Stations series is taking me into that darkness. I did not anticipate what working with black on black paintings would be like, nor what they would look like. There is an eerie subtlety and haunting sensuality to this work; but that's speaking about impressions, not process.
The process involves laying down lots of paint and taking it away. With the white on black works this gave way to forms, but with the black on black, the paintings become as much about what is absent and what has been removed. Fitting from a theological perspective I suppose.
condanna [the first station], (in progress), Dec 2013
My initial experimentation with the process caught me off guard. The works were not what I had anticipated but a the same time so much more. As one would expect, they are incredibly difficult to photograph. There's a pathos to them. There's a sense of naked humanity and transcendent emptiness that I find very difficult to express in words.
sticks
via Instagram
Paint sticks and the big black sketchbook and bourbon, alone in the parlor. Fire and dog, hearth and home as the tired Odysseus; weary from the semester and its toll. Black on black my thoughts; trading in subtlety, perhaps waxing intellectual against my better judgement.
There's something fine about oil paint across surface. On paper, it glides and clumps and drags: roads, I am always on roads after all. There's the work. The work that is rigorous and hard but that is liberating in a way that nothing else is. I tend to happen upon. Yet I put myself there in the first place, and happenstance then becomes a constructed sum of intention and opportunity. When we prepare ourselves for chance...well, there you have it.
struggles
I have been working on the first two stations since late October. I have found that black has to be contended with, at least in this case. I confess I'm struggling; perhaps overthinking, as I wait and discover where these paintings want to go. Much progress today, things are beginning to click for me.
I've said many times that work comes from work. I'm not a big believer in inspiration or those lightening strikes moments in creation. The best ideas/revelations/observations come in the moment of doing, when the mind is hyper-focused and attuned. I am coming to terms with just how large of an undertaking this series truly is.
I'll build two more stretcher frames this week and skin them toward the end of the week or next weekend. With 4 in play, I think I can begin to see them differently. I was excited to move the two together on the large wall yesterday.
Black can be academic. It's heady and intellectual from a painterly perspective. It shows everything and what I'm most interested in right now is eliminating everything from my paintings and simply getting to the essence.
I took a long drive yesterday, down the two lane back roads and rural highways across to Union and back. The pleasure of driving alone in a responsive car with no destination in mind is something too many people never experience. That oneness of man and machine is sublime; a way, like painting, that enables one to lose themselves and reach intense universal awareness. It is a like being naked in the ocean, lying on your back and looking at the stars; as if there is no beginning or end or separation from self and sky and sea.
So that's my head space for this work. To take away everything until I reach the point of fragility and entropy and then to somehow stop it just before that moment. To find the where the painting is about to collapse and stop just shy. No color, no form. Oneness and meditation.
two in the night
Two canvases in play, I smoked a cigar in the brisk night. Good work tonight, and the weight of the past weeks felt lifted. Black has a spiritual presence; as if the absence is itself being. I can get distance now with the space cleaned out. I can see.
There will be much paint thrown this week, good paint to purpose and meaning. Quiet house and warmth now after the dampness of the evening rain seeped into my bones. I've built walls to make room, I'll build more painting storage this weekend and wrap and store the large paintings. Over the next few weeks I'll have 4 to 6 paintings in play; moving in and out from one to another like a boxer. I feel purpose and direction again.
the black paintings
I managed to build a new wall in the studio over the long weekend, and now have much more room to work. The temperatures this week look as if they may cooperate and I will rush into the studio when they do. I have two, 6' square black canvases there now waiting. I've been wrestling with where to go next, but as I have considered it and after bouncing it off a friend this afternoon, I know that I have do the series in all black.
I guest curated an online series about art and mysticism. I think selecting the paintings for that series got me thinking about my influences and about painting and of course being in the studio and making work...work comes from work in that way.
I've never hid my love for Goya. His Black Paintings are very much an inspiration; though I stumbled upon this series rather than decided to do it. I also love Rothko's black paintings, perhaps more than anything else in his oeuvre. The final "sign" was the weekend I posted the picture in the last post. There was an article in the NY Times that same week about Ad Reinhardt's black paintings. It seemed all things pointed to it, and while I momentarily worried about being derivative, I realized that these will be very much my own.
There's a lot of work to be done. At this point I think it would be ambitious to think I can finish the series in a year. So I am embarking on something epic in scope, as the paintings are epic in scale. Like the best journeys, I don't know exactly what it will end up being. I don't know if I'll stick to strict squares or incorporate other shapes and ratios. I don't even know if these first two will end up even being good paintings or if they will be experiences that end up in the trash heap. Some do.
I guest curated an online series about art and mysticism. I think selecting the paintings for that series got me thinking about my influences and about painting and of course being in the studio and making work...work comes from work in that way.
I've never hid my love for Goya. His Black Paintings are very much an inspiration; though I stumbled upon this series rather than decided to do it. I also love Rothko's black paintings, perhaps more than anything else in his oeuvre. The final "sign" was the weekend I posted the picture in the last post. There was an article in the NY Times that same week about Ad Reinhardt's black paintings. It seemed all things pointed to it, and while I momentarily worried about being derivative, I realized that these will be very much my own.
There's a lot of work to be done. At this point I think it would be ambitious to think I can finish the series in a year. So I am embarking on something epic in scope, as the paintings are epic in scale. Like the best journeys, I don't know exactly what it will end up being. I don't know if I'll stick to strict squares or incorporate other shapes and ratios. I don't even know if these first two will end up even being good paintings or if they will be experiences that end up in the trash heap. Some do.
Embark
The year unravels and the days fall into one another as we all count the days until the students leave. I'll sign off in a few weeks, my annual ritual of unplugging over the holidays helps me stay sane. I feel that I'm coasting into December on vapors, one engine left and the other 3 enveloped in smoke. I am spent; profoundly and utterly.
Yet.
I've begun my stations of the cross series. I am not a religious person, but the story is so epic that I wanted to take it on creatively. I've never been interested in being controversial or shocking people. Despite being passionate about many issues, I've always remained mostly apolitical in my work. So I do have the fear that these paintings will be maligned and misinterpreted and given agendas they will not have. But the need to make them compels me, no matter the response.
I simply want to re-interpret the story. I want to do it straight, without irony. I've decided to rename some of the stations and alter the narrative, and it is likely those re-imagined versions will be the point of contention for some. But that's honestly not my intention. I know to refer to as it myth is deeply upsetting to a lot of people, but making myth personal is something that I believe is essential to our journey as humans. I'm not concerned with historical accuracy or even a discussion as to whether the events depicted are real or embellished. It doesn't matter to me. It's a powerful story from which millions of people draw strength and comfort. I've no wish to diminish it or mock it for anyone; quite to the contrary, I want to re-tell it to make it belong to people who might not even consider it in another context.
I'm reading Homer's Odyssey and it has cracked open a perspective toward art for me. This series was a natural expression of where I find myself and what I personally believe art is for.
So these are my final apologies. Like any body of work, once it goes out into the world I have no control as to how it will be received. I can't worry about that in the making, either. I have to be true to the course I set for myself in the studio and work with authenticity and integrity.
I've got the first two paintings in various states of beginning. All 14 will be 6' square, and unlike the work I've been doing for the past 2 years, I don't know if I'm going to use white at all. I envision them all black. Originally I had thought to do them in order, but as I seldom name paintings until they are completed I felt this was disingenuous. Better to paint what comes than work linearly from 1 to 14. So the titles may skip around as I post the images over the next year.
I've also decided to make the titles in Italian as a nod to the painters of old and my heritage as a painter and craftsman. We were once the earthly hands of the Divine. We adorned the sanctuaries and painted the sacred stories for the illiterate. We worked for Tribe, Village, Church and King. What are now?
I believe art should speak to our humanity and offer us a look inside our being. Art should show us the depth of ourselves. That's what I'm interested in. That's why I do this.
So let the work stand. I wish no ill towards anyone or their beliefs, but I'm not responsible for anyone else's feelings either. In the end the paintings will endure or die because they are either good or bad.
So we begin...
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