The Waking Vision

The cat decided to take a nap on my lap this evening.  I love it when she does; I find her very comforting.  After a while, however much I enjoy her warm presence, my legs begin to ache from impaired blood flow and I must, reluctantly move.  She invariably leaves me and I usually, as I did  tonight, curl up in a ball and sleep.

This evening, I briefly napped, awoke with an idea in my head and ran upstairs to make a drawing, with which I am pleased.  From there I went to work on an idea about a painting, on which I have been working on for ten years.  It is a part of a series of works, both 2-d and 3-d referring to The Crown of Thorns from the New Testament of the Bible, with which Jesus was crowned as a mocking tribute to his authority.  I am fascinated by the metaphor.

This particular painting is a collage of my ripped up charcoal drawings, on a panel,.  I had done one before measuring 3 x 3 feet, on a red background.  I like it very much.  This one is 4 x 4 feet on a pale blue background, like a sky.  It was too simple, yet, I could never quite find a way to complicate it just right.  I tried lots of things and pulled them off the surface. When I say I have been working for ten years it was, build up and tear down for several of them. Finally I got smart, lazy or frustrated and worked in my head.  The image has been thumping around in my head, with its' four sharp corners for a long time.
 
In the last three weeks, I conceived of an idea, brought to me by my storage war.  I do not have room to store a  4 x 4 foot painting and it is a pain in the neck to move.....that is what saws are for.

Tonight I placed the image in "Paint" and cut it up.  I love it!  4 x 4 cut into 4.

In my studio that I had this past fall, I had a cot.  When I grew tired, every day, I would lie down and nap for as little as 5 or 10 minutes.  When I woke, my eyes were new, my head was clear and ideas flowed again;  same as tonight.  Perhaps there is something about waking up from the horizontal to see the vertical image that allows me to just get it.  Live with the work; the waking vision is so different from the staring one.

The only problem I have now is that I do not want to sleep, I am so excited.  I hope the lumber yard will cut this thing for me.

Oh boy Oh boy oh boy!

Rules??

I confess, I follow most rules.  As an artist this can be an oxymoron and yet potentially liberating.  It can also be a wonderful framework in which to press the edges until they mold to what I want.

In life, I try to follow rules.  In life, I often fail.  This is not because I am such a rebel, I am not, at least not until I am pressed, not unlike that aforementioned framework...   Rather the issue I face with rules is that I just don't understand a lot of them.  Dare I say - your rules; dare I say your rules, except when they apply to me?

I get shushed, more than I would like and often by people who seem to enjoy my company. I guess my company is OK up to a certain volume.  My cousin posted a t-shirt on Facebook to another cousin of mine; the t-shirt read:

http://www.greekworldmusic.com/product_info.php?products_id=3203&osCsid=pei36r19so11r7cvg52dr2c330

Actually, while there is some truth culturally, in saying that Greek culture accepts a different level of interaction volume, it could also be construed as an ethnic slur.  I was not encouraged in my upbringing to have no opinions nor to be unwilling to express them.  I was encouraged to be lady-like, but also full of life.  So I chose to keep my legs together when wearing a skirt, and to speak fully when moved to expression.  This is against the rules, especially if wearing a skirt; why those two are related boggles my mind.  I do not get the rules.

Museums are not churches, you may talk.  You may feel.  You may rejoice with consideration of others and of the work (Do not throw snowballs in a museum). I walked into a gallery in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York,  to visit my favorite Manet angels:



http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/29.100.51


and wept instead when I encountered a Courbet:

http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/40.175

It just plain floored me that day.  The guard thought I was nuts.  Perhaps I was, but I felt overwhelmed and it felt alive to allow the full sensation of that feeling.  It is a beautiful painting (not well represented online). I could feel the touch of Courbet's brush on the canvas. I still love the Manet too, but that Courbet, just got to me.

Television is entertaining.  Why do people think that it is odd of me to laugh out loud at a joke on TV?  I am in my own house and I am not disrupting their pleasure; I do not get this rule.

I like funky clothes.  I wear them less than I used to because I am old.  The age things matters to me because I belong to other people and I might make them feel foolish.  I hate that, but I try to follow that rule a bit.  Most people would tell you that they have no idea what I am saying, since I always look weird; they have no idea what I left in my closet.

It is nice not to rob, injure, murder, cheat, lie....but really, if I am loud in the hall while you are playing bridge, will it kill you;  4 seconds of 24 hours, because I laughed, fully?

I can't do Facebook according to he rules either.  I have no idea what those rules are, but I seem to be messing up there royally.  I keep getting private messages or phone calls that say "Stop!" "Take it down!" or "Oh no!!!"  I keep sending "Sorry."  I feel about 3 years old.  If you see less of me on Facebook, that's why - I seem to be really stepping in it and I do not want to bother anybody.

I am a bull in the china shop of the world.  I don't like breaking the china, I am just trying to say hello and get out of your way.  Perhaps I should press my ringed nose against the glass, but that would probably scratch it.  Point me to Wall Street where I can play outside and be a good omen.

In the meantime, as I have been told, I will continue to be as described: "...about a subtle as a Mack truck" and "What you see is what you get."  I take these as compliments.  I have little subterfuge, I stink at lying and I wear my heart on my sleeve. Rules?  I am very compliant, but I often can't read the language.

Sorry is my mantra, but expression seems to be my tenacious, truculent, succulent, inexorable identity.

                    .....Sorry.

                                                                                            

  

Flu Blues

I recently fell ill with the flu.  Please do not yell at me for not getting a flu shot, I did.  As so many of us have come to realize this winter, the flu shot does not cover all the strains this year and we have an epidemic.  Fortunately, the shot did lessen the effects so I was not totally miserable and my fever stayed below 101 degrees.

Flu hits hard, even weak flu and I spent most of the first four days in bed.  I had lots of time on my hands, lots.  TV gets old, Facebook repetitive, reading is a little tough... so I thought, between naps and then I thought more.  I worried and obsessed over things I had said the day before my temperature rose; dumb things, really dumb things.  I ached, some from the flu, but mostly from verbal regret, unfettered by new interactions.

Today, I saw a couple of the people in whose presence I had verbally embarrassed myself. I apologized for my clumsiness and stupidity and the possible offense I had precipitated in them.  It is completely possible that the dear people I spoke with today plead generous ignorance out of kindness. It might well be that they had been too busy with their own versions of the flu or other business, that they actually did not recall, or care, if I had been a less than evolved human.  Thank goodness and their good natures, that I am redeemed!

"Too much time on my hands," never too many friends, glad I didn't lose any while I learned yet another painful lesson.  I am still becoming human and I am working hard on it too! Perhaps the flu slowed me down and shut me up at just the right moment.  Ah-choo, ah-choo, thank you flu? God bless you too.

Story-Telling and Art

The last event of my show at Baldwin School was  a meeting with the Third Grade who were studying my paintings; imagine!.  I have taught elementary students a little bit, a long time ago. These students have an outstanding teacher who taught them a lot about looking and about talking about art.  They were fun.

I was a little concerned that too many limitations were being placed on their reactions, so I wrote them a letter:

Dear Third Grade:

It was fun meeting with you a couple of weeks ago.  I would have written sooner, but I got the flu!  While resting though, I have been thinking about our few minutes together.

I am very impressed and honored by the time and care you have each taken to consider and to comment, with great insight, on my artwork.  Mrs. G. has taken her wonderful knowledge skills in art history and appreciation and taught you very well; you are insightful viewers. I apologize for forgetting to point out some of Mrs. G's amazing observations that might have been helpful in your other studies.  My paintings have no people in them.  That is on purpose, as I feel people diminish the vastness and the eternal qualities of the ocean.  The permanence and vital import of the water is the main reason I am attracted to it.  While I love to play in the water, I also feel a full connection to the universe when I am near it.  It is an enormous force of nature and the source of all life.  It’s enormity in every aspect of our lives is immeasurable and I hope to capture that feeling in the images.

Having stated my point of view and having praised your formal art observational skills, I want to go on to encourage a skill that you may not realize you have developed.  As you were lining up to leave, a comment was made by your substitute, that there had been “enough story-telling and it was time to move on.”  There is never, nor there ever be “enough story-telling.”  I delighted in your stories; we were all interacting with the art work.  Your stories were direct reactions to the images.  They were sparked by the images and your stories demonstrated to me what my work brought to your minds.  Some of you were more verbal than others.  Some of you were silent. Silence is also a response to art, whether it is sparked by personal contemplation or by lack of interest, it is a strong response.

Art is an act of sharing.  It is a non verbal story.  Much of the artwork found in churches was made to tell Biblical stories because most of the people in the churches did not read.  Art is thought, ideas  and emotion; story-telling and education in a non-verbal form.  Your storytelling was wonderful and gave me much insight about the effectiveness of my pictures.

I am so glad that you enjoyed my work and I am delighted to have met you and to have heard and seen your interactions with my work, each other and with me.  Keep up your enthusiasm, curiosity and generosity.  You are wonderfully intelligent and joyful people.

I hope that they take my words to heart and know that talking in the presence of art work is a joy. Living with art is a privilege that I wish more people would undertake.  Buy real art, it does not have to be expensive and it brings huge wealth to your life.  

I have a HUGE inventory ;)

Fool For Art

December 2014:
The show is framed.  From here on out it is all fun until the day it gets hung on the walls. Whew.

Way back in August I began the process, now five large paintings, six drawings, four traditional prints, four digital prints are ready.  Everything is new, guess I can still work when I have the space.

The space is the one in my mind and in my being.  Today I started out at home and was interrupted not less than a dozen times.  12X!  How can anybody work when there is not time to put two thoughts and feelings together? Time, not in isolation so much as in safety, of freedom, exploration and expanse.

Since I have had space, my entire life has changed.  The family still begs attention, but I wake up with ideas in my head.  I am happy.  I am whole again.  Artists must not be led down paths of service to the world which do not involve their work; it kills.

February 2015:
Now that I lack the physical space, the metaphysical has vanished as well. Thoughts no longer pop in my head with abandon;  depression and dullness reside there with great spreading wealth.

My entire creative life  from high school to the present day, now lives in a spare bedroom. Every crisis, joy and confusion, visually documented, lies in piles of paper, canvas and pigment.  When I die, what will they do with this debris?  I imagine the same as they will do with my body, burn it.  I have cleaned out the houses of many elderly women who have been forced to downsize.  We pick through the vestiges of their lives, hopes, dreams, joys and sorrows.  No life goes without inspection of detritus, with or without judgement.

Years ago I threw out a self portrait made in my twenties.  In it, I sported a strapless blue bikini top and blue jeans.  I placed the painting outside for the trash men; it was taken from the trash.  I was flattered and oddly embarrassed.  I wonder where I am, half dressed.  Am I dart board?  The painting was mounted on plywood.

The truth is that when paintings leave the studio, I have no control over them and if  I choose to make images of myself then I have no control over that momentary aspect of myself.  When the time comes for me to leave the studio, permanently, I will have no say in the dispersal of my life's work, nor will I care. So do I dispose of work now via the trash or do I try to sell or give it away?  Does that become my life's work?  The walls of my studio, like those of the Death Star's trash compactor, are closing in. I must act or be swallowed by personal history.

As I no longer have an empty, quiet space in which to work, it seems that I have few options. "Growing old is not for sissies;" growing old for artists is not for the weak-stomached nor for the sentimental. Alas I am both.