Choices

"I have touched with a sense of art some people - they felt the love and the life. Can you offer me anything to compare to that joy for an artist?
Mary Cassatt

This is what all the hard work and heavy thought is all about. This is the Saturday nights with a western film playing in the background while I stand in front of the canvas. This is the reward for all the other things the fairy elves won't do while I attempt to have a personal life. Mary Cassatt also said, "Americans have a way of thinking work is nothing. Come out and play they say." Sing it, Sister is what I say.

Pursuit of anything involves Choice and its even more festive buddy, Chaos (see earlier post). Sometimes making the right choice sucks the big banana. I don't know about you but nobody highlighted that when we studied for the test.

Regardless, some of us will choose to play it safe and some of us will be forever launching ourselves into the unknown with blithe abandon. And it's okay to do either one and probably wisest to do a saner combination both extremes. Myself, I am leaning a little toward launching. However you are so inclined, I hope you are enjoying your journey!

Life=Art, Art=Life

Dear Blog, it has been too long since I wrote in you. Here I am again, when the everyday has gotten to be too much and I once again must express myself or spontaneously combust.

"I would not cast out my illness, for there is much in my art that I owe it to."
Edward Munch

"I have put has my heart and soul into my work, and have lost my mind in the process."
Vincent VanGogh

"You should keep on painting no matter how difficult it is, because this is all part of experience, and the more experience you have the better it is - unless it kills you, and then you know you have gone too far."
Alice Neal

Recently I wandered and wondered down a different path, and have once again been reminded that it's probably a good idea keep to the one thing that has held and sustained me my whole life. Growing up in a small Southern Baptist town taught me early on that artist as outsider is more the norm than the exception, and that being different is not something that is always respected or celebrated. This has been my reality for a long time, and most of the time I am at peace with it.

When I was young I wanted very badly to fit in with the kids at school, but never quite achieved it. Even now, I still secretly long (not so secretly now) to be accepted. Even more, for someone to see me and actually want to talk to me about life and art and be interested in what I have to say. Recent experience has once again demonstrated to me that my life is rich in many ways, but that I can't have everything (at least not all at once).

"Of all lies, art is the least untrue."
Gustave Flaubert

Chaos

Another big topic. Here goes:

In the process of creativity and life at a certain point chaos reigns. Think: making the big life-changing move, know where you're moving to and what goodies await. Yet still: there are the bits and pieces of life waiting to be sorted and packed and classified in order to make that big move. At first, all is well but at the end there are always things to save and organize but not enough time,energy and inclination to do so.

Every time I begin a painting this happens. At first it's all big ideas and big brushes. Inevitably, at some point reality will set in and I will think, "What was I thinking"? It's at this point the sheep start to get separated from the rams.

Choices in art and life abound at this point:
Give up and walk away?
Throw something and swear vigorously?
Paint over the damn thing and pretend it never happened?
Some combination of the above?

Whether any, all or a combination of the above, I think it's important to recognize that chaos is integral to change, growth and life in general. Our companion chaos is not comfortable and not warm and fuzzy, but I'm thinking chaos is necessary to all of us on our journey.

Measuring Success: Here Comes the Judge

In my last blog I talked about measuring success. It's all relative, correct? What about when you (or me) is the judge?

It is human nature that we measure our (perceived) worth against that of our peers and family in any number of situations. Think wealth, looks, jobs, children, etc. Case in point: the Art Show.

On Saturday I am one of 3 judges of over 80 artists and artisans at a show in my area. Oh, No. What was I thinking? This is not a good idea for several reasons:

1] Everyone worked so hard and paid a fee to be there, so I believe they are all winners. How am I supposed to pick just a few?
2) The amount of time I have to consider all this work is short and (see above) no matter what their work looks like, they deserve respect for being there.
3) Who am I to be in charge of looking at this work and awarding prizes?

Once again, we are back to measuring success. Maybe the TRUE measure of success is to be in the moment and to be happy to be there. The Dalai Lama talks of relativity: the wealthy man can have a really rich meal and have indigestion; the poor man can have simple meal and know a full, happy belly.

I hope on Saturday I'm able to recognize efforts and hard work and encourage creativity in everyone who participated!

Measuring Success

WOW! This is a pretty big topic to take on, so I believe I'll just dip a toe in and see how the water feels.

In the last fortnight I attended the opening at the Museum of Florida Art and I had a booth at the Boards & Waves Expo. Both events were fabulous good fun, as far as I was concerned. However, the big issue always comes up: SALES. "Are you selling anything?"

This is how some (okay, lots) of people measure success. Money in the art world is tied to myriad definitions of success. Maybe success is making enough lighthouse paintings to make the mortgage but not have a day job. Maybe success is huge worldwide recognition and acclaim with all the ass-kissing in the world. Maybe success is making the booth fee.

I don't know. Truth be told, all of those thoughts flash through my head at some point or another in the process. It's pretty easy to go from a Vincent state of mind (one sale in his lifetime) to Salvador success (everything that man touched was pure gold) in the blink of an eye.

Did I make my booth fee? Sort of. Did I recoup all my expenses? No. Did I make new friends and find new creative ventures to explore? Yes. Do I believe that the venture was a success? Yes. What do you think?

I'd like to close with one of my favorite quotes:

"Love what you do. Believe in your instincts. And you'd better be able to pick yourself up and brush yourself off every day." -Mario Andretti

Persistence

"Kate Comes Ashore" is a personal study in patience and persistence, and I am pleased to say she is finally getting the attention her little self deserves.

I took the photo of my BF Donna's daughter Kate way back in '99. I held on to it until about 3 years ago, when I (finally) felt I had some of the skills necessary to do her justice in a painting.

I used scale and a grid on something like a 1:5 scale to work out the proportions. I painted the face with the image and the canvas upside down to force the L-R brain shift and make me see what the shapes of her face REALLY look like, not what my left brain thinks a face looks like.

The first few times I showed her, the reception was less than enthusiastic. I really got a little paranoid about what people were telling me about her, because I have no experience with portraiture and I had to go back and work out issues several times. I persevered, and now she has a play date at the Museum of Florida Art in DeLand for Florida Biennial V from April 9th through May 30.

BTW: the painting looks just like her at age 4.

Art and Math

I stated in an earlier blog that art is not like math; there is more than one correct answer. What I didn't say was that art and math are buddies, and that in order to make art a working knowledge of math is essential.

This can create a dilemma for someone like me, who began failing math at age 9 and continued to fail it in a spectacular fashion all the way through graduate school. I Christmas treed The ACT and GRE,and there is not enough therapy and drugs available to make me take an exam involving math ever again in my life.

Life is full of irony, and some of my best tools are a tape measure, a T square and a ruler. Artists for centuries have used geometry and algebra as essential components for creating artworks, particularly on a large scale. I have a painting in my studio I haven't finished for months because I got stupid and ignored the (1" to 5") scale I had set and the corresponding grid. Now I have to paint over large bits. So much for the process being all touch-feely.

In life an ability to measure any number of things is pretty important. Reading blueprints and understanding dimensions when building a home, measuring spaces for furniture, assessing a space for appliances and other home stuff all require basic math skills. Mess up and it can be costly and embarrassing. Believe it or not, I have taught 18 year old students who did not know how to use basic measurement skills, like how to draw 1" square on a piece of paper or understand the marks on a ruler.

We measure people, too. Sometimes they "measure up" and sometimes they don't. Get it right and all is well with the world and relationships go smoothly. Get it wrong and then measure up the high cost of fixing it. Yikes!

On that note, here's a thought provoking quote:
"Each of us will one day be judged by our standard of life - not by our standard of living; by our measure of giving - not by our measure of wealth; by our simple goodness - not by our seeming greatness."
William Arthur Ward

Art in the News

This last week has provided a few interesting and diverse art-related news items.

An Alberto Giacometti sculpture fetched the highest auction price EVER for an artwork, commanding 104.3 million dollars at a recent London auction. The selling price beats the previous record of $104.2 million for Pablo Picasso's "Garcon a la Pipe" in 2004. Giacometti's "Tall Figure I" originates from 1960, when the artist planned a series of bronze figures. The artwork stands 6 feet tall and is of an extremely emaciated human figure in mid stride. Both Giacometti and Picasso enjoyed critical acclaim and financial success while they were still alive, a real bonus and (thankfully for the living) not totally unheard of.

The upcoming Winter Olympic venues are going to be showcasing over 140 pieces of Aboriginal Art from 90 First Nations, Inuit and M'etis artists. The artists are from every province and territory in Canada. The program will produce a first of its kind collection from established as well as up and coming talent. Even more wonderful, the program pairs artists with at-risk youth in communities across the country. I think this is so awesome and is testimony to the power of art to inspire, educate, inform and express the human experience.

Carl Jung, one of the pioneers of psychology and a contemporary of Sigmund Freud, believed that there are symbols and images that transcend culture, time and place. His theory is that these archetypal symbols date from our very origins as humans and that they are recognizable to us, even in these contemporary times. What is so interesting is how similar Australian Aboriginal symbols look to Native American symbols and the Aboriginal Art that I'm looking forward to seeing at the Olympics.

I'm also looking forward to the Super Bowl ads later on today. Talk about having fun with the Elements and Principles of Design! I want to see the Bud Light house made out of beer cans. In the commercial, it's easy to spot the "homeowner" guy because of his bright orange parka against the blue beer house. That's because colors that are opposite one another on the color wheel make each other look brighter when placed next to one another. How cool is that?!

"Art washes from the soul the dust of everyday life."
- Pablo Picasso

Feeling it Now: Texture All Around Us

I work with children. Lots and lots of them. We talk about art and life and cartoons and all sorts of things. I'm beginning to realize more and more that no matter who we are and how disparate the topic, there are links that connect us globally and individually, both in the present and to those whose shoulders we stand on.

My daily dialogues revolve around art. It is my purpose, in the past it has been my salvation and it has put a roof over my head and food on my table my entire adult life. I am never bored and am frequently amused by all the things I see and experience on my journey.

I ask the children at every visit what is their favorite thing about art. Thousands (and I mean that literally) of times I hear "because I can express my thoughts and feelings." YAAAAAA! That's my favorite part, too. Art is not like arithmetic: there is more than one correct answer. There are as many answers as we have ideas, and every single one is as unique as a snowflake.

Art is all that and so much more. I don't know what happens in people's brains when they grow up or how crappy their art teacher was, but I am here to tell you that we all use and reference it all the time. It isn't all just for people with piercings and funny clothes. Like building a house, there are certain elements and principles that come into play that must be recognized in order to successfully compose all the separate components into a functioning and aesthetically pleasing whole.

The elements of art and design are the building blocks: the foundation. They are line, shape, form, color , texture, space and value. Knowledge of these elements and how to manipulate them is necessary for thoughts and ideas to be expressed, and for all kinds of things to be interesting and functional. Everything benefits from good design: paintings, fashion, surfboards, football uniforms, golf clubs, shoes, cars, video games, movies, etc. You get the idea.

For the last couple of months the children and I have been discussing texture. In art, texture is defined as the surface quality or "feel" of an object. The fun part about texture is finding all the words to describe how something feels. Another kind of texture is "implied" texture. That is a kind of texture that looks like it will feel a certain way but it is an illusion and is actually made out of something else. . Artists and designers use both real and implied texture for a variety of reasons: to make their work more interesting, to illustrate a point or a story, as a symbol, to aid in an optical illusion and the list goes on. Think snowflakes and leopard print polyester mini skirts.

No matter how they utilize texture or how much texture influences their art, artists and designers are aware of the nuances and effects of texture on themselves and everyone else.

We all utilize texture in a number of ways. One of my favorites is food. I'm not the only one and culinary arts people know this. Texture is one of the primary ways they make food and taste combinations interesting. Texture is one of reasons why I can eat a pound of saltwater taffy from Zeno's in 3 days but will never in my life eat a Lima bean willingly. Texture is a big deal in advertising, too. Did you know that burgers in in print and TV ads are really raw and painted? They look better that way.

How about fashion? We have driven entire species to extinction with our lust for the texture of their fur or feathers. I'm pretty sure we we ate our way through some of them for their texture, too. Certain fabrics are status symbols for their texture. Leather, silk, lace, cashmere, linen, marble, snakeskin, beaver, egret, etc. are a few examples.

Then I really took it to the limit and began to think about how we use texture to describe our relationships. "it's a bit rough right now" or "things are going smoothly." Like some fabrics, a relationship may become so worn and frayed that it disintegrates. If it's true that there are seasons to our lives, then is it also true that just as we change the textures we surround ourselves with for warmth and comfort seasonally will also be true for the relationships we surround ourselves with as we progress through life?

I'm thinking that it may be possible to take what I know about texture in art and apply it to other areas of my life. It's said you"can't make a silk purse out of a sow's ear." That may be true. However, I am an optimist and I've seen what sheep's wool looks like on the sheep on the hill (talk about matted and muddy) and what that same wool looks like when it's been carded and spun and woven into something that's soft and smooth and fabulous. Maybe it really is possible to take an awareness of texture and use it to "smooth out" some of the rough edges in life along with making things more emotionally and aesthetically pleasing. What I do know for sure is it's too cold to get in the water and thinking about all this beats the hell out of doing housework.