This is the painting that is featured on the invitation for my next , Avatars, which opens July 15th at the West End Gallery. It is titled The New Avatar and is 23″ by 33″ and on paper.
I chose to use the word avatar as the title because I wanted to have people look beyond the surface of the piece, past the representational quality of the work. Past the idea of the painting as a landscape. I wanted to stress the idea that the painting and its subject is symbolic of something more, something beyond the apparent.
An avatar is the incarnation or manifestation of a person or idea. In Hinduism, this incarnation is of an Immortal Being or the Ultimate Supreme Being, usually Vishnu, the Preserver. The word avatar is derived from the Sanskrit and means descent and usually implies a descent into mortal realms for special purposes, to instruct or to guide.
Maybe that’s too much to ask for paint smeared on a surface but I wanted to at least open it to the possibility of being more than it seems. More than a Red Tree. More than a Red-Roofed house. More than a Red Chair. I hoped that the viewer might see something in the work that might reveal itself only to them, something that would be an avatar for what they needed or desired in their own lives.
Again, that’s asking a lot for what seem to be simple landscapes. I may never know if I’ve succeeded in this aspiration. That may not matter. Just continuing to find a new avatar in each new piece that speaks to me, that reveals some sort of meaning if only for my eyes, may be the final reward.
And that is good enough for me.
Redtree Times 