He who lives in harmony with himself lives in harmony with
the world.
– Marcus Aurelius
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This is a new painting that is titled Streaming Peaceful, a 24″ by 36″ canvas that is part of a group of paintings that should be arriving today at the Just Looking Gallery in San Luis Obispo on the Central Coast of California. This very much a signature piece for my work in form and content, a deep landscape under a gradated sky with the Red Tree holding central focus.
But for me the central aspect of this piece is the placid feel that emanates from it. It has a rich and supple feel that I find brings immediate calm as soon as my eyes lock on to the image. Even at this moment as I write, there is an instant sensation as though I am releasing a deep breath when I shift my gaze upward on the screen to this painting.
And that sense of being near some sort of core of peacefulness is what I am looking for in my work, at least in my own personal relationship to it. I have maintained this quite a few times over the years here that my primary personal goal in painting is not in mere representation, not in pure design or technical prowess. No, what I want, my ultimate goal, is to simply move myself with the work to an inner point where I am finally calm and at peace with the world. For me, feeling that calming envelope surround me is all I truly seek in my work.
Everything else is secondary.
And this piece hits that mark– for me. I can’t speak for others. We all seek different things and have differing reactions to art. What others see or feel in this is their experience alone and that is as it should be.
But, like it or not, I am at peace in it.
Redtree Times 