In this new painting, a 10″ by 30″ canvas that I am calling Rooted, the Red Tree steps aside and allows the Red Chair to take centerstage.
The title is an obvious reference to the Red Chair’s most frequent interpretation as a symbol of family and ancestry, with the dark tree that holding them looking in a way like a pedigree chart with branches coming off the main root and branching out. The path that disappears in the distance could be referring to the journey that the family tree took at an earlier time, perhaps emigrating from a distant land.
But for all its symbolism, I feel the strength of this piece is more from a visual fulfillment in the way the tree’s trunk and branches break up the picture plane into little islands of light, as though I am looking down on it from above and the tree transforms into a river with the branches becoming smaller streams feeding into it. Thus, the Red Chairs are not growing away from the earth but are flowing back toward it.
There are a lot of things happening in this modest piece. Even now, looking up at it as it rests on the fireplace here in the studio, I find myself taking in different aspects of it that send my mind in new directions. And I like the fact that it can be simply what it is or can move me into a completely different realm of thought.
Rooted will be part of my show, Native Voice, opening June 5 at the Principle Gallery in Alexandria, VA.
Redtree Times 