Redtree Times

Wasn’t going to write anything this morning. Words just don’t seem to want to come. Recently, I have been thinking in shapes with dreams that have me working on puzzles that involve shapes and forms. The neat thing is that in the dreams I sometimes solve them with a logic that seems much better than the one I possess in waking hours.

If only I could dream while I’m awake.

Oh, wait, I already do that.

I thought I would instead share two pieces that I did over a few days back in 2017 based somewhat on the Aboriginal art of Australia. I am a fan of that work and wanted to try to consciously incorporate some of its elements in my work. That led to these two pieces.

I never showed them in any public forum and the one below, a 12″ by 36″ piece on panel hangs in a bedroom/storage area here in the studio. I never felt they were enough of mine, that they were too derivative of the Aboriginal work. And that’s not fair to either of us.

Plus, as a result, they never fully fit into my body of work or, at least, in a way, that felt natural or organic to me. I would always see them as Aboriginal based and maybe a little too forced.

But the funny thing is that I always enjoy looking at these pieces when I do so without taking my own bias into account. The textures, rhythms, and colors create a reaction that satisfies me in some way.

Makes me want to fly. Not way up in the clouds. Just a couple of hundred or so feet in the air so that I could see the rolls and rhythms of the land in bit and pieces. There used to be an ultralight that would periodically fly by on its way to a seldom used airstrip down the road. I would see the pilot– is that what they’re even called?– as the putt-putt sound of his small engine reached my ears. He seemed to be hanging in the air in a lawn chair strapped under a wing as he chugged along at considerably less than supersonic speeds. Looked to be about 45 MPH to my eye.

I always envied that guy.

But I never wanted to do that because I knew I would surely suffer some sort of hypnotic state while staring at the ground and the patterns. Most likely, I would just end up putt-putting my way into a bloody face plant with the ground while in such a stupor.

I’ve done that before, from a ladder at a mere 16 feet or so. I still periodically see the wet earth racing up to meet my face. Once is enough and I don’t really feel the need to do it from a higher point. Even so, there are moments when I yearn to fly low and slow, to see the fields and farms and streams and ponds lay out beneath me.

So I imagine. And dream. And paint.