Time changes everything except something within us which is always surprised by change.
–Thomas Hardy
I am running late this morning so thought I would share this post from eight years back. It’s about coming across some early formative work and realizing the amount of time that has passed. It’s like it has slipped away while I sat here totally unaware.
But more than that, it is about the excitement that comes in the creation of new work. The thrill of seeing something tangible grow under your hand that excites your senses and speaks to you is the same today as it was when I felt those feelings when painting these pieces 28 years ago. I know because I have felt it in recent days and in my experience as an artist, it remains the driving force.
I came across a group of work the other day and realized that they were from a week almost exactly twenty years ago when I had worked on them. For instance, the piece at the top was done twenty years ago yesterday. The sheer idea of twenty years passing seemed fantastic in the moment. So much has happened and so many things changed over that time, yet I still feel new in what I am doing, still feel like the person who looked with wonder at the painting above.
There have been only a few moments, most in the last year [2014] or so, when this passing of time has fully sunk in and I feel as though I am truly a veteran at what I do, feel as though I am what might be termed an “established artist.” Maybe seeing these pieces will cement that feeling in place.
Looking at them, I can see how my confidence was burgeoning in my work as I began to better understand the materials I worked with and how to control them. It was all about learning control at that time. At the time these were painted I was still torn over how and what I would paint. I still didn’t fully understand the importance of personal vision and was only trying to harmonize forms and color in a pleasing way. The work still captured emotion, but it was simply a by-product of being immersed in the process so deeply that it could not help but reflect what I was feeling internally.
As I said, I still feel very much like that same person from twenty years ago. Outside of my marriage, this is the only thing that I have stuck at for so long and that is probably due to the ever-changing and constant sense of newness and wonder it produces. That same feeling that I felt years ago when I painted these is still felt today when I work on something new. Thankfully, that is one thing that has not changed.
Redtree Times 