Redtree Times

In Eminence— At Principle Gallery

The sole art that suits me is that which, rising from unrest, tends toward serenity.

–André Gide, journal entry, November 23, 1940

The journal entry above from Nobel Prize-winning author André Gide very much speaks to me. Though it serves many purposes for me, I tend to view my work as a means of absorbing and acknowledging the anxieties and pressures that this world often presses upon us, dampening their effects, and then moving, to use Gide’s term, toward serenity.

The darker aspects of the world are still there, an underlying presence that creates a contrasting tension, a counterpoint that serves as a starting point from which serenity and other aspects of light can build.

I am talking about the emotional tone of the work here, but it also roughly describes my actual painting process. Much of my work starts with a dark surface on which light and brightness is built.

Even my work with transparent inks that is more watercolor-ish in nature employs a process where a darker layer of ink is first applied. almost as a dark puddle on a light– usually white and prepped with layers of gesso– surface. This layer, this puddle of ink, is then little by little removed, each deduction revealing more and more light from the underlying surface.

From darkness comes light…

Let’s have a tune this morning. The song is I See a Darkness. It’s one I have played a couple of times over the years, once by Will Oldham (aka Bonnie “Prince” Billy) who wrote and originally recorded it and the other as covered by Johnny Cash, from the American Recordings period late in his life. His work from this time, when his scarred voice carried his age and emotion so eloquently, is potent stuff.

Light coming from darkness…

 I think this part of its chorus fittingly applies to today’s post and to life in general:

Oh, no, I see a darkness.
Did you know how much I love you?
Is a hope that somehow you,
Can save me from this darkness.