Light and Wisdom (2018)
We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
― T.S. Eliot, Four Quartets
A large portion of my painting year thus far has been devoted to looking back at earlier work, caused, as I have explained too many times before, by my recent health issues. Though it has been mentally difficult in not being able to create and release the new work I know is in there, it has been deeply satisfying to explore once more the paths I have trod before.
Much of the work remains somewhat fresh in my mind but the revisit seems to deepen my appreciation for it, as though I have gained added perspective with the time that has passed.
Some of this work has slipped from my mind and surprises me as though it were new to me. This fills me with gladness.
And there are a few pieces like the one shown above, Light and Wisdom, that never left my mind, always seem to be near the surface. Not sure why except that it checks so many boxes for me. Rich and dark colors. A rhythm in the landscape. Great depth into the picture plane. A unity of all its elements. And most especially, an underlying personal meaning that seems to whisper in my ear whenever I look at it.
It feels like the me I hope to be. It reminds me that I am on a path and there is still some distance to go before I reach that desired end. But it also reminds me that I have already come a long way and have been changed by that journey.
That the desired end is something accumulated along the way, not a pot of gold waiting for me at the path’s end. That’s something not recognized when you take your first steps on the path.
This painting and so many others that I have reexamined recently from past years bring that point home to me. They were hints that I was indeed on the right path and had already been somehow transformed.
Light and wisdom had been accumulated…
This painting, Light and Wisdom, oddly enough for all its personal meaning to me, had only a brief time out in the public before it came back to me. Maybe that was the way it was intended. I don’t know.
It is going out in the world once more as part of my showcase, A Seedling Returns, as part of the Big Gems exhibit at the Gmeiner Art & Cultural Center in Wellsboro, PA. This exhibit is first of its kind collaboration between the West End Gallery and the Gmeiner. The exhibit opens Saturday, July 18 with the official Opening Reception taking place on the following Saturday, July 25 from 2-4 PM.
Here’s this week’s Sunday Morning Music. It’s from one of my favorites, Rhiannon Giddens, and is fittingly titled I’m On My Way.
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