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Archive for the ‘Biographical’ Category

Next Up: Home+Land

Posted in Biographical, Painting, Recent Paintings, Work In Progress, tagged , , , , on June 13, 2015| 2 Comments »

GC Myers WIP in Studio 2015 JuneThere wasn’t much of a break after getting back from last Friday’s opening of my show, Native Voice, at the Principle Gallery, which hangs there until July 6th.  No, there was another deadline waiting for me when I returned to the studio: the July 17 opening of  my annual show at the West End Gallery, this year titled Home+Land.  The last week has seen me fall right back into the groove that was formed in prepping for the Principle Gallery show.

This is not an unusual pattern.  This is the 13th year that my West End show has began right on the heels of my Principle Gallery show and  in that time I have developed a way of coping with the tight schedule: heavy drinking.  Not really but there are days sometimes that feel like that might not be such a bad idea, especially those ones where the creative thread seems to disappear briefly and a bit of panic rises in me.  And believe me, that does happen from time to time.

Yesterday, for example.  I had finished a new painting ( the one at the top) and was still in that piece in my mind and not ready to move on quite yet.  I checked out my calendar to see where I was in relation to the opening and it just seemed, in that moment when my mind was still not yet moving on to the next task, that there was so much to do and so little time in which to complete it. A horrible ball of tension built within me and I found myself paralyzed with panic for a while.  My mind just stalled with that calendar imposed on it.  I paced around the studio for quite a while, trying to gain footing and move past this.

I knew that I could and that I would.  The experience of having been through this so many times before calms those nerves and lets me keep my eyes on what is in front of me rather than fretting about what is ahead.  And that is the secret to overcoming the pressure of a deadline such as this– staying focused in the moment.  Clearing the mind of worries about things that may or may not occur in the future and immersing yourself in the task at hand.  And luckily for me the task that I normally face is one, by its very nature, that normally calms my anxieties.

So I moved immediately to the paint and within minutes of the first brushstroke the anxiety seemed to ease.  The mind cleared.  The calendar seemed trivial and distant. All I saw was the scene that began to take shape in front of me and all of my thoughts were simple reactions to what I was doing on the canvas.

All was well again.

That being said, there is still much to do for the upcoming show and I am sure there will more incidents like yesterday in the next month.  But I am prepared and the show thus far looks and feels very good to me, which in itself is a calming agent.  I just thought I would give you an inside look at one of the parts of the process that sometimes gets swept under the rug– you don’t see it but it’s often there underneath the surface.

 

 

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The Animating Presence

Posted in Biographical, Painting, Recent Paintings, Technique/History, tagged , , , , , , , on May 28, 2015| 2 Comments »

GC Myers- The Anmating Presence smSometimes I am a little hesitant in showing certain paintings here on the blog.  Sometimes their photographed images just don’t fully convey the impact or depth of the work.

Take the painting shown above for an example.  Titled The Animating Presence, it produces a strong  initial impact with its large size– 20″ by 60″ on canvas— and its deep colors and textures.  The photo captures the colors (although not the depth within the colors) and a mere fraction of the texture but the  power in its size is lost on the smaller screen.  It is still a strong image but most people would be surprised at how truly different the actual painting comes across in person.

I showed this painting here a few months back in an early stage, shown now at the bottom.  The landscape was laid out in the red oxide paint I use for my underpainting and the sky with its first several layers of color, the emotional atmosphere of the piece beginning to take shape.  Many, many more layers produced the sky as it now looks above.  There are layers that are almost completely obscured, perhaps with only a tiny glimmer of it coming through here and there.  Looking at it, you may not be aware of it but its presence is vital to me, giving the whole thing the depth and life force that I seek in it.

And maybe that last sentence is a good way of explaining the title, The Animating Presence.  The more I worked on this piece, the more I began to feel as though the Red Tree was in some sort of communion with a greater power in this painting, represented by the light breaking over the horizon.

This is always a hard thing to explain for me.  As I have explained in the past, I was not brought up with religion of any sort.  I was never indoctrinated in any sort of system of faith, never led to have either belief or disbelief.  I was just here, neither a believer or an atheist.  But looking at the world I had a sense that there was something more, some unseen source of power that sparked all life and consciousness.  It wasn’t a benevolent god sitting on a throne in some heaven pulling the strings on human events and listening to our prayers.  No, it was more a matter of physics and light and energy, an unseen force that permeated everything– an animating presence.

Now, a couple of hundred words can’t really sum up the whole of  what I am describing or even what I see in this painting.  But it is this struggle to come to terms with this idea of that presence that I see in this painting.  That like those unseen layers of paint in the sky which give depth to the painting, one’s life is given meaning by an unseen force that we may never fully know or understand.

You can see this painting at the Principle Gallery at my Native Voice show,

2015-gc-myers-wip animating presence

 

 

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Quote of the Week/ Pascal

Posted in Biographical, Quote, tagged , , , , on May 14, 2015| Leave a Comment »

GC Myers Eternally FreeAll of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.

–Blaise Pascal, Pensées 

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This week’s quote continues the theme of silence that showed itself in yesterday’s post where poet Wendell Berry advised us to sit alone and to be quiet, to accept those things we might find in the silence.  This oft-quoted line from  French mathematician/philosopher Blaise Pascal from back around 1660 shows us that even in that world without smartphones and the constant crackle of 24/7 electronic and social media the idea of sitting in silence made most people anxious.

It’s an interesting thing to ponder.  As I sit here, a little before 7 AM in my quiet studio, I can hear the thump of a bass from someone’s car stereo probably almost a mile away as it goes down the road.  That is someone who obviously isn’t ready to embrace silence and believes that they are doing everyone else a favor by breaking it up so we won’t be bothered by it.

Hard as it is to admit, I was that guy at one point in  my life.   Noise was a way of making my presence, my existence, known.  

The lion’s roar.  The barbaric yawp.  

It was all an existential scream that tried to break through the ever-growing wall of sound from the outside world that threatened to obscure everything, melding all the noises into a huge suffocating drone of anonymity.

But my noise made no difference.  No single sound, no one angst-filled scream could break through and show that I was indeed alive, that I mattered.

No, existence was found sitting quietly in a room alone.

It wasn’t always easy.  In the silence there is nowhere to hide from every random thought, every fear, every diminishment of yourself. But silence provides the gift of acceptance after a time and every relived thought and moment, good or bad,  becomes equally part of the make-up of your self.  You come to realize that proof of your existence is in this acceptance and not in that barbarous scream that you once thought would scar the world as that proof.

It sounds too simple, I know.  But simplicity is sometimes very difficult and I still find myself struggling to stay in the silence, to not revert to screaming out.

But most days I find that it is worth the effort.

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Make the World Go Away

Posted in Biographical, Music, tagged , , on May 10, 2015| Leave a Comment »

GC Myers Mothers Day 1994 smI thought I would take the opportunity on this Mother’s Day, to dedicate this week’s Sunday music to my late mom.  It’s hard for me to believe but later this year will mark twenty years since she passed away after a short but brutal battle with cancer. Needless to say, I miss her very much and wish she could have seen the things that came in the years after she died, such as the great-grandkids she never got to dote on.

For my parts, she never lived to see my work hanging in a gallery or museum, never got to see how it has grown over the years.  Looking at two large pieces on easels next to me at this moment, I realize that there is a whole different world of mine she never got to witness.

But I think she would be pleased to know that things worked out okay, that I found something to ease my mind and give me something of a purpose.  I would hope she would like the work I’ve done.  I know she liked the earliest pieces, the only ones she would know, like the piece at the top which was one of my earliest efforts in early 1994, long before I had experienced any kind of creative breakthrough,  It was gift to her on Mother’s Day of that year and it hangs in my studio now, always reminding me of her.

So, for this bit of Sunday music, I thought I would play one of the songs I know to be a favorite of hers.  She always loved Eddy Arnold‘s voice and I have specific memories of this song coming from our old stereo console.  The title,  Make the World Go Away, just seemed to fit Mom so well.  For that matter, looking at the alternative world that surrounds me here in the studio, I guess it fits me as well. I am my mother’s child, after all.

Have a good Mother’s Day.

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Heroes

Posted in Biographical, Music, Video, tagged , , , , , on May 3, 2015| 6 Comments »

Arthur Ashe HeroismKeeping up the theme that was the subject of an earlier post this week, I decided that for this Sunday morning’s musical selection I would play a lovely version of Heroes from David Bowie.  It’s an acoustic version (with Gail Ann Dorsey accompanying him on vocals and bass) from a 1996 performance at the Bridge School Benefit, an annual concert began by Neil Young to benefit the Bay Area school that helps kids with severe speech and physical impairments.  In that context, the song takes on additional layers of meaning as you see the many parents in the audience with their children, many cradling them.

Heroism.

Looking for an image to illustrate this post, I did an image search by punching in the word hero.  It was all superheroes and warriors which saddened me because I know that heroism is something far more than that.  It’s about doing those things that need to be done, about taking responsibility  in  order to serve a purpose beyond your own needs.  We think of it as a rare thing but it is evident every day in the actions of those people who give so much of themselves to others.

For me, an example of this came to me in a very personal way.  When my mother was struggling in the last months of her battle with cancer, I visited her for  last time.  Her and my father had been together for about 46 years at that point, years which could be described as turbulent at best.  For such a long married couple, they had an odd love/hate relationship which had them always on the edge of huge screaming  battles that were fraught with violence.  They were terrible things to see and even as a child I often wondered why they remained together.  But they did and as she neared the end of her life, Dad became her cook, her maid, her nurse,  and her driver to the many treatments that made up the last months of her life.  Her everything.

When I made my last visit, I noticed a photo on her bedside table.  It was photo of the two of them together from several years before, standing at some Florida site drenched in sun.  On the cheap little frame, underneath my father was a word formed in simple block letters, those type of things that you rub on from a sheet.

It was the word Hero.

Now, at that point in my life I didn’t see my father in heroic terms.  Far from it.  No, he was and is a very flawed human being with many traits that are far from any definition of heroism.  But in this case, he took on the form of a hero for my mother and in that moment, looking at that photo, for  myself as well. I realized that the word was not about great accomplishment but rather about following that need to serve another.

So it can be for everyone, as the song says :

I, I will be king
And you, you will be queen
Though nothing will drive them away
We can beat them, just for one day
We can be heroes, just for one day

I finally came across the  quote at the top from the late Arthur Ashe that seemed to best fit the thought .

Have a great Sunday. Be a hero to someone today.

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Quote of the Week: Brancusi on Fame

Posted in Biographical, Quote, tagged , , , on April 22, 2015| 4 Comments »

Brancusi The Kiss Phila Museum of ArtOne day in Switzerland, in front of a beautiful mountain there was the most beautiful of cows, and she was contemplating me in ecstasy.  I said to myself, ” I must be someone if even this cow admires me.”   I came closer; she wasn’t looking at me, and she was relieving herself.  That tells you what you need to know about fame.

–Constantin Brancusi

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This was a favorite anecdote of famed sculptor Constantin Brancusi (1876-1957) concerning an incident as he took the long trek on foot from Bucharest to Paris as a poor young man seeking fame and fortune.  He found both but the influence of his peasant roots in Romania remained with him.

His story of the unimpressed Swiss cow is a pretty good reflection on the nature of fame, even the type acquired through great deeds,  Fame is something created by other people, not something that is displayed on oneself. When all is said and done, we’re all pretty much the same– famous or not– in the eyes of that peeing cow.

It reminds me of when I first began showing my work in a gallery while I was still working as a waiter in a pancake house.  I would go to openings and people would praise my work, telling me how great I was.  I could barely get in my car to drive home because my head was so big by the end of the evening.  But at 6 the next morning, there I was, pouring coffee for truckers and families who were less than impressed by the praise lavished on me the night before.

A big pin prick that brought my head quickly back to a more normal size.

Those folks at the restaurant were my peeing cows.

It’s a lesson that I try to remember when things are going too well and I find myself beginning to believe that I am something more than what I really am– a simple schlub watching a cow pee.

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After the Talk/ In My Life

Posted in Biographical, Favorite Things, Music, tagged , , , , , , , on April 12, 2015| 3 Comments »

GC Myers-Family Path smYesterday’s Gallery Talk at the Kada Gallery went really well.  Many,many, many thanks to Kathy, Joe and Morgan at the gallery for providing a comfortable setting and the many folks in attendance for taking time out on a rare sunny Saturday afternoon to spend it with me.  They were an absolutely wonderful group –attentive and inquisitive–which made my task much easier, making me feel very welcomed and at ease in front of them.

Hopefully not so much that I over-talked  or came across as too full of myself.  I always worry about things like that on the ride back home, agonizing over things I said or didn’t say.  It comes easy because at that point I am pretty tired of hearing my own voice, tired of pretty much being the public me at that moment.

One thing I forgot to mention which bothered me as I was on my way home was that it was the input that I get from the encouragement and stories shared by the folks that attend these events are such a huge inspiration and the motor that drives my work.  I work untold hours alone in my studio and it is their reaction to the work and the fact that they allow me to glimpse briefly into their lives that make them seem almost present at times in my studio.  Distant eyes looking over my shoulder.

I shared one recent inspirational story that took place very recently right there at the Kada Gallery.  A week or so ago, they received an email inquiry from a lady in Switzerland about a large painting, titled Family Lines with the Red Tree with a Red Chair in its branches.  It turns out that she had recently lost her husband to Alzheimer’s and one of their final exchanges was about that very painting, obviously seeing it in online.  Her husband said that he was the Red Tree and she was the Red Chair.  I have to admit to being made teary-eyed by that.  How can something like not stick with me, not find its way into my thoughts when I am alone in the studio?

That story, like so many others shared with me over the years, brings a sense of purpose to the sometimes abstract and introverted act of painting.  I can never fully thank these people for the gift in their sharing.

991126 Color RisingOne of the ways I do try thank folks at these talks is by having several giveaways, including an original painting.  We had a very good time with it yesterday and the group was so receptive that I thought they deserved another.  I had a painting, Color Rising, from a few years back that won by a young lady in her 90’s which leads me to this week’s Sunday music selection.  The painting, shown left, was a monochromatic piece, shades of back and gray with just a dash of color.  I explained that I do these paintings periodically to just more less refresh my color palette in the period between working on shows and that seeing one of my compositions with the color removed was a bit like hearing a song that you’ve heard a thousand times before done by one person done by somebody else.  The song has the same notes, chords, melody and lyrics but it is somehow different, somehow changed.

That brings me to this musical example, a version of the Beatles‘ song In My Life from 1965‘s Rubber Soul album.  My god, I can’t believe this song is fifty years old!  This version is from the American recordings of Johnny Cash, done in the final months of his life.  His age and ailments changed his delivery and imbued the songs with real heart-felt emotion and purity.  A powerful group of music.  This version of the Beatles’ song is not so different but it has  his own personal meaning which makes it his own.

Again, so many thanks to everyone who came yesterday.  It was my great pleasure to spend the day with you all.  Hope your Sunday is a good one…

 

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Potential / Redux

Posted in Biographical, Motivation, tagged , , on March 28, 2015| 1 Comment »

gc-myers-1994I am ridiculously busy this morning, with several imminent deadlines and tons of work to be taken on in the next several weeks.  I am not complaining.  It’s a good busy.  But having done this blog for so many years now, I felt obligated to post something this morning.  However, I couldn’t focus  so I went to the archives and immediately  came across the post below that addresses the hard work that it takes to reach the full potential of one’s  abilities.

Without the effort, potential is a hollow nothing.

Here’s what I wrote several years back:

I had a nice email from a gentleman who told me about a prize his 16 year old daughter had recently won for one of her paintings.  I took a look at the piece and responded to him.  It was nice painting, nicely composed and had strong lines and color.  It was far ahead of anything I was doing at that age, especially by the virtue that it was complete.  I could see this young person doing more with their talents in the future.  I wrote him back and told him this but with my standard warning, one that I have written about  here before:  Potential  must be actively pursued with constant efforts and a consistent pushing of one’s abilities. 

I wrote him to tell him this, to let him know about some of the young talents I have seen come and go because they felt their talent was something that was in them and could be turned on and off with the flip of a switch.  I told him to tell her to look at the work required as a musician looks at rehearsals.  Perhaps even look at their talents as being like those of a musician, talents that need constant exercise in order to stay sharp and strong.  For instance, even if you have great innate talent, you can’t expect to play the violin like Itzhak Perlman if you don’t devote your talents in the same way as he does. A great part of his life is in nurturing his abilities.

I always feel like a sourpuss when I’m giving this advice.  Nobody wants to hear that they need to work harder.  Everyone wants to think that they have this great talent born within them and it will flow like a spigot whenever they so desire.  If only that were true.

I think you will find that those who succeed at the highest levels in any field are those who understand this need to constantly push and work their talents.  I’m sure there are exceptions but none come immediately to mind.  I wrote about this in a blog post when I first started this, over two years ago.  I wrote about something author John Irving had said about competing as a writer as he competed as a wrestler, putting in the same sort of work as though he were attempting to be an Olympic wrestler. 

Hard work.   It’s not glamorous especially in this world of instant gratification but it is a proven entity .

I’m showing the piece above to highlight this.  It’s a small painting that I did before I was showing in any galleries, in 1994.  At the time, it pleased me very much and I could have very easily kept painting in that style and been pretty happy, without much effort.  But there was a little voice in me that kept saying to push ahead and work harder, to see what I could accomplish with greater effort.  It became not an end but a stepping stone to move ahead.

That is how I hope this man’s daughter see her painting– as a stepping stone.  She may think it is the best thing she has ever done but if she is willing to push ahead and put in the effort, she will look at it someday as a mere step in her journey.

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Quote of the Week/ Limits

Posted in Biographical, Painting, Quote, tagged , , , , , on March 19, 2015| Leave a Comment »

GC Myers- Archaeology-Rainbows EndThe thing I am most aware of is my limits. And this is natural; for I never, or almost never, occupy the middle of my cage; my whole being surges toward the bars.

–Andre Gide

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I chose this week’s  quote from the late French author Andre Gide, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1947, because as an artist I find myself sometimes wondering about my limits, questioning whether I am pushing myself enough into new territory.  Gide uses a cage in his metaphor with his limitations being the bars that keep him from moving forward.  He is not content to simply accept these limits sitting contentedly in the center of his cage. No, he is always pushing and pulling at the bars, seeking to get past them.

In the past, I have expressed this same desire to press past my limits with a metaphor where the artist climbs ever upward until they come to a plateau where they are comfortable and safe.  It is a place where they could easily live out the remainder of their days with little worry, living an easy life by retelling stories that made up the journey up to this point.  Many might not even notice there is still a mountain hovering above them to climb, if they just dare leave the comfort of the easy plateau.

Gide’s cage is my plateau and while he is trying to break through his bars, I find myself still questioning if I have the nerve to start climbing.  Oh, there are first steps, tentative meanders up the path but only far enough that I am within sight and  can return easily to my safe haven on the plateau.

When does the real trek upward begin?  When does one begin to thrash at their bars?

Where are you in your own cage?

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I used a painting from several years,  Archaeology: Rainbow’s End, to illustrate this post.  For one thing, I just like this image.  But more importantly, looking at it seemed to remind me that one’s creative past is often buried and gone from sight.  Or at least, should be if one is going to continue growing.  Like the tree in the painting, you grow from that past existence  being nourished by it.  But you don’t live only in that past.  You must move upward like the Red Tree in this painting to find clear air.

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Iterations- A Musical Journey

Posted in Biographical, Neat Stuff, Video, tagged , , , , , on March 6, 2015| Leave a Comment »

IterationsI came upon this lovely animated film on Brain Pickings this morning.  It’s titled Iterations and is produced by hitRECord, a global creative community and mulitmedia production company formed a decade ago by actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt.  You might remember him as the teen Tommy on the sitcom Third Rock From the Sun but he has matured into a very fine actor and director with an eye for challenging material.  His work at hitRECord falls into that category.

It’s a sweet film that concerns its self with self transformation, a theme that is visited often here on this blog.  The idea that each phase, each new iteration, of our life is an experiment and that it is under constant recalibration appeals to me.

Change is a part of who we are.  At least, I know it is part of who I am.  For a while, I came to view it as a weakness, this need for constant change.  I mistakenly thought that finding a state of being static was the answer.  This little film reminds me that it is not.

Below is a description of the film along with the names of the many artists involved in its making from Gordon-Levitt and below the video are the lyrics to the tune.  Hope you’ll enjoy.

 

“….are very pleased to present ITERATIONS — a short musical film to come out of our collaboration regarding ‘The Road.’ The road can represent many things including escapism, change, and personal growth. And, while many people may identify the themes of ‘The Road’ with artists like Jack Kerouac and others of the beat generation, the story told in ITERATIONS is a slightly different interpretation. Based on ‘The Journey of Jeanine’ by hitRECord artist, SophieRumi (Hungary) and developed in collaboration with mirtle (Cyprus), ITERATIONS tells the coming of age story of a girl’s sometimes difficult and sometimes reluctant path to adulthood. Jeanine has a guide (Wolfred the wolf) and gets help and support along her journey, but in the end must set off on her own path. The piece is set to Metaphorest’s (Scotland) wonderful song, ITERATIONS and orchestrated by Robo_J (USA). The eye-popping animation is provided by the incredibly talented artist, fajigajiga (Canada). The worldwide community of hitRECord artists provided additional illustrations and instrumentation.”

Have you seen my old self?
I think I must have lost her
I wonder if I cost her
Her life?

Have you seen my second self?
She seems to grow younger
More delicate than ever
But never better

I’m an experiment
Each trial is a test
Constant recalibration

I am recycled cells
I learn to like myself
more with each iteration

Where is my restore point?
I found an old sore point
All disjointed
My file corrupted

Where is my replacement part?
I need another new heart
The other one’s beat was
Interrupted

I am recycled cells
I learn to like myself
more with each iteration

I’m an experiment
Each trial is a test
Constant recalibration

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