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Archive for the ‘Biographical’ Category

The New Face of Evil?

Posted in Biographical, Current Events, Opinion, tagged on February 7, 2010| 2 Comments »

This is Alexa Gonzalez.

She’s 12 years old and attends junior high school in Queens, NY.

She loves her friends, Abby and Faith.

Probably knows every show on the Disney Channel.

You probably wouldn’t guess that she’s a menace to society.  A threat to the very fabric of our civilization.

You see, this past week Alexa was arrested and taken from her school in handcuffs by police.

Drugs, you ask? Bullying?  One of those horrible videotaped girlfights?  Did she stab a teacher?

Worse.

She wrote on her desk.

Terrible things.

I love my friends Abby and Faith and worst of all, Lex was here 2/1/2010.

Then she punctuated the whole bit of obscenity with a lewd symbol– a smiley face.

Omigod!  Monster!

You know, when I heard this the first thing that came to mind is that I would be in prison today for almost anything I did  on a regular basis from the ages of 12 to 16.  Talking during class.  Running in the hallways.  Yelling during lunch.

Actually, I probably should have been in prison for some of the things I did that I won’t mention here but I’m trying to illustrate a point here.

Kids are still kids.  Kids will do goofy, rebellious things.  Our job is not to go insane, not to overreact.

I used to write little stories with illustrations on the tables of a study room a group of friends and I occupied during lunch hours at my school.  They were goofy tall tales of a character I called General Billy Bob Buckles. Not great stuff but they filled the time and satisfied a creative outlet.  Not obscene, although they were far more inflammatory than I love my friends.

But in the end, they were saying the same thing.  Like Lexa was here, I was saying I was here.  It’s that eternal need to be heard, especially when you’re a 12 year old child in a world where you often feel powerless and voiceless.

Now I knew at that time that if I had been caught by someone in authority  (particularly our principal who was very much irked by these stories and whose ire only served to make me want to write even more on the desks)  that I would have been in for trouble.  But the thought that I could have been hauled from the school in cuffs would have seemed ludicrous, beyond belief.  It would have seemed, even to a kid with limited life experience, to have been way out of scale for the crime, especially when so many far worse  crimes were occurring within walking distance.

It seems we have lost scale for we react to many things, this incident just being a highlight.  It feels as though we are teaching these children to be reactionary, to not step back and take measure with a calmer eye and common sense.

And where this lesson leads is far worse than a 12 year old girl writing I love my friends.

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Little Gems

Posted in Biographical, Favorite Things, Recent Paintings, tagged , on January 21, 2010| Leave a Comment »

I’m trying to refocus my attention back to my work after the last few days of the auction.  Currently, I am working on a group of very small paintings for an annual show called Little Gems at the West End Gallery in Corning.

This show has always had special significance for me in that it was the first show that I ever publicly displayed my work, back in 1995.  I wasn’t sure where the road would lead at that point and surprisingly, it has surpassed my hopes of that time.  Without that first step, at that first show fifteen years ago, I might very well have a very, very different life now.  So you see how I put some weight towards this exhibit of small paintings.

I also like this show for the format which forces me to work small.  It’s a great opportunity to work out new things on a small basis,such as amping up different colors and blocking in new compositions.  Or in the case of this small piece shown above, revisit a composition with a different feel and color.  Small pieces enable me to work on dynamism on a small scale, finding what elements work and might translate to larger work in the future.

Important rehearsal time.

From a collecting standpoint, small works have always been important to me.  Many of my longtime collectors obtained a small painting of mine as their first piece of art.  I try to make the small pieces every bit the same as the larger, more expensive paintings in all aspects except for the price.  I like the idea of making original work available in price to most people, opening the sometimes overbearing world of art to a wider range of the public.  There is something exciting about having new eyes and new energy in the galleries and both often come from people who may have been intimidated by the idea of even being in an art gallery in the past.

And like my first foray into the world of art fifteen years back, that can be an important first step.

Little Gems opens  February 5, with a reception from 5-7:30 PM,  and runs through March 12 at the West End Gallery in Corning, NY.

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Party Lights

Posted in Biographical, tagged , on December 13, 2009| Leave a Comment »

I’m getting things around this morning for a gallery-type talk that I’m doing today for a group at a Christmas party at a local country club.  It’s a little different from gallery talks I’ve done in the past where the people in attendance are there specifically to hear me speak and I’m surrounded by examples of my work .  These folks are there to celebrate the holidays so I’m just a bit nervous about how well I will be able to grab their attention.

But I will certainly give it a try.

I will mainly focus on the story of how I came to be a painter rather than how I paint, leaving technique for other venues.  I figure this will be more biographical, trying to emphasize some of the elements that have a bit of inspiration.  I will probably talk  a little about attitude and serendipity, stemming from some great opportunities for my career that arose from my days as a waiter at a Perkins Restaurant.  I don’t really have a speech or anything like that.  I usually just get up and start talking and let it go, hoping that it will grow organically like one of my paintings.  Most of the time this works.

I hope it does today.

I wonder if they’ll have an open bar?

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Tilting at Windmills

Posted in Biographical, Favorite Things, tagged , on December 10, 2009| 1 Comment »

Now that we’re in the Christmas season, I’ve been thinking about some of my favorite gifts I’ve received over my life.  There have been many that have had special meaning such as the typewriter, that I wrote of earlier, that was a gift from my parents in order to foster my writing ambitions as a teen.  Most are gone now but some still live with me.  This is one that does.

My sister, Linda, gave this to me many, many moons ago when I was 12 or 13 years old.  It’s a simple carving of  what is probably meant to be Don Quixote.  It doesn’t matter- it’s always been Don Quixote to me.

It’s not finely carved, probably made by a guy in some tropical foreign land where he knocks out 20 of these a day to earn a meager living.  Doesn’t matter.  To me, it’s a Rodin.  I’ve carried it with me through ups and downs and the wear shows on it.  A nick from his hat and a scratch here and there.  It broke in two at his ankles and needed mending just to continue standing.

And he does.

I view him as an inspirational icon, a constant reminder to dream beyond what is in front of you, to believe that you can exceed what others think is possible for you.  That you can be whatever you dream yourself to be.

To tilt at your own windmills.

And to remember that others believe in you.

Simple things and small gestures can have great effect.

Many belated thanks, Linda…

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Why Look Back?

Posted in Biographical, Influences, tagged , , , on December 8, 2009| 2 Comments »

I’ve been doing some genealogy lately.  Don’t worry- I won’t bore you with all the details of my family.  Nobody wants to read that.

But doing so raises the question of why I’m doing this.  What is the purpose in looking back?

Growing up, there was never a sense of history in our families.  It felt as though our family lines had started one or two generations before, little known before the lives of our grandparents.  Hardly anything in the way of familial knowledge was passed down, either in words or objects.  It gave a feeling of being disconnected from the rest of the world.   It left me wondering if the place we occupied in life at the moment was always this same niche.  How did we arrive at this point?

For example, there’s a side in my family that seems like a hopeless lot.  Barely educated with many being illiterate.  Poor.  Prone to violence and crime.  The only stories I heard about this side of my family were lurid accounts of fights breaking out at funerals where the casket ends up overturned and guys kicking out the screens of their televisions while watching professional wrestling.  There were other stories that were worse than that but I’ll keep them to myself, thank you.

The point is, how did they get to this low level?  Were they always like this?  Were they always stupid?  Were they always fighting themselves at the bottom?

When you’re trying to figure out who you are and you see that half of your past is less than inspiring, you begin to wonder.

So I begin to dig, putting together a fragile puzzle with bits and pieces spread all over the place.  I use all the online resources I know of to gain  bits and pieces of info.  There’s hardly any movement then, with a single piece of found information, there’s a landslide of information and the pattern of this family seems to be uncovered.  Their place in the web of the world is there to be seen, not hidden anymore under layers of ignorance and shame.

I felt like an orphan discovering the name of his parents, feeling connected with a knowable history.

And for this side of my family, it was truly enlightening to view their line.  They seemed to be the products of nothing but ignorance at this point but it was not always the case.  Their decline was many, many generations in the making.  They had been religious scholars and among the wealthy merchant class of northern Europe going back to the mid-1500’s.  Recruited by William Penn and coming to America they had been among the first settlers of Philadelphia. They fought with Washington at Valley Forge.  They moved westward, forming some of the earliest frontier settlements in Virginia and beyond.

But as they went, there was a serious erosion of the value they placed on knowledge and learning as evidenced by the numbers of them who were marked down in censuses of the 1800’s as being unable to read or write.  While their family line had once been at the forefront of the great movement west as leaders and landowners, they gradually settled into a life as tenants and farm laborers.  Each generation bringing them closer and closer to the version of this family that I now know.

So what’s the purpose of this whole exercise?  I don’t really know for sure.  For me, it’s finding that my family was an active part of the American past, that there is a foundation down there under the rubble.  It’s a newly found pride in a name that I didn’t want to claim as part of me.  It’s knowing that a positive contribution to the formation of this country has been made and that this line of the family is a real part of the American experience.

It also points out the value of knowledge and education in the survival of a family.

And a country…

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Time of Change

Posted in Biographical, Painting, Technique/History, tagged on November 29, 2009| 2 Comments »

It happens every year.

There’s a period in my year where I’m sort of on hiatus from my painting.  I’m in the studio still,  doing small tasks and tidying up.  Looking at older work.  Thinking.

Thinking about what my next cycle of work will bring.  This is a natural point for me every year, when I’m sort of  mentally spent, from a painting perspective.  I’m in need, at this point, of new energy, new inspiration.  Something that set me off in a new direction or at least a new aspect.

I always look at this point with both a little trepidation and a little excitement.  The trepidation comes from the possibility that I may be a dry well, that I’ve drained off all my creative energy and it’s not replenishing itself.  The excitement comes from knowing that this isn’t the case and soon the change I’m anticipating will be at hand.  Something new will be here that will focus my energy, drive me into the new year with new direction.

How do I know this?

Because I am still trying.  The effort put forth will bring at least a few new thoughts and these new thoughts will spark other new ideas.  New possibilities.

And the well is flowing once more.

So, while I may not be painting at the moment, I am assembling the base on which new work will be built…

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Adrift…

Posted in Biographical, Technique/History, tagged , on November 23, 2009| Leave a Comment »

It’s a funny time of the year for me as an artist.  I’m at the end of a creative cycle and have a little more time at my disposal, which is nice.  Allows me to catch up with things I too long neglect or just don’t make time for normally.

But there is a part of me that is made uneasy by this freedom to do other things.  My next shows and goals seem very far in the distance and I’m unfocused,  floundering around a bit, trying to find my bearings as to where I see my work moving.  It’s as though I am somewhat lost without having to be at work, without having an immediate goal.  Sort of like being rudderless in the waves.

This is not an unusual event for me at this time of the year.  The nice thing in having done this for a number of years now is knowing that this time, and the accompanying uneasiness,  is only temporary.  I realize that this is all part of a cycle and that I have the tools to get through this feeling of being adrift creatively and that the time will come soon when I will be once more fully engaged.

It reminds me of  something I read in the comments of a friend’s blog, when the discussion was about getting through a period of depression.  The commentator said he had learned to accept these periods of darkness as part of who he was and that it became easier once he recognized that when the black crows flew in, they were his black crows.  And eventually he knew they would leave if he could only be patient and wait them out.

I understand what he meant.

Once you know there is a cycle, you know the other side will soon come around.

And I think it’s important to have this part of the cycle, as uncomfortable as it may seem.  For me, it always seems to spur new searching and new creativity.  For that reason alone, I have learned to embrace my own particular black crows…

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Ragtime

Posted in Biographical, Favorite Things, Influences, Neat Stuff, tagged , on November 20, 2009| 1 Comment »

This week, after having made deliveries of new work to the galleries that represent me over the last week,  I’ve been catching up on some maintenance around the studio, getting things ready for the upcoming winter.   It’s a break from thinking about painting and a chance to recharge the batteries.  Sometimes much needed recharging.

As I mentioned in a post a few days ago, I’ve also been spending a little time looking at old newspapers as I do a little research into a few ancestors.  It’s also really interesting to see an article concerning a relative next to an ad of that time, such as the one shown here, with Annie Oakley endorsing a dandruff shampoo.  It makes you realize what a transitionary period those early years of the 1900’s were, with so many aspects of rapid progress taking place in a world that had changed much slower for centuries before.

For instance, in the article that was near this ad, there was an account of a wrestling match here in Elmira.  Wrestling was a big deal around here back then with matches held several times a week in various locations such as men’s clubs, hotels and the gyms of local athletic clubs.  The story here told of the night opening with a vaudeville-type tumbling exhibition from a touring wrestling family complete with selections sung in rich baritones.  There was a short boxing match followed by someone performing ragtime, which was new to that time.  The headline event, usually a match between heated local rivals or a local favorite facing a touring pro, finished up the night.

I had heard stories that my grandfather, Frank “Shank” Myers, had lived and participated in this rough and tumble world but had never seen any evidence until I started reading these old papers.  But there he was, a 17 year old kid described as an Eastside mat ruffler, rolling around in smoky halls with strangleholds and body throws.  In one little notice, he was advertised as the preliminary match for a match headlined by Americus, shown here, who was touring pro who would come into town and take on the  best of the locals.  It was to be held at a hall in a local hotel that had been remodeled for the event.

I was able to find several articles with his exploits but only in a short period of time due to the lack of continuity in the newspaper availability from that time.  I did find a few pieces from a few years later, in a match from Binghamton, a slightly larger city about 60 miles away, between a Binghamton man and a well-known champ from NYC, where he was mentioned.  He was introduced to the crowd as the lightweight champ from Elmira and he issued a challenge to the Binghamton grappler, for a match to be held there, in Binghamton , or Elmira.

I may never know if this match ever took place but it ‘s great to finally fill in little details of a world that only existed in a cloud of familial myth. An interesting time…

 

 

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Control of the Narrative

Posted in Biographical, Influences, Painting, tagged , on November 19, 2009| Leave a Comment »

This is a painting from back in 2002 titled Muse.  It was part of a series I was painting at that time, in the months after 9/11, that some of my galleries still call my Dark Work. It was painted in a style that I call my obsessionist style these days, meaning that it is painted by building layers of color over a dark ground as opposed to the reductive style I have used so much in the past where I apply a lot of wet paint, puddles, then pull it off the surface until I reach the desired effect.

When I was doing these paintings they seemed like a stark contrast to the reductive work, especially given the tone of that time.  They were well received although not with same gusto as the lighter, more transparent,  work.  I felt very strongly about this work but allowed my desire to please the galleries need for my most sellable work override my desire to pursue this work to further levels.  I moved back to primarily painting the wetter reductive work and was able to continue to push that work further through color and texture.  I never regretted the move back to this work but there was always a little nagging voice in the back of my mind that I hadn’t pushed the other work to its full destination and had let outside influences hinder an inner process.

I have begun to see my body of work as my own personal narrative, the story of who I am and how I am seeing my world at any given time.  In order for it to be so it must be an honest and complete reflection, guided by my own inner muse and not outside forces telling me what I should or should not do.  It took a while but I realized that I have the ability and right to control my own personal narrative, to tell my story in my own way.

I’ve done this in many ways for years already.  I am constantly given ideas for paintings or am requested to do commissions but seldom do I follow up on them unless they fit in with where I see my work heading.  In that aspect, I normally reject outside influence.  I stick to my narrative.

The piece above, Muse, actually fits this post well in that it now belongs to a man who asked me to do a painting of his son, a truly gifted guitarist.  He sent me photos and they were wonderful.  He was long and lanky with a really interesting ethereal  look, a portrait painter’s dream.  In fact when I looked at the pictures I could only see him as painted by other painters I know.  I struggled for a while trying to do something with this but in the end I realized it wasn’t part of who I was at that point, not part of my narrative.  I let it slide and after a long while, apologetically explained this to the father who was extremely gracious.

So I am back focusing more, at this time, on this obsessionist work, allowing it to be a bigger part of my story.  I will continue to paint in the other style but I just feel that there is something waiting to be told, something to be discovered in this other work at this time.  That is my decision made without outside influence, my choice for my personal narrative.

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A Different Time and World

Posted in Biographical, Favorite Things, Influences, tagged , , , , , on November 18, 2009| 2 Comments »

I wrote the other day about doing some genealogy about my great-grandfather, Gilbert Perry, and how interesting it has been in reconnecting with an ancestor about who I knew so little about.  One of the great pleasures has been reading the old newspapers from the late 1800’s that are available online via  the Northern New York Library System.  I am constantly fascinated in browsing the ads and notices of the times, seeing how day to day life changed and evolved.

This ad for a balloon ascension with Professor Squire, a la The Wizard of Oz, at the Franklin County Fair in Malone, NY appeared in the September 2, 1872 edition of the Malone Palladium.  It was on the front page alongside accounts from the Republican convention of that year where Ulysses S. Grant was nominated for the presidency as well as death notices, ads for pianos (they were selling Steinways up there!) and dry goods.  Ads looking for tin peddlers, a furniture dealer selling metal burial caskets, a lumber dealer, carriage painters and a mail order ad for a tea dealer on Wall Street in NYC.  There was a list of  rules of behavior that would be enforced at the Fair.  No drinking or betting on the trotters.

It was all pretty interesting, a glimpse into that time, but the part that caught my eye was near the top of the page, just under the death notices.  It was a Notice of Liberation where my great-great grandfather, Francis Perry, was giving Gilbert Perry, my great-grandfather, the remainder of his minority, giving him freedom from furhter financial obligations to his father.  Gilbert was free to transact business as he saw fit.

It was at this point that Gilbert formed his first crew and headed into the North woods with his first contract to deliver logs.  He was just 18 years old.  He continued to be a logger for the next 60 years, only stopping a few years before his death at age 81.  My Aunt Norma has recollections of visiting his farm in St. Regis Falls when she was small girl in the early 1930’s.  She said there were big log sleds scattered all around, the type pulled by teams of horses.  He was throwback even then to an earlier time before big tractors and chainsaws.

So in this little piece in this little newspaper from the north I see the beginning of my great-grandfather’s world, one that led to my grandmother’s much different world and to my father’s even more different world to my world which would probably seem incomprehensible to a man so at home in the woods.  Or maybe not…

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