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Archive for the ‘Biographical’ Category

Elbow Room

Posted in Biographical, Current Events, Event, Favorite Things, Music, Painting, tagged , , , , , , , , on April 26, 2020| 6 Comments »

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When the gates swing wide on the other side
Just beyond the sunset sea
There’ll be room to spare as we enter there
Room for you and room for me
For the gates are wide on the other side
Where the flowers ever bloom
On the right hand on the left hand
Fifty miles of elbow room

—50 Miles of Elbow Room, Herbert Buffum

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I have always longed for elbow room.

Huge arching domes of clear air above.

Wide open spaces for the eye to search.

Soundless vistas with not a soul to be seen.

The elbow room I long for is not that described in the lyrics of the 1930 gospel song, 50 Miles of Elbow Room, from songwriter Herbert Buffum. His version of elbow room is a placid paradise in the hereafter

Ideally, I don’t have to die to find my sought after elbow room. Of course, finding such a place might entail a little imagination along with a willingness to accept that this elbow room most likely will be located inside oneself.

Maybe that’s what I am trying to uncover with my work.

Elbow room. At least, my own little bits of elbow room.

The painting at the top is such a piece. It’s part of my aptly titled show, Social Distancing, that is still planned to open on June 5 at the Principle Gallery in Alexandria, VA. There is some doubt as to whether there will be an actual physical opening reception but there will be a show hung to be viewed so long there is– wait for it– social distancing.

This painting is titled Elbow Room, of course. It’s a return of sorts to my earlier work of the early and mid 2000’s, painted in the transparent inks I favor on paper. In a way, painting it felt like it was something inherent. Built in. Natural, like coming home, like a circle being completed.

For me, this is the hardest work to judge. It’s like looking at old family photos. You don’t look at the faces and apprise them for attractiveness or ugliness. You just see them for what you know them to be, for what they mean to you. How the outside world sees them is not important.

And this certainly feels like a family photo for me.

So, on this Sunday morning, let’s hear a bit of that song, 50 Miles of Elbow Room. I couldn’t find the original from Vaughan Happy Two. The two most significant versions are a gospel version from the Rev. F.W. McGee in 1933 and a traditional folk version from the Carter Family in 1942. The song I am playing today owes its influence to the Carter Family. It’s performed by a favorite of mine, Gillian Welch.

Have a good Sunday. Hope you find some elbow room for yourself, if that’s what you want.

 

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Hold On, Hold On

Posted in Biographical, Favorite Things, Music, tagged , , on April 5, 2020| 6 Comments »

I was looking at this painting above this morning, one that resides with me now here in the studio. It’s from back in 2011 and is called Dissolve. It really spoke to me from the moment I realized it was finished and laid down the brush.

It still does.

It’s a simple piece with complex feelings, one that makes me immensely happy and slightly sad at the same time. It’s contented yet wistful and yearning, something mirrored in the beauty and solidity of the fields in the foreground set against the dissolving colors of the sky.

With it’s duality of feelings, it’s a very human piece, I guess. And that bit of humanness is what struck me this morning. While I have alternated between high and low emotions lately, looking at this painting for a bit seemed to modulate all of these feelings.  The lower ebbs are still there but there is a visible counterweight that takes away some of their depth, makes them more tolerable.

This modulating effect might be the most valuable aspect of my work, at least for myself. Without it, everything else that the work provides for me is worthless.

So, this morning I sit with this image in mind and feel… like a human. And, for the most part, that’s a good thing.

Hope you’re feelng human this morning and can find your way, perhaps with a little modulation of your own, to a good day. Here’s a song from one of my favorites, Neko Case, from a 2006 appearance on Conan. Here’s Hold On, Hold On.

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The Power of Hopelessness

Posted in Biographical, Opinion, tagged , on April 4, 2020| 1 Comment »

“The Americans have no sense of doom, none whatever. They do not recognize doom when they see it.”

― James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room

At the bottom of the moods swings that occupy my waking days and dreaming nights as of late. In the studio at 5:30 this morning, a Tom Waits song playing with huge clunking beats and his coarse, smoke burnt voice yelling over it all, And the earth died screaming/While I lay dreaming…

Shuffling through things, trying to find something to hold on to and I come across this little painting, one that I quickly did years ago for my eyes only. Never meant to be shared, just a private reminder to myself of those days when the dark crows of doom have flown around my door. Meant to keep me aware of the signs that appear when these crows are coming back, to remind me of the immense fatigue and sense of doom they bring with them so that I might be able to stay clear of them this time.

To avoid hopelessness.

But sometimes hopelessness cannot be avoided.

If you have been at this point, you know there are only two outcomes:  to succumb to the doom or fight. You realize that hope, at that point, has become your enemy, a distraction that weakens your resolve and keeps you from being fully engaged in the battle.

Hope is a tool used by agents of doom, to tyrants and despots who tie themselves to religions that keep the masses passive with promises in lives after this one on earth. Hope makes you look forward when you need to be only in the here and now. Hope makes you sloppy and inattentive, willing to surrender to nearly the same terms and conditions that have brought you to this point.

Hope is a promise unfulfilled, a wish without action.

No, in times of doom, hopelessness is your greatest ally.

Hopelessness demands action.

Hopelessness is the greatest agent of change.

Hopelessness is fearless, with nothing left to lose.

I wasn’t planning on writing this this morning. God, I want to be cheery and optimistic and, dare I say, hopeful. I have always preached hope on this blog but that was in times when I thought the future was still a bright sky, not a dark and foreboding one like the one I see now, where the storm clouds have been amassing for the last four years. I’ve watched them gather but hope made me think it would somehow resolve without me engaging, that the sky would brighten of its own accord.

But I was wrong to trust hope. I can’t turn to hope this morning.

No, I am looking to hopelessness as my savior. I’ve have sometimes visited that abject blackness down where hopelessness dwells and it has always sent me back upwards. It has invariably set me in action and stiffened my resolve. It has made me realize that this life is a precious thing that is worth fighting for, against all hope.

Against all hope. I never thought about that term before, though I have used it on more than one occasion. I think we are at that point, where we must struggle against all hope with hopelessness as our great ally.

So, for the time being, I am setting hope aside. Oh, I’ll hope you’re doing well and staying safe because I want us all to have a brighter future at some point soon. But I will not depend on hope or trust that it will bring that desired future.

Only hopelessness can do that.

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Another Cuppa Black Coffee

Posted in Biographical, Favorite Things, Motivation, Music, tagged , on April 3, 2020| 5 Comments »

black coffee

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I’m feelin’ mighty lonesome
Haven’t slept a wink
I walk the floor and watch the door
And in between I drink
Black coffee

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In the studio early again and a little tired from riding the rollercoaster ride of recent times. Lots to do but it’s hard to getting the engine fully rolling. This thing grips tight and breaking free enough to really create is sometimes a tough task. I spoke with a gallery owner yesterday who said that one of their upcoming and much anticipated shows would be much smaller than they had hoped because the show’s artist had a hard time completing the pieces for the show because of the anxiety caused by the pandemic.

I understood that artist’s feelings completely and learning of their struggle gave me a little comfort in knowing that it wasn’t only me.

So, here I am this morning in the studio with the light outside struggling to emerge and a ball of anxiety in my gut just waiting to wake up. Much I can do but all I want to do is sip my black coffee and look out the window at the wind ruffling the limbs of the white pines above the milling deer in my yard. Maybe listen to a little Ella.

Sounds like a plan to me.

Gonna proceed with that plan now. Hope you have a plan to make your day a good one. Here’s part of a post about the song Black Coffee, along with Ella’s stellar version of it, that ran five years back. It also has a link to great poem that might help you through your day, so take a look. Or not. I don’t care about anything this morning except my cuppa black coffee.

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The sultry Black Coffee was written in 1948 by Sonny Burke and originally recorded by Sarah Vaughan and a few years later by Peggy Lee. There have been many, many covers of this song and most are very good. But there are four versions that really stick out for me, all very distinctly different. They are Vaughan’s original, the one from Peggy Lee, k.d. lang‘s darkly twangy version and the one I am featuring this morning from the great and grand Ella Fitzgerald.

Her version is elegantly spare with her voice and piano interweaving beautifully. It is darkly tinged but there is such strength in her phrasing that it keeps the song feeling surprisingly upbeat. Just a great, great song.

A little bit of trivia about this version: It was the favorite song of Nobel Prize winning poetess Wislawa Szymborska , who requested it be performed at her funeral. You might remember Szymborska from a blog entry here last month that featured her poem Possibilities.

So,give a listen as you sip the morning beverage of your choice. Maybe a little black coffee…

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A Golden Solitude

Posted in Biographical, Quote, tagged , , , on April 1, 2020| 1 Comment »

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Solitary trees, if they grow at all, grow strong.

—Winston Churchill

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The solitary tree has been a vital part of my work from the beginning. Actually, the word vital understates its importance.

I couldn’t find the image of a painting from a number of years ago that I wanted to see again. This sent me on a search through a maze of files and images from over the past twenty years. I probably spent more time doing this than I should have but it became one of those obsessive things.

Shuffling through these images, one after another, that form of the lone tree just jumped out at me. I say jumped because of the way in which it surprised me. I, of all people, know that the single Red Tree has been important and prevalent in my work. There is no getting around that fact. I have literally been called the “Red Tree guy.”

I understand its symbolism and meaning very well.

But it just seemed different, more away from me personally.

There were many that had slipped my mind that made me stop to look closer. I wasn’t seeing myself anymore in those pieces but found myself admiring the character they taken on in the time they had been absent in my memory. There was a strength and dignity in them that was palpable.

They had somehow expanded in the time I had lost track of them.

They were no longer me. They were them.

It was as though my forgetfulness had made them grow in solitude and they, out of necessity, had grown stronger as a result. Much like the words above from Churchill, which were written in a letter to his mother in 1899, a few years after his father had died.

I may have been the symbolic father of those works, those many Red Trees, but their strength was their’s alone, obtained in their solitude. I felt bad that I had lost track of them but was so pleased at what they had become.

They were beyond me.

Which is all I could hope.

 

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Reassurance

Posted in Biographical, Current Events, Opinion, tagged , , , , on March 19, 2020| Leave a Comment »

It’s a time for great swings of emotion that have me off balance much of the time. Waves of bewilderment that sometimes lead into anger followed by fear then anxiety. In between are interspersed moments of peaceful calm and even a full blown laugh that bring the whole shebang back into a more workable balance.

Then, once in a great while, there are moments that feel like a bit of grace being extended. The balance suddenly seems manageable and perhaps there is even hope.

That was just yesterday.

I was up early to head out to our local Wegmans supermarket, to be there at opening which had been advertised as being 6 AM. We needed a few items and I thought getting there early would beat the potentially infectious larger crowds and also give me a chance at finding my needed items on the freshly stocked shelves.

I pulled into the parking lot around 6:20 and I couldn’t believe my good fortune. There were only a handful of cars, outside of the employees vehicles parked further out in the large parking lot. I would be able to get in and out without running into many folks at all. I was out of the car with my shopping bags in hand when the window of a car near me rolled down. The guy inside spoke, telling me that the opening time had changed, that it was now 7 AM.

Oof. I slumped a bit and got back in the car to wait it out. By 7, there were quite a few cars but it wasn’t crazy busy as we shuffled in, everyone doing a pretty fair job in trying to keep their distance. Inside the store, with my gloves still on, I maneuvered my cart through the store and was kind of knocked out by the number of empty shelves that were there at opening time. The produce was sparse but I found the couple of items that we needed.

In the section that held canned beans and the like, there were 3 single cans of vegetarian beans. One had a pretty large dent on the edge of its lid, so I grabbed the other two. The pasta and rice sections were also picked pretty clean except for sporadic spots that held what appeared to be a case or two of a single item that would no doubt soon be gone.

All in all, I found most of the items I needed– there is never a shortage of Count Chocula cereal. Just kidding. We will just do without those other things that I couldn’t obtain.

I was able to keep a good distance from other shoppers but checking out was a bit unnerving to suddenly be a little closer. I tried to keep as far back as possible from the frail looking lady who was checking me out. I felt so bad for her and the cashiers who were constantly within a foot or two of a constant stream of different shoppers without knowing where those people had been or how seriously they took their responsibility to maintain distance or wash their hands. They would be there all day exposed to who knows what.

If you must go to a shop, bear this in mind. Keep your distance for their safety and yours as well. And be extra kind to these people who most likely have no choice in whether they can be there.

There are going to be shortages for the near future. It’s understandable. Along with the panic buying of regular shoppers, there is a whole group of people who are suddenly forced into the stores, putting further strain on the food chain. These are the people who used to get most of their meals at restaurants. You might say that’s ridiculous but even when I worked at the Perkins Family Restaurant twenty-some years ago, there was a remarkable number of people, even whole families, who would get two and sometimes three meals a day there.

According to stats, that trend hasn’t lessened in recent decades as more and more people eat out for many of their meals. Suddenly, these people are forced to either make their food or order the allowed takeout. And since many are also now under some sort of financial stress, perhaps laid off with no way of knowing when and if they will get back to work, they must begin shopping for food in a supermarket, trying to save a little money where they can. Throwing these people into the mix makes for even more shortages.

It will be that way until we get some sort of reassurance that the food supply will be stable and that we will be able to have access to the foods we need. And that reassurance is definitely lacking from the leaders at the top who seem woefully unprepared to handle a situation of this magnitude. Their inability to be forthcoming, accountable and honest has created a lack of credibility that now makes us distrust every word they utter, every move they make. Average people are beginning to realize that they must fend for themselves and that creates a frenzy in a population that hasn’t experienced this sort of potentially existential crisis in their lifetimes.

Will that reassurance come? I don’t know but my opinion that this administration is incapable of doing so., given their lack of empathy and their constant desire to assign responsibility or blame for anything to anyone but themselves. A great leader doesn’t keep saying that he is doing a great job. He doesn’t need to– his actions speak louder than hollow self praise.

Okay, let’s call that the anger part of my day. Like I said, this was how my day went yesterday. Up and down. Bewildered at the supermarket. Angered and made anxious by the news. Worried about the near future and our personal situation. Talking nonsense to my studio cat, Hobie, then laughing like an idiot at a sitcom that I had put on the tube for some sort of relief, even though I had seen it a hundred times before.

I was all over the place.

The new normal. Or is it the new abnormal?

Wait, I mentioned there was a moment of what seemed like grace, didn’t I?

Well, in the midst of this day, when I riding a ridge of anxiety down to its lowest point, I received an email. It was from a local man, a doctor, who asked about buying a large painting for very specific site in his home. I had only one painting that fit his need and it was one that has been dominating my space lately, both in the studio and in my mind. I turned and looked at the painting. I look at it a lot these days.

I read the email a couple more times and asked myself if this was a real inquiry? Who would be looking for a large painting right now? Are they pulling my leg and if so, how cruel would that be?

But after a minute or so of consideration, I thought it must be real. I actually teared up a little in that moment because it was just what I needed in this new abnormal day.

It felt like a small bit of grace. I don’t know if that’s right but I can tell what it was.

It was reassurance.

The reassurance that I, like so many others, was lacking. The reassurance that, even in a time of dire crisis, what I do has some meaning, that I exist and count for something.

Reassurance that I will be able to persevere and weather the storm.

I don’t know that this person was just looking for a painting at this particular time or if he decided to do this now because his action would be greatly helping out a local artist and small business at a time when it was truly needed. Whatever his reason, it moved me.

I sent him the image, writing a bit about the painting, and it looks like it may be moving to a new home very soon. I have often said that, in my mind, every time a person chooses to buy my work is a small miracle of some sort. I don’t know if that is absolutely true but I know that this sale will linger with me and have meaning for a long time to come.

We all need reassurance now. Each of us has the ability to give others some measure of reassurance.

Be kind. Be generous, even if you only afford to do so in spirit.

It goes a long way.

Sorry for the length of this post. If you got this far, thanks for sticking it out. There was a lot to say, I guess.

Have a good day and be careful.

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The painting at the top, Life Pop, is at the West End Gallery in Corning. Their doors are closed currently but they are still operating normal hours via phone and online, as well as with private appointments.

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The Morning Dew

Posted in Biographical, Music, tagged , , on March 17, 2020| 1 Comment »

Ah, another St. Patrick’s Day.

No parades this year with the drone of pipe bands and local fire departments showing off their freshly shined trucks while kids aboard them throw fistfuls of candy at the yelling crowds. No raucous drunk buses trekking from pub to pub filled with folks in plastic Kelly green derbies and Kiss Me I’m Irish t-shirts. No restaurants, firehalls or Hibernian Centers packed with revelers chowing down on their corned beef and cabbage and pints of Guinness.

No, this is not a year that will be tipped toward the louder side of this holiday. Instead, it will be one that leans toward the more somber and melancholy side of the Irish character, which is never far from the louder and more sociable part.

For me, moving to this more melancholy part is not a challenge. It usually brings memories of my mom, who has been gone nearly 25 years now, to the forefront. This would have been her 88th birthday. St. Patrick’s Day and her are permanently connected in my mind, down to the color green that I associate so much with her memory.

It’s the cool green of damp ferns, bright and vibrant in the yellow of the sun yet more fully beautiful and rich in the blue darkness of the shadows.

I stopped for just a moment now and a flood of memories came over me. That made me even more melancholy because they were so many of the same memories that I have been relishing for years now while I know there are so many more that are deeply tucked away in the folds of time and mind, hidden so that they would most likely be forever lost to me.

So, try your best to enjoy your St. Patrick’s Day this year, be it with a pint and a song or a tear and a memory. Or both.

Here’s a bit of Irish from the Chieftains, who we lucky enough to see at Carnegie Hall on St. Paddy’s Day many years ago.  Wonderful show. These are two songs with Morning Dew in their titles that are distinctly different. The first is the instrumental The Morning Dew which has the feel of march and the second, the wistfully sad song of memory, May Morning Dew.

Have a good day.

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Social Distancing: Approaching Storm

Posted in Biographical, Event, tagged , , , , , , on March 16, 2020| Leave a Comment »

I do a one-man show every June at the Principle Gallery in Alexandria, VA and have done so since the year 2000. This year’s show, my 21st such show, is slated to open June 5. I am keeping hope alive that the current situation will have subsided to some degree and that the show can go on by that time but the experts’ projections, based on what little data they can obtain from our inadequate testing, make it look a little shaky.

But I am continuing to work on this show on the premise that the show will go on.

It’s what I do. All I can do.

That being said, I have determined that this year’s show should reflect this time. At least, my take on it. To that end I am calling the show Social Distancing. It’s a term that, while it has really taken hold in this world in recent times, I don’t think I have encountered much before now.

I have practiced it and painted it in many ways but just didn’t know to call it that.

From my earliest days, much of my work has dealt with the duality that runs along that line between solitude and alienation. The yin and yang, the joy and the sorrow, that comes from being apart from others. Many of my series have focused on this separation, the Exiles and Outlaws series jumping to mind.

But even my most used archetype, the Red Tree, usually concerns itself with distancing.  It almost always is alone or at least apart from other trees. Most of the time, it is about finding strength in recognizing those things which makes us unique individuals but occasionally it is about feeling alienated from the rest of the world.

Some find empowerment in their solitude. I believe that’s been the case for myself as I have seldom felt loneliness, especially in my adult years. But for many, that line between simply being alone and lonely is a thin one.

Solitude and silence can be frightening to those unaccustomed to it.

This being the case, there will be a pretty substantial nod to my earlier work, such as the painting at the top. It’s a 14″ by 24″ piece on paper that I call Social Distancing: Approaching Storm. I guess it’s a timely title.

For me, this return to that earlier method which focuses on sparse landscapes and big blocks of transparent color is like comfort food to me. The more I immerse myself in this work the more I understand what its appeal was to myself and those folks who were drawn to it in the early days. Working on this group over the past week or so has been steadying in the face of the great uncertainty we face.

I could say more but I think I want to stop. Hopefully, the show will go on, at least in some form.

I am going back to the solitude of my work now.

It’s what I do. It’s all I can do.

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Social Distancing, this year’s edition of my annual show at the Principle Gallery in Alexandria opens June 5.

Stay tuned for further details.

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Inner World/ Hesse

Posted in Biographical, Favorite Things, Quote, tagged , , , , on March 2, 2020| 2 Comments »

This quote came from Hermann Hesse‘s most famous book, Steppenwolf. A great book but my favorite Hesse book is Demian, which I have referenced here a couple of times in the past. It was a book that I read at a time when I was at a crossroads in my life and it was very influential in my heading in the direction which led to this point. I think this quote very much jibes with my perception of the world portrayed in my work, that being that it is a real entity, a real place.

It has as much substance as the outer world to me. It has depth and layers. It has breath and light. It has emotion and its truth comes the fact that it is a precise portrayal of itself– not a replication of the outer world.

It just is.

That may sound nutty or perhaps egotistical to some. I get that. But without this belief in the reality of this inner world, the validity of the work to myself comes undone. It fades to nothingness and certainly doesn’t move across the void to the viewer. It loses all meaning for everyone, myself included, without this certainty in its being real.

I’m going to stop at this point. I may have said too much already, maybe too much for the outer world. In here, in my little inner world of colors and shapes, it sounds right…

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This post was from about five years back. I reread it for the first time again this morning and thought it deserved another run.

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Court and Spark

Posted in Biographical, Influences, Music, tagged , , on February 23, 2020| 3 Comments »

Joni Mitchell- The Mountain Loves the Sea- watercolor 1971

Over the years, I have often been asked about influences on my work and I often list several artists that I feel pushed me in certain directions. Then I also point out that there have been influences that fall outside of the painter mode. For example, literature, poetry and film come immediately to mind. Then there’s pop culture such as cartoons and comics, television and so much more. I’ve mentioned that there was a Coca Cola tv ad back in the 80’s that featured saturated colors– reds and golds– that stuck in my mind for years before I began painting.

There are so many contributing sources of inspiration.

I mention this today because as I was looking for a piece of music to play this  morning, I came across the old Joni Mitchell album from 1974, Court and Spark. It was a great album, one that I loved even as a teenage boy. I had not listened to it in years but each of the songs was imprinted in me by this time.

I also hadn’t looked closely at its album cover for many, many years though it was a beautiful cover, cream colored with a small watercolor painting, The Mountain Loves the Sea, that Joni Mitchell had painted a few years before, tastefully in its center. It had a simple elegance that I recognized, again even as a teenage boy. But it was just one of those things that, because I had seen it so many times before, I didn’t look with any attention at all.

But I looked closer today at the painting in the cover’s center and was surprised at how much my own work sometimes held echoes of this little painting. I would never thought of Joni Mitchell as an influence beyond her music but looking at this little image made me rethink that.

Maybe it was just one of those little things that push you without your knowledge in one direction or another. Influences that you internalize and can’t recognize or name until you come face to face with them. We all have them, those small things we take in and blend together to make us who we are.

I am glad this was one of those things for me. So, let’s give a listen to the title track from Court and Spark.

Have a great Sunday.

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