It’s Mother’s Day again. You might think the image I am showing today is an odd selection for this day. It’s a small painting called A Hard Past that is from my 2008 Outlaws series. It’s one of a few pieces that I deeply regret ever letting go as it holds personal meaning for me. I just didn’t realize this at the time.
I know that this may not seem like a flattering thing to say but every time I look at this image I see my Mom’s face. At least, a certain look she had when she was sitting by herself in silence at the kitchen table, drinking a cup of tea and smoking her ever-present Camel cigarettes, those unfiltered beauties that no doubt contributed to the lung cancer that took her life at age 63.
She would sit in stillness for a long period time at that table with a distant and hardened gaze on her face. I always wondered what she was thinking or where she was in that moment. But when you’re a kid you just move through the kitchen without a word or a question.
More’s the pity…
The title, A Hard Past, came from this memory of her. She had a pretty hard life- her mother died when she was three, no school beyond ninth grade, years of toiling in a factory and a long, turbulent and angry marriage to my father. It gave her a hard edge, a toughness that several people commented on after her death back in 1995. But they also commented on her humor, generosity and willingness to help others who might need a hand– those qualities that I also saw in her. Those qualities that I so miss.
So while it may not seem like a flattering tribute, just seeing my Mom in this piece means so much to me.
For today’s music, I’m going with her favorite, Eddy Arnold, and a song that she probably felt fit her like a glove, You Don’t Know Me. It’s a classic song that Arnold is credited with co-writing along with songwriter Cindy Walker in 1955.
Have great Mother’s Day…
I’ve got a soft spot for pictures of lumbermen. I’ve written here before about my great-grandfather,
I’ve been a fan of 
If you work diligently… without saying to yourself beforehand, ‘I want to make this or that,’ if you work as though you were making a pair of shoes, without artistic preoccupation, you will not always find you do well. But the days you least expect it, you will find a subject which holds its own with the work of those who have gone before.
There is an exhibit of paintings currently hanging at the Grand Palais in Paris that features the work of the early 20th century Portuguese artist Amadeo de Souza-Cardoso. It is only the second major retrospective of his work and the first since 1958. He is another of those artists who are probably not on your radar– I know I was unaware of his work. But once I found it, I couldn’t shake the memory of it.
He was born in the north of Portugal in 1887 near the small city of Amarante. While still a teen he made his way to Paris where he absorbed the fertile art scene that was in place. He began painting and drawing while becoming close friends with many artists and writers such as Gertrude Stein, Modigliani, Juan Gris and Brancusi.
In the last few months we lost two of the most unique and transcendent musicians of our time, David Bowie in January and now Prince. Luckily for us, both had long and prolific careers and left large musical legacies behind. I admired Prince greatly and I think that is all there is to say, especially after the millions of words written and spoken over the past few days. I don’t think I can stand to see another tweet on one of the news channels form some celebrity saying that this is how it sounds when doves cry.
despite that, Schiele created, to my way of thinking, one of the most provocative and distinct bodies of work in modern art– all before an all too early death from the Spanish Flu in 1917.
We first ran up through Central Park to the Neue Galerie, a small museum just above the Metroplitan Museum that features German and Austrian Modern art. It’s a beautiful collection situated in a beautiful 5th Avenue mansion which makes for intimate, if sometimes crowded, viewing of the art. If you’re in NYC, the Neue Galerie is worth a visit if only to see this piece even though there is much, much more to see there.
I wanted to feature some music this morning that kind of jibed with the Henri Matisse Blue Nude cut-outs above that the artist produced in the early 1950’s. I wasn’t sure what I wanted but I settled on something from composer Burt Bacharach. 
Ah, the dark days of winter are receding. The trees are budding out and the green of the grass (under the newly fallen four inches of snow!) is pushing aside the dead growth of a long gone last year. The robins have returned and once again the world makes sense– the daily metronome that is major league baseball returns today.
Redtree Times 