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Archive for the ‘Influences’ Category

The Principle Gallery in Charleston

Posted in Favorite Things, Influences, tagged , , , on November 5, 2013| 6 Comments »

Principle Gallery Charleston interior Nov 2013It happened a couple of months back but it’s now official: the Principle Gallery Charleston has opened.  Located on Meeting Street in historic Charleston, SC, the gallery formerly known as the M Gallery of Fine Art made the transformation to its new name under the Principle Gallery banner last week.  They had ran for the first two months with the M Gallery name as the gallery was previously obligated under that name to hold the annual exhibit of the American Impressionist Society, a huge show with around 200 paintings.  But once that show came down, the move to the Principle Gallery name was made.

This expansion is an exciting move for owner Michele Ward.  She brings her keen eye and her principled approach ( that’s where the name originated) to business to the Low Country and I think the residents of  the Charleston area will quickly understand why the Principle Gallery has prospered and grown in Alexandria over the past two decades.

Principle Gallery Charleston exterior Nov 2013It’s exciting for me to see the Principle Gallery grow.  I have been with them since they made their initial move to  their present King Street location in early 1997.  They were a great gallery even in those earliest days with a wonderful roster of artists.  But  the gallery never remained static  in its approach and has continually strove to expand the quality and reach of the work it represents  As a result, the Principle Gallery name has become nationally known and is a destination gallery for many artists.  By that,  I mean  it is a gallery that most artists would place on their wish list if they could choose where they could exhibit their work.

That being said, it makes me appreciate so  much the nearly 17 years I have exhibited with Michele and her gallery.  Without the encouragement and opportunities I have received from the Principle Gallery and Michele, I am sure my career and my life would be very much different at this point.   I owe much of any success I might have now to this gallery and it is gratifying to see it rise to new heights in a beautiful new space in a great city.

I am sure they will be a big hit in Charleston.   Congratulations and all the best wishes for you , Michele!  

 

  

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Control of the Narrative/Redux

Posted in Early Paintings, Influences, Technique/History, tagged , , , on November 2, 2013| 4 Comments »

GC Myers- Muse 2002

GC Myers- Muse 2002

I am now preparing for my show at the Kada Gallery, Alchemy, which opens in two weeks on November 16th.  Along with all of my new work for this show I am including a small group of paintings from around 2002.  These are paintings that were darker in tone , both visually and emotionally, than my other work at that time, reflecting my feelings in the immediate aftermath of 9/11.  These pieces have not been shown in years and I believe that they have aged well, especially when they are not considered in the context of the time in which they were created.  I am eager to show them again.

I went back in the archives of this blog and came across this posting that speaks a bit more about how I handled the reception for this work when it first went out into the world.  This painting, Muse, is not part of the group.  It is, as noted below, in the  trusted hands of a man who I consider a friend in Virginia.

here’s what I wrote back in 2009:

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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Long Live Lou

Posted in Favorite Things, Influences, Music, Video, tagged , , , on October 28, 2013| 2 Comments »

lou-reed-transformer-imageLou Reed died yesterday at the age of 71.

Lou always found his way into my listening life.  I wrote about Lou a few years back on this blog, recounting how I played his album Rock N Roll Animal all day one Christmas when I was an early teen, filling the house with the strains of Heroin and Sweet Jane.  A few years later, one of my prize finds from scouring the bargain bins at the local Newberrys store were a couple of early Velvet Underground recordings– on eight-track tapes.  I still chuckle at the idea of Lou and the Velvets  on one of those big clunky tapes.  I remember driving with a shoe box filled with tapes to play in the car.  I think there were maybe ten tapes.

But Lou was there, on one of those huge dinosaur cartridges.  It was as unpolished as anything I had heard.  Bad recordings and Lou’s flat vocals which sounded even more strained on these recordings.  But there was something there that transcended the sound quality or even Lou’s voice.  It was real expression.  Not raw emotion, but  restrained expressions of deeper feelings.  The sensation I got is similar to that which I get now from looking at great Outsider art.  It is  work that somewhat takes the form of more traditional art  but is less concerned with the technical aspects and more centered on getting across the feeling and the individual voice of the artist behind the picture.  They can appear crude but sometimes there is a pure beauty in them, one that speaks across the wider range.  Real art.

That’s what I heard in Lou’s songs for many years.  Sorry to see him go.

There are many songs from Lou that I could play here but I want to hear Perfect Day.  It’s a song that I forget at times but when I come across it, find it sticking in my mind for weeks. Hope yours is a perfect day…

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North Celestial Tree

Posted in Influences, Neat Stuff, Photography, tagged , , , , , , , on October 24, 2013| Leave a Comment »

North Celstial Tree-- JeronimoLosadaI’ve been having some work done here in the studio recently and have been sharing my space with a couple of carpenters.  I am never comfortable sharing my  workspace with anybody and always feel a bit distracted, even inhibited.  But both Tony and Nick are good and easy going guys and I have been able to get some work done.

Yesterday, Tony told me to check out the NASA’s Astronomy Picture of the Day.  He thought it would look familiar to me.  Clicking on the site I was greeted by the photo above, a magnificent image of a great tree under a night sky taken by Spanish astrophotographer Jeronimo Losada  near Almaden de la Plata in the province of Seville, Spain.  Through a break in the upper reaches of the tree you can see the North Celestial Pole.  Losada focused on the North  Star and over two hours recorded a series of 30 second exposures which created the star trails that make up this spectacular sky.

It was just a great photo and it certainly did strike home even though the tree was not exactly my Red Tree.  But  Tony was right.  The tree , the saddle in the center of the photo created by the wide angle of the lens  and the silhouettes of trees on the horizon reminded me of much of my work.  I had even done a painting or two with that same swirl of light and color in the sky.

Please check out Jeronimo Losada’s  blog  to see some of his other wonderful shots of the landscape beneath the night sky.  There are some brilliant shots there and it’s well worth a visit.  It is a Spanish language site but most browsers have translators.

And for some other great shots of the heavens check out the Astronomy Picture of the Day.  Today’s is a great shot as well.

 

 

 

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Stranger in a Strange Land

Posted in Biographical, Early Paintings, Favorite Things, Influences, Music, Personal Mythology, Video, tagged , , , , , , , on October 20, 2013| 3 Comments »

GC Myers Stranger (In a Strange Land) -I featured an older piece here on the blog last month, a painting that was considered my Dark Work from around 2002.   The piece shown above is another of these paintings and is one that I have always considered solely mine.  I very seldom consider a painting being for myself only but this one has always felt as though it should stay with me.  It is titled  Stranger (In a Strange Land) which is derived from the title of Robert Heinlein’s famous sci-fi novel which in turn  was derived from the words of Moses in Exodus 2:22.

The landscape in this piece has an eerie, alien feel to it under that ominous sky.  When I look at it I am instantly reminded of the feeling of that sense of not belonging that I have often felt throughout my life, as though I was that stranger in that strange land.  The rolling field rows in the foreground remind me just a bit of the Levite cloth that adorned Moses when he was discovered in the Nile as an infant, a symbol of origin and heritage that acts as a comforting element here, almost like a swaddling blanket for the stranger as he views the landscape before him.

As I said, it is one of those rare pieces that I feel is for me alone, that has only personal meaning, even though I am sure there are others who will recognize that same feeling in this .  For me  this painting symbolizes so much that feeling of alienation that I have experienced for much of my life, that same feeling  from which my other more optimistic and hopeful work sprung as a reaction to it.  Perhaps this is where I found myself and the more hopeful work was where I aspired to be.

Anyway, that’s enough for my five-cent psychology  lesson for today.  In short, this is a piece that I see as elemental to who I am and where I am going.  This one stays put .

Here’s a little of the great ( and I think underappreciated) Leon Russell  from way back in 1971 singing, appropriately,  Stranger in a Stranger Land…

 

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Alexander Hogue: An American Visionary

Posted in Favorite Things, Influences, Video, tagged , , , , , , on September 23, 2013| 5 Comments »

Alexander Hogue- The Crucified Land 1939

Alexander Hogue- The Crucified Land 1939

Several years ago, I wrote a post about the work of Alexander Hogue, an American Regionalist painter whose work I felt was at the same level as that of Grant Wood and Thomas Hart Benton, though he never achieved the wider fame of these two.  I know I knew nothing of his work before stumbling across his name on the site of a gallery that I was associated with at the time in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where Hogue had spent the last half of his long life, dying in 1994 at the age of 96.

Alexander Hogue- Mother Earth Laid Bare

Alexander Hogue- Mother Earth Laid Bare

His work was a stunning find for me.   The imagery is bold and powerful.  His color palette was strong and unique, with deep saturated colors often alongside ethereal, wispy colors .  His depictions of the southwestern landscape possess a profound sense of place and spirit, filling what might seem like an otherwise desolate scene with a quality of humanity.  His dust bowl scenes from the 30’s are spectacular visions.

Alexander Hogue --Eroded Lava Badlands Alpine 1982

Alexander Hogue –Eroded Lava Badlands Alpine 1982

So, I was thrilled when I read that the exhibit, Alexander Hogue: An American Visionary was opening this week at the Rockwell Museum of Western Art in nearby Corning.  The Rockwell is an unexpected gem for the visitor to this region, a treasure trove of the largest collection of Western art east of the Mississippi where Hogue’s wonderful work will feel at home, although I feel his work is powerful enough to stand among any painter from the last century.  This exhibit displays work from across the many years of his long career, with works from the 1920’s up to near the end of his life.  Hogue worked until his death, which I find reassuring.

Here’s a video from  the show’s curator, Susan Kalil. I love how she describes the attachment of the owners of Hogue’s paintings to the work. I really urge you, if you are in the Corning area this fall, to stop into the Rockwell to see this show.

 

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Acres of Diamonds

Posted in Influences, Motivation, Quote, tagged , , , on September 20, 2013| 5 Comments »

Grass-Is-Greener“The more intensely we feel about an idea or a goal, the more assuredly the idea, buried deep in our subconscious, will direct us along the path to its fulfillment.”

—Earl Nightingale

______________________

It’s funny sometimes what you take from an experience in your life.  At one point in my life I was in the retail car business, working at a Honda dealership both as a salesman and a finance manager.  In order to keep their sales staff engaged and excited about pushing their product, the management there would periodically send us to seminars with industry-specific motivational speakers and would also have sets of motivational tapes from other speakers that they would encourage us to listen to in our free time.  One of the sets of tapes was from a man named Earl Nightingale who had a deep and engaging voice that added a serious dimension to whatever he said.  As I listened to his tapes, my interest grew as he told his little tales and his lessons registered deeply within me.

One of his stories was a short retelling of a classic lecture  called Acres of Diamonds from Russell H Conwell (1843-1925), an interesting fellow who was a baptist minister, a lawyer, a philanthropist and the founder and first president of Temple University.  The lecture, one that Conwell delivered over 5000 times during his lifetime, made the point that the riches we seek are often right in our own backyards.  His tale is of an African farmer who sells his farm in order to go in search of diamonds and finds nothing but failure that ends with his suicide.  Meanwhile, the man who took over the farm found an abundance of diamonds and ended up with one of the largest diamond mines in Africa.

There were a lot of lessons to be learned from this tale but primarily  what I took away  was that I must leave the car business–it was not my backyard.   It was the place to which I had come in search of my own diamonds.  I had not yet, at that point, began to search my own backyard. I am not sure if that was the message that management had been hoping would sink in.  Or maybe it was.

The other part of Nightingale’s message was that you had to set a course, aim for a destination.  Everything was possible if you knew where you wanted to go and truly set your mind to it.  He gave a laundry list of great human accomplishments that were achieved once we put our minds and wills in motion towards their fulfillment.  That resonated with me.  I had seen many people over the years who seemed deeply unhappy in their lives and most had no direction going forward, no destination for which they were working.  They drifted like a rudderless boat on the sea, going wherever the strongest current took them without having any influence over this motion.

If you can name it, you can do it in some form.

As I said, it’s funny how things influence you.  It’s been about twenty five years since I heard those words but they still resonate strongly with me, even now.  I try to be always conscious of the goals I set, knowing that the mind and the universe will always try to make a way for the possibility of achievement.

 

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GF Watts’ After the Deluge

Posted in Favorite Things, Influences, Quote, tagged , , , , on September 16, 2013| 4 Comments »

Julia Margaret Cameron- Whisper of the Muse-Portrait of GF WattsI came across this photo from Julia Margaret Cameron, a Victorian era  British photographer whose work I find tremendously interesting and forward leaning.  I have featured her work here before, with photos titled Sadness and Iago.  This photo from 1865 is titled Whisper of the Muse/Portrait of GF Watts  once again shows off the painterly eye that marks Cameron’s work as she portrays the renowned painter of the time amid two young girls.

I liked the image and it piqued my interest as to GF Watts‘ work.  I had heard the name but couldn’t recall his work so I decided to give a quick look.  An interesting guy, one who fell from favor at one point after his death and has found renewed interest.  Some of his work is Pre-Raphaelite in its appearance, very appealing and beautiful but falling into the genre to the point it became hard to distinguish it from other painters working in the same time.

But there was a piece that really captured my eye.  Titled After the Deluge (The Forty-First Day) it is an almost abstract depiction of the world after the biblical flood, the sun dominating in bursts of warm tones .  It was such an anomalous and powerful piece, more Van Gogh and modern in feel than Pre-raphaelite.  It evokes Mark Rothko, to bring it even further into the future. I found it just amazing.  It was on display at the National Galleries of Scotland last year in an exhibit titled Van Gogh to Kandinsky/ Symbolist Landscape in Europe 1880-1910.  This is how they described Watts’ work:

George Frederic Watts took his role as an artist to a high calling, stating: ‘I paint ideas, not things’. For him, landscape provided elements which he could transform to project profound meaning via natural grandeur, as in his large, imposing painting After the Deluge: The Forty-First Day. This simple image – a vast sun hanging over an expanse of calm, unbroken water – is far from a mere sunset; it evokes the cosmic energy of a star.

I love the quote– I paint ideas, not things.  Something to hold to.  Here’s the painting in question:

george_frederic_watts_after_the_deluge

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Exiles: Cain/ Redux

Posted in Early Paintings, Influences, Quote, tagged , , , , , on September 13, 2013| 2 Comments »

GC Myers- CainI brought up a reference in last week’s Gallery Talk at the Principle Gallery that I would share here again.  It’s about a posting that appeared here about five years ago, one that focused on one of the paintings from my Exiles series from around 1995.  It’s a painting that I would never part with for many reasons but mainly for the meaning it holds for me in changing the course of my life at one point.

In 2008, I wrote:

I thought I’d take a moment and show this painting, Cain, another from the Exiles series that I’ve discussed in past posts.  This is a smallish piece and one of my favorites, one with which  I will never part.

He is based, somewhat, on the biblical story of the original exile, one expelled from his homeland after slaying his brother  to create a new world for himself, never to return.  It is also based on the novel Demian by Hermann Hesse, a book that meant much to me when I went through a trying time years ago.  Actually, it seems a lifetime ago.

In Demian, Hesse uses the mark of Cain as a symbol for those seeking the truth in themselves.  He also discusses the dual nature of man, an idea which has had a very formative aspect in my growth as a painter.  The idea of opposing forces, light and dark,  being contained in one element, one being, always struck a chord in me.  It made sense of the struggles that I observed in myself and many others.

He also made a statement that resonated like a gigantic bell tolling for me.

Whoever wants to be born, must first destroy a world.

Without going into detail, that small sentence was a revelation.  It changed my world forever.

I realize this is a fragmented explanation of this painting and the book that influenced it.  I merely wanted to illustrate what personal meaning some pieces can have for an artist as well the serendipitous nature of moments when art and one’s real life converge.

Maybe I will elaborate in the future.  Maybe not…

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Satisfied

Posted in Biographical, Influences, Painting, tagged , , , on September 12, 2013| 6 Comments »

GC Myers- SatisfiedIt was twenty years ago this month that I had the accident that started my painting career.  When I began painting at that time, it was not with some long-range goal of becoming a professional artist or even with the thought that anything would come from it.  I was simply looking for a creative  outlet for emotion that was roiling within.  I never had real expectations and didn’t even begin to form any until a year or so after I started.  I had no idea where this would take me nor did I have a notion that my work would take any sort of form that might reach out to people.  It was simply an urge that begged to be fulfilled at the time.

As the years went by, expectations and hopes did begin to take form.  I began to expect to sell my work and to have people take somewhat of an interest in it. I hoped that people would take my work as seriously as I did and that people would look deeper into it.

But the thing that has surprised me over the years is something  that I never expected or had even thought of beforehand.  That is the trust that many people place in me when they confide to me their feelings about the work, often sharing deeply personal stories about their lives.  I have heard many personal stories, some sad and some triumphant,  in the past two decades and seen many teary eyes as they relate their stories.  Each time I am surprised and touched at how open and honest these folks are in sharing the details of their lives with me.  Surprised may not be the right word here.  It was surprising at first  but then  turned to humbling in that I often didn’t feel worthy to be so privileged.  Now, it is still a bit surprising, a lot humbling and totally an honor to be let in on such private emotions.  It is the most gratifying and satisfying aspect of my experience as an artist over the past two decades, far exceeding financial rewards and public acclaim.  It is perhaps the most inspirational element that I carry with me into the studio each morning.

I had no idea that such a thing might happen when I started and still struggle to figure out how it has happened within the framework of my paintings.  It remains a mystery but a most satisfying one.  Thanks for such an unexpected gift.

*************************************

The painting shown here is fittingly titled Satisfied and is a 24″ by 14″ piece on paper and is currently at the Principle Gallery.

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