I’ve been taking a few days off here around Thanksgiving, taking it a bit easier in the days that kick off the first days of the Christmas season here. I can’t say I’m as big a fan of the holidays as when I was child but I still feel that same warm fuzziness when certain songs of the season come on the radio. Nat King Cole singing The Christmas Songor Bing Crosby’s White Christmas,for example. One of my all-time favorites are the wondeful compositions from Vince Guaraldi for A Charlie Brown Christmas. Hearing the relaxing tones of Christmas Time Is Here with the children’s chorus is like zen candy to me–it just pushes away all the bad things we,ve come to accept as part of the season and fills the void with a peaceful calm.
I thought I’d share Diana Krall‘s take on this great piece. It lacks the children’s voices but it is lovely nonetheless and a good way to head back into my work.
Thursday is our traditional Thanksgiving holiday. But this year Thursday is also the first day of Hanukkah, the eight day Jewish holiday also known as the Festival of Lights. The holiday commemorates the re-dedication of the holy Temple in Jerusalem following the Jewish victory over the Syrian-Greeks in 165 B.C.E. The eight days of Hanukkah refer to the purifying ritual of that took place in the Temple after their victory. Because the Temple had been defiled by foreign gods, it was determined that it must be purified by the burning of ritual oil in its menorah. They discovered that there was only enough oil for one day but lit it anyway. It burned for the required eight days which was considered miraculous and gave rise to the Hanukkah celebration.
This is the third time the two holiday have converged since President Lincoln proclaimed Thanksgiving a holiday here in 1863. The first two times, 1888 and 1899, occurred before the current laws which dictate that Thanksgiving fall on the fourth Thursday of November. This is the first time since the law went into effect and will the last time the two holidays fall simultaneously until the year 79811, as calculated by a physicist with some extra time on his hands.
This convergence has been dubbed Thansgivukkah. Kind of catchy, huh? I don’t know that there is any real significance here but it sure sounds ominous (and kind of cool) when you throw in the fact that it won’t happen again for another 77,ooo years or so. And anytime you get to throw around a portmanteau like Thanksgivukkah, it’s got to be good. So enjoy your Thanksgivukkah, whether you’re thinking about the Pilgrims or the Maccabees.
Here’s a tongue-in-cheek look at this rare holiday with The Thanksgivukkah Anthemfrom the Jewish a cappella group Six13. Kind of kitschy fun…
It’s been a busy year. Actually, it’s been a busy two or three years but the last few months have seemed even more hectic. There was the preparations for the Kada Gallery show and work being done around the studio by carpenters and masons. It seemed as though there was little time to really take stock of everything. But with the Kada show opening this past weekend and my delivering a group of work to the Principle Gallery in Alexandria on Tuesday, yesterday was my first chance to take some time to reflect, to see where I was on my artistic path.
After a short period of examination, it seems to me that I am at a plateau. Mind you, it’s a happy plateau but I’m not sure this is where I want to stop, not sure that this is my final destination as an artist. For the past several years, I have been working at what I consider my highest level: I am painting the paintings that I want to see. The work is distinctly mine and is consistent in its communicative effect and in the way it satisfies me internally. The work from my recent shows have been as personally satisfying as any I have ever showed. If I were a miner, I would say that I have been working a rich vein.
But I am increasingly having that nagging feeling that there is an even richer vein for me if I move from this plateau and climb a bit higher.
It’s a scary thought. This has been, as I said, a happy plateau. It’s where many artists, upon arriving , settle in for the remainder of their careers. And why not? They have worked hard to reach this plateau and are producing the work they set out to produce at the beginning of their journeys. It would be very easy to stay here and be content and safe, to not have to face the prospect of a new climb with all the perils that come with it: The uncertainty of what is up there and the possibility of failure.
Maybe I am being over dramatic in my description here. I don’t know. I do know that I have that clawing and gnawing feeling in my gut that now is the time to start moving onward and upward, to leave this happy plateau and take on the risk of failure. Whether I can actually muster enough bravery to make this move, whatever that may be, and where it might take me are only the beginning of the questions that arise, questions for which only time holds the answers.
We shall see…
Here’s an old song, Unsatisfied, from The Replacements that fits the bill for this subject. Look me in the eye and tell me that I’m satisfied…
I am heading out to Erie later this morning for tonight’s opening reception for my show, Alchemy, at the Kada Gallery. While I am always a bit nervous beefore any of these solo shows, the ride out to Erie generally has a calming effect. It is a simple and quiet ride through rural western New York on a highway that sometimes feels deserted, with hardly another car appearing at certain points. The landscape is a mix of rolling hills that skirt the Allegheny National Forest before leveling off into a plain that runs to the Great Lakes, Lake Erie in this case. It is sparsely populated and airily wide open. I think this is an image of New York that would surprise many people. I know that it’s a ride that always has a calming effect for me.
The painting, Forever and Ever, above is a small piece, 6″ by 6″ on paper, that is include in this show. It is another take on the Baucis and Philemon myth that I have described here several times in the past. I really like the vivid tones of the sky and the landscape here. They seem to give it the other-worldly feel that I think fits the story of the fated couple.
Here’s a little music that has the calm that I anticipate on my drive westward. It’s You Don’t Know What Love Is from two of my favorites, Elvis Costello and the late great Chet Baker. I hope to see you tonight if you’re in the Erie area and can come out to the Kada Gallery. Kathy and Joe DeAngelo, the owners of the Kada, are wonderful hosts. See you tonight!
I am on the road today, delivering the work to the Kada Gallery for my show, Alchemy, which is opening this coming Saturday. While it’s always a relief to deliver a show and be out from under the weight of a deadline, today is a bittersweet trip for me. You see, today is the day that Fred leaves for his new home. I didn’t want to be there when he goes so I said my goodbyes before I hit the road this morning and when I return, the studio will be strangely empty without him there.
Young Fred
I wrote about Fred here back in September, a few weeks after we had found him nearly dead in a ditch, barely a few weeks old. He has prospered beyond our hopes and is now healthy, strong and happy. Thanks to the carpenters and other workmen who’ve been in the studio for a few weeks now, he is comfortable and outgoing with all sorts of people. Our vet is amazed at how socialized he seems to be.
But now he moves on to life to be a companion to Lucky, my brother-in-law’s exceptionally sweet cat. They have had several meetings to get acquainted and Fred is fascinated by the much larger Lucky, following her constantly as he attempts to get her to play with him. Lucky is very tolerant of the energetic little guy. Everything points to them being ideal companions.
I know I will miss the little guy. I hope he remembers me when he comes back to visit in the future. Here’s one of my favorite songs from Harry Nilsson, circa 1974 and fittingly from his Pussy Cats album, that expresses that very sentiment.
Had the opportunity to take a short break from my show prep and venture up to Ithaca last night where we met a longtime friend to see Elvis Costello at the State Theater there. He has been doing a solo tour with just him and his guitars, a wonderful mix of acoustic versions of some hits and some other chestnuts. Of course, with such a long recording career, there were songs that were omitted from his show because of time limitations. For me, I missed Almost Blue and a few others. But the show was so engaging that they weren’t sorely missed as Elvis was in fine form, seeming to really enjoy his performance before a very rapt audience.
One of my favorite songs of the evening was not one of his own distinctive songs but a classic pop song from the 1930’s, Walkin’ My Baby Back Home. Here’s a version of him doing this song that I was able to find thanks to YouTube. Enjoy and have a great weekend!
As I have noted way too many times lately, I am in the midst of getting work ready for a solo show, Alchemy, at the Kada Gallery in Erie that opens in two weeks, on November 16th. With just a week to go before I deliver the work to the gallery there is still a lot to do. I am finishing up photography on the paintings, matting the pieces on paper, varnishing those on canvas and staining frames.
It’s tedious and takes me away from painting so it’s one part of my job that I don’t really enjoy too much, outside of that moment when I see a painting for the first time fully presented. Especially those pieces on paper. There’s something quite magical about the transformation from the image itself on a bare sheet of watercolor paper to seeing it in its mat and frame. It’s the difference between seeing a gem stone on a tray or in a beautiful setting. The gem is still lovely outside of the setting but the setting focuses it, holds it up for the world to see.
So, tedious as it may be, it has to be done and I am off to stain and varnish this morning. By the way, the painting at the top is The Song We Carryand is headed to this show as well.
I thought this would be a good day to hear from one of my favorites from back in the day, The Replacements from the early 80’s. This Minneapolis band was tremendously influential on the music of the 90’s, especially the sounds that came to be known as grunge or alternative rock. This song, I Will Dare, is from their 1984 album, Let It Be. Good sounds to start a working Sunday…
I’ve written several times here over the summer about my friend Michael Mattice‘s debut album, Comin’ Home. It has been really well received here and abroad, drawing great reviews from a number of different venues. Below is the first video from the album of the song, Led to Gold,a favorite of mine from the album as it really highlights his abilities on the guitar. The video has a few DC landmarks recognizable to most as well as the lesser known but no less spectacular Great Falls, just above DC on the Potomac. It’s a really well done video to a strong song.
It’s been interesting watching Mike’s creative arc over the past several months. In September, we spoke at length about the ebb and flow that comes with creativity, especially in how the public reacts to it–overnight success is seldom as quickly gained as it appears on the surface, I advised that he not be too swept up in this waxing and waning in the short-term and we both agreed that patience and trust in your own abilities and vision are key to maintaining your course. If you stay true to your vision, people will come around eventually. And in Mike’s case, I believe this absolutely true.
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…
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…
I’ve been taking a few days off here around Thanksgiving, taking it a bit easier in the days that kick off the first days of the Christmas season here. I can’t say I’m as big a fan of the holidays as when I was child but I still feel that same warm fuzziness when certain songs of the season come on the radio. Nat King Cole singing The Christmas Song or Bing Crosby’s White Christmas, for example. One of my all-time favorites are the wondeful compositions from Vince Guaraldi for A Charlie Brown Christmas. Hearing the relaxing tones of Christmas Time Is Here with the children’s chorus is like zen candy to me–it just pushes away all the bad things we,ve come to accept as part of the season and fills the void with a peaceful calm.
Redtree Times 