Shakespeare said that art is a mirror held up to nature. And that’s what it is. The nature is your nature, and all of these wonderful poetic images of mythology are referring to something in you. When your mind is simply trapped by the image out there so that you never make the reference to yourself, you have misread the image.
—Joseph Campbell (with Bill Moyers), The Power of Myth
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I think that the words above that Joseph Campbell spoke during his conversation with Bill Moyers for The Power of Myth speak beautifully for both mythology and art, at least in my view. I believe that we truly connect with myth and art when we see it as personal to ourselves, as being somehow symbolic of our own experience and being. Our emotions and reactions.
Of course, many myths and much in art may not speak to us on this personal level. I certainly don’t expect my work to speak to everyone no matter how much I may wish that it could. It simply can’t. My work is a reflection of my journey, my limited knowledge and my flawed self. Yours is completely different. But occasionally, there is a moment when you will see something of yourself in my representation of my inner world and that to me is magical.
This new painting, an 8″ by 24″ canvas, is what I see as being a very personal piece that might well reflect for others. I call it In the Inner Place and it is included in my upcoming show, Part of the Pattern, at the Principle Gallery which opens June 3. Without being specific, I see many things in this painting that I think speak strongly to how I want to see my world and my place in it.
An inner perception.
You might simply see it as a pleasant piece.
Or not.
Or you may see it as something reflective of your own inner world, something that speaks to who you are. I can’t say. We can’t control what anyone sees in a mirror.
I’ve been looking for a title for this new painting, an 18″ by 18″ canvas, for a week or so now. A lot of things come to mind and I thought I had it for a while. Then I was listening to some music and one of the songs just hit me.
I was going through some older posts from this blog when I came across a couple that featured some of my paintings on the website
I’m so glad that he let me try it again
The soul becomes dyed with the colour of its thoughts.
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 said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
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.
Redtree Times 