Redtree Times

Cheri and I were walking yesterday afternoon on a dirt road near us.  The road goes down steeply into a ravine then back up, passing through fields.  On one side there is a large field, probably 70-80 acres in size, that is no longer worked by any farmer and has become full of chest high goldenrod, now all out in  yellow splendor.  This field of goldenrod rises to our left as we climb and all you can see at the top of the ridge beyond the field are the perfectly round crowns of maple and other hardwood trees.  Above it all is a deep blue autumn sky with beautiful full clouds rising at  the bottom of our sight  of it. 

It’s quite an idyllic scene.  Tranquil. It seems as though it is a place existing in different times at once and as we walk, I can’t help wonder how someone walking up that road two hundred years ago would have felt.  Would their experience of that moment and place been any different than mine?  Have all the changes in the world over that time altered the way in which I or anyone of our time react to this moment?  Have we really changed at all since someone might have first walked up that road centuries ago?

I try to put myself into the mind of someone from that past time doing just that, try to think of things that may have been bearing on their mind at that time.  Someone at that time walking up such a road was probably a farmer of some sort.  Probably thoughts of the labors that must be finished before the harshness of winter set in preoccupied their thinking-the crops that must be harvested and safely secured, the wood for heating their home that must be cut, etc.  All the things that allowed their survival against the cold and hunger of winter.

My thoughts are a bit different, less concerned with survival and sometimes about things well beyond my own personal world.  I suppose my world has allowed me more time to think on things outside the immediate necessities of pure sustenance.  But I wonder, in that moment when I look up over the goldenrod and see those blue skies, if  we don’t share at least that same sense of awe at the beauty of the moment?  In that moment, would his thoughts of the immediate labors before him dissolve in the same way as my thoughts of things far removed did as I looked on?

Perhaps, beyond our trappings, we remain unchanged.  I would like to think so, at least in matters of awe and wonder.

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This a new painting that I recently took to the Principle Gallery.  Called The Bond, it’s a 7″ by 17″ image on paper.  I had a number of people comment on this piece this past Saturday, really drawn to it by the simplicity of its design and the contrast of the reds and oranges.   It does have a bold silhouette on the wall.

 There is also an obvious emotional element that seems to draw people to this painting in the limbs of the two trees come together and seem to grasp one another.   This symbol of connectedness resonates within many people and that, coupled with the warm tones of the sky, make this a really inviting tableau for the viewer to enter.

It’s a satisfying piece for me, both as the painter and a viewer, so I’m always pleased when a painting strikes others in that same way.   Sometimes a painter never really knows what sort of reaction a piece raises in people so it was great to hear that The Bond was reaching out to people so quickly.  All I could hope for a piece of mine.

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This is a new piece, Exit Strategy, that is part of a group of work that I’m delivering to the Principle Gallery today when I’m there for my annual Gallery Talk at 1 PM.  If you’re in the area, stop in at the gallery on King Street and join the discussion. 

 I’ll try to keep it interesting.  Promise.

Yesterday, I had a Hank Snow song.  Here’s another, one of his most recognizable song, Movin’ On,  except that it’s a vintage performance by the early Rolling Stones, from 1964.  I guess 47 years ago makes it vintage. It feels different from Hank’s version but that the way it should be.

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I’m on the road today, probably already hours into my drive as this article is posted.  I’m heading out for the Haen Gallery in Asheville, NC today to drop off some new work then on to Alexandria, VA to do the same at the Principle Gallery.  I will also be giving a gallery talk at the Principle Gallery on Saturday at 1 PM.  It’s a trip I do a few times a year, a  highway marathon covering about 1400 miles in two days.  It’s a lot of time behind the wheel but it gets me back to my homebase quickly and efficiently.  As I like it.

I’m always glad to give these talks at the galleries that represent me.  It gives me a chance to explain some things in greater detail and to answer the questions of the folks who attend.  It’s also a great source of feedback on the recent work, feedback that goes beyond the validation that comes when a piece is sold.  I can get a better idea of how things in the work that I like resonate with others.  This is important to me because I feel that the strength of my work is the wide embrace of it, the way it communicates to a wide audience.  If people aren’t reacting to it in some way, it’s not communicating in the way I hoped.

So, if you’re in the Alexandria area tomorrow, please stop in at the Principle Gallery and say hello.  I look forward to seeing you there.

Here’s a little traveling music from the great Hank Snow.  Though he may appear to be from a decidedly different time and place and may not be the style of the moment, I have always admired this man from Nova Scotia and his wonderful songs.  Plus this song always seems right when you’re hurtling through the Shenandoah in your car.

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As I was finishing up the framing for  the group of work I had recently completed and would be delivering in the next few days, I came to the last piece, 4 Windows, shown here.  I realized that I hadn’t yet addressed the question posed to me a week or so back when I posted this painting on this blog.  I had been asked how I would sign a group of small pieces– each piece individually or a single signature that blankets all four pieces?

I had always signed the pieces individually when I had done this sort of piece in the past so I thought I might simply go that route.  But the question really made me think about my concerns about keeping this as it was, as a single piece rather than one that could be taken apart and made into 4 smaller individual paintings. I know that should not be my concern, that once the painting leaves my possession I have no control over how someone treats it.  They could smash them, burn them, paint over them and there is nothing I can do.  But that doesn’t mean I can’t somehow signal my intent for the piece, that I desire that this work stays as it is, intact.

This being the case, I decided that one signature that somehow bonded the 4 pieces together would be some sort of solution.  This way there would be no signatures, save one, if somone decided to separate the paintings.  I wanted it to be distinctive though, something that differed from my standard signature and signified my intent.

I decided to go with a signature in the bottom right corner of the bottom right piece in the group.  It would be like my normal signature except that I would add the number 4 through the bottom of the line that normally encircles my name.  That number would designate the number of pieces in the group.  In the future, I can use this same method for signing similar pieces.  Maybe that will keep these paintings intact through time, as I originally saw them.  It might not be perfect but it works for me.

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 After a storied history that spanned the last century as the great American maker of fine crystal, Steuben is closing down later this year.  They produced their extraordinary work in Corning since the beginning of the company in 1903.

I remember watching the engravers at work several times during visits to the museum which had sections where you could see them through glass panels.  They had rows of engraving tips on their workstation and beautiful drawings that worked from in creating pieces such as the spectacular one above.  It’s hard to believe that the fabled brand will end.

Goergia O'Keeffe in Steuben Crystal

One of their great groups of glass was the one that they produced in the late 30’s for a 1940 exhibit at their Manhattan showroom.  Called  Twenty-Seven Contemporary Artists, they took designs from 27 artists and translated them into glass.  The artists included Matisse, Georgia O’Keeffe, Dali, Thomas Hart Benton, Grant Wood, Leger, Dufy, De Chirico among many others. 

It’s a sad time to see such beautiful work come to an end.  I know it has certainly influenced what I look for in my own work and how I approach it.  Their designs are usually clean and crisp with strong imagery and the lines of the crystal are always just right and graceful.  All you could ask for…

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While following the path of Hurricane Irene as she sweeps up the East Coast ( best wishes to my friends in those areas affected by the storm– hope everyone is safe and sound) I came across Ron Paul’s statement about FEMA’s response to the storm, saying that the federal response was unnecessary, that the states and local authoriites should be able to take care of it for themselves. 

“We should be like 1900…” he stated.

This seems to be the refrain and goal of the smaller government set of which Paul, a government official since 1978, is part.  I understand the desire to return to a state of self-sufficiency as an individual but to return to 1900 is a ridiculous goal for any political movement hoping to govern this country in 2010.  If you’ve ever browsed the newspapers of that time you’ll recognize that the time was not idyllic in any sense of the word.  Diseases we consider benign today were rampant and deadly.  The same problems we decry today were still there and their effects were sometimes greater dues to a lack of regulation. 

Take for instance fires.  Building codes (yes, evil government intervention)  were lax at best in most areas and it wasn’t unusual for entire sections of towns to burn to the ground.  The town of Forestport in the southern part of the Adirondacks was a boon time due to the lumbering there in the 1890’s and two times within five years it had catastrophic fires that destoyed its entire downtown section.

There was no government tracking the weather and warning the population in 1900 either.  Perhaps Paul might like to at least maintain this part of 2010 when he returns to 1900 when thousands ( estimates run from 8-12 thousand) were killed in the great hurricane of that year that hit Galveston, in his district.

It was not a perfect time in any way but the biggest difference between then and now is that we as a nation were still an agricultural society then.  The US population in 1900 was just under 76 million ( less than a 1/4 of today’s population) and the farm population was around a whopping 29 million which means that almost 40% of our population lived on farms. 4 out of 10 Americans lived on a farm.  Self-sufficiency was part of who we were at that time.  Farmers accounted for 38% of our labor force.  By 1990, the US farm population had dropped to 2.9 million, about 10% of what is was in 1900!  It only accounted for 2.6 of our labor force in 1990 and in 2010 farmers are less than 1% of our work force. 

We have become less and less self-sufficient as individuals and more and more interconnected to the infrastructure.  I am not decrying this– it’s just a fact.  That being the case,we can not simply adopt the same form of governance that ruled a more rural and certainly imperfect time such as 1900.  It’s a simplistic call to arms by pols such as Paul that appeals to those who foolhardily see themselves as not being connected to the great web of commerce and government of which we are all part, like it or not.  We live in 2010 not 1900 and that time is thankfully long gone.  God help us all if it ever comes back around.

Sorry for the Sunday morning vent.  Have a great day!

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I like to do pieces containing multiple images periodically.  I like the repetition of form and the way the individual pieces play off each other, forming a new rhythm that is new and different.  This is one of those pieces, called 4 Windows.  It is built from four individual  5″ square paintings, each very similar in content and color.

  Each is an interior scene with a window with exterior scene, a red chair and the corner showing of a piece of artwork hanging on the wall.  There are small differences in each piece.  One has a table’s edge appearing. The scenes in the windows have differing elements– two have red trees with banded fields and the others have suns and bony tree trunks.  The red chair is shown with only the two rungs of its back in one piece.

The way the individual pieces are placed within this also has an effect on the overall feel of the whole.  I moved them around into every possible combination until I came to this arrangement which creates  the same sense of balance I look for in individual pieces.  A sense of solidness.

I really like the sense of contemplation in these four windows, as though it reflects four separate individuals mulling similar thoughts even though they are not connected.  That, combined with the nostalgic feel of the sepiatone walls, makes these pieces feel full in undirected emotional content.  By that I mean, it doesn’t overtly describe what that emotion should be that is being created. 

 That comes from the individual experience of the viewer.

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