Gratitude is a sickness suffered by dogs. –Joseph Stalin
I was looking at a selection of quotations with a Thanksgiving theme when I stumbled across this lovely item from that great inspirational speaker, Joseph Stalin. It was so much in contrast with the rests of the lovely platitudes that it made me laugh. Stalin would probably not be the guy you would want as your guest on Thanksgiving, especially if you expected him to say grace. He would no doubt our holiday as a foolish expression of sentiment, a day for sick dogs to howl in thanks to their owners.
You know, even though it comes off as cruelly insensitive at first, I think Stalin’s comment might actually make sense. Though I doubt that this was the intent of his words, Thanksgiving is a day where we can recognize that we are no better than our pets, that we are as dependent on others as our pets are on us for love and support. We should do like our dogs and show our gratitude to those we love without condition.
And that would be okay with me. You can call me a sick dog on this day because I am nothing if not grateful for so many people I have encountered in my life from my family and friends to the many good people who I don’t even know who have offered kindness when I was in need of it.
Here’s a reply to Stalin from a real human being, Elie Wiesel:
“When a person doesn’t have gratitude, something is missing in his or her humanity.”
So, whatever you might call today, be it Thanksgiving or Sick Dog Day, be thankful for those you know and love.
Be a dog today. It’s the human thing to do.
This post ran back on Thanksgiving of 2012. I liked it then and I like it now.
Simultaneous contrast is visible depth – Reality, Form, construction, representation. Depth is the new inspiration. We live in depth, we travel in depth. I’m in it. The senses are in it. And the mind is too.
–Robert Delaunay, Simultanism, 1913
I don’t know that the depth that French Modernist/Cubist painter Robert Delaunay (1885-1941) describes above is the same as I am talking about today but I liked how he expressed it and it could fit– if you squeeze it a little here and push it a bit there. He was talking about simultaneous contrasts, about seeing two differing representations in an abstract painting. Well, I think that’s what he was talking about. Not totally positive on that and will do some research on it later. For now, it doesn’t matter.
My interest in depth comes from a recent visit to the West End Gallery where Jesse Gardner, the gallery owner, handed me a pair of cardboard framed 3D glasses. It seems that a glass artist with an interest in optical illusion from the Corning Museum of Glass had been in that week, wearing the glasses as he went from painting to painting. He pointed out to Jesse how well the 3D effect worked on many of my paintings. She put on a pair and was wowed by how much the paintings seemed suddenly have that extra depth and how the Red Tree seemed to jump to the forefront and had an almost sculptural feel to its crown.
These glasses were not the old ones with one lens red and the other blue. These were ChromoDepth glasses which push the colors Red and Orange to the front of the picture and organizes the depth of the remaining colors according to their position within the rainbow’s color spectrum– ROYGBIV which is Red,Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet.
Without my knowledge and quite by accident, quite a few of my paintings follow that order of color, at least somewhat loosely. And since the focal point of many is the Red Tree, some of my work seemed a perfect fit for the 3D effect.
Lake Troubadour
When I visited the gallery, Jesse and I went around the gallery and some seemed to jump out at us, especially those with a darker sky in blue or violet. It felt like it added a new dimension to those pieces where it really worked, such as Garden of Delight, above. In the piece shown here on the right, Lake Troubadour, the mound and field with the guitarist were pushed way in front of the background. It seemed to glow and created what I can only call a deep shadowbox effect, giving the scene a fuller sense of the depth that it represented.
I went back to the studio and ordered some of the glasses. When they came, I went around the studio and wasn’t able to get quite the same results. For one thing, some of the paintings here didn’t have the correct arrangement of colors. I also found that you need enough light to allow the colors to react. But on those pieces where the colors were in place and the light and angle was right, the effect was fascinating. The lines formed by the black base of the painting that separate the colors turned into what appeared to be shadows behind the forms, further enhancing the 3D effect. And, a I pointed out, the Red Tree seemed to take on a fuller sculptural form, even more prominent int he picture, if that is possible.
Seeing the work in this new way has been most interesting and I have began thinking of ways in which I can employ the effect. But overall, I doubt that it will change the manner in which I paint or how I choose the colors for each piece. I sort of believe that if I began to think too much about how to employ it, it would become contrived and lose whatever organic quality it possesses. That is normally what happens when I try to force an idea or concept into a piece. But having the idea appear on its own is another thing, especially when it has a fresh and natural feel.
When it just is. Maybe that’s why it was such a thrill to see the pieces in the gallery and the studio take on that extra depth and life– they were already alive and existing on their own.
If you get a chance, stop into the West End Gallery soon and take a tour with their 3D glasses. You might see some of the work in new ways.
Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues but the parent of all others.
– Marcus Tullius Cicero
From 2018:
The great Roman orator Cicero certainly has it right. When you think of the great virtues– honor, courage, loyalty, honesty, compassion, respect, and grace along with so many others– you can easily place gratitude as a contributing factor to each. These virtues are often just gratitude set in motion.
If gratitude is not the parent of all virtues, it is at least a conjoined twin.
I am not harping on gratitude now just because it is the week of Thanksgiving. No, it has become painfully obvious that there is a lack of gratitude, and by extension, the absence of accompanying virtues, being shown by many of our public leaders. This includes one person in particular. [Mind you, this was 2018. However, we are still dealing with that one particular person]
Simply put, this lack of gratitude trickles down (much more so than any tax cuts!) from the top to the general population. As a result, we end up with ugly attitudes permeating our daily life.
Gratitude transforms into a sense of entitlement.
Humility becomes boastful self-aggrandizement.
Respect is replaced by insult and denigration.
Courage becomes cowardice.
Loyalty becomes a temporary transaction where one’s loyalty is given only for as long as the other person remains useful.
Empathy devolves into a mocking of the shortcomings and weaknesses of others.
Responsibility is replaced by a need to place blame on others.
Honor becomes disgrace.
Trust turns to deep skepticism.
Grace transforms into insolence and coarseness.
And honesty?
Honesty has turned into a sort of mythological creature, like the Bigfoot or the Loch Ness Monster–- seldom seen and so shocking that when it finally shows itself, we don’t believe what we are seeing with our own eyes. Dishonesty becomes the accepted norm, and we lose the ability — or even the will–- to distinguish between what is a lie and what is the truth.
Without gratitude, we then become a nation of amoral liars, a land without virtue or honor that can no longer be trusted.
It doesn’t have to continue in this way. We have long believed that we are a nation based on its virtues, always moving towards doing what is right, no matter the cost. We can reclaim that. We can be a country of virtue.
It all starts with simple gratitude.
Be thankful for all that you have. Express it in your words and, more importantly, in your actions.
I thought I would rerun the post above about gratitude that I posted a couple of times several years ago around this time, during the week of Thanksgiving.
I am a firm believer in the words of Cicero at the top, feeling that, if it is fully embraced, gratitude permeates everything we do in a positive way.
I also believe that nobody achieves anything solely on their own, that everyone owes someone something for getting them where they are. Someone along the way taught them something, pointed them in a direction or opened a door that greatly helped them move along.
As much I would like to think I have done everything on my own, even the tiny amount of success I have achieved is the result of lots of help and encouragement from hosts of people. Without them, I am nothing.
A sense of gratitude makes everything it touches better. And as I wrote above, a lack of gratitude debases everything.
Here’s a song that I play every so often around this time of the year. It’s a favorite, one of those songs that I find myself singing to myself for weeks at a time when I hear it again. It’s William DeVaughn and his Be Thankful For What You Got.
Our admiration of the antique is not admiration of the old, but of the natural.
–Ralph Waldo Emerson, Essays
I didn’t really need confirmation of the fact that I have been doing this for a long time but am sometimes reminded of it in the oddest ways. For instance, I was surprised when I recently came across a listing on Ebay for what the seller describes as being “vintage” and “a real nostalgic piece of ephemera” with my name on it.
It was, of all things, a page from a 2001 magazine (I think it was American Art Collector) with three advertisements. The ad from the PrincipleGallery for my then upcoming 2001 show there was at the top of the page.
I had no idea that such things were considered collectibles in any sense of the word. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised since I have seen, on more than one occasion, gallery postcards from my past exhibits framed and for sale in antique shops.
It felt kind of odd being described as vintage or part of anything nostalgic, as though I was looking at a different facet of reality that didn’t exist in my own world. That area beyond your own sense of self-awareness where the world perceives you in ways you can’t recognize.
Adding to the oddity was the fact I didn’t remember this ad and the painting featured on it was not as familiar to my memory as other pieces. It was from a pre-digital period where most of my paintings were recorded on film or slides. As a result, I am not able to easily revisit much of this work from around 1995 to early 2001. And when I do, I am usually dismayed at the pitiful quality of the images.
Back then, if you photographed the painting you had to wait for developing before you knew if came out good enough for use. I would sometimes get my slides back and find that there it was slightly out of focus or there was glare or shadow on the piece that I hadn’t noticed when taking the photo. It’s so easy now with the instant feedback of digital cameras. But back then I would either have to reshoot and go through the time and effort of developing the new film again. Or live with it if the painting had already made its way to a gallery. Which often occurred.
This particular piece, a mixed media of oil and acrylic on paper, must have turned out well since the image seems okay. Even so, I would bet that it looks much better in person than on the page.
I guess being part of something called vintage or nostalgic isn’t that bad. At least I haven’t yet entered the realm of antique.
I may be called an antique at some date in the future, but I hope the work never reaches that point. I hope it always lives in the present, except in old magazine ads.
Cowards are cruel, but the brave love mercy and delight to save.
–John Gay, Fables, 1727
Ain’t that the truth?
And it applies in so many ways today. The bullies who bluster and threaten and prey on those with little power are in great abundance. We see evidence of this in the constant cruelty being exhibited by public officials who hide behind the cloak of their offices and titles and by online trolls who hide behind their anonymity. People who only want to punish and harm those who are different than themselves or those with less power. People who are forever taking for themselves and seldom giving anything to others.
Not money nor compassion and not a hand up or a way forward.
Certainly not mercy.
I guess it’s always been that way. A bully in 2023 is most likely little different than a bully in 1727.
And now, as it was then, the solution to bullies and wannabe tyrants is to cut through the sound and fury of their threats and hold them accountable. To make them finally understand the importance of mercy in this world.
I’m talking in vague terms here, of course. There are some bullies who will never understand mercy and will see it as a weakness to be exploited. These bullies will always claim to be victims. Such people deserve little mercy until they are brought low enough to feel truly chastened and accept the responsibility for their words and actions.
Is that possible? I don’t know.
Maybe I am just blabbing this morning for the sake of hearing my own voice. That’s always a possibility. Actually, I had the quote at the top from John Gay, best known for writing The Beggar’s Opera in 1728 which introduced the world to MacHeath or Mack the Knife as we know him.
I also had this week’s Sunday Morning Music which is Her Mercy from Glen Hansard. I chose his version performed in what appears to be an Irish alley somewhere because I am always impressed by his commitment to his performances, even in a not perfect environment like that alley. He gives the same level of effort whether he is performing for a full arena or an empty alleyway. I love that type of commitment. It most likely comes from his years as a street busker.
I wasn’t sure what image to set beside these two other elements that deal with mercy. I finally settled on one of the paintings from my Ring of Fire series. Five of these pieces are headed down to the Principle Gallery for their Small Works show that opens in early December. These are pieces that are meant to be spare in their rendering while expressing a depth of angst, though that came as an afterthought. The characters in this series are all haunted from which they are seeking some sort of relief.
In big cities, on farms, in remote places, throughout the countryside, people are moving busily. Why? We are all motivated by desire to make ourselves happy. To do so is right. However, we must keep in mind that too much involvement in the superficial aspects of life will not solve our larger problem of discontentment. Love, compassion, and concern for others are real sources of happiness. With these in abundance, you will not be disturbed by even the most uncomfortable circumstances. If you nurse hatred, however, you will not be happy even in the lap of luxury. Thus, if we really want happiness, we must widen the sphere of love. This is both religious thinking and basic common sense.
–Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama, How to Expand Love: Widening the Circle of Loving Relationships
Much to do this morning so I am keeping this short and sweet. Emphasis on the sweet, as we ease into the next week with Thanksgiving and all that it brings. It’s a good time to think less about those things we want or expect from others and focus on those things we have to offer– love, compassion, and concernfor others as the Dalai Lama states above.
Things without monetary value but more valuable and meaningful than piles of cash or stock portfolios.
Things that make worth living. For ourselves and others.
Just a thought.
Here’s a song in that vein. It’s the old early Beatles hit Can’t Buy Me Loveas performed by Paul McCartney from a 1992 concert at the Ed Sullivan Theater that was recorded for MTV. This is a really nice reinvention of the song in a bluegrass/country style.
Gino Severini- Red Cross Train Passing a Village, 1915
Philosophers and aestheticians may offer elegant and profound definitions of art and beauty, but for the painter they are all summed up in this phrase: To create a harmony.
–Gino Severini (1883-1966)
I am always a little hesitant to feature Italian Futurists such as Gino Severini or Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, who authored the Manifesto of Futurism which was a rejection of the past and celebrated the speed, machinery, violence, youth and industry of modernity. It was a document that caused the movement to be forever associated with the growth of Fascism in Italy.
And, as we all know, fascism can be a touchy subject. Then and now.
But let’s put that aside for the moment and focus on Severini’s words above. It very much reflects my own feelings on creating a work. For me, the artist’s purpose is to create or find the harmony and rhythm of their subject.
I think any effective piece of art demonstrates this. I could be wrong, of course, but it works for me.
Let’s just leave it at that this morning and look at some of Severini’s work.
Gino Severini– Le Boulevard 1910
Gino Severini– The-Pan-Pan at the Monico, 1959
Gino Severini- The north-south, 1912
Gino_Severini, Dynamic Hieroglyphic of the Bal Tabarin, 1912
Progress has not followed a straight ascending line, but a spiral with rhythms of progress and retrogression, of evolution and dissolution.
– Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
I was looking at a book catalog yesterday, just browsing for something new and I spotted a book on the works of Robert Smithson, who is best known for his monumental earthworks. The most famous is shown here, the Spiral Jetty, which juts out into the Great Salt Lake in Utah. I’ve always been somewhat fascinated by earth-moving on a large scale and have always admired Smithson’s work.
The reason I mention this now is that I found myself thinking smaller lately, perhaps painting smaller paintings for a smaller economy. Part of this was a conscious decision but part was the result of just becoming a little more wary with all the turmoil in the world. There has been a period of introversion marked by a noticeable withdrawal from thinking boldly.
Seeing this image of Smithson’s work reminded me of the need to think big.
I realized I had become a bit fearful of pushing myself, perhaps afraid of exposing my limitations. I had lost a little faith in my own abilities, including the ability to adapt to new challenges.
I was being safe. It was my version of the retrogression that Goethe mentions in the quote above. I was in the spiral.
This all flashed in my head within a few seconds of seeing the spiral jetty. Funny how a single image can trigger a stream of thought with so many branches off of it.
I had forgotten that I had to trust myself and throw the fear of failure aside, that thinking bold almost always summons up the best in many people. Once you say that you don’t give a damn what anyone says, that if you fail so be it, the road opens up before you and your mind finds a way to get you on it.
So, I have to remember to think big.
To look past the horizon. Just freaking do it.
Then progress will come…
This post was from way back in 2009. I was reminded of it in recent days when I was cleaning out a part of my collapsing old studio. I pulled out some remaining old frames from back in the early 2000’s and was surprised at the sheer size of them. Most were much larger than anything I paint these days. I had forgotten how much bolder I was in that manner back then than I am now. And it made me wonder if I had lost something by not maintaining that same boldness, that willingness to make big expressions.
I was doing a little research on the painter Robert Gwathmey, the social realist painter (1903-1988) whose work most often depicted the day-to-day life of poor African American culture of the American South in the first half of the 20th century. I knew that his son, Charles Gwathmey, was a famous and influential architect but I didn’t know much about his wife, Rosalie. It turns out that she was a talented photographer who chronicled that same rural culture that was the subject of her husband’s paintings. In fact, her photos were often the source material for his work.
Digging deeper, I came across her photos and found them compelling. There were poignant shots of families at work and at home, often in abject poverty. Wonderful compositions of a barn on fire amid the wide flat fields, smoke ominously billowing. All very powerful stuff.
Rosalie Gwathmey- Barn
Reading some articles about her I came across a terrific article from 1994 and Erika Duncan in the New York Times. It was of an interview with Rosalie Gwathmey, who died in 2001 at the age of 92, focusing on her work as a photographer which, at the time of the article, was being rediscovered as the result of a solo show of her photos. It turns out that she had been an earnest photographer associated with some of the other great photographers of the time such as Dorothea Lange, from around the mid 1930’s up until 1955 when she abruptly put down her camera, destroyed many of her negatives and gave away her photos.
“I just quit,” was her description.
Reading the rest of the article, she also simply stopped painting at one point, despite having great promise, and she also abruptly ended a long career as a textile designer. She simply stopped, saying, “I did that for 27 years, and then I quit in much the same way. I have no regrets. I just closed up shop. There was no reason to keep on doing it.”
That really made me think. Was this merely a facet of her personality or could this happen to anyone? Could I one day suddenly decide that I no longer wanted to paint? What was it that made her suddenly lose that need to express herself in a certain way? Is it a loss of passion or something different?
It became a sort of scary thing to think about for me, as though it were some horrible affliction that lay in wait for me somewhere in the future. Maybe never but maybe tomorrow. Or the day after that.
I don’t know that there are actual answers here, only more questions. But her quitting is as intriguing an aspect of her life as her wonderful work and makes me wonder how many others have simply walked away from what seems to be a great career.
I came across this post that originally ran back in 2011 and it gave me pause. I’ve been doing this for 25 years now and there are certainly days when I would love to just shuck it all. However, for me, it’s always just a passing fancy that goes away as soon as I make my first mark on the next canvas. Besides, there’s nothing else I really want to do at this point.
For this reposting, I have added more of the photos of Rosalie Gwathmey below. They certainly evoke time and place. And for another perspective on what makes someone suddenly say “I just quit” I urge you to read a post, Stepping Off the 8:15, from my friend Linda Leinen’s The Task at Hand blog. It’s an interesting story.
Maybe it’s not so bad to dwell in the past, and muddle in the memories, to stem the simplification of time, and put some craft back into it. Maybe we should think of memory itself as an art form, in which the real work begins as soon as the paint hits the canvas. And remember that a work of art is never finished, only abandoned.
— John Koenig, Klexos definition from The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows
It’s been a while since I shared a definition from The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows. In it, author JohnKoenig has coined a number of new words describing complex feelings and emotions that have often lacked words to describe them in the past. It took Koenig many years to compile his dictionary, but it ultimately produced a best-selling book. I have shared a number of his definitions here in the past and usually find myself nodding my head as I recognize many of the feelings he describes.
Today I am sharing the word klexos which is briefly defined as the art of dwelling on the past. I chose this word because I have recently mentioned here that this is often the time in which I revisit old work, mostly that from the time before I began showing it publicly. Though I have done this many times before, there is almost always something new to be found in doing this again.
As Koenig points out in the video below, which gives the full definition, the context for the past is always changing.
There is always something new in the present which changes our memories of the past.
I also like a couple of subtle points in his definition of klexos. For one thing, it uses the word on instead of in in its primary definition, the art of dwelling on the past. Dwelling in or on the past are two different things. One, in, has you trapped in the past while the other, on, has you moving on but reexamining the past for potential clues or lessons for the present.
The other subtle point is the suggestion that we think of memory as an artform. That very much aligns with my own thoughts on how we all possess a story or mythology in our lives. The painting analogy Koenig uses for this feels on the spot for me. Some folks choose to abandon their painting as soon as the paint hits the canvas while others continually revisit theirs to organize and embellish it in an artistic manner.
If you read this blog regularly, you know which group I fall in.
Here’s the video that goes with klexos. It’s worth a few minutes of your time.
FYI- The painting at the top, Closing the Door from 2013, is one of those pieces here in the studio that I often revisit in my own personal klexos. Surprising how often I find something new in it that helps me in the present.
Gratitude is a sickness suffered by dogs.
Redtree Times 