Redtree Times

Botanica Ascensus– At the West End Gallery

We rise by lifting others.

― Robert Ingersoll

I wanted to write about this new painting, Botanica Ascensus, which translates as Climbing Botanical, and went looking for some words, a quote or excerpt, to kick off the post. I came across the terse four words above from Robert Ingersoll and thought that they pretty much captured the essence of this painting, at least as I see it.

None of us is truly self-made or self-sustaining. None of us exists totally independent of others nor live in a vacuum. None of us has risen to any point in life without the aid and efforts of others.

We simply climb up the structures, those existing vines in this analogy, that have grown before our coming. Those vines support us as we grow higher and higher, allowing us to make the most of our circumstance.

And, hopefully, one day others will climb up our stems and vines, using them as the support they require in order to show the beauty of their own flowers.

Maybe that’s a somewhat tortured reading of the painting and I should just focus on the colors and the tone and structure of the piece or how it came about.

Maybe.

But I like– and need– the reminder of our interdependence that I see in this piece. That it comes in what I hope is an attractive manner is just icing on the cake.

Botanica Ascensus is, of course, part of my current solo show at the West End Gallery. It is 26″ by 8″ on paper.

FYI– I used the short quote from Robert Ingersoll at the top. I have mentioned him here several times, including a post dedicated to his life. I think he may be the most interesting character in 19th century America whose name is unknown to most of us.  Ingersoll was idolized by the greats of that era in the late 1800’s. Thomas Edison extolled his wisdom, Walt Whitman considered him the living epitome of Leaves of Grass, and Frederick Douglass saw him as being on the same level with Lincoln. He was a lawyer and orator, known as the Great Agnostic, giving speeches to huge crowds wherever he went. He was perhaps one of the most best-known people of that era in America, yet he remains a small footnote now. Here’s hoping more folks take note of his life and the words they left behind. Both are extraordinary.

Pursuing the Light– Now at the West End Gallery

Happiness in this world, when it comes, comes incidentally. Make it the object of pursuit, and it leads us a wild-goose chase, and is never attained. Follow some other object, and very possibly we may find that we have caught happiness without dreaming of it.

–Nathaniel Hawthorne

I often see the boat paintings not so much as being concerned with sailing as being about the pursuit of something. It can be the tangible– new places, new people, riches, or sanctuary from the bonds of the past– or it can be the intangible, such as a quest for knowledge or the spiritual.

It is never about the pursuit of happiness because we understand by now, from the words of Hawthorne and so many others, that happiness is not a thing in and of itself to be pursued. It is a mere by-product that comes from one attaining certain elements in their life such as love, security, satisfaction, a sense of purpose, and probably a thousand other factors.

The list is incomplete because it no doubt varies to some degree for each of us. Also, because I am no expert on what constitutes a full and complete life. I am just throwing stuff out here as I am, like those sailors on those boats in these paintings, still largely in pursuit of something.

Some days I think I know what it is I am seeking, and it seems to loom on the horizon, almost near enough to reach soon. And on others, I am lost at sea, being thrown about by wild waves and holding on for my life.

But I remain afloat, still pursuing the light. And that is a good thing in itself.

Here’s song that came across the Pandora channel I was listening to this morning. It’s a song called Don’t Rock the Boat from a British duo called Skeewiff. They are, in their own words, an electronic breakbeat act that includes elements of jazz, lounge and big band music into their style. Electro-Swing?

Whatever it might be, they produce a variety of interesting instrumental sounds that have found their way into many films, TV shows and video games. It’s not exactly the style of music I normally choose to share here but this track really caught my ear this morning. It’s a remix of their sound with the original recording of the gospel song Don’t Rock the Boat by the gospel group The Charioteers from sometimes around the 1940’s or early 50’s.

I found myself listening to it several times this morning it and thought it might go well with the new painting at the top, Pursuing the Light. Give a listen if you are so inclined.

Terra Firma— Now at the West End Gallery

The island is all eyes.
The silence ponders, notes, and codifies.
We discover only what we set out to find.

— Lawrence Durrell

Thankfully, there’s a soft but steady rain this morning, something I wish I could send along to my friends in those areas so desperate for the moisture.

I was going to simply leave this new painting from my West End Gallery show and a few words from Lawrence Durrell this morning. It seemed enough to say on a warm and wet Monday morning.

But I happened across a video that was filmed yesterday at the Newport Jazz Festival. It was Joni Mitchell singing Gershwin’s immortal Summertime. from Porgy and Bess. It’s a song that never fails to be moving for me but this performance seemed even more so. 

Maybe it’s this moment in time, in this year in the ease and strain that accompanies summer or maybe it’s the sight of a long-loved icon at the junction of age and illness still creating something beautiful, but there seemed to be something special in it.

Or maybe it’s just my own bias. You be the judge.

Forms and Chaos– Now at the West End Gallery

So I wish you first a
Sense of theatre; only
Those who love illusion
And know it will go far:
Otherwise we spend our
Lives in a confusion
Of what we say and do with
Who we really are.

― W.H. Auden

The new painting above, Forms and Chaos, is one of those pieces that I would consider for myself more than anyone else. It’s one of those paintings about which I have little concern how it is perceived by others, have no expectations for its acceptance or appreciation or the possibility of it finding a new home.

It may have meaning to it that words might point out but I don’t need them and don’t want to do anything–explain it, interpret it, defend it– beyond simply showing it.

It has no illusion. It just is what it is and that is all I need to know.

Maybe the shedding of illusion is how one persists through chaos.

I don’t really know.

And this morning, I am just going to let it be as it is.

Here’s a favorite song that I haven’t played here in a long time. I was reminded by its use in the TV ads for the new sci fi/horror film Nope. The version they use is not the 1970 original from The Temptations. The film instead uses 1971 remake from The Undisputed Truth, which was a group that was formed and managed by songwriter/producer Norman Whitfield.

You probably don’t know the name but Whitfield wrote or co-wrote many of the greatest hits of the Temptations and others, including “Ain’t Too Proud to Beg”, “(I Know) I’m Losing You”, “I Heard It Through the Grapevine”, “Cloud Nine”, “I Can’t Get Next to You”, “War”, “Ball of Confusion (That’s What the World Is Today)”, “Just My Imagination (Running Away with Me)”, “Smiling Faces Sometimes”, and “Papa Was a Rollin’ Stone”. 

There are many more but that, by itself, is quite a playlist.

The Undisputed Truth was formed by Whitfield as an effort to branch out into what he termed Psychedlic Soul. which employed different production techniques, effects, and instrumentation than the Motown Sound of which Whitfield was one of the original creators. His group covered many of the songs he had written for the Temptations and enjoyed moderate success though never truly to the level of the originals.

Though I prefer the Temptations original, the version below from The Undisputed Truth is still really strong. How can you not love a song that says:

Oh, great googa-looga, can’t you hear me talking to you
Just a ball of confusion
Oh yeah, that’s what the world is today

End O’ Day — At the West End Gallery

In normal life we hardly realize how much more we receive than we give, and life cannot be rich without such gratitude. It is so easy to overestimate the importance of our own achievements compared with what we owe to the help of others.

― Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison

Many thanks to all who came out last night for the opening of Chaos & Light at the West End Gallery. It was good to get to see a number of new folks, some others whose names I knew but have never met and a host of familiar faces. 

I am so grateful for those who chose to attend. It was good to talk again about art and, for a brief few minutes, it felt like a small return of normalcy in the strange new place in which we find ourselves.

I still felt awkward but not quite so much as I had feared.

And I guess that’s a good thing, a small victory, of sorts. That, at least, gives me something I can work with going forward.

Another thing for which I can be grateful.

I must also extend my heartfelt thanks to Jesse, Lin and John at the West End Gallery. Their constant support and encouragement along with the hard work and attention to detail they put into every show always knocks me out. I can’t fully express how appreciative I am of all they do and have done for me over the past 27+ years that I have been affiliated with the gallery.

Now, if I can only squeeze in another 27. I might be asking too much in that, but it is something to shoot for, a goal to put out in front of me.

We all need that, don’t we?

The excerpt on gratitude at the top of the page is one that I have used on this blog several times over the year. It’s author, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, is also the subject of one of my most popular blog entries, one from a number of years back that still gets a number of visits every day. That post, On Stupidity, is one worth reading if you are not familiar with Bonhoeffer’s life during the rise of Nazism in Germany before and during WW II. You may well see parallels with those perilous times in what has been occurring here in the present.

Lake Life — Included at Chaos & Light at the West End Gallery

How can it be that I’ve never seen that lofty sky before? Oh, how happy I am to have found it at last. Yes! It’s all vanity, it’s all an illusion, everything except that infinite sky. There is nothing, nothing – that’s all there is. But there isn’t even that. There’s nothing but stillness and peace. Thank God for that!

― Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace

I came across the excerpt above from Tolstoy’s War and Peace and it really rang a bell for me. It seemed to capture the feeling I have often had when faced with big skies before, above and around me.

It feels as so much nothing and yet, so much everything. As though stillness and peace become an entity in the space of the sky, one with its own consciousness and being. That might be the reason I seldom feel alone in such spaces.

That’s the thought behind the new painting shown at the top, Lake Life. It is 30″ by 48″ on canvas and is included in Chaos & Light, my solo show that opens tonight at the West End Gallery with an Opening Reception that runs from 5-7 PM.

Ah, another show opening. I’ve taken part in about 60 of these in the past twenty-five or so years so it should be old hat. But because of the pandemic, this is only my second since 2019 where I will be in attendance.

I have to admit that I am nervous. There is always a level of anxiety and worry about meeting expectations, turnout, and how the work is received. That’s built in by now.

But more than that, I have become pretty hermitized over the past few years and the idea of spending any time out of the comfort zone of home and studio feels like a traumatic episode. Since I can’t drive because of the broken foot, I have only left my place only a few times, for doctor appointments and to deliver the show. As soon as we are heading down the road, I am already envisioning and savoring the return home.

Another part of my nervousness is that I’m a little out of practice in talking to people, in general and about my work. You’d be surprised how little I speak about my work to the very few people I do talk with on a regular basis.

It occurs to me as I write this, that this lack of discussion may be why it has become more and more difficult to write about the work here. So, maybe this will be a good thing.

We shall see tonight.

As I have pointed out in recent posts, I will be wearing a mask since I anticipate speaking with a number of folks in close proximity. But we are not requiring masks for anyone and will leave that choice to you based on your own level of comfort and concern.

We are still considering doing a Gallery Talk of some sort. We are trying to work out the logistics required to make it work in a way so that all who might want to attend –myself included– would feel both safe and comfortable. At my last in-person Gallery Talk at the West End in 2019, there were about 90 people jammed into that space. It was a fun talk for me and while I would like to do that again, that kind of crowding is out of the question at this point.

We are considering doing a talk with a smaller group with limited reserved seating. Of course, we don’t want anyone to feel left out. To that end, we might be open to a series of such talks with different groups of people, and maybe even different topics, for each. Maybe even a series over a couple of days. Just thinking out loud here.

Nothing has been determined but we do need some feedback. If you are interested in attending one of these talks with limited reserved seating, please contact the West End Gallery and let them know. 

West End Gallery email: info@westendgallery.net

West End Gallery phone: 607-936-2011

Entwined in Time— At the West End Gallery

Then only in the empty spaces,
Death, walking very silently,
Shall fear the glory of our faces
Through all the dark infinity.

So, clothed about with perfect love,
The eternal end shall find us one,
Alone above the Night, above
The dust of the dead gods, alone.

—Rupert Brooke, The Call

The new painting at the top is another in the Baucis & Philemon series that I have documented here many times over the years. They feature intertwined trees that represent the poor elderly couple from Greek mythology that won the favor of Zeus. In return for their warmth and hospitality when he had been spurned by all their fellow townspeople, Zeus granted their wish that they should be together through eternity by transforming them at their deaths into two trees on a hillside that would forever be as one.

This particular interpretation of this theme is called Entwined in Time. I chose to pair it with the last two stanzas of a poem from Rupert Brooke titled The Call. Brooke was a young British poet who died, at age 27, in World War I.

As a result, though he only wrote a handful of poems having to do with the war, Brooke has always been considered one of the British War Poets. Even in the video below for The Call, which was written long before the war in the years between 1905 and 1908, it is depicted as being about a solider at war. There is another video version of this poem that is totally based on war imagery.

But I read the poem as being solely about the attraction– the call– of another that leads to a form of enduring love. Perhaps even an eternal one that lasts beyond the time of man and gods.

You may see this painting in a different light. Again, that is as it should be. I don’t expect that people will see the same things in my work or interpret them in the same way. Actually, I am often heartened when hearing a different take on a piece because that means that it struck a deep enough chord that this other person took time to ponder over their reaction.

And as an artist, that is all I can ask.

Entwined in Time is a 20″by 10″ painting on aluminum panel that is included in this year’s edition of my annual solo exhibit, Chaos & Light at the West End Gallery in Corning, NY. The show opens tomorrow, Friday, July 22, and there is an opening reception that runs from 5-7 PM. Harpist Meredith Bocek will be performing in the Upstairs Gallery.

I will be in attendance and will be wearing my mask since I am cautious and also anticipate speaking with quite a few folks. However, the gallery is not requiring that you wear a mask. That is left to your own determination based on your personal preference, comfort, and risk levels.

Hope to see you there.

Between Order and Chaos– At the West End Gallery

In all chaos there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order.

–Carl Jung

There is a philosophical concept called Unus Mundus— Latin for One World. Its premise is basically that behind the evident chaos of this world and the universe there is a unifying realm of absolute knowledge on which all existence is based.

It has been around for ages, going back in some form to the ancient Greeks. In the last century, Carl Jung became the biggest advocate of this theory, using it to explain the similarity in the content and construct of the myths and stories of the cultures and their belief systems. Each represents the discovery of some small bit of the order or pattern contained in chaos surrounding this world and becomes a recurring symbol, forming what Jung termed as an archetype. 

I describe an archetype as being how there are universal reactions and interpretations to certain images. One of the main reasons I use the Red Tree and the Red Roof, the Red Chair, and the ball in the sky that serves as the sun/moon is that each translates seamlessly across cultures. You don’t need specific cultural knowledge to understand the reality they symbolize. Each carries universal meaning.

This theory, the Unus Mundus, is what I see as the force behind the new painting at the top, Between Order and Chaos. It’s about how we struggle to create order in the face of constant chaos (represented in the sky’s slashing marks) with the orderliness of the flower beds representing this attempt.

The round flower bed caught in the curve of the path echoes the sun above. I see it somewhat as a symbol of synchronicity, another term coined by Jung. He uses it to explain some coincidences that seem to have some sort of meaning though there is no explanation for this feeling.

A coincidence might be just that or it might be that we have unwittingly come in contact with a strand of the Unus Mundus.

I sometimes feel as I have had fleeting moments of synchronicity but I can’t be sure of that.

How does one really know such a thing?

And I can’t say that we will ever learn more about or understand the Unus Mundus or the meaning of synchronicity, even though it might be for the betterment of us all as a species.

Perhaps we have become too comfortable living in this slice of the universe between order and chaos?

I don’t know. But for now, it’s all we have.

Between Order and Chaos is a 16″ by 20″ painting on aluminum panel that is included in this year’s edition of my annual solo exhibit, Chaos & Light at the West End Gallery in Corning, NY. The show opens Friday, July 22, and there is an opening reception that runs from 5-7 PM. Harpist Meredith Bocek will be performing in the Upstairs Gallery.

I will be in attendance and will be wearing my mask since I am cautious and also anticipate speaking with quite a few folks. However, the gallery is not requiring that you wear a mask. That is left to your own determination based on your personal preference, comfort, and risk levels.

Hope to see you there.

The Allure— Now at the West End Gallery

Let yourself be silently drawn by the strange pull of what you really love. It will not lead you astray.

― Rumi

A lot of paintings have bodies of water in them. Most likely, this is a result of living in the Finger Lakes region of New York state. I don’t take advantage of this proximity to the water very often but just having it nearby has an effect.

There’s always a thrill in coming over a ridge and having the lake roll out below you. At such times I sometimes feel like I’ve stumbled on a scene from a snowglobe with the lake at its bottom and a huge dome of cool, clear air over it.

That thrill of seeing the water and air and land merging together creates a pull of its own. This attraction is common to all people. From the folks around the lakes to those at the edges of the great oceans and seas to those who live alongside the rivers of this world. I built a pond here years ago just so water was never far out of sight.

The allure of water is certainly powerful.

And that is part of what I see in this new painting, The Allure, which is from my upcoming West End Gallery show. The title refers to allure of water as well as other forms of attraction– the pull of the sun, the open road, the far horizon, or the security of home.

We are all drawn by those things– people, places, tastes, art, etc.– that we cannot always explain or deny. And maybe we shouldn’t attempt to do so. Perhaps we should just trust our mysterious instincts and allow ourselves to be drawn by those things we love.

Hopefully, as Rumi, the 13th century Persian poet, wrote above, it will not lead us astray.

This year’s edition of my annual solo exhibit, Chaos & Light, opens Friday, July 22, at the West End Gallery in Corning, NY. There is an opening reception that runs from 5-7 PM. Harpist Meredith Bocek will be performing in the Upstairs Gallery.

I will be in attendance and will be wearing my mask since I am cautious and also anticipate speaking with quite a few folks. However, the gallery is not requiring that you wear a mask. That is left to your own determination based on your personal comfort and risk levels.

Hope to see you there.

“Big Time”

Homefield – At Principle Gallery”

If you don’t think too good, don’t think too much.

― Ted Williams

The words above may or may not have much to do with baseball– or art– but the fact that they were spoken by Ted Williams, long considered perhaps the greatest pure hitter in baseball history and the holder of one of my favorite nicknames, the Splendid Splinter, made it worthy of inclusion here today. That and the fact that it’s good advice for anyone– baseball players, fans, artists, or anyone else.

I thought since Major League Baseball is on break for its annual All-Star festivities, I would take this opportunity to show off a couple of new baseball paintings that are part of my exhibit of new work that opens Friday at the West End Gallery.

The two pieces shown at the top are Big Time and Homefield. Both are 12″ by 16″ on aluminum panel.

I enjoy painting these baseball pieces. Part of it undoubtedly comes from some innate attraction to the geometry of the baseball diamond, something I’ve felt since I was a small child. Another part is just the simple process of composing these particular paintings. They always start with the diamond at some point on the surface and then the rest of the composition spreads out organically.

Painting that spreading part is a constant process of problem solving, weighing and balancing each element while trying to predict what one mark on the surface will dictate for the next. These pieces, while enjoyable to paint, are also very taxing. They require long periods of tight concentration with little time to let the mind wander or go into a state of stillness.

I generally feel a little wiped out after working on these pieces. Maybe that can be attributed to the advice from Ted Williams. Perhaps too much thinking for my limited capacity.

But so long as the result pleases me, I can deal with that. And the baseball pieces generally please me very much. I can’t put a finger on any one aspect that triggers this reaction. They simply please some inner part of me. Sometimes it feels like I have an unspecified personal need to paint these pieces and these two have fulfilled that need.

Here’s a little Baseball Boogie from Mabel Scott to kick off the All Star break. Now, play ball!