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Posts Tagged ‘Exiles’

Getting Ready For the New

Posted in Early Paintings, Recent Paintings, Technique/History, tagged on December 3, 2010| 3 Comments »

Now that we’re in December, I’m beginning to tie up the year’s work.  I’m tryiong to finish up a few obligations such as a couple of smaller commissioned pieces befor ebeginning to gear up for the coming new year.  I ‘ve been mulling over going ahead with some concepts that I’ve been pushing aside for years now and I’m getting pretty anxious to get at them. 

I have plans to doing a few larger paintings, including a couple that are very large.  I am also working on a series that relates to the Exiles series that I did back in the mid-1990’s, such as the piece shown here.  The newer pieces will not emulate this work as they were surely emotional products of that time in my life and, as such, cannot be simply replicated.  At least, I can’t do that.  So they will emerge with a different look and probably a different feel, which is exciting in itself.  One idea involves a large assemblage of small paintings in this theme.  I will reveal more as the work comes about.

This period of getting ready for the upcoming year is always exciting, for the most part.  I have had years where I struggled early on to find something to move me ahead, something that lit the fires under me.  Inevitably, the ignition came but it feels much better to start the year with a fire already ablaze.

There are also a couple of other things in the works that I will announce in the new few months that I am pretty excited about.  Hopefully, they will turn out as well as I hope.

And if not, we’ll make it work…

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I Am Goodbye

Posted in Favorite Things, Video, tagged , on March 28, 2010| 2 Comments »

Busy this morning, I wanted to just have a small bit of music on this Sunday so I chose a song from Bonnie Prince Billy, known to some as Will Oldham.  I’ve always liked his very distinct style and songwriting and chose this song, I Am Goodbye. I wanted to have an image to accompany the song so I gave a quick look in a file and came across my old friend here.  I thought he might fit the song well.

This is a piece that I did about fifteen years ago, in 1995.  He was the first figure like this that I painted and became the basis of a series that I called Exiles which was a creative breakthrough for me at the time.  Thankfully, he never was sold or given away and remains with me.  He is one of my treasured pieces, holding many meanings in many aspects for me.

But for today, while this is  hello,  he is goodbye…

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Poor Old Dirt Farmer

Posted in Favorite Things, Influences, Video, tagged , , , on August 26, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Let Us Now Praise...Strange confluences.

I was going through some old work and came across this piece just as a random track came up on my iPod.  It was a Levon Helm song, the sort of title track from his latest CD, Dirt Farmer.

It really went together beautifully and the rhythm of Levon’s music kind of captured how I saw this fellow looking at his land, the beauty and sorrow of it.

I may have displayed this piece before.  It’s called Let Us Now Praise Famous Men… and was part of my first solo exhibit some 13 years ago, a show called Exiles that was hung at a lovely art center, the Gmeiner, in Wellsboro, PA.  This piece has always resonated with me, having sorts of indicators that I only see.  Little cues that remind me of the time in which this piece was done, giving me a sense of how I felt at the time and how I was viewing the world.  Things that only make the piece special for me.

That’s a pretty common thing.  Cheri has a piece of mine in our home that I painter several years back.  A nice piece but not a great one.  But when I see it I remember all that went into this particular piece and the struggle to pull something from what appeared to be a mess at the time.  I see the effort and determination that recovered the painting from the scrap heap and made it work.  I see it as a turning point in my confidence in my own abilities.

But those are only for  my eyes, probably not evident to the outside world.  Kind of like the dirt farmer above.  Who knows what his eyes behold?

Here’s Poor Old Dirt Farmer from Levon Helm:

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Miserere

Posted in Influences, tagged , , on March 10, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Who Does Not Wear a Mask?I wanted to briefly talk about the painter/printmaker Georges Rouault, whose work I first came across a number of years ago in a book containing his print series, Miserere, which translates to Mercy.  

It was around the time I was doing my Exiles series and in his work I found an immediate connection in both spirit and content.  I easily stepped into his raw, expressionist prints and when looking further into his work, particularly his paintings, was equally impressed with his rough brushwork and his use of dark outlines in his work, an influence of his early career as a glass painter.

I was also drawn to his subject matter and his use of the spiritual in his work.  His harlequins and kings impacted me immediately.  Also, the idea of using his images as pieces to a larger cycle was also influential.

Are We Not Convicts?We Believe Ourselves Kings

Have Mercy On Me, Lord

Ecce Homo

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Exiles: Martyr

Posted in Early Paintings, tagged on February 26, 2009| Leave a Comment »

MartyrThis is another painting from the Exiles series of the mid 90’s, titled Martyr.  

As I sit here right now, I am at a loss for words to describe this piece.  While there is overt religious symbolism, for me it is not about that.  It is about self-sacrifice, giving everything for the benefit of others.  

But there is also an element that has to do with fear.

When I look at the torso of this character I see it almost as though he has had his skin removed, baring the muscles beneath.  For me, this translates as one being afraid of the consequences of exposing what lies inside.  In my mind, this martyr has been punished for showing who he truly is.

Maybe I’m describing paranoia.  Maybe it’s a form of agoraphobia or just introversion.

I don’t really know.  It’s funny that this piece that has hung above my desk for many years still perplexes me and eludes definition.  I’m sure that one would expect to know exactly what was meant when I painted this but quite honestly, when I started this piece I had no idea where it was going.  Even when the figure neared completion I was still scrambling for the true meaning.  The elements that seem to from a crucifix were not present and weren’t even contemplated at first.

So the piece remains an enigma.  Personally, I like that.  It gives me a sense that the piece is beyond the obvious which is what I hope for all my work. 

Hey, maybe that will be the title of one of this year’s shows:

Beyond the Obvious…

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Bang Your Drum

Posted in Biographical, tagged on February 10, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Bang Your DrumThis is another piece from my early Exiles series, titled Bang Your Drum.  This is a later piece, finished in late 1996.  

Initially, I was a bit more ambivalent about this painting compared to the feeling I had for the other pieces of the Exiles series.  It exuded a different vibe.  For me, the fact that the drummer is marching signifies a move away from the pain and loss of the other Exiles pieces.  There is still solemnity but he is moving ahead to the future, away from the past.

Over the years, this piece has grown on me and I relate very strongly to the symbolism of the act of beating one’s own drum, something that is a very large part of promoting your work as an artist.  For me and most artists, it is a very difficult aspect of the job, one that is the polar opposite to the traits that led many of us to art.  Many are introverted observers of the world, passively taking in the world as it races by as they quietly watch from a distance.  To have to suddenly be the the motor to propel your work outward is an awkward step for many, myself included.  Even this blog, which is a vehicle for informing the public about my ongoing work and remains very useful to me as a therapeutic tool for organizing  my thoughts , is often a tortuous chore, one that I sometimes agonize and fret over.  Even though my work is a public display of my personal feelings, this is different.  More obvious and out in the open.

There’s always the fear that I will expose myself to be less than my work.  The fear that people will suddenly discover the myriad weaknesses in my character that may not show in my paintings, forever altering their view of it.  The fear that I will be  revealed to be, as they say, a mile wide and an inch deep.  

But here I stand with my drumstick in hand, hoping to overcome these fears and trusting that people will look beyond my obvious flaws when they view my work.  Maybe they too have the same fears and that is the commonality they see and connect with in the work.  Whatever the case, there is something in the work that makes me believe that I must fight past these fears and move it forward, out into the world.

What that is, as I’ve said before, I just don’t know.  Can’t think about it now– I’ve got a drum to pound…


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Exiles: Let Us Now Praise Famous Men

Posted in Early Paintings, Influences, tagged , , on January 25, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Let Us Now Praise Famous MenThis painting is another of the Exiles series, its title, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men,  taken from a group of Depression-era photos of sharecroppers in the American dust bowl from the camera of Walker Evans.  I have always been taken with these portraits as well of those of Dorothea Lange.  There is a sense dignity and will that has an eternal quality as though anyone in anytime in any culture would know and could empathize with their sorrow, their struggle.

That universal feeling is what I had hoped for this piece.  I am never sure it hit that particular mark but there is something quite haunting for me in this slightly alien face and the sadness written in his face.  He is a true exile…

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Dedicated Follower of Fashion

Posted in Early Paintings, Painting, Video, tagged , , on January 13, 2009| 3 Comments »

Dedicated Follower of FashionThis is called Dedicated Follower of Fashion, based on the song of the same name from the mind of Ray Davies  and the Kinks.  

I call this one of the Exiles pieces but I’m not really sure if it truly fits.  It was done at the same time back in 1995 or ’96 and performed in the same manner but lacks the emotional depth of the others.  In fact, it’s defining feature is its lack of emotional content.  

I think that this blankness may have been the factor that led me to shape this piece into its final form.  The elements of the face were the first part completed and basically dictate, in the way I work, where the painting goes.  For instance, he could have been place on a vast and deep plain that sweeps to the distance behind him but that didn’t fit for me.

There was something in his oddly colored features that reminded me of the vanity and obsequiousness of many fashionistas. And that’s where the Kinks come in.

So, maybe he doesn’t quite fit in with the other Exiles but maybe that in itself makes him an exile of sorts.

Anyway, here are the Kinks doing the song…

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Exiles: The Creeper

Posted in Influences, Painting, tagged , , , on January 6, 2009| 1 Comment »

The CreeperThe Creeper is another of the Exiles series although he is an anomaly in the series.  He does not mirror the sense of loss or suffering of the other pieces.  He is not the mournful exile.

He is the menace of dark dreams. He is always there, looming halfway in the bedroom window.  

But, while he is a little scary, there is a bit of whimsy in his appearance.  He is more cartoonish than the others.  When I look at this face I am constantly reminded of the movie parodies from the beloved  Mad magazine of my youth, with their Mad Magazine Godfather Parodyoversized, caricatured faces.  This softens the whole feel of the piece for me and makes him less terrifying.

Now, whether someone without that same frame of reference will see him in the same way is another question.  Without that reference, maybe he is as creepy as his name.

For me, The Creeper  always brings back the memory of a young friend who loved this painting and truly identified with everything about it.  He saw the humor but felt the darkness of it as well.  He was a vibrant, whirlwind of energy  who knew well about the personal demons so depicted in this painting.  He was a tortured personality and took his own life several years ago.  For him, The Creeper was all too real.

This one’s for you, Scott…

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Exiles: Blue Guitar

Posted in Early Paintings, Influences, Painting, tagged , , , on December 30, 2008| Leave a Comment »

Blue GuitarI wanted to show yet another of the paintings from the Exiles series, a piece titled Exiles: Blue Guitar.  This was larger than the other paintings in the series and was the most intricate in design.  It was the only piece to show a full body, more or less.  The crimson sheets beneath the figure are certainly not typical of my work.  Even the blue guitar was an anomaly.  I think these things, in themselves, make this a distinctive painting and one that is perhaps the one piece I most regret letting go.

I remember painting this piece back in ’96 with great clarity.  The face was based on a portrait of the composer Sibelius  taken by the great photographer Karsh.  I had seen the photo at an exhibit of Karsh portraits at the MFA in Boston (where there is, coincidentally, an exhibit celebrating Karsh currently on display ) and was immediately taken with the face.  The face expressed bliss, but not joy.  A painful bliss, perhaps an ecstasy tempered by the knowledge that the world is an imperfect one and that this moment of grace is a fleeting one, soon to be gone.Sibelius by Karsh  It was exactly the expression I saw for my guitarist and one that I wanted the whole piece to convey.

This was the centerpiece of my first exhibit and remains vividly in my memory.  I hope that whoever possesses this piece appreciates all that it represents and gives this sad, blissful guitarist a bit of attention now and then.

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