Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Posts Tagged ‘New Painting’

California Dreaming

Posted in Influences, Music, Painting, Recent Paintings, tagged , , , , on January 26, 2014| 1 Comment »

GC Myers- California Dreaming 2014It’s another clear and cold winter day, about 4 degrees outside .  It’s visibly beautiful with the crisp and sparkling snow clinging to the pine boughs.   The contrast between what I see out the window of the studio and what I am seeing in my mind is often hugely different.  This new painting is such an example.

It’s a 36″ by 36″ canvas that I am calling California Dreaming.  It was not done with intention but as I was finishing it I couldn’t shake the feeling that this large piece reminded me of California, at least in some microcosmic way.  The mountains in the rear remind me of the Sierras rising from the Central Valley and even the two smaller hillocks in the foreground felt a small bit like the coastal hills.  When you added in the warmth of the colors, it just felt very California to me.

Having this on the easel then turning my head 90 ° to look out the window is quite the contrast.  Both make me happy but they are worlds apart.  At least, a continent and several temperate zones apart.

The title is, of course, a reference to the famous The Mamas & The Papas song, although my favorite version, out of  the many done of this song, is from Jose Feliciano.  Here’s a really nice instrumental version done by an exceptional guitarist, Michael Chapdelaine.  Enjoy and have a great day, whether you’re warm or just dreaming.

Read Full Post »

Is It Snow?

Posted in Favorite Things, Influences, Painting, Recent Paintings, tagged , , , , , on January 20, 2014| 5 Comments »

GC Myers-2014

I am still taking in this new painting, an 18″ by 18″ piece on canvas that remains unnamed as I ponder it a  bit more.  It is, at first glimpse, a snow painting.  At least, it was intended to be so.  For me, there is something quite challenging in presenting this surface that translates as pristine but, in fact, is far from it, having multiple layers of color beneath it which show through at points.  The edges show a glow of red oxide and violet, giving it a warmth that belies the coolness of the white blanket.  It’s a departure from the snow of Dale Nichols‘  paintings that I showed here yesterday, which is pure and luminous.

The thing that I have found with using the white of the snow is that it really displays the lines of the forms underneath.  The lines of  landscape in the foreground here, for example, really pop off the surface.  This could be a bad thing if they don’t have an organic sense of rightness,  that vague and elusive quality to which I often refer.  I think this piece has it.

While looking at this painting this morning, I began to ask myself, “What if that isn’t snow?”  This change of perspective gave the piece a very different reading , one that I hadn’t thought of when it was being painted but one that might pass through the mind of some folks.  What if this is some desolate post-apocalyptic landscape, devoid of  vegetation and covered in ash and dust?  The ravaged  landscape of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road immediately came to mind.  The painting suddenly took on a different feel but it still felt warm and even jubilant in a way.  As though the Red Tree,  fatigued at the end of that dark ribbon of road, had finally met the warm gaze of the sun that burned through the hazy sky.  The Red Tree was still standing despite the desolation around it and was rejuvenated, lifted up, by the sun’s energy.

It brought to mind the poem Strange Victory from the late Sara Teasdale, a poem that I have featured here in the past.  It is one of my favorite poems and expresses the contrast that I often try to impart in my work.  I think it fits this reading of this painting very well.

 Strange Victory

To this, to this, after my hope was lost,

To this strange victory;

To find you with the living, not the dead,

To find you glad of me;

To find you wounded even less than I,

Moving as I across the stricken plain;

After the battle to have found your voice

Lifted above the slain.

–Sara Teasdale

Funny how a simple shift in perception  can alter the whole meaning of a piece.  It was originally meant as snow and will probably remain so .  But for the moment I find myself asking:  Is it snow?

 

Read Full Post »

Mountains to Climb

Posted in Biographical, Painting, Recent Paintings, tagged , , on January 17, 2014| 3 Comments »

GC Myers- Mountains to ClimbJanuary is usually a month of probing for me,  a time of looking for a direction in which to move, work-wise.  Sometimes it’s a struggle and sometimes it comes more easily.  I’ve written recently about a feeling of being on a plateau with my work, one that has been my home for quite some time now and one from which I am beginning to feel  anxious to move above.  This plateau feeling has made this January searching more of a struggle than normal, as though I were a rock climber faced with a sheer cliff before me  and can’t quite make out my next move.  I am just standing there looking for an edge in the rock face to find a hold that will me to pull myself up.

Maybe it’s that analogy that brought about this new piece, Mountains to Climb, a 12″ by 12″ canvas.  It features a swirling sky and a more prominent peak  beyond the foothills that have been a fixture in my typical work,  There’s an alluring quality to tall peaks that can’t be denied.  It is both a question and a challenge that stands between you and the horizon: Do you have the will and the ability to climb higher?

It’s a question that still rings in my ears as I stand before my own personal mountain.  I think I have my answer and I am beginning to see a way upward, a first hold to pull myself up.

We shall see…

 

Read Full Post »

Outlier’s Heart

Posted in Painting, Recent Paintings, tagged , , , on January 7, 2014| 4 Comments »

GC Myers- Outlier's HeartI guess the weather that has swept across the middle of the country to settle here has made its way into my work.  I’ve never used snow much as an element in my work.  Oh, there were a few pieces here and there over the years.  They were often simple pieces that were in shades of  blue.  I never really considered using the white of the snow as a critical element.  Maybe because it would create a question of rational plausibility when the Red Tree would appear in these snowy landscape with its blazing foliage, as it most certainly would.

And does here.

The title of this new piece, an 8″ by 24″ canvas, is  Outlier’s Heart, to directly confront this issue of  whether a disparate element would adversely effect the feel of a piece.  For me, it didn’t make a difference and the Red Tree seemed right at home in the scene and in my mind as I took it in.  What bothered me was that I had even worried about plausibility while composing this.  I have always prided myself on not adhering to rules and here I was, suddenly boxing myself in with questions of that I usually  quickly discard.  I think it’s important to stay out of these boxes of conformity and this has been a good reminder.

That aside, I like this work with the use of the snow as the main element.  The contrast between the coolness of the white of the snow and the blues of the sky against the warmth of the Red Tree create a nice tension that makes the piece feel much less cold and forbidding.  I think this is right for this piece because I didn’t see it as being about just merely representing coldness.  I see this as being about the search for beauty.  I don’t think I will explain any more than that at the moment.  I will just let the piece speak for itself  for now.

As it should always….

 

Read Full Post »

The Long Way Home

Posted in Influences, Quote, Recent Paintings, tagged , , , , on December 9, 2013| 3 Comments »

GC Myers- The Long Way Home smHome is a name, a word, it is a strong one; stronger than magician ever spoke, or spirit ever answered to, in the strongest conjuration.

  ~Charles Dickens

**************

This is a newer painting that went to the Principle Gallery recently.  It’s a 12″ by 16″ painting on paper that I call The Long Way Home.  Home, as a concept,  plays a large part in my work as it is the destination for the life journey that is the basis for much of what I do.  I don’t necessarily see home as a physical place but rather that interior space where we are comfortable with who and what we are.  For me, our real journey in life is always internal.

Everything leads inward.

We often set out on treks through the external world trying to find a place, a physical location where we  feel accepted and at home.  But it never happens until we find that inner peace and acceptance in that inner realm that is always with us.  Though we may have traveled a million miles, home is always within reach if we only stop and look inward.  And I think that is what this piece is communicating.  The title reflects on the search that always leads back to that internal place we often overlook in our zeal to find that place we call home.

Home is always with us.

Read Full Post »

Ahead of the Curve

Posted in Painting, Recent Paintings, Technique/History, tagged , , , , , on November 9, 2013| 4 Comments »

GC Myers-- Ahead of the Curve smThis new painting, titled Ahead of the Curve, is a 20″ by 24″ canvas headed in the next few days out to Erie for inclusion in Alchemy, my solo exhibit opening a week from today at the Kada Gallery.  This was one of those paintings that comes quickly at first then is sat aside for quite a long time before I go back at it.  In some of these pieces, it’s because I just don’t see a way forward in it and don’t want to act before I have some inner direction, some small sense  of destination to follow so that the lifeforce I see in it isn’t squandered.

On others,  I reach a point where I see all sorts of possibilities in moving forward and can’t decide which way to move.  I become paralyzed.  Such was the case with this painting.  I built this from the bottom, as I often do, and had allowed the multi-colored mound of fields to grow.  I loved the color and curve of it and the way the smaller green mound jutted upward into the blank canvas.  I thought it was beautiful at that point, with no trees or sky or sun — just a mound with a forked road against a white surface.

So it sat for a few months and I would look at it every day, one day seeing it juxtaposed against a deep and receding field.  The next time I looked I saw I saw it looking down on mountain tops.  But it was the curve of the mound that spoke to me and directed me.  I wanted to create some depth, to move the viewer past the mound and into the scene itself but not so deep that the mound and the Red Tree that would adorn it would be just looked past.

I began to see a slightly lighter curved field with a road continuing through it, creating a closer  curved horizon. The greenish trees on the curved horizon appeared like the  hands on a clock to me, somehow representing the passage of time and I saw a sun or moon on that horizon so that the tree would be above it, as though it were ahead of the sun’s advance.  The Red Tree here is not reactive, bowing to the circumstances the world puts before it.  No, it is proactive, creating its own stance and its own reaction from the world.    It is indeed ahead of the curve.

I think that’s what this is all about, the idea of being proactive in carrying out and maintaining one’s own vision of their world.  Trusting that the sometimes invisible things that they see can be made visible to others.   That might be the definition of a visionary or a fool.  That’s the thing about being ahead of the curve– you may not be around to see which is true.

Read Full Post »

Cornucopia

Posted in Painting, Recent Paintings, tagged , , , on November 4, 2013| 4 Comments »

GC Myers- Cornucopia smThe cornucopia or horn of plenty, with profuse amounts of fruits and vegetables spilling from its end, is a pretty well known and well worn symbol of abundance and nourishment, seen often at this time of the year when the traditional harvest has taken place and we near our holiday of Thanksgiving here in the States.  The cornucopia has been around for ages, going back into the classical mythology of the Greeks and Romans , but  has been ingrained in the psyche of our culture and still resonates as a symbol.

Perhaps that is why the image of the cornucopia came to mind when I had finished this new painting,  an 18″ by 36″ canvas that fittingly carries the title Cornucopia.  When I looked at it it seemed that the landscape sat at the end of a spiralling cone that emerged from the sun here and the multicolored fields represented the bounty of the land that you see in a horn of plenty.  The orchard on the lower left could be a group of apples spraying from the horn.  The sky and sea shapes coming down to the saddle shape of the landscape reinforce  this image, forming a horn-like shape.  The Red Tree could be a bunch of grapes or simply the recipient of this abundance, serving itself up in gratitude to the sky.

I think this is a piece about gratitude, recognizing what the world has given you.  We all too often focus on striving for more without seeing the gift  before us that  we have been given in the preciousness of the moment.   Every day has a gift for us.  Whether we recognize it is our own choice.  That’s what I see here in the warmth and generous spirit of this painting.

This painting is also part of Alchemy, my solo show at Erie’s Kada Gallery which opens November 16th.

Read Full Post »

The Furthest Reach

Posted in Motivation, Painting, Quote, Recent Paintings, tagged , , , , , on October 27, 2013| 6 Comments »

GC Myers- The Furthest Reach smNone of us will ever accomplish anything excellent or commanding except when he listens to this whisper which is heard by him alone.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

******************

This painting is called The Furthest Reach, a 20″ by 24″ canvas headed to the Kada Gallery for my November show.  This has been done for a few weeks now and has been at the edge of my sight as I have been prepping for this show.  There is something quite reassuring about having it there, serving as a reminder of the trust I have placed in that inner voice that Emerson references in the quote above.

 It has taken a number of years and many thousands of hours spent in the relative isolation of the studio to truly trust that voice, to feel as though I have separated my work from all  external noise and distraction, including the subjective criticism and opinion of others.   It has allowed me to use this  trust as the sole criteria for my work, to no longer judge it against the work or opinion of others.

With this trust the work becomes self-sovereign and, as I have written here earlier this year, the  island serves as a symbol of  this self-sovereignty while the stance of the Red Tree, a symbol of the work for me here,  represents the liberated feeling attained in the realization of this trust.  I see the dock as the gateway to outer world, meaning that while there is trust in the work spawned from this inner voice there is also a willingness to share it  with this outer world.

Again, that’s how I have come to see it in the last few weeks here in the studio.  Perhaps you will see something quite different.  Maybe you will see a confidence and  tranquility in it that meshes with your own experience or perhaps  simply a pleasant scene with a quiet warmth.  Or maybe you won’t see anything in at all.

Whatever your inner voice whispers to you, place some trust in it…

Read Full Post »

Deep Focus

Posted in Quote, Recent Paintings, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on October 23, 2013| 8 Comments »

GC Myers- Deep Focus sm

Meditation brings wisdom; lack of mediation leaves ignorance. Know well what leads you forward and what hold you back, and choose the path that leads to wisdom.

–Buddha

***********

This is another new painting that is headed to the Kada Gallery for  Alchemy, my solo show that opens there on November 16.   This piece, 18″ by 18″ on canvas, is titled Deep Focus.  This was one of those pieces that just seemed to fall out with very little inner wrangling or consternation.  Once I started, it was off and running with what seemed very little assistance from me.

It was immediately clear that this painting was going to be about focus, about looking deeper and deeper into the canvas. Built from the bottom, each layer pushed the eye further inward.  About halfway into this I began to think of the title for this as being AutoFocus, just for the ease with which it was emerging.  But I finally opted for Deep Focus because of the depth I was seeing in  the picture and the way everything seemed to gravitate toward the central point of the sun that is peeking over the distant hill.

This piece seems to have a very meditative quality, a placid feeling that goes well with the ease of the piece.  Or at least,  the ease that I felt in its creation.  Sitting here now, taking it in, its construction seems simple, almost naive. Yet there is a feeling of opulence that I think comes from the colors and curves of the landscape that sheds this naivete and gives it a feeling of deeper knowledge.  or a way to deeper knowledge.  Far from naive.

Years ago, I had a  hard time trusting the validity of pieces that fell so easily from my hand, believing that  struggle must be part of making a painting come alive.  I was almost embarrassed by the ease with which some pieces came.  But over time, I have come to believe that it is this effortless work that is the goal, the work that is true and has the authenticity that I seek.  This piece is a testament to the trust in my intuition that has come with time.

Read Full Post »

Harmonic One

Posted in Recent Paintings, Technique/History, tagged , , , , , , on July 23, 2013| 4 Comments »

GC Myers- Harmonic OneI call this new painting  Harmonic One.  It’s 14″ by 34″ on paper and is part of my Islander show at the West End Gallery in Corning , opening this Friday and running through August.

This is another of those paintings that I start then set aside, waiting for a moment of clarity when the direction of the painting comes through to me.  Sometimes I set them aside because I simply lose momentum, lose the rhythm that is driving the creative force forward and find myself dulling the painting.  Other times, like this, I set them aside because I reach a point, in full rhythm, where I must choose a direction and cannot because I so like what I see before me that I am fearful that I will make a wrong decision which would destroy everything.

The thing that attracted me to this piece and caused me to hesitate when I came to that point on this piece was the color and texture of the sky.  It was chaotic  and rough with bits of differing tones of blues and pale greens.  It was just alive and seemed to dance on the surface.  There is a detail from the sky shown at the bottom of this post.  I knew that to just jump ahead too quickly would diminish the whole effect of that sky.  It required a focal point that would play off of the chaos running through the sky.

Of course, my focal point, my central character,  was going to be the Red Tree.  But it had to have a certain weightiness, a feeling of strength that would create a solidity that would contrast with the foreboding confusion of the sky and bring the whole into some sort of equilibrium.  In short, a tree that would create harmony.

I repeatedly would put this piece on my table and, time after time, I would take it away without touching it.  I just could envision such a harmonizer.  I was at a point where I was beginning to think that I had created a piece that would never go beyond mere potential.  The finished section began top lose vitality and I thought it would go in the heap with other work that never lived up to their possibilities.

But finally, it showed itself in the form that you see.  It transformed the whole thing, bringing a peaceful solidness and force that brings the chaos of the sky into balance.   The title came easily.  In the end, I was tremendously pleased with this painting.  It had everything that  I looked for in my work–depth, texture, color, contrasts, and a feeling of vitality all in a deceptively simple package.  All that I could ask of it…

GC Myers- Harmonic One detail

Read Full Post »

« Newer Posts - Older Posts »