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Posts Tagged ‘Painting’

Looking Back- Lakedays

Posted in Early Paintings, Painting, Technique/History, tagged , on December 29, 2012| 7 Comments »

GC Myers- LakedaysI wrote last week about this being the time of year when I examine where  I am at the year’s end on my artistic path.  In order to somehow chart a course forward, I look back at the work of this past year, trying to see what changes have taken place, to see what new paths were followed and where they might take me in the near future.  I am at the same time looking  to  see what paths presented themselves and were passed by and never revisited.

I also go back through the years and look at pieces that also  offered these different directions.  I examine them to see where I might have taken the work further if I had continued the creative thread I was following at that time.  Were these opportunities missed?  Would I want to go back to that juncture in my journey and set off now in that direction?

The piece shown here, Lakedays, a 16″ by 20″ canvas.  is such a painting.  From 2003, it was painted with a bluefor the  underpainting instead of the red oxide that I normally use.  The red gives me a warmth from below the surface that connects the whole piece in  harmony.  Using the blue– a manganese blue, if I’m not mistaken– gave this piece a different feel, one that was cooler  and cleaner.  It has distance, making me feel removed from the scene.  Using the  red shortens that distance, pulls me closer.

That sounds like a criticism of the effect here but it’s not.  The coolness, the remoteness of the distance provided by the blue in this piece, works very well here.  It provides the sense of the airiness one feels when looking over lakes, that feeling of a cool dome of air that encompasses the space.  But despite the cooler temperatures of the blue underneath, there is still a golden warmth and intimacy in the space between the tree and the building, providing a contrast  that gives this simple scene a dramatic tension and a sense of the ethereal moment.

I like it very much and think it is a very strong piece.  But is it a path to revisit?  Or should this remain an anomaly in  the continuum of my body of work?  That’s the type of questions I ask myself at this time of year.  The answers shall be seen in the coming year…

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Beeswing

Posted in Music, Painting, Recent Paintings, Technique/History, Video, tagged , , , , , , on May 9, 2012| 2 Comments »

I wrote the other day about the rhythm I’m looking for when I’m in the studio, that groove where the painting is more instinctual than intellectual.  Everything flowing fast and easy with little thought, each brushload of paint inspiring the next and on and on.  All intuition and reaction with hardly a thought given to subject or meaning.   It’s a great feeling, one that makes me feel as thought I am somehow connected to some sort of better self within, one that can only be reached by letting go of conscious thought.

A rare and delicate thing.

Delicate in the sense that I find myself at points coming out of this groove to examine what I’ve done and I lapse into conventional thought.  At these times I look at the work spread around the studio, in various stages of their journey to completion.  I forget for the moment how the work came about , about  the fact that the work is not about subject or the scene but about capturing emotion and feeling.  All I see is repetition of form, red trees and red roofs set on mounds and plains.

And for that moment, I panic just a bit.  The delicate thing seems almost crushed in that instant.

But then I focus on a painting and the fragility of  how it came about and what it really is doesn’t seem all that delicate after all.  Though there is often repetition of forms, I can see by looking at this individual painting that these elements are only part of the whole, that, while  they often serve as the central focus of the piece, their importance comes from how they play off the other less obvious elements of the painting to create the real feel of it.  People are not moved by the tree but by the sense of feeling that the tree evokes within the painting. 

It’s not subject but the emotion captured that makes each piece unique. 

And with that realization in hand, I feel free once again to go back into the rhythm, that rare and delicate thing.

The painting above is a new one that fits perfectly with this post.  It is a 10″ by 16″ painting on paper that I call Beeswing,  after a line from a Richard Thompson song of the same name that has as its chorus the line, ” she was a rare thing, fine as a bee’s wing…”  There  is a delicacy in this piece, a fineness of form that makes the moment of it seem forever fragile.  When I look at it all I can think of are those incredibly rare moments of absolute happiness, when the outer world is completely forgotten and there is a clarity of joy in myself.  A fleeting feeling, rare and delicate, fine as a bee’s wing.

Here’s the song from Richard Thompson—-

 

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Blue Dance of Dawn

Posted in Painting, Recent Paintings, tagged , , , , , on April 12, 2012| Leave a Comment »

I’ve written here before about how I find the color blue an intoxicant.  When my nose is to the canvas and it is all that I can see, it has a way of making me feel that it is the only color in my world.  It’s a very satisfying and mollifying effect and, if I am not wary, I can find myself using blue tints to the exclusion of all others.  Because of this wariness, I try to only sporadically break out the blues.  But even with this watchful effort, I find the addictive pull of the color very strong in some pieces.  This new painting is such a case.

Called Blue Dance of Dawn, it’s a 10″ by 30″ canvas that employs two of my familiar icons, the Red Tree and the the Red Roofs.  They, however,  feel secondary to the predominance of the color blue here.  They serve as warmer counterpoints to the coolness of the blue and signify awakening  to me in this scene.  But the feel of this piece is dictated by the calm harmony of the blues.

I find this piece very placid with that  kind of satisfying effect that one sometimes has in the best dreams, that feeling of total understanding and acceptance of the universe.  That wonderful feeling that fades so quickly once you open your eyes and realize that it was only a dream, the details suddenly fuzzing over.  Maybe that’s what this painting represents– that idealized version of the world in those dreams just before we are awakened to the reality of the moment. That fleeting feeling of grace, seemingly within grasp then gone.

Let me think that over…

 

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Gem

Posted in Painting, Quote, Recent Paintings, tagged , , , , on April 9, 2012| 9 Comments »

A gem cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials.

–Chinese Proverb

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

I call this new painting Gem.  It’s an 18″ by 26″ piece on paper.  The gem part came obviously from the deep and rich colors that run through and define  it.  It reminds me at first of a colorful bracelet or brooch dotted with bright gems.  Rubies and sapphires, emeralds and amethysts all set in a citrine yellow sky.  It definitely has a jewelry-like  appearance.  Bright and easy.  Almost a trifle.

But there seems to be a feeling in this piece that goes beyond the playful interplay of the surface colors, something that takes it far from being a trifle.  There is for me a feeling of self-realization in the central figure of the Red Tree, a sense of knowing and understanding one’s self.  It’s a sense that comes from knowing one’s strengths and weaknesses,  a realizing of all that one is and is not in an instant, a flash of insight.  And though it comes in as a sudden thought at a singular moment, it is formed through a lifetime of living, taking into account all successes and failures equally.  The trials that form  character, as the proverb above states.

Our lives are very much like a gem-studded bracelet, easy to see with all surfaces shining bright.  But the gems here have underwent eons of transformation through pressure and friction to reach that easy shine.  Maybe that’s what the white ribbon of the trail going through this painting signifies for me, a long and sometimes hard road to reach that final gemlike quality. 

Maybe.  All I really know is that this painting seems easy to take in at first but lingers on the way down.  And there is a great satisfaction in that discovery of something below the surface, an added depth that belies the shine of the gems.

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RFD

Posted in Painting, Recent Paintings, tagged , , on March 30, 2012| 2 Comments »

A new painting, a 16″ by 20″  canvas that I call RFD,  for rural free delivery.  It alludes to the small mailbox with the the door hanging open, a theme I have  used in a prior piece within the past few years.  Maybe it’s a comment on the decline of our postal system, something that saddens me because, as I have writtern here before, it meant so much to me as a child as a form of connection to the greater outer world in the days long before the internet and social media, both terms that would have drawn quizzical looks at that time.  Maybe that’s what it’s about.  Maybe not. I know I’m not sure.

There’s a moody melancholy to this piece that is both a little scary and satisfying at once, something that I am hard-pressed to explain.  But I guess that’s what I find appealing in this painting- the fact that it is harder to take in easily with no apparent answers.  It is dark and a bit foreboding, filled only with questions.  Who might live here?  Where are they now?  Is mail delivered there now or has this place been abandoned?  Is this the end of the road or does it travel on?  When is this moment?  Is it a darkening or lightening sky?  Fall or spring?

There is no Red Tree, no central personification here.  Just a tall, windowless and doorless  house with a gaping mailbox set amid bony trees and an ominous sky.  There is no heroic quality here, no absolutely positive reading or message. Just a mood of mystery. 

And sometimes that’s enough…

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Native Rise

Posted in Painting, Quote, Recent Paintings, tagged , , , , , , on March 28, 2012| 1 Comment »

It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child.
–Pablo Picasso
****************
This short sentence from Picasso is  one of my favorite quotes.  It both makes me smile whenever I hear it and brings to mind my own struggles with recognizing my own creative voice, something that used to be a real internal battle in the early formative years.  There was always a pull between the craft side, as might be represented by Raphael in Picasso’s quote, and the side where one paints naturally and intuitively, as the child might.
 I knew I would never paint like a Raphael.   I never cared to tie myself to any one tradition of painting and wanted the liberty of free expression, the ability to freely display emotion, even in the most mundane scene.  Wanted my own voice, preferring the colloquial over the classical. Kind of like wanting to sing like Woody Guthrie versus singing like Pavarotti.  For as beautiful as Pavarotti’s voice might be I found a quality in Guthrie’s voice and songs that spoke more directly to me.  Native simplicity I suppose it might be called.  Over the years, my voice has evolved and there are pieces where there is often a bit of this native simplicity in the work that really pleases me, makes me feel as though I am somewhat painting in the way a child might.  Or at least in a way that might speak as well to children as it did to adults.
The piece shown here is such an example.  A 10″ by 30″ canvas, it is an extension of the work I have done recently, work that I have called internal landscapes.  Called Native Rise, it is painted very intuitively and speaks plainly.  It has an attractive harmony in its elements that lets it speak easily and be asorbed quickly – if you like this sort of voice.  For me, I see this piece as being very symbolic of my true voice,  how I see and express the world as I internalize it.  It is painted easily and in my own voice.   And like my own voice, it is far from perfect but tries to speak plainly.  And truthfully as to how I see my world.
At least, that’s the way I see it   It’s funny how much more difficult it is to describe  with words my own native painting voice, something that comes so easily on the canvas.  Perhaps one shouldn’t try…

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Beauty Scorned

Posted in Early Paintings, Painting, tagged on March 23, 2012| 2 Comments »

I was going to write about something  different but came across this older image and completely lost my train of thought, this piece replacing everything that I had been thinking.  It’s a smaller painting, maybe 6″ square,  that sold many years ago but has lived in a larger sense in my thoughts ever since. 

It’s titled Beauty Scorned and is a relatively simple piece.  But there’s something in the the bend of the twisting tree trunk that really speaks to me in a very poignant way, as though it is a pure physical expression of some deep emotion.  Beauty and sorrow. 

For me , I see this as being about perceptions of beautyand acceptance.  About how we often conform, like the other trees which are so much alike here, and step back from that which is different, seeing not the beauty in it but scorning it because it is unlike us.  The difference is the beauty. 

I remember when I did this piece, feeling that this was symbolic of my own work at that time.  It was often different from the work of other painters with which I showed and I was still unsure of the validity of my own voice, often feeling that my work was somehow inferior because it wasn’t painted in the same manner, didn’t have the same look as these others. At the time,  I felt like my work and my voice was truly tied to this twisting tree and those who dismissed it because it had a different look were missing the beauty and emotion that it may hold. 

Just seeing it again, summons all of these thoughts in a rush of feeling.  It remains a potent piece for me for this reason.  It also has a sad memory in it.  When I see this piece I am always reminded of the couple who purchased it and were avid and encouraging collectors that I always looked forward to seeing at shows.  They later divorced and the wife would still come to the shows, always so happy for and encouraging of my work.  Tragically, she passed away in a plane crash this past year and now, instead of seeing the scorning of beauty in this piece as I once did, I now see the beauty of this young lady’s spirit. 

It’s a different painting for me now but no less potent.

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Triumphant One

Posted in Recent Paintings, tagged , on March 12, 2012| 4 Comments »

A new painting, this a 16″ by 20″ canvas that I call, for now,  Triumphant One.  I’m still mulling some other titles, most concerning some form of the word triumph or alluding to the word labor as symbolized to me by the various patterns running through the fields.  I originally considered The Triumph of Labor but felt that it might be too easy for the casual viewer to read that as a political statement.  And, though I have long sided with the cause of organized labor and the aspects of  it that have long benefitted us as a people,  that is not what I saw for  this piece.  It was smaller in scale, more personal in how it spoke to me.

To me the triumph of labor I saw was both in the final product, as I see here in the Red Tree as it basks under a brightening  sky, and in the sheer act of the labor itself.  The fields, to me, represent not only hard work in how they are shaped and developed.  They also symbolize a sense of joy in the actual doing, a pleasure inherent in the sense of purpose that is acquired from this labor. 

And that’s what in see in this piece– both joyful triumph and a sense of purpose.  The joy of simply working at what gives one pleasure and meaning.

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Done!?

Posted in Favorite Things, Painting, Recent Paintings, Technique/History, tagged , , , , , , on March 2, 2012| 9 Comments »

Well, I am finished with the large canvas I started over three weeks ago.  It is the largest piece in size I’ve ever attempted by quite a bit at 54″ by 84″ which I often found intimidating at times, as I freely admitted here.  But that intimidation and fear faded over the weeks as the painting evolved, moving from the darkness in which it began to the vibrant brightness of the finished product.  This shift in tone mirrored my own shift in my feelings for the painting.  I began with a fearful anxiety that began to ease with each new layer of color added.  I began to feel a lightness in myself as the piece began to find its unity and rhythm and a sense of confidence when it began to start taking on a life of its own as it neared completion.

It was interesting  to see how its domination of the studio space changed.  At first, its size and darkness made it seem at times like a big canvas eclipse blocking out and absorbing all incoming light.  But near the end it bagan to have its own glow, seeming to give off more light than it absorbed.  Even after the large floodlight under which I work was turned off, its glow cut through the hazy darkness.  Those moments of seeing that really struck me and gave me a real sense that it was becoming what I hoped for it. 

 As the final strokes went on to the Red Tree that stands above the lake, bringing the piece into a state of completion, it began to move completely into its own realm, its own life.   I felt like a parent watching their child move out of their home and into their own life.  The  influence of the parent is evident but there is a point where the child moves on, no longer dependent on the parent.  It is a moment filled with both the joy of  pride and the sadness of loss. 

 Like this parent, I feel both of these emotions.  I am proud of how this painting has come around and grown into something strong and viable but sad that my time with it has come to an end.   Well, close to an end.  I will spend the next few months with it, making little tweaks here and there.  Nothing large.  Just a tiny  rounding of the edges here and a smoothing of the line there. 

I’m calling this painting The Internal Landscape.  I will discuss this at a later date along with some other observations about it.  But for now, I’m going to simply stand back and take it all in again.

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Coming Closer

Posted in Recent Paintings, Technique/History, tagged , , , , on February 16, 2012| 6 Comments »

I’ve been documenting the progress  that has been made over the past two weeks on a large canvas on which I’ve been been working.  It’s been a roller coaster of emotion for me as I’ve been working on the 54″ high by 84″ wide painting.  Sometimes I am completely satisfied, thrilled with what is unfurling before me, and at other times I am worried that it may not pop in the way I envisioned in earlier stages.  At the moment, I am closer to happy as the piece has started to come into full sight.

After beginning to bring more light to the sky, I have started adding color to the lake that dominates the center of this piece.  As I do so, I can better see tweaks that need to be made in some of the colors of the landscape around it.  Nothing big but small adjustments that bring it closer to completion. 

After coming to the still dark blue color as shown above, I decided that I wanted the color to be more dominant and added a light teal that really emboldened the whole composition.  I have to better photograph this so there is a bit of glare on the image below.  I also noticed that the sun is showing a bit harsher here, less warm than it actually is.  But this gives you an idea of what is there at the moment.

This painting pretty much dominates everything in the studio at the moment.  It’s big in size and visual impact and my eyes immediately fix on it.  There is still a ways to go but it’s coming closer to being the internal landscape that I envision.

 

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