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Posts Tagged ‘Principle Gallery’

Epiphany?

Posted in Biographical, Early Paintings, tagged , , , on May 9, 2026| 6 Comments »

Epiphany (2015)

I think a lot of people have unreasonable expectations because they never stop to consider what life actually has to offer them. They’re always looking for some great epiphany from the skies. They never stop to consider the fact which human beings find hardest to recognize: “Maybe I’m not worthy of an epiphany.”

–Robertson Davies, Conversations with Robertson Davies (1989)

The painting above, Epiphany, is another painting that will be heading to the Principle Gallery for my June show. It’s a painting that satisfies me on several levels. The contrast of the corona of light around the Red Tree against the underlying darkness of the black underpainting and the deep reds and yellows are right in my sweet spot. It also connects with me on a personal level, bringing to mind a very early painting that I might consider my one true experience with epiphany.

The word epiphany, of course, denotes someone experiencing a sudden and profound realization. A Eureka! moment. I never really thought about such things before. I mean who has time to seek something like epiphany when you’re just trying to get by in this world? And even if I had thought about it, I would have no doubt ascribed to the words above from the late Canadian man of letters, Robertson Davies, that you could waste your life seeking something that will never be available to you while the miracle of this world and our existence in it is in plain sight all the time. I am pretty sure I would not have seen myself as being worthy of an epiphany.

But you never know, do you? After my accidental fall from a ladder brought me to painting in late 1993, I began to spend several hours a day painting in between my job as waiter in a pancake house and working towards completing the construction of our home. I didn’t have any expectations at that point, never saw it doing anything other than providing an outlet for expressing pent up emotions in a constructive way. I would have been happy with that.

Well, I think would have been. It didn’t turn out that way so how can I really know what I would felt if that had been the case?

Anyway, as I worked in our back bedroom for several months, I began to feel that my painting had something more to offer me but I wasn’t seeing it. And to be honest, I had no idea what it might be or what it would even mean if I were to come across it. How would I know such a thing?

I tried to not think about such things and just focused on what the painting was giving me in the moment. Just seeing it develop and progress seemed to be enough.

One evening that summer, after doing my morning shift then working for a few hours on our house, I went home and sat down to paint. I was working on a small painting and suddenly it beckoned on me that what I was looking at was exactly that thing I was looking for. It suddenly had form and substance. More than that, I could see it in a flash that it instantaneously opened a path forward for me. I didn’t know where it would lead but I knew that it had to be followed.

I remember so distinctly that moment. I felt a giddy excitement that was a shock to me. The hair on the back of my neck was raised and my heart was racing. I didn’t know what to do. I mean, what do you do when something hits you like that? Nobody told me that something like this might happen. I needed to tell someone about this, but Cheri was still at work.

First View (1994)

I paced anxiously for a couple of hours, waiting for Cheri to return. I met her at the door and made her follow me into the back bedroom. I picked up the small piece of watercolor paper that held the painting. I can’t remember exactly how it was phrased but I said something like, “Look at this! Look at this!”

She looked then replied, “Yeah. It’s nice. What is it?”

“You don’t see it? That’s IT!”

“What’s it?

“This is what I have been looking for. This means something. I don’t know where or what, but this is going to take us somewhere.”

I told her how it came to be and my explosion of emotion when it appeared. I still am not sure she was impressed or convinced by what I was saying that night. In retrospect, I can understand that. It’s a quiet, simple little piece. It doesn’t yell or wave its arms to grab your attention.

But that didn’t matter to me. In my eyes that night– and even now– it set off explosions in me that blew down walls that had been hindering me from seeing the path that was now before me. It felt like it had opened up a whole new section of synapses in my brain that I had not been using up to that point.

I later titled it First View since it felt like I was looking at a newly discovered and unexplored vista. This unassuming little painting still retains its power for me. Every painting since this piece has been an attempt to recapture that explosive reaction that I felt on that summer night in 1994. There have been potent and wonderful moments from other paintings but none that came close to the feeling this painting provided.

Was that an epiphany? I don’t know. But if it wasn’t, maybe like Davies said, I wasn’t worthy of an epiphany and will probably never experience one. I don’t know that I could physically or mentally handle a real epiphany if that wasn’t one.

But epiphany or not, the painting above symbolizes and very well captures that moment from 1994. It is a direct descendant of First View and being so, carries elements from it that speak clearly to me, providing moments that recall that first epiphany, if that is indeed what it was. Letting me know that I was not mistaken in following the path I was given.

And that satisfies me in all the best ways.

What more can I ask?

 

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Only Now

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on May 4, 2026| 6 Comments »

Only Now (2012) – Coming to Principle Gallery

This day will never come again and anyone who fails to eat and drink and taste and smell it will never have it offered to him again in all eternity. The sun will never shine as it does today…But you must play your part and sing a song, one of your best.

—Herman Hesse, Klingsor’s Last Summer (1920)

Only Now, shown above, is a 24″ by 30″ painting from 2012. It is scheduled for inclusion in my June solo show at the Principle Gallery. It has long been a favorite of mine.

I don’t know that I can put a finger on any specific reason for that, but it remains one of those pieces that speaks directly to me. Maybe it is its combination of airiness and earthiness or perhaps it is its clarity of both expression and message for me.

I guess the reason doesn’t matter so much as the fact that it communicates and connects with me on an emotional level. That is the final arbiter for me in all things.

A coincidence occurred while I was looking for a short quote or passage to accompany this painting. I came across the passage above from a lesser-known Hermann Hesse novella that I felt was custom made for this painting. The coincidence came in that I had just purchased the book last week and it still sits unopened and unread on the counter by the backdoor to the studio.

Mere coincidence? Most likely. But it made me wonder about the convergences of things and whether they have meaning in our lives, themes that seem at home in Hesse’s writings. And in my paintings.

By the way, Klingsor’s Last Summer is about a middle-aged painter in the last summer of his life. There is no coincidence here. This will not be my last summer, not by a long shot. Too many paintings still unpainted. Nor am I a middle-aged hedonistic, hard drinking womanizer in Italy like Hesse’s title character.

That description makes my life sound pretty damn boring. But I guess how we experience life is not so important as simply experiencing each day with the understanding that is a once-in-a-lifetime event.

Life is like art– to each his own.

And sometimes the inverse holds true– art is life.

Here’s a song to that might seem at first blush to be an odd choice to go along with this painting. But if you’ve ever really listened closely to the lyrics, you will understand the connection.

Day after day, alone on a hill
The man with the foolish grin is keeping perfectly still
But nobody wants to know him, they can see that he’s just a fool
And he never gives an answer

But the fool on the hill sees the sun going down
And the eyes in his head see the world spinning around

The song is, of course, the Beatles classic The Fool on the Hill from their 1967 album, Magical Mystery Tour. Though the Beatles’ original cannot be surpassed, I am sharing this version from Sergio Mendes & Brasil ’66 for the simple reason that I have always loved its sound and vibe.

And as you know, I am all about the vibe. Says the fool on his hill…

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A Look Back: Dissolve

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on April 28, 2026| Leave a Comment »

Dissolve– 2011

Anyone in whom the troublemaking self has died,
sun and cloud obey.
If you wish to shine like day,
burn up the night of self-existence.
Dissolve in the Being who is everything.

— Rumi, Masnavi, Book I (ca. 1258)

The paintings in the A Look Back series usually drawn are from my earliest work, pre-2000 or thereabout. By that definition, this painting from 2011, Dissolve, is not part of that series. But nothing is carved in stone here and it is more than a few years old. That’s good enough for me.

I used this piece several weeks ago in a post about being humble. The painting was not mentioned and only served as a symbol of humility for that post. I thought it deserved more attention since it has long been a favorite of mine and will be included in my solo show, Flow, at the Principle Gallery in June.

Below is what I wrote about this painting soon after it was completed in 2011:

This painting called Dissolve is another in the series I’ve been working in for the past few months. This 24″ by 36″ piece is based very much on the same format as Like Sugar In Water, [a large 36″ by 60″ painting from that same time, shown below that served as an anchor for my 2012 show at the Fenimore Museum]. Both paintings grow from the bottom where they begin in structured blocks of color. The path cuts through, rising from the geometry of the fields up to a plain that flattens out. The path continues by the red-roofed house and is not seen again as it enters the broad yellow field that runs to the horizon. The path’s upward movement is continued in the spreading bare limbs of the distant tree which merges into the broken mosaic of the sky.

GC Myers- Like Sugar In Water

GC Myers- Like Sugar In Water 2011

It’s a simple concept and composition, dependent on the complexity of the color and the placement of the elements in order to transmit feeling and emotion. These simpler compositions, when things click and I feel they work well, are often very potent purveyors of feeling and are among my personal favorites. The stripped-down nature of the scene takes away all distractions and centers the essence of the work in the willing viewer’s eyes, making it very accessible to those who connect with it.

And that is much of what I hope for my work- to create work that stirs strong emotion within a seemingly simple context.

Maybe there’s more to it than this. I can’t be sure if my thoughts and interpretations are any more valid than those of a first-time viewer. That’s the great thing about art– there are no absolutes.

That’s also the thing about art that scares a lot of people. Many people fear the gray areas of this world, of which there are many, desiring an at least an appearance of absolute belief and knowledge in all aspects of their lives. However, art most often lives in the ambiguity and uncertainty of this world.

And that can be unsettling to some. 

 Dissolve seems absolute and certain at first glance but is all about the gray areas of our world and our belief.  At least as I see it…

I realize that this earlier description didn’t really say much about what it meant for me. Here’s how I described this painting to the writer for American Art Collector, which will be featuring it in an upcoming preview for my show:

The title for this painting, Dissolve, comes from the feeling I sometimes have that we humans exist in a state of being in that gray area between the physical solidity of this earth and the ethereal nature of the sky. We are made up of both– the physical and the ethereal– equally. At some point that balance shifts. The body remains but the ethereal part of us begins to disperse and dissolve into the sky. Like sugar in water.

I don’t know if the two descriptions combined do this piece justice. Funny how what seems to be a simple painting can sometimes be beyond the grasp of words yet speak powerfully to some emotion within us.

Maybe that is its strength, the quality in it that draws me to it.

I don’t know. I only know that it always leaves me with the desire to stand out in an open field and feel myself being absorbed into the ether, my atoms mingling once more with those of the universe.

Here is a song in a similar vein. This is a new cover of the Mazzy Star hit from 1993, Fade Into You, from Gregory Alan Isakov, who I have featured here in the past, and Sylvan Esso, which is an electropop duo from Durham, North Carolina , according to Wikipedia. Not knowing exactly what electropop is, they are new to me, but I like their work with Isakov on this song. It has a good feel.

Now be gone. You’re blocking my absorption…

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Room to Breathe/Ride Lonesome

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on April 23, 2026| 2 Comments »

Room to Breathe (2010)

You got to ride lonesome
You got to try to find the road
You got to cry a river
And follow it all the way home
Alone

— Beck, Ride Lonesome (2026)

The painting at the top, Room to Breathe, has long been a favorite of mine. When it was painted in 2010, it seemed different than the work I was doing at the time, more like a throwback to my earlier work. It had that feel, painted as it was with the transparent inks that marked my early work. It also had that same airy solitariness with the Red Tree out and away from the other trees beneath a wide and deep sky.

But more than these other similarities, it had a simplicity that I was craving at the time. My early work was simple by design, meant to cut away the distraction of detail, allowing the few basic forms to hopefully dance and harmonize with one another. More than that, it allowed space for the viewer’s own feelings.

Room to Breathe felt like it was very much cut from the same cloth.

It is well traveled, having made the rounds of the galleries around the country through the years. Every piece does not immediately find a home and sometimes those pieces that I consider true gems are simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. So, having a painting return to you is not uncommon. In fact, it’s a regular and expected thing for any artist, something taken it in stride.

But with some pieces, there is a sense of hurt attached to them when they return. Every piece I paint has an emotional investment, carrying with it some part of me. But some pieces seem to carry a bit more of me with them. Their return always feels like it is not only the painting that is being rejected. It feels like it is a personal rejection as well.

I know that this is not the case. But that feeling still lingers even after I have rationalized the why’s and how’s of it. I sometimes think it is like seeing something in your child that is not evident to everyone else and how deeply you feel at even the most minor of rejections they experience.

It is a disappointment that comes when others are somehow blind to the qualities that you love in your progeny.

I suppose that is how I feel about this painting. And maybe it also represents my own moments of rejection or exclusion, those times when I found myself not part of the in-crowd or even in the inner core of my smaller group of friends.

Like the Red Tree standing apart from the group of trees.

I have found that standing apart is not a bad thing. There is, as the title plainly states, room to breathe. Clear air and unobstructed views.

Room to think and grow in all directions.

I am still debating whether I will include this painting in my June show at the Principle Gallery. I am not sure I want to subject this child of mine– or myself– to yet another potential rejection.

But I tell myself that one of the lessons of this life is that though you may face disappointment and rejection, you have to keep getting up and going out to meet it head-on.

Who knows– it might be your lucky day.

Here’s a new song from Beck that initially sparked this entry. It’s called Ride Lonesome. Its chorus shown at the top pretty much sums up what I have tried to say here.

Now, get out of here and go back to the other trees. I want to be alone…

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The Outsider

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on April 1, 2026| 2 Comments »

Out of the Loop 2013

I’m fundamentally, I think, an outsider. I do my best work and feel most braced with my back to the wall. It’s an odd feeling though, writing against the current: difficult entirely to disregard the current. Yet of course I shall.

–Virginia Woolf, 22 November 1938, A Writer’s Diary (1953)

The lines above Virginia Woolf from a 1938 entry in her A Writer’s Diary struck a chord with me. In the entry, Woolf looked back on her career, describing how she had at points received praise and widespread acclaim and at other times fell out of favor with the literati, suffering criticism and personal attacks that marked her as a second-rate talent.

She had certainly known the highs and lows.

She claimed that the attacks did not bother her as much as she might have expected since she had never saw herself as being famous. How can they take away something you never felt you possessed? Actually, she saw their downgrading of her as being a sort of relief, shedding all pretense of her being part of the insider’s club. She could clearly see herself as an outsider now. As she wrote, it put her back to the wall, a place where she felt she did her best work.

Much like the I’ll show them attitude I described here recently.

As I wrote above, this resonated with me. Though I’ve had my fair share of high points and an equally fair share of low points, I have always, like Woolf, viewed myself as an outsider.

I believe this comes from knowing who I am and how I am built. I understand that I don’t have what it takes to be an insider. I don’t play a social game, don’t go to parties and few openings. To be honest, I am uncomfortable at my own events. I don’t schmooze with museum or gallery directors. Don’t seek out people who might specifically help my career. No agent seeking new opportunity nor public relations person trying to spread my name in the media. Outside of this blog and a few little social media entries, I have no mechanism for self-promotion. And even this seems like something more than self-promotion now.

I was never part of an artistic group or school. Well, there was one time, when my work first showed at the Principle Gallery in 1997. I was part of group of five artists from this region, all then showing at the West End Gallery, selected by the Principle Gallery who then labeled us the Finger Lakes School. We did a couple of shows there under that label. But even then, I was the outsider in that group, the only one of the five working outside of traditional representational oil painting.

I also don’t pursue opportunity. Perhaps to a fault.

After my 27-year relationship with Kada Gallery in Erie ended when they closed a couple of years ago and the gallery repping my work in California had changed their business model in a way that greatly lowered my visibility there, I considered looking for new galleries to replace those two. I had a realization then that I had not approached a gallery in nearly 30 years and that every gallery that had represented me approached me first. Approaching galleries now felt so far out of my comfort zone that I soon dropped the idea.

And often, I turn away those opportunities that are offered.  I have often failed to follow-up on commission requests simply because I wanted to do work that pleased me first and then others, not the other way around.

A year or so ago, I was offered a chance to have 13 of my Red Tree paintings grace the covers of a series of Hermann Hesse books published in Mandarin Chinese. The company in China had been following my work for several years and felt that my work was a good match for Hesse’s work. I was flattered but ended up turning down the offer simply because I felt it was too far out of my hands.

Mistake? Maybe. It wouldn’t be the first time. But I find myself being okay with this and those other peccadilloes because I know how I am.

I know I am an outsider, will never be the toast of the art world outside of my little corner of it every once in a while.

The way I see it is that to be in that wider spotlight requires effort and responsibility that goes well beyond the work itself, something I am not comfortable in taking on at this point in my life as an artist.

And I am fine and comfortable with that. To be honest, I never trusted the perception that came with the highs nor the lows. Though the praise is nice to hear sometimes and the rejection always stings, they ultimately are not accurate indicators. The work was generally equal in my eyes at both the high and the low points. Actually, there has been work produced in the low points that went unnoticed that I feel was better than much of the work from the high points.

Time, it turns out, levels out those highs and lows.

So now I just do my work, as Woolf did, with my back against the wall and going forever against the current.

That’s all I can do. That is who and what I am– the outsider.

Here’s a tune from Eddie Vedder that is somewhat, if not wholly, in the same vein. This is Society.

PS: Not that it matters, but this is a remake of the post I accidentally deleted yesterday. I think the original had a bit more gracefulness and flow than this one. Maybe it hit its points more impactfully. But this will have to do for now.  It’s much like trying to recreate a painting where the original just flowed organically from the artist. The copy never has the same ease of being, at least in the eyes of its maker. 

The painting at the top, Out of the Loop, is a piece from 2013 that I am considering for inclusion in my June show at the Principle Gallery. It recently came back to me from California where it had been for over a dozen years. My impression of it had been reduced to the online image of it, such as the one at the top. When I took it from the crate, I was thrilled and surprised at its vibrance and depth, which far exceeded the digital image. Seemed a perfect fit for this post but still deciding if it goes to Alexandria in June. We’ll see…

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Funny How Time Slips Away

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , on September 28, 2025| 2 Comments »

Running the Moons— At Principle Gallery

He began to search among the infinite series of impressions which time had laid down, leaf upon leaf, fold upon fold softly, incessantly upon his brain; among scents, sounds; voices, harsh, hollow, sweet; and lights passing, and brooms tapping; and the wash and hush of the sea.

–Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse (1927)

I’m a bit tired this morning and have to get right back to work this morning to finish up work for my upcoming West End Gallery show so this is going to be shorter than it should be. It was a long day yesterday, most of it spent on the road, but it was a good day with what I felt was a fun Gallery Talk.

Well, I had fun.

I just want to extend a special Thank You to all that came out to participated. I could not be more appreciative of the warmth and friendliness that I received from you. Your attention, kindness, questions, and comments were the real strong points of the talk yesterday, making me feel as comfortable as possible in my uncomfortable role of standing and speaking before a group.

You folks made it fun for me as well as providing a large boost of energy and a positive affirmation of sorts, something much needed in a year that has been filled with doubts, loss, and uncertainty along with several health concerns.

I received much more than I gave yesterday– and I needed it all. You deserve all the thanks I can muster.

And, of course, a special Thank You to Michele and her wonderful group at the Principle Gallery– Clint, Taylor, Owen, and Brady. I could write a lot of words here (and probably should) about how much your friendship and affection, your caring attitude, and your hard work has meant to me in the 28+ years we have worked together, but my words would never properly capture the depth of feeling I have.

So, I will simply say Thank You with the hopes you know how much I truly mean those two simple words.

Hard to believe I’ve been with the Principle Gallery for over 28 years now. Like the title song chosen for this week’s Sunday Morning Music says, it’s Funny How Time Slips Away. This version is from the great Al Green and Lyle Lovett.

Here’s to many more years…

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Back Yourself into Your Own Corner

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , on September 24, 2025| Leave a Comment »

The Wanderer’s Compass— Coming to the Principle Gallery

I think while appropriation has produced some interesting work … for me, the most interesting thing is to back yourself into your own corner where no one else’s answers will fit. You will somehow have to come up with your own personal solutions to this problem that you have set for yourself because no one else’s answers are applicable.

[…]

See, I think our whole society is much too problem-solving oriented. It is far more interesting to [participate in] ‘problem creation’ … You know, ask yourself an interesting enough question and your attempt to find a tailor-made solution to that question will push you to a place where, pretty soon, you’ll find yourself all by your lonesome — which I think is a more interesting place to be.

— Chuck Close, 2006 interview with Joe Fig for Inside the Painter’s Studio

I have written about late artist Chuck Close (1940-2021) a few times here before. While I was fan of his distinctive work, it was his words that really hit close to home for me. For example, his Inspiration is for amateurs, the rest of us just show up and get to work has been a credo of sorts for me for some time now. In this article which spawned that credo, Close also spoke the words above and they have the same sort of meaning.

Back yourself into your own corner where no one else’s answers will fit.

I love this and can easily identify with it. I have sometimes described it as working to a place where all your influences have faded away completely and your work becomes distinct, almost self-referential.

Painting is about problem solving. Just the process of taking paint and using it to give form and meaning in two dimensions is, at its heart, a major problem. Some artists follow the lead of those who came before them in solving the problems that come with painting. That’s the appropriation that Close mentions.

But as he also says, it is most interesting when the well-worn answers no longer solve the problem as you see it. You must depend on your own unique set of skills and intuition. That is when the work of any artist takes on a new dimension and singularity for a solution. It also creates a great sense of autonomy in the artist, one that feels freed from the constraints of the influence of the past.

I also like Close’s thoughts on problem creation versus problem solving in the creative process. Problem creation forces us into those corners where new answers emerge as solutions.

I think the painting at the top is microcosm or shorthand version of that principle. It was started at the Painting Demo I gave at the Principle Gallery in June. I had a young lady from the assembled group make the first mark on the canvas.

It was a slash in a difficult spot on the surface. Definitely a problem that somewhat backed me into a corner. But it was actually a good thing because it allowed me to demonstrate how I react to such problems and the problems that arose from my initial reactions. And in my own way.

I often think that my best work comes when I encounter a problem that stretches me out and makes me uncomfortable., forcing me to look beyond the toolbox of skills I have assembled. The creation of new problems allows us to react in different ways, to climb out of our own ruts.

To create new solutions and maybe open new avenues to follow forward– that is where growth begins.

The painting, a 20″ by 20″ canvas, from the Demo is now finished, framed, and titled The Wanderer’s Compass. It will be coming with me to the Gallery Talk this Saturday, September 27, along with a group of new work. The Talk begins at 1 PM.

Gallery Talks also fall into the province of problem creation and problem solving. A big part of my talks is Question & Answer, which by its very nature is problem creation which often makes me scramble to come up with an answer that makes sense. It’s much like painting in that way.

Of course, I can cover up all my mistakes at the Talks by giving away a painting at its end. The painting this year is A Place of Sanctuary, shown below. Hope you can make the Gallery Talk on Saturday. You might well walk away with this painting!

A Place of Sanctuary— You Could Win This Painting!

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Gallery Talk One Week From Today!

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on September 20, 2025| 2 Comments »

A Place of Sanctuary— You Could Win This Painting!

The whole value of solitude depends upon oneself; it may be a sanctuary or a prison, a haven of repose or a place of punishment, a heaven or a hell, as we ourselves make it.

― John Lubbock, Peace and Happiness

I promised the other day to reveal the painting that I would be the main prize awarded to someone at the Gallery Talk that I will be giving at the Principle Gallery next Saturday, September 27.

Well, here it is.

It’s titled A Place of Sanctuary and is a substantial piece at 18″ by 24″ on canvas. I believe this painting is, as I wrote earlier, a pip. I can’t fully describe what it is that makes it so, but it never fails to capture my attention when I am in its presence. Presence might be the right word, with its deep and rich colors and a large sun that feels that it might be a hypnotist’s watch mesmerizing me as I gaze at it.

Whatever it is, it transports me to a place that feels like sanctuary.

I have always maintained that the paintings given away at Gallery Talks over the years have great meaning for me, that giving it away has to involve a sense of sacrifice on my part. It has to hurt a little bit, has to make me question if I am making a mistake. This painting definitely falls into that category.

There will be a drawing for A Place of Sanctuary at the end of the Gallery Talk at the Principle Gallery which takes place next Saturday, Saturday 27, beginning at 1 PM. The Gallery Talk and the drawing for the painting is free and open to everyone. You must be present when the painting is awarded.

Hope you can make it to the Principle Gallery next Saturday. In the meantime, here’s post about this painting from a few years back:

I had never heard of John Lubbock before coming across the short quote above. He was one of those interesting 19th century British characters, a titled member (1st Baron Avebury) of a wealthy banking family who made great contributions to the advancement of the sciences and math as well as to many liberal causes. For example, it was John Lubbock who coined the terms Paleolithic and Neolithic in describing the Old and New Stone Ages, as well as helping to make archaeology a recognized scientific discipline. As a youth he was a neighbor to Charles Darwin and was heavily influenced by the older scientist, who he befriended. He also worked with Darwin as a young man and championed his evolutionary theories in his later adulthood. He was obviously a man who used his position and access to higher knowledge to add to both his own intellect and that of our collective body.

That being said, his words this morning gave me pause. I have generally viewed solitude as a sanctuary, even in the troubled times of my life. It was a place to calm myself, to gather my thoughts and clearly examine what was before me. I crave solitude so the idea that for some this same solitude could feel like a hell or a prison seemed foreign to me.

What differentiates one’s perception of such a basic thing as the solitude in being alone? How could my place of sanctuary be someone else’s chamber of horrors?

If you’re expecting me to answer, you’re going to be disappointed because I can’t really say. I might say it might have to do with our insecurity but I have as much, if not more, uncertainty and insecurity than most people. We all have unique psychological makeups and every situation, including that of solitude, is seen from a unique perspective.

This subjectiveness is also the basis for all art. What else could explain how one person can look at a painting and see an idyllic scene while another can feel uneasy or even offended by the same scene?

Now, the painting at the top, titled A Place of Sanctuary, is a piece that very much reflects this sense of finding haven in solitude. For me, it is calming and centering, a place and time that appeals to my need for sanctuary.

Someone else might see it otherwise. They might see something remote, alien and unsettling in it.

I may not understand it but that’s okay, too. So long as they feel something…

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Inner Perception, Redux

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on September 19, 2025| 2 Comments »

Inner Perception (2011)– Coming to Principle Gallery

I have sat here for quite some time this morning trying to write about some of the new work I have been producing for my October West End Gallery show or some that is headed with me to the Principle Gallery for my Gallery Talk there next Saturday.

I know that I am more than little distracted and anxious by what is happening in this country as we descend into outright authoritarianism. It sometimes seems trivial and foolhardy to talk about art and thought when the house is burning down around you.

But I also know that part of what I do is to create work and write about things that deal with coping with life and all its travails. There is a need and a place for what this is in times like this.

I am time strapped now after sitting and ruminating here for so long. So, I am running an older post that deals a bit with an older piece, Inner Perception, shown above, that I am bringing next week to the Gallery Talk at the Principle Gallery. Every so often I like to break out and make available a vintage piece or two. This has been a personal favorite for a long time now and I felt it was time to let it find a place where it could be viewed with fresher eyes than mine.

Here the post from 2014:

This is a painting from a few years back that has toured around a bit and found its way back to me. Called Inner Perception, it has been one of my favorites right from the moment it came off my painting table. Maybe the inclusion of the the paint brush (even though it is a house painter’s brush) with red paint in the bristles makes it feel more biographical, more directly connected to my own self. Or maybe it was the self-referential Red Tree painting on the wall behind the Red Chair.

I don’t know for sure. But whatever the case, it is a piece that immediately makes me reflective, as though it is a shortcut to some sort of inner sanctum of contemplation.

Looking at it this morning, a question I was asked at a Gallery Talk I gave at the Principle Gallery a week or so ago re-emerged.

I was asked what advice I might give my fifth-grade self if I had the opportunity.

I had answered that I would tell myself to believe in my own unique voice, to believe in the validity of what I had to say to the world.

I do believe that, but I think I might add a bit to that answer, saying that I would tell my younger self to be patient and not worry about how the world perceives you. That if you believed that your work was reflecting something genuine from within, others would come to see it eventually.

I would also add to never put your work above the work of anyone else and, conversely, never put your work beneath that of anyone else. I would tell myself to always ask “Why not me?” instead of “Why me?”

This realization came to me a couple of years ago at my exhibit at the Fenimore Art Museum. When it first went up it was in a gallery next to one that held the work of the great American Impressionists along with a painting from Monet. I was greatly intimidated, worrying that my work would not stand the muster of being in such close proximity to those painters who I had so revered over the years. Surely the greatness of their work would show me to be a pretender.

But over the course of the exhibit, that feeling faded and the intimidation I had initially felt turned to a type of defiant determination. I began to ask myself that question: Why not me?

If my work was genuine, if it was true expression of my inner self and inner perceptions, was it any less valid than the work of these other painters? Did they have some greater insight of which I was not aware, something that made their work deeper and more connected to some common human theme? If, as I believe, everyone has something unique to share with the world, why would my expression of self not be able to stand along their own?

The answer to my question was in my own belief in the work and by the exhibit’s end I was no longer doubting my right to be there. So, to my fifth-grade self and to anyone who faces self-doubt about the path they have chosen, I say that if you know you have given it your all, shown your own unique self, then you must ask that question: Why not me?

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Three Rules/ Oh What a Beautiful World

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , on August 29, 2025| 2 Comments »

The Call of Wonder– At Principle Gallery

Three Rules of Work:

Out of clutter find simplicity; From discord find harmony; In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.

–Albert Einstein

This Einstein fellow is a pretty smart guy.

Simplification, harmony and opportunity could be ingredients for any recipe to success in any field, but I think they apply particularly well to the creative arts. I know that I can easily apply these three rules to my own work.

For me, its strength lies in its ability to transmit through simplification and harmony. The forms are often simplified versions of reality, shedding details that don’t factor into what it is trying to express.

There is often an underlying texture in the work that is chaotic and discordant. The harmonies in color and form painted over these create a tension, a feeling of wholeness in the work. A feeling of finding a pattern in the chaos that makes it all seem sensible.

And the final rule–opportunity lying in the midst of difficulty– is perhaps the easiest to apply. The best work always seems to rise from the greatest depths, those times when the mind has to move from its normal trench of thought. Times when one has to expand beyond the known ways of doing things and find new solutions and methods to move the message ahead.

The difficulties of life are often great but there is almost always an opportunity or lesson to be found within them if only we are able to take a deep breath and see them. These lessons always find their way into the work in some way.

Thanks for the thought, Mr. Einstein. I hear good things about the work you’re doing.

I run theses Three Rules from Einstein every couple of years and it felt like the right time since I think we are all looking for simplicity, harmony, and opportunity in our own lives. Plus, I am short on time this morning. I am going to embellish a bit with two other favorite quotes from Mr. Einstein and a newer version of the wizened wisdom of Oh What a Beautiful World from the ageless Willie Nelson and Rodney Crowell, who wrote and first recorded the song in 2014.

Here are those words from Einstein:

The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.

———–

“People like you and I, though mortal of course like everyone else, do not grow old no matter how long we live. What I mean is we never cease to stand like curious children before the great Mystery into which we were born.”

–Albert Einstein, Letter to Otto Juliusburger, September 29, 1942

And what a mystery it is…

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