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Posts Tagged ‘Ralph Waldo Emerson’

Moonlight Revelation

Posted in Quote, Recent Paintings, tagged , , , , on July 1, 2014| 3 Comments »

GC Myers- Moonlight RevelationThe revelation of thought takes men out of servitude into freedom.
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-Ralph Waldo Emerson
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When I look at this  new painting, a 24″ by 24″ canvas, it gives me a sense of conscious dreaming, of  taking those deepest  and largest internal wishes and making them known to the world, bringing them into the realm of possibility.  I think there’s something potent in the idea of this sort of imagining, of seeing oneself in different circumstances, in different lights.  It sets courses and opens windows of possibility.  It unsettles us and stirs change.
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It also makes me wonder how this sort of dreaming changes over the course of our lives,  I know as a child I was always immersed in daydreams that took me to far-reaching places under the wildest of circumstances.  Yet while I still daydream, as an adult my dreams have changed and become far more limited and smaller in scope, much less expansive than they were in my youth.  Perhaps it is a product of pure practicality, of having realized my own limitations and what is possible for the person I believe myself to be.  Or maybe my desires have have lessened by virtue of  simple acceptance and comfort in the present.
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When do we lose the capacity for the large dreams of childhood?  Is it when the world loses some of that sense of wonder that came with the fresh eyes of youth?  Is it possible to imagine unlimited possibilities when the sight of a bright and full moon rising fails to inspire you?
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Maybe that’s what I see here, a recapturing of that wonder in seeing the moon and all that is possible under its gaze.
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This painting, Moonlight Revelation, will be at the West End Gallery as part of my solo show there, Layers, which opens July 25.

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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

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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…

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High Sign

Posted in Influences, Quote, Recent Paintings, tagged , , , , , on March 10, 2013| 2 Comments »

GC Myers -High Sign Every natural fact is a symbol of some spiritual fact.

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

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I think I understand what Emerson is getting at with these words.  I know that when I look around I often see juxtapositions of natural elements– trees and stone and water and sky– which move me in ways that I can never fully explain.  Some fill me with inspiration.  Some with a sense of wonder  and great calmness.  Peaceful unity with the world.  And, with some, a sense of foreboding, a dread of the inevitable valleys that accompany all peaks.  Even those scenes which make me feel as being “in the moment” resonate because they have some underlying  connection to a deeper strand of thought or being.

I think it’s this sense of this symbology that fills in some of the gaps in my work, that gives it a little more depth than the surface offers.  I know that it is this greater sense of being that I am trying to capture in my work, hoping that perhaps others who feel this same type of  innate symbolism in the natural world  somehow sense it and connect with it.

I think this newer piece, High Sign (6″ by 10″ on paper), is a good example of this.  It is a simple scene but, for me, is filled with symbolism.  Some is obvious and some subtle.   The tree and it’s position on the mound against the graded sky is obvious as is the road that winds through.  Less obvious are the upward pointing arrows of the houses’ peaks and the light and shadows of their walls.

The odd thing is that it’s not something I think about when I am painting the piece.  It’s all about achieving a sense of rightness in each move in the painting.  Each move is  step forward and if I can maintain  that feeling of rightness throughout the process, generally the painting will have this added depth, this layer of symbolism.  It comes of its own accord, naturally.   And I guess that the way it should be.

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Amiel’s Journal Intime

Posted in Favorite Things, Influences, Quote, tagged , , , , on April 11, 2012| 1 Comment »

The man who insists upon seeing with perfect clearness before he decides, never decides. Accept life, and you must accept regret.

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One of the great things about the cyberworld is the ability to find the work, either in image or words, of those people that might easily go unnoticed in the past.  You can now come across a few words or images that intrigue  you and within moments have access to a world of information about the writer or artist.  Such was the case recently when I stumbled upon a few quotes from the writer of the words above and  shown in the portrait above, Henri-Frederic Amiel. 

Born in 1821, Amiel was a Swiss professor, poet and writer who died in 1881, leaving no major marks on the world before his death.  Although esteemed, his poetry was not celebrated and he made no major breakthroughs as a professor of moral philosophy in his time.  It was after his death that Amiel began to live on in the form of a personal journal that he kept from the 1840’s until the time of his death.  Called the Journal Intime, it is a wondeful inner exploration of the man, exposing a depth of thought apllied to universal truths.  His words, written over 150 years ago in many cases, seem as fresh and as true today as then, a fact that made the Journal Intime a timeless classic  in much the same manner as the essays of Ralph Waldo Emerson. 

However, despite its acclaim after it posthumous publishing, the book has faded from the modern consciousness  and may not grace the shelves of many libraries.  But thanks to the online world, it is a book that is now readily available to those wishing to read these thoughtful words.  It is available on most book sites and is available free at a number of sites including Project Gutenberg.

So many of the quotes that have been pulled from the Journal Intime ring true for today, including those that could be applied to subjects that are hotly debated in this country such as healthcare and taxation of the richest of us:

In health there is freedom. Health is the first of all liberties.
Sacrifice still exists everywhere, and everywhere the elect of each generation suffers for the salvation of the rest.

I was probably drawn to his words by two that said what I have said for some time.

The great artist is the simplifier.

Learn to… be what you are, and learn to resign with a good grace all that you are not.

The Journal itself is not an easy read.  It is a winding road through the life of one man and doesn’t always reveal its truths quickly.  So if you wish to quickly absorb some of Amiel’s aphorisms, I suggest checking out his pages at BrainyQuote or ThinkExist.

Good stuff…

 
 

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