ArtHouse23

Moved by a myriad of characters, fine acting and resonant stories, a week at the Oregon Shakespeare sends hearts and minds to places which can be hard to frequent in our day to day. Hungry for comprehension of how these worlds of wonder come about, the post play actor talk-back opens doors to enhanced understanding.

Every actor from every play, whether authored by the Marx Brothers or by Shakespeare, begins the discussion explaining the director’s and the design team’s emphasis on “how to tell the story”. It’s the story that matters. It connects the audience to the playwright, to the artists, to history, to other cultures and to each other.

We need stories. They have power. They open us in ways we may not understand or even notice right away but we feel it. And they change us.

Storytelling is done with dance, music and with painting, as well as with words. We all long to tell a story that means something to us–that shares our values and beliefs and our visions. Their creation is self-reflection. Their acceptance is validation.

Part of the painting process is about our search for a story that can be told visually and the means by which to tell it—color, shape, line, brush technique, etc. I believe that the best of this comes at an unconscious level, by following urges and instincts. Awareness of reaction plays a part.

Paying attention to how shape and color and the quality of a line support the message will assist. A terrific book, Picture This by Molly Bang tells “how pictures work”—how shapes, color and composition make us feel the way things look. “Why does a triangle make us feel stable, while diagonal lines give a sense of tension?” CHECK IT OUT: http://www.nhsdesigns.com/pdfs/graphic_ss_picture-this.pdf .

With this info in the back of your mind and the concept of notan that was discussed in the last blog/class, address works in progress or start something knew. We’ll bat around ideas as needed.

Arthur Wesley Dow—“If a composition has a soul, then the notan is the doorway to that soul. The greatest gift the notan gives us is access to the underlying energies that drive a composition. Thus, learning about the notan teaches us to be better composers.”

Dow was a renowned art teacher at the Art Students League in New York where he taught the likes of Georgia O’Keefe and Max Weber, among others, including photographer Alfred Stieglitz. He was considered a most influential teacher who showed his students how to translate the poetry of nature into dynamic compositions

He wrote several books on art, understanding art and design. His most respected title was Composition:Understanding Line, Notan and Color (Dover Art Instruction)

The idea of notan comes from a Japanese word meaning light and dark harmonies. It can often be seen in the famous Japanese woodblock prints from the late 19^th century. (http://www.aristidesatelier.com/system/files/styles/large/private/Tsunami_by_hokusai_19th_C-728779%5B1%5D.jpg?itok=JaCk5gUp ) The yin-yang, a Chinese symbol, is the simplest demonstration of notan and it’s very meaning, expressing the dualism of existence, is a clue to the meaning of notan. The light cannot exist without the dark and vice versa.

Lights and darks, darks and lights, lights and darks—could you hear anything more frequently when discussing your artwork? There’s a reason for that. Being able to simplify the complex combination of shapes that make up our environment (and your two-dimensional picture plane) affords greater composition mastery. The concept of notan reduces light and dark to its most basic form.  Every dark defines a light in a composition and every light defines a dark, giving image to form and shape.

We’ve done an exercise that was essentially notan, so this isn’t totally new. (I was unfamiliar with the term then, even though I was familiar with Dow.) Now we’ll revisit and combine. Recall the Beverly paintings. She painted many evocative shapes with luscious colors that were mostly mid-tones. If you can see the shapes in your mind’s eye and divide them into only black and white, can you imagine the image? Can you “move” the composition by switching the darks and lights?

We’re going to play with this concept a little with some video, etc. this week.  Then choose either to proceed with works  in progress, including any unsatisfactorily resolved  Beverly pieces. Or you can develop something new with notan—or both.

Notan-beauty means the harmony resulting from the combination of dark and light spaces…whether in buildings, in pictures, or in nature. Arthur Wesley Dow. Here is a link to some small sketches by Dow.  These are master works he’s reduced to “notan”: http://rozwoundup.typepad.com/.a/6a01053560de5d970b010536160109970b-popup

What informs? When creating, sources can be anything. (Think various artists–Warhol, Cezanne, Van Gogh, Matisse, Degas, Stella, Sherman, Rothko, Whistler—everyone,  not necessarily in that order) It’s how you choose, filter, combine, edit.  It’s how you let the senses overlap and how emotions become part of the dabs and dots, lines and shapes.  It’s how color washes over you and your work or how the lack of it says what needs to be said.

Is it the fresh burst of the cherry trees outside the studio that makes your chest swell or the withered leaf blown behind shed? Perhaps it’s the smile of your grandchild— or grandmother. Maybe it’s that horse you rode in a dream or the sun on water or on that building on the hill across the river, or the idea that corporate greed is unjust, or that Diana Nyad can swim from Cuba to Florida (http://www.ted.com/talks/diana_nyad_never_ever_give_up) .  Or maybe it’s Cuba? Or Florida?  It’s bound to be different at different times. Discovery can come as a complete surprise. Awareness is key.

Contemporary artist known for ‘recycling’ found bits, John Balderssari: “The art is about getting to the heart of the matter.” (http://www.baldessari.org/)

How do we get to the heart of the matter is one question and how we communicate it is another.

Tolstoy—“ To evoke in oneself a feeling one has once experienced… then, by means of movements, lines, colors, sounds, or forms expressed…. to transmit that feeling that others may experience the same feeling — this is the activity of art.”

So with some awareness, some recycling, some feelings experienced and already expressed by a fellow-artist AND collaboration we are going to work on composition, which is the structure of visual communication. Collage may be an excellent option so tuck a few things in your bag or search the collage box when you come into the studio. Consider subject ideas knowing you will be working in teams of two. Ponder what gets to the heart of the subject. I (and dear friend Beverly) will provide the initial substrate. You and your partner will provide the energy, insight, and evolution for an effective composition by merging ideas and elements.  The course of the activity for some may be shorter than for others so plan for that. Those anxious to get to work on other things will likely have some time after the exercise.

Is your language blue–Peacock hues tinged with yellow shifting to emerald and other greens? Do you see crystalline skies of cerulean and cobalt? Do you swim in cool aquiline waters, flickering with turquoise?  Or do you speak of storms in Prussian and violet and black made from burnt bones?

Does red, the juicy color, sink into your consciousness—the flashing lights of cadmium, or cake cherries staining fuchsia? Or do you ring round russet barns encircled by flaming autumn? Have you known the dark, sticky red and purple of blood? Or do pink flamingo feathers float through your personal jet stream along with waving flags?

Do you hang onto sunbeams that filter through your eyelashes and spill onto the canvas followed by dandelion petals and lemons? Does golden light haunt your dreams? Or are the slivers of energy from honey skies sprinkled on your cereal and pound cake?

Do you tell stories in line, caressing the arch of a hip or the tendrils of spring peas?  Or do you declare your philosophies carving into ground with palette knives or layering smears of transparencies with trowels and fingers?  Does black, black, black charcoal trickle throughout your paintings, smudging the light? Do thick, wet slabs of paint tell your tale?  Perhaps you prefer rough staccato dots to reach your conclusions?

Flowery descriptions perhaps, but the hope is that one or more of them pricked something familiar to remind or inform you what it is that makes a viewer know your work. We have a visual language we come to know. And although it may be cross-pollinated with others,  it becomes unique by what we choose to utilize most.  Our choices (once we become aware we are making choices) of  color, size, scale, surface, technique, tools and subject reflect our sensibilities and in turn shape our statement.

An illustration from another context–

Keith Chen, an economist at Yale University, theorizes that  languages’ different devices play a large part in shaping a culture and a society. For example native speakers of English,  a language in which there is a future tense, are more inclined  to save less for retirement and be more obese than their Mandarin-speaking counterparts because the future tense conveys a sense that consequences for actions are far in the future. In contrast languages in which verbs are always in the present tense, like Mandarin, convey a greater sense of urgency resulting in different outcomes. (Chens research shows Mandarin speakers save 39% more than English speakers by retirement age.)

Whether we believe this correlation or not, visual language holds a similar power to shape the artist’s statement.  Drips opposed to blends. Reds opposed to yellows.  Large opposed to small.  Etc. We may make the choices at random, but they tell your tale regardless of the consideration you give them–work to understand and then exploit them. Let your visual language lead your imagination.  Don’t be afraid that your work looks different–it’s supposed to.

The Winter Olympian– Rattling down an ice tube at 80 miles an hour, sometimes face-first. Or—flying through the air twisting, convulsing, strapped to 5 ft long boards. Or– landing on one 4 inch wide plank from dizzying heights.  Or–Speeding on an edge that tends one way then the other reaching up to 37 miles an hour on one’s own power. Then there are those that add dance and poetry to similar feats.

The expense and decades of incredible training, bodies sacrificed and broken and then repaired only to fight again is almost inconceivable to me.  Some of the athletes know they will come in last or close to it.  And some who hope to stand on the podium fall short by as little as 4/100ths of a second.  How do they even measure that?

It is grandiose to think that are small squares and rectangles can be discussed in context of the Olympian.  But the examples set by these crazy people, or heroes, or ordinary folks who like to test themselves are something that can—just maybe–push discouragement away after a bad painting day.  Maybe, as a creative adventurer, knowing that so many people risk so much simply for the sheer, (pardon the pun) exercise of it, trying new or questionable techniques will come easier.  And maybe there will be less self-criticism and more pride-for-trying when they don’t pan out

The Olympic Creed: “The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well.”

To fight on again this week for the perfect balance between finesse and aggression–works in progress.

Routine.  Commitments.  Demands.  Expectations.  Results. Our days are intentionally built on these. They make sense–we get stuff done. But remove them and see what else can happen. Easy exploration. No guilt. Creative problem solving.  Quiet looking.  And still—results.

SNOW DAYS!! A chance to surrender.

This past weekend relinquishing control of schedule left lots of room for the things at the top of my values list.  It facilitated being in the now, unable to be busy with the usual.  Options were removed so predicted paths could not be followed.  Being fortunate to be warm and dry with food in the fridge, there were no worries. The “set-up” was good so reacting, not planning, was possible.  Not thinking about even the immediate future was freeing.

Once again, surrender echoes the prime sensibility for creating.  With space, materials, subject and time, you can set: an idea; a collection of marks; glops of paint; a collage piece; etc. in motion and let involvement in the experience, not the outcome, be the focus.  That’s the favorite aspect of the “Follow the Leader” exercise. It takes away the control so you can just enjoy the experience and let it lead you into the unexpected. Of course, the unexpected can lead to a mess of mud and leave you lost.  But in the process of finding your way out of that mess, discovery comes to light.

Actor Mathew  McConaughey,  in an interview discussing his decision to risk unemployment in order to accept only acting roles that would allow him to grow and provide meaning, says:  “I’ve been choosing the experience, and I’ve been loving the experience of it, and I’ve noticed that if I stick to the process and love the process and what I’m doing, head down, but not thinking about results…. more results are coming my way.”

Valuing the experience without looking toward the results is the most assured way of getting results that resonate. So this week let’s pretend it’s a “snow day” and surrender. Make it interesting by letting go of outcomes and doing things you’ve never done. Pull out underpaintngs or fresh substrates and with simply an attitude of “what-if”  love  the process.

For first half of my life “blue” was the answer to the magazine-quiz question “What’s your favorite color?”  Blue–soothing aqua, with its underwater weightlessness. Blue–cerulean to cobalt, hinting at infinity, unless a wayward cloud drifts by, the deeper the blue the more straight-up the gaze: traveling, traveling, traveling. Deep Prussian blue—a backdrop to the stars. Notice how the color blue seems to somehow relate to defying gravity? It’s of the heavens and of deep mysteries. Locked in ice it’s mesmerizing. Being surrounded by it is peaceful.

For the first bedroom of my own I chose powder blue. Rich, blue velvet was the fabric I chose for my self-crafted prom dress. Blue eye shadow-definitely. The song Blue by Joni Mitchell was my early-twenties anthem.  My first new car was Ice Blue and my first brand new sofa was navy. The only jewel that ever made me swoon was a sapphire. When we “had our colors done” in the ‘80’s I was told to wear blue.

Blue soothed. But I grew tired of it. Now you’d be hard-pressed to find blue anywhere in my life (except in my wardrobe—apparently the color the Color-Me-Beautiful people were right). Red and green and yellow and pink and pumpkin are all around.  I’ve resisted working with it for years until I forced myself to start using the tubes drying in my bin. Painting the paintings for  the play Red, I learned how blue glazes could deepen and neutralize those unlimited Rothko reds. It really contributed to the rich, velvety depth of surface.  Blue is now teaching me about quiet and fluidity.

Around 600AD artist’s started painting with Ultramarine blue ground from semi-precious lapis lazuli.  The Italian was translated to mean “blue from beyond the sea.”  Isn’t that just the word blue suggests?– Beyond. Reds and yellow—much easier to come by.  Iron is more plentiful in the earth and plants relinquish their color with less effort than the hard stone.  Costlier than gold, blue was color reserved for the Virgin Mary.

There is debate about what a warm blue is and what a cool blue is.  But if you unwind the color wheel and realize that color is determined by the length of light waves, it’s clear that the pthalos, those sliding toward yellow, are the warmer blues and ultramarine, headed to violets, the shortest wavelength in the spectrum, are cool.

Winter may be the time for blue.  As a primary, they cannot be made, you have to buy blue. But play with mixing blues to practice unearthly results—try pthalo turquoise and nickel azo yellow, or ultramarine blue with quinacradone magenta. Combine them in the same painting to increase harmony but add interest. Test the boundaries of blue.  Get to know different meanings of being “blue”.

Our past studio—industrial– LOUD, squealing trains; overpass and docked cargo ships just the other side of the grain elevator, etc.  A gardener maintained a serene space behind corrugated tin—a slice of charm.

That last summer the garden spilled to the parking strip. Something tall and tropical shot up casting shadows on the clapboard, gray wall.  Pods nestling orange buttons stood erect. A radiated mantis from a subtitled, ‘B’ movie came to mind.  As the west light began to retreat late in the season the stalks started to droop, eventually crackling in the wind. Orange turned to Van Dyke brown, green to Naples yellow.

The stems were even more compelling dry than they were fresh and fleshy in living color. Curvaceous, paper-thin forms curled around a collection of still tightly-bound seeds. Stick straight stalks splayed this way then that, some see-through, some lay in layers– they rattled rhythms when carried across the room.  Then there were the multiple curly bits that hung in clusters from scarecrow bent elbows.

Sheila brought one into the studio.  Everyone painted it–me, Sheila, Angelina, Beverly.  It was/is seductive when close.  Its entire life stays evident in the dried remains.  The forms are beautiful.

This “dead thing” has been pinned to the studio wall for close to ten years.  But every now and again…

I moved it eye level right next to my canvas and began to render it large on the four-foot square. Using a very soft (9B) graphite stick I “watched” it closely and responded—some marks swooped through the space like a soaring bird, others fell strait and hard like rain.  Depending on the music, the little buttons were formed with ticker tape, staccato stabs, or tight, obsessive circles, or delicate figure-eights caressing each other—orange then brown then orange.  I could smell the sun that dried the thing and smiled at the memory of that gritty, beloved building—my arm went wide across the canvas.  Sometimes the squealing metal on metal memory sliced through a negative shape zigzagging towards the edges.

The marks were good, expressive– some made with deep pressure squeezing the graphite into the tooth. Others were faint as to not disturb the delicate parched forms.  My hand, tool, surface and subject all danced. Not a bad start, but the nature of the long, thin object filled two sides of the picture plane leaving the middle almost blank. A repeat pattern perhaps?—it wasn’t conscious but railroad tracks emerged to unite the two sides of the painting. It worked, for now.

The point of all of these adjectives is to illustrate that our subject can have a life. It can begin to breathe, to tell a story, a story to which we react and of which we become a part–even if we are looking only at a dried weed. The story will be different for every person.  But if we connect to what we see, if we allow ourselves to get swept up in its energy, the marks become a conduit for something that may not be named, but may have meaning that can be seen and felt. Marks that connect to others.  Marks that can be made by the one and only you.

Facing the studio after not. Partial paintings intrigue. Sort of.  What shall they be? No clue. No ideas. Blocked.

Facing dinner in the morning. ( I hate making dinner at dinnertime. ) Pork loin thawed—pulled pork? Green chilies, tortillas and Mexican cheese?  Black, beans-Cuban? No.  No mushrooms either.  Ah, frozen fruit for a berry glaze—hmm. Cut loin into chops, brown.

A tired painting becomes the recipient of leftover paints from discarded, wet palettes.  Yours, mine, doesn’t matter.  Smash. Squeeze, d-r-a-a-g-g.  Attempting some good bones.  Oooo, what does this new tool do?  Striations—could it be rock face?  I don’t know yet!!

An onion sautéed in butter can go any direction and is always delicious.  So far, browned pork loin chops and sautéed onions.  Tomato sauce? Balsamic reduction glaze? Wine? Raisins and Couscous? Hmmm, this cauliflower needs cooked. Blanch it add to onions. Slivered almonds, perhaps?

No ideas?—glaze it!  Glazing unifies the surface and the color and depth of the glaze sets a mood.  It can drown out the mud.  This red ink is so seductive.  Looks pink–darn! Not exactly what I was going for.  Yellow will give me orange, warmth-of-the-sun-colors.  Do I see tree trunks or sky?  How to create balance?  Is the delicious surface enough?  No. That damn horizon line–why am I married to it!?  Is that ok? Is it boring?  Or does it amalgamate?

A little white wine left in a bottle and some pesto—a Christmas gift, better use it. A direction emerges. Pork loin chops rubbed with garlic, browned; sautéed onions and cauliflower in brown butter. Deglaze with white wine. No chilies, no raisins no fruit, but aromatic pesto …and maybe balsamic still.   Add great white northerns for health, or arugula ravioli (Otis bought, when?) for taste, or both?  Stir fry the broccolini with fresh garlic. Forget the beans.

Dinner sits in a pot in the fridge waiting for the studio time to leave me exhausted.

All that orange needs some blue, its compliment—or does it?   I like the moody sky.  Storm brewing always gets me.  When I was very little lightening divided a tree in half in our front yard.  My dad told me that thunder was two clouds bumping into each other.  I liked/like both notions.   I wasn’t scared, just curious.

Just curious. A hundred answers to “what if?” No one is right, only different, leading to different outcomes.  Being an artist allows for exploration without much risk. (Making dinner is riskier.) It’s only paper.  Or canvas that can be painted over and over. There’s room for uncertainty in the practice.  Being in that state of ambiguity can be uncomfortable, but it’s good exercise.  Staying curious keeps us engaged– asking questions and trying on many answers is one of the perks of the process.  It allows you to let go of the need to “get it right” and just ask “what if?”

A New Year, a clean slate—time for a recap, a visit to ye ole stand-by ideas, but ideas that keep fresh the intent of the creative spirit.

Starting with the lessons Robert Henri (pronounced Hen-rye), who was a beloved and influential teacher of the early 20^th century.  His students at the New York School of Art included the renown: Joseph Stella, Edward Hopper, Rockwell Kent, George Bellows and Stuart Davis, among others. At the encouragement of his followers he published a book of his teachings entitled The Art Spirit, which has been in a handy spot on my bookshelf for the last 25 years. The book is a collection of wisdoms, easy to pick up for a quick insight.

A few quotes to re-point the direction for 2014:

The object, which is back of every true work of art, is the attainment of a state of being, a state of high functioning, a more than ordinary moment of existence. In such moments activity is inevitable, and whether this activity is with brush, pen, chisel, or tongue, its result is but a by-product of the state, a trace, the footprint of the state.

This is ultimately the goal of painting for me.  What it feels like to do it. Those moments when being lost in a focus is palpable, when the energy waves in the room hit a certain frequency that calms the mind and lifts the soul–those  are really the reward of the doing.  It is indeed a state of “high functioning”.

No work of art is ever really finished, they stop at good places.

It is helpful to remember this idea.  “When do you know it’s done?” is a frequently asked question.  I once read an artist’s response: “When I’ve learned all I can from it.” Not a bad answer either.  I usually put a work up for a long while and if it still interests me when I’m not really paying attention and nothing bugs me, I’ll consider it “done”.

An artist’s job is to surprise himself. Use all means possible.

For me a painting is a record of an encounter rather than a record of a subject. The encounter is with something that evokes emotion for any number of reasons.  The whole idea of encounter, by definition, implies action and reaction.  It is most often unplanned, unexpected. It isn’t passive. I think of painting as engagement and the job of an artist is to become and remain engaged.  When you find yourself laboriously filling in the picture plane with imagery that really doesn’t interest you, it’s time to shake things up.  That’s one of the reasons people like the “follow the leader” exercise.  It allows one to stay in a reaction mode—to be surprised—to employ honest, active responses.

And lastly—

The object isn’t to make art, it’s to be in that wonderful state which makes art inevitable.

Full circle.  It speaks for itself.