New work

It's been awhile but I promise I've been working. I did finish my holiday card piece and I have a couple of things with potential. For now I'll post something I started this Thanksgiving holiday. It's not finished but I think I like it so far.

Untitled. Acrylics on canvas. 36 x 20 I think

Wash away the detritus

I woke this morning nervous, edgy and still hopeful. All objective evidence points to repudiation of the last 8 years and an awakening to a better day.

On my way to work in a dark drizzle, I was struck by the reds, yellows and oranges of the fall maples and the contrast of the fallen leaves on the green carpet of the lawns. I noticed the rain washing away the dirt and grime and had this deep feeling that it represented a stripping of evil and hubris from the American soul.

I was born in Jackson, Mississippi and grew up in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The Jackson newspaper, the Clarion-Ledger, has endorsed Barack Obama. Baton Rouge, I hope, will re-elect an African-American mayor. The times they are a changing.

I did not believe I would see the day when 68 million or so Americans would vote for a black man for president. And tonight I will watch with tears streaming down my face if the polls and the pundits are correct and we elect Senator Barack Obama the President of the United States.

Oh yeah and go vote dammit!

An epiphany

Karen bought me a book a while back, Musicophila by Oliver Sachs. It has sat on the shelf these many months.

Wanting something to read I picked it up today to find that it spoke to me deeply.

Sachs talks about people’s relationship to music. In Chapter 1 he describes people who were indifferent to music before some cataclysmic physical event, for example, Tony’s being struck by lightning or Salimah’s being prescribed LTG for her seizures.

This made me think back to my own epiphany about painting. I was dealing with depression and was barely able to keep things together. We tried several drugs along with therapy but nothing seemed to work. Then I started on Wellbutrin and began to see the world in an entirely new way. Keep in mind I’m 49, 47 then, and hadn’t painted since, well, never. Then I saw the Dada exhibit at the East Gallery and had my first and only panic attack.

I moved out from my family and my wife of 23 years into a furnished apartment of a grad student who had a summer internship at U Cal Berkeley. Every night, every night, I painted until 1 or 2 in the morning then woke to drive an hour to work, coming home only to start painting until 1 or 2 or 3 again. I lost 20+ pounds and I am a small guy to start with. I barely ate. Mostly I drew and painted – amateurish as it was.

I’ve wondered about this change in me and the day, in DC, when I saw the Dada exhibit that drove me over the edge. I had changed somehow, fundamentally, going from being a boy to a man, from being to blind to seeing, from a world of black and white to one of color. And I think, this is what Sachs is talking about.

Politics and Art

Our present political environment scares the shit out of me. I started out my art with political pieces that reflected my anger and depression. Since then I moved away from the political, not because I'm no longer angry, but because I could no longer find inspiration from my anger. I may or may not go back to the political and may or may not find my muse there. The anger remains no matter.

Bush, Cheney, et al continue in their goal to create an Orwellian America. Those leopards won't change their spots, but I had hopes that McCain wasn't the same sort of leader. Alas I was wrong. "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss." I'm not so sure we won't get fooled again.

You may have seen this detail of my 2006 piece The Medusa Leaders or Orwell Just Got the Year Wrong in which I quote George Orwell, "In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act."

Sign me an agnostic who is praying for this world and country.

Valasquez and El Greco at the Nasher Duke Museum

We went to the big "El Greco to Velázquez: Art during the Reign of Philip III" exhibition that just started at the still relatively new Nasher Museum at Duke U.

The El Greco's and Velázquez's were (mostly) wonderful and sometimes breathtaking. Pieces like the El Greco Fray Hortensio Felix Paravencino and Argote avoid all of things I disliked in many of the minor pieces. Dislikes? Well, the religious imagery weirds me out, the use of the odd and out of place details in the outer edges of the pieces makes no sense, and the painting of children so that they look like bizarre small adults is creepy. I was impressed with some of the Maino pieces and the Cotan still lifes.

El Greco's St James (Santiago el Mayor) shown below with its rich green cloak and lovely long hand was my favorite.