Not Alone

My landscapes may appear empty. I have fielded the disquiet felt by some viewers: Have you thought about painting people working in their gardens? Do you need someone to take pictures of? Please don't ruin this sunset by telling me how sad you were when you painted it.  To those of you feeling the ache: how can I be of service? Would you like a side of human form with that day break? 

While there may be no people in the Skylines series, I haven't left out life: telephone poles lean in to gossip; a stoic tower stands sentry; fence posts shuffle off in their labor; grasses party like it's 1999; trees huddle in to watch the end of a day. 

I'll paint you a picture of what I think is real loneliness. It always uses some shade of these words: You'll never understand me; or I don't understand you.  Then, a wash of silence. The silence is key here: when no one is saying, Well, tell me more, I want to try.  Only one thing happens in that quiet: the ballooning of space. Our gut is punched, our breath expelled, and someone across the couch is already a million miles away.  THAT is the bleakest of landscapes: there, two fleeting lives, either pushing away or being pushed.  There's no looking back. 

Maybe the opposite of loneliness is the ability to keep looking, to not blink; can we look into the lightening flash of another's life long enough to find a connection? Despite our fears, can we not flinch and recoil? I might feel blinded and terrified and dizzy, but will I stop and ask for directions to your place? I would so like to go there to see how you are. 

My landscapes are full of human life: my life.  I only paint what I know, and I paint with the belief that what I know is not so different from what everyone else knows: some bit of joy and a some bit of grief; some sense of place and some wandering; some sense of belonging, and yes, some loneliness too.   

This week a friend embraced me with these words: you are not alone.  It was just what I needed to remind me that someone, more than one actually, is with me. In fact, when I rubbed my eyes I was really glad to see that the field I was standing in was theirs as much as it was mine. Well, here I am with you, and you with me.  Our landscapes are not empty. 

Canola Field. 2015. Oil on panel. 22 x 12 inches.  The day I painted this piece I was not alone. During the painting I took several breaks to spread manure, a most inspiring chore- why, if not for hope and longing of enrichment, would one bother?; I conversed with someone who was intrigued by what and why I was painting;  I conversed with another person who thought that I shouldn't lose my day job. But, I was not alone. It was was late spring. I felt like I was stretching my roots down into a place of warmth while being drawn up into the light of human interest. I originally called this painting "A Growing Joy". 

Hey Punk, Join the Jazz Band

Terry and I heated one winter night with a conversation about how to really make “interesting art”. He defined this category as one requiring the artist to “just go wild”. He detailed examples of works that he feels are successful and how they contain random insertions, juxtapositions, methods and images that contradict and challenge.  Sure, little old me with my pink sunsets got a little defensive.  

To be honest I entered into the conversation with guns ablaze, having been fired up by reading this article by Adam Gopnick about sociologist Howard Becker's theories of social deviants. I felt far, far away from being as cool as a Deviant and rather more like a Novitiate, crawling on my knees into the artistic world. I am currently holding a begging bowl trying to prove my worth, wanting to be granted a coveted identity and perhaps some monetary reward; being a bit obsequious; taking a few requests; leaning into humility. Gopnick says that “to enter [the art] field at all is possible for outsiders only if they learn to repeat the words that construct its values.”  I may be willing to mumble a guru's mantras and say three Hail Mary's, but let me be clear: I'm lying in wait. 

What came through this winter's conversation was a multitude of questions that influence the end product of an artist: who gets the title of "artist"?; who has the power to define what is "art"?; what is "interesting" vs. "novelty" vs. "aesthetically pleasurable"?; how do we value "novelty-based" art once the polish wears off?; what is the value of pure aesthetic pleasure?; is it possible still to make something "brand new"?

I used Becker's theories to argue that we have specific roles to play on whatever stage we act; there are rules to follow. As an striving artist, I defended the need to, at times, toe the line of “status quo” by making acceptable art. It feels to me that broad audiences don’t respect artists who can't also prove they have recognizable skill with their media before spitting on the rules and throwing in their wrenches. Sure, we'll talk about them, we give them our attention when startled- but strangeness doesn't have a lasting power in our brains.  We create long-standing meaning in our lives through context, and to have context "acceptability" and "respectability" come into play. Randomness and juxtaposition alone aren't that meaningful.

It seems to me that visual artists have to prove some mettle- and that usually means having some ability to parrot "Polly Wants A Cracker" a few times and step in line within the parade before beginning their delicately orchestrated secession. They might sweetly begin to harmonize, before leading a riff or insisting on an improv set; this happens before they can pause the track, scratch as the needle drags across the record, and shout out their own new song.

Becker might like my musical metaphor as he said, "Like reefer-smoking among jazz musicians, art making was not the business of solitary artists, inspired by visions, but a social enterprise in which a huge range of people played equally essential roles in order to produce an artifact that a social group decided to dignify as art."

Here's where my ideas of relying on others' for my title of "artist" is also supported by Becker's work. He writes: 

A ‘world’ as I understand it consists of real people who are trying to get things done, largely by getting other people to do things that will assist them in their project… The resulting collective activity is something that perhaps no one wanted, but is the best everyone could get out of this situation and therefore what they all, in effect, agreed to.

Becker spends a lot of time using a cinema metaphor for these interconnected relationships; that a movie is made through the teamwork of a myriad of people and their skills, resulting in an artwork that is an amalgamated vision. But what about people who strive daily in earnest towards perfection, and seemingly with little assistance? How about a housewife's efforts that are discovered at a garage sale, or a hermit's profound writings discovered posthumously? What of the person who cultivates ignorance so as to appear unbiased and independent? 

It feels like, looks like, is just like being alone- but what of the trail of choices we’ve followed? Who made the trail? Where does it lead behind and before us? How quickly and with what diversions will we choose to travel?  More to the point: what choices have we made, what choices have others made, to put us into these positions, influence our actions and our products? Personally, I feel at times like the American Beauty plastic bag: I am my own entity but certainly one under particular influences, or confluences of influences. 

So, I'm not able to don my sandwich board and stand on a street corner shouting: HOT OFF THE PRESS: THIS, MY, MINE ALONE! THIS MY NEW IDEA! I'm a part of a crowd who posits that extraordinary novelty only exists in a world that is regionalized, and narrowly contextualized. An impression of "newness" and "uniqueness" is created by having a perspective that is very limited historically and/or geographically. Babies are the only people who think for a brief time that "something comes from nothing"; they're the only ones honestly surprised around here!  As we age we are much more equipped and ready to see connections and equations, how things come about.  

Our increased awareness of what has been made around the world, how and why, means that there is often more likely a sense of "reference" or "appropriation". Case in point: the work of Europe's 19th and 20th century artists, from The Masters to the Cubist and Surrealist rebels, doesn't feel that surprising to contemporary viewers. We have an even broader understanding than those artists' own contemporaries of the larger contexts of their work, and even still we can greatly value and admire deeply their end results. What made these artists so special? What made their attempts feel so novel? The world was just about ready for their small twists to the game, and that's when the artists jumped in and said "Let's Play": their "talents" were a socially-acceptable amount of novelty.  Their genius has something to do with good timing. 

As a novelty spreads, its impact dims into the mundane. Likewise the wider and farther we look the greater number and variety of artists we have to acknowledge.  (Might that mean too, the title of "artist" isn't really that unique?) Today, mere pockets of extreme localism exists, except in certain American political parties and very isolated tribes, I dare say. Our narrowness is blown out by our global, instant connectedness, access to shared pots of resources, images, language, and values.  So, how shall we make "interesting" art?  Is "just going wild" just a way to manipulate attention?  And after we have the attention, what important thing shall we say with our work?

This Little Light of Mine

I was raised on many riffs through the gospel song, This Little Light of Mine*. It came to mind as I read John Lahr's recent profile of Julianne Moore ("The Sphinx Next Door". The New Yorker, September 21, 2015.).  In his essay he lifts a candle to shed the barest of light onto Moore's personality and artistic processes. Lahr details that Moore herself was the one who set limitations on what he could know; she is indeed shy of too much exposure as much of her work is internal and private, but she also doesn't want to ruin any of the wonder of it all for us. Paradoxically, Lahr reports that many of her coworkers and family members have a sense of Moore being particularly open, welcoming and awake to the world. This sense of balancing the flow between internal and external really resonates with me. 

Lahr notes in several places Moore's need for organization and visual clarity in her physical spaces and routines. He writes "Moore is fond of quoting Flaubert's dictum Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work."  The maintenance of sanity, children, and puppy are natural limitations for how clean I keep my home and what schedules I keep, but I also see a correlation to my ease in working with having my household in decent order.  If that sounds like a healthy attitude, then be sure to read this: some days I'd like to go frickin' OCD all over this hellhole.  

CR31, Orchard Shadows, detail.

Physical control of my space and time aside, I think the balance of internal and external worlds also plays out in my relationships with people.  I can easily see myself saying what Moore did to Lahr when he was watching her work: "I'm probably going to let you stay for, like, half an hour. I don't want you to get in my way. Because you will. You'll take up mental space, and I need to have focus." Blunt, eh? But, so perfect. I so desperately and deeply love people, and then, I want them to GO AWAY.  

Does that make you feel left out? Gosh, do you think I even have any friends left now? How does this attitude fit into a healthy, intimate relationship? From my perspective Moore's husband captures it, and respects it perfectly; in fact so perfectly that this quote is currently topping my list of Most Romantic Things Ever Said.  Here's Bart Freundlich describing a moment of falling in love with Moore when he still just her coworker and found her standing outside in the cold:

I came up to [Julianne] and stood with my back to the wind. I didn't want to put my arm around her, or smother her, because I didn't know her that well. Even though I couldn't have articulated it then, I understood that I could keep her warm up to a point. But then the rest was going to be for her to do.  We connected in that moment on an unspoken level, where she knew I saw that flame in her, and understood it, and was willing not to suffocate it but to protect it.

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CR31 Orchard Shadows. 2015. Oil on Panel. 18 x 24 inches.

If you're like me, when you're done fanning your face, adding that quote to your own list with the same hash tag, and wiping away adolescent-era tears of "Finally, someone gets me", think about how well Freundlich's attitude applies to treating anything we deeply love:  our children; the products of our work; anything precious and needing a life of its own. If you're thinking what I'm thinking this would be an excellent time to reference Sting and his own ditty, "If Your Love Somebody Set Them Free". But I'll end with something less poetic: when we love best we let that little light shine! 

*Is there anything more American than this little ditty celebrating self-righteousness and independence?! If you aren't familiar with it, and/or need to put a little Spring(stein) in your step today, let this version shine!

Stand

Who surrounds you? Who has brought you up? Ok, ok, don't mock me.  Don't feign surprise that my great cloud of witnesses is a group of very, very strong women.  Not a Biblical scholar, but a Silviculturist perhaps? My stand is a cohort of uneven-age and undetermined crown percent; a perfect . Most of these women, decades my senior, are total ragers. Yes, they party: jazz, color, rave passion.

If by "that good night" you mean "domesticated bliss", then no, THESE women, these women DO NOT go gently into that good night.  And for my life, I thank them! They stand as testament, those whose lives yet may have forked no lightening they/Do not got gentle into that good night. And to Dylan Thomas and all other men who, like my dad*, can live with the lack of gentleness, I also thank you. Thank you for standing/withstanding.  

*who was a Forestry teacher nonetheless.

In a Perverse Way

Somethings just don't work out. Here are two examples: 

I never wanted to accurately paint a tree in either case. But my original intentions for both of these pieces are buried under layers and layers of paint. (I'm sure you can tell which works these became.)

I'm letting these trees stand, but I'm going to keep swinging my ax 'til I get me a fine log!, said Ms. Environmental Steward raised at the feet of Paul Bunyon. 

As my hero Diebenkorn said, "Attempt what is not certain," and "Be careful only in a perverse way."

Getting to Know You

Like flashes of color from the Redwing's flight, there are moments when our spirit is caught by something brilliant but ephemeral. And most of us recognize that those flashes represent something bigger, more meaningful than what is explained our individual or collective knowledge. Why? and What? and How? So many experiences and people in life we first notice like a sweep of redwings or a murmuration of sparrows. Look! Over there! There is something amazing going on! What more is there to understand?  

I've fielded a few questions about my work this month- and am deeply honored whenever anyone takes the time to offer curiosity. I can only believe that the person truly cares about me or that a part of the work is actually snagging his/her attention. What greater reward for my work might there be?!  One interesting part of these encounters has been noticing the similarities in the questions; there seems to be a natural order of what is asked. Echoing the layman's own list, John Seed*, the art critic who wrote a review of my work for the Skyline show's catalog, sent me these questions before writing his essay: 

Tell me a bit about growing up and your art education. Did you have any mentors? Did you grow up in California? Location and sense of place seem to play important roles in your painting.... right? Tell me a bit about your materials and methods.  You have an interest in the way that manmade structures interact with the landscape. Is that a recent interest? Is there a message in the way you are attracted to structures? How do you choose your locations and subjects? Do you want to tell me about two or three works in terms of particulars? (Place, subject, time of day... etc) How do you hope viewers will react to your art? Who are some artists that have influenced you? 

These questions are pertinent to understanding who and what I'm doing. They are my introduction.  But they got me thinking about what types of questions I might ask another artist.  Lately I've been having some technical questions and I'd benefit by sitting down with some particular, but patient, painters and really see how they achieve certain effects. Also, I could really groove getting to know more about the motivations and bigger ideas behind the work of other artists.  

And what about artists whose work is outside of my experience and understanding? Like musicians: How do you keep track of your own sounds when joining in a group? How do you retain an individual voice and also know how it adds to the whole? These ideas are such a mystery to me! I would sit, as if at Socrate's knee, to hear more about how this works!  Mathematicians, physicists.... I hardly even know how to ask a question of these folk; I don't know where to start!  Maybe other people feel that way when approaching visual arts. 

What questions would you ask of an artist, anyone whose passion is their work?  What do we need to ask in order to understand and deepen our respect for the ephemeral flashes of brilliance in our lives?!  By the way- these need not be posed rhetorically.  Share a question or two from your lists!

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CR29, RedWings, detail. 

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CR29, RedWings. 2015. Oil on Panel. 36 x 30 inches.

*Full disclosure: the care and curiosity of this person is paid for by the gallery! You'll be able to read some my answers to his questions, and his analysis of my work in the show's catalog... soon to be hot off the press!

Want to hear one of the most uncomfortable versions of Getting to Know You?  Rodgers and Hammerstein are probably feeling upstaged, join them here (starts at :27) 

Call me Ishmael

It's not down in any map; true places never are. ~Herman Melville, Moby Dick

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Road 29's Bend. 2015. Oil on panel. 18 x 24 inches. sold

Down in the Dumps, But You Don't "look" Sad?!

For several reasons, CR29 Eastward, Blues is one of my favorites. Although there is nearly an equal division of land and sky, the colors bleed into one another: the blues of a clearer dawn sky above the sun-lit clouds echo those lavender shades of the paved road; the yellows of that sky are reflected in the haze hovering above the ground and the stripes in the road. The horizon therefore is lost. We'd like to find that line, to think in black and white but no separation is simple and clear. The cynic in me also likes how this beautiful road leads the public to only to one place: the county dump.

CR 29 Eastward, Blues. 2015. Oil on panel. 18 x 23.5 inches. 

Empty Nester

Many people have visited our house over the last year, and it's hard for any visitor to avoid the stacks of paintings that have accumulated. Only people who like my work ask questions along these lines: "How does it feel to know your paintings are just going out there?"; "But won't you miss them?" or "Do you ever just want to keep them at home?" I take it as a compliment, that so much do these people value what I make, that they start talking about my paintings as if they were children. And I do know what they mean. I've had those nervous-mom type thoughts that usually sound like this: "If I keep this at home it can't embarrass me in public". 

But, then I also return the question back to my admirers: Would you really want your kids living with you forever? What about your patients, do they stay in your treatment rooms? Would you stack up in your garage all the devices that you ever engineered? Would you let hum in your cupboards all the systems you organized, all the relationships you smoothed? What about the tests you were able to label with an "A+, Great work", would you keep them in a giant file as evidence that you're a successful teacher? Do you shut all the doors and windows when you play your song?  Only if you live in fear. 

CR101A, Crows,  detail.

If I think that maybe THIS work?! Oh, THIS might not actually be good, or THIS may not mean anything, or THIS piece might be my last, then my fists do start clenching; I don't want to share what is weak and limited about myself, and the small amount that I might create with my life.  

If I think rather, that THIS work has a speck of meaning, but I have more to uncover, or THIS contains a piece of myself, but I am growing and will have more to offer tomorrow, or THIS has meaning to me and maybe it can connect with someone else too, then I am able to share.  When I keep focused on that sense of abundance and grace I have confidence that what I make, and will continue to make, has value in the world.

Our lives are indeed short, but within them our abilities to explore love and other experiences is infinite.  That is where my work comes from: from journeying on these endless paths during my very short days.  Besides, my garage is very small. If I don't get the paintings out, there's no room for the bikes. And if I let fear be a bedmate, there's no room for the dog and the snuggling children. 

Me n' Rocky B.

Lest you think I've got a six-pack of core strength or an inner reserve of confidence sloshing around like a a city's emergency water tank, let me correct you.  Approaching the easel for me is a little like a Rocky scene:

And in fact, yes, like Rocky II, children are chasing me, cheering me on.

There's no Mickey however, swearing at me,

You're gonna eat lightnin' and you're gonna crap thunder!

Sigh. Too bad. 

Cheerleaders, coach or no, painting is very much a physical effort for me. That is my tendency in all things however. When I am most involved in life- learning the most, expressing the most- it is a whole-body experience. So, when I get ready to do what I love and yet fear- there is a great deal of "psyching-up" that I do.  This actually does include jumping jacks or a hard run,  a few key mantras, and even some aggressive, loud music.  Sure, I've painted a few paintings already, but I do actually have to tell myself I can do this.... each... and every... time.

Coming to my artwork is not just about following the muse, having my brushes lifted by the spirit of inspiration. I was reminded through one of my kid's "Magic Tree House Mystery" books about a quote from Thomas Edison: 

What it boils down to is one per cent inspiration and ninety-nine per cent perspiration.  

And I am really a sweaty person. Or I am Ms. Avis over here yelling, "I try harder"! Moreover, the painting process requires continually showing up, even when the mantras sound hollow in my own ears and the laundry needs doing or someone mentions that power lines aren't actually beautiful.  That's when I whip out this self-improvement ditty (another Rocky quote, in case you don't recognize it): 

Let me tell you something you already know. The world ain't all sunshine and rainbows. It is a very mean and nasty place and it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain't how hard you hit; it's about how hard you can get hit, and keep moving forward. How much you can take, and keep moving forward. That's how winning is done. Now, if you know what you're worth, then go out and get what you're worth. But you gotta be willing to take the hit, and not pointing fingers saying you ain't where you are because of him, or her, or anybody. Cowards do that and that ain't you. You're better than that.  

To that, I can only add a loud Amen!  I definitely am standing in the pews, waving my hands up in the air with an Allelujah at the ideas of not being a coward, not pointing fingers, getting up off our knees, moving forward.  But with all that up, up, up energy, another notion this year that I've had to face is that of being steady.  

Part of my learning process this year has involved how to keep an even level of energy through a painting. I've found that if I can have a theme-song through a piece, that it really helps keep me in a particular mood. If I come to the easel amped up when the painting is actually rather quiet one, then I need to be able to enter that. If my painting is bold, but I'm feeling nervous and shy that morning then to allow that to break into my painting style may lead to some awkward juxtapositions, a lack of visual flow. This means there are several songs burned into memory, but none to make me an excellent addition to your Karaoke party.

Additionally, music helps me breathe. I find that I tend to hold my breath with concentration but music introduces a rhythm for breathing and the breaks between songs provide natural pauses for deep breaths and stretching.

Meanwhile the Rocky theme plays on!  Trying hard now.... Getting strong now... Gonna fly now...

Marching On!

Honestly, late winter tends to be a hard, dark time for me. After a long dash through the festivities of the fall and then Christmas, I'm totally winded. Add to that any measure of soul-searching or world catastrophe, and it can really bring me down, dude. I mean, I can understand what they were trying to do when they threw Valentine's Day in there. But really?! Not the best time to catch me in the mood (and, um, I mean for anything)!  

I completed this painting in March, during the last days of winter, as a call to spring.  My title for it is Riotous Banners of Joy - because some days, under the weight of the world's sorrows and competing expectations, just picking up my head and celebrating feels like a a revolution.

Towers, Yellows, in progress.

Love in the Time of Drought

Those white plastic things surrounding a baby tree? A "Grow tube", tree protector, and/or tree shelter. Put a thousand in a field and it looks like a lot of hope. What else, if not a type of love, would support such a hopeful/wishful/romantic act of planting an orchard when there is absolutely no rain before or behind you?  I call this piece Love in the Time of Drought. 

Russel Blvd, Westward, in progress.

Obergefell v. Hodges

On the heels of the Supreme Court's ruling on same-sex marriage in June of this year, I worked on this small piece called Second Street, Westward. It depicts several box cars along the tracks just east of the Davis train station.  Whether the object of my subconscious or not, I couldn't help but laugh out loud when I saw a very distinct rainbow show up in the sides of the cars. While a bit muted in the final piece, you'll see the colors still if you look close.  So, I raise a toast to everyone working on the Railroad of Love: here's to Coupling, Uncoupling (my unofficial title for this work)!

Second Street, Westward, detail in progress.

Second Street, Westward. 2015. Oil on panel. 18 x 24 inches. 

Frosted

CR27 at 113, detail.

Believe it or not, this piece reminds me of cake: the sloping lines, as if scallops of piped frosting; the soft pastels, as if food for a baby shower, bridal shower, ladies' luncheon, or any time a petit four might enter the room. Not that anyone else might have a thought of "cake" and follow up that with "Thiebaud", but this work I offer up as a humble nod toward the work of Wayne. For this reason, I call this piece "That Just Frosts My Cake"; more fun than CR27 at 113, don't you think?!

Thiebaud, Wayne. Beach Shop. 1960. Oil on canvas. 18 x 36 inches.

Smashed

"This, to me, is the ultimately heroic trait of ordinary people; they say no to the tyrant and they calmly take the consequences of this resistance." 
- Philip Dyck

Hidden Actions

I was almost sad to continue working atop the underpainting for Old Mill Road. See all the movement there in the strokes? The eye is drawn up and in, then scattered right and left through the middle. 

The final piece is so calm and still, but I like to remember all the liveliness underneath.  My mom would call this my "Duck" work:  "still on the surface, but paddling like hell underneath". 

Old Mill Road, in progress.

Old Mill Road, detail. 2015. Oil on panel. 36 x 23.5 inches.

Corset

Below are a few shots of the development of Tower, Sunrise. 2015. Oil on panel. 30 x 48 inches.

I have privately referred to it as "Corset" because the colors of the sunrise remind me of flesh, bruised and pinched. 

Initial drawing

Underpainting; lots of blues under there!

Pretty much done. Here you can see the heavier "drips" along some of the lines. Also see a peek of Hwy 20, Westward Before 5, behind on the left? That piece used to be SO yellow. And I feel a little bad about taming that boldness. 

Tower, Sunrise, detail. 

Start Where You Are

Walnut Bayou Lane was a joy to work on, from start to finish. Inspired one morning in a nearby orchard, I was filled with the sense that THIS painting was going to be fun! The colors of the sunrise in the center is a near exact match to the yellows on the cover of Start Where You Are, a book I was reading at the time; I can't help but think my predilections of hope and color were influenced by Pema Chodron's own work, so I'll leave you with some of her words: 

When you begin to touch your heart or let your heart be touched, you begin to discover that it's bottomless, that it doesn't have any resolution, that this heart is huge, vast, and limitless. You begin to discover how much warmth and gentleness is there, as well as how much space.

after about 3 hours of work

after about 6 hours of work

after about 11 hours work

Walnut Bayou Lane. 2015. Oil on panel. 60 x 48 inches.

Fall

Two years ago, on the way to the funeral of a dear friend, I stopped to spend a quiet moment on one of my favorite trails in Prairie Creek Redwoods Park.  While I got out of the car feeling a little fragile about impermanence, I found myself physically responding to the wood's colors and falling leaves with a leaping heart.  I wrote the following poem as I walked on the trail there, but the experience itself and the poem rushed back to mind as I painted this orchard's yellows and tried to capture the idea of the ephemeral tracks between its rows, the blur of branches as one drives so quickly by.