Everyone has heard the story which has gone the rounds of New England, of a strong and beautiful bug which came out of the dry leaf of an old table of apple-tree wood, which had stood in a farmer’s kitchen for 60 years, first in Connecticut, and afterward in Massachusetts — from an egg deposited in the living tree many years earlier still, as appeared by counting the annual layers beyond it; which was heard gnawing out for several weeks, hatched perchance by the heat of an urn.
Who knows what beautiful and winged life, whose egg has been buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodness in the dead dry life of society, deposited at first in the alburnum of the green and living tree, which has been gradually converted into the semblance of its well-seasoned tomb may unexpectedly come forth from amidst society’s most trivial and handselled furniture, to enjoy its perfect summer life at last!
Henry David Thoreau, Walden
Waking at 4:30 this morning, I lay in the darkness of The Redlands Hotel and allowed my mind to embrace the new ideas visiting in the pre-dawn. This precious story from Henry David Thoreau I have not read or taught for over twenty years, yet it arrived in my half-awake consciousness to punctuate the New Year meditations I’ve been scribbling in my journal for nearly a month now. I lay there in the darkness this morning, wondering what kind of heated urn had been placed on my consciousness to hatch this story. Finally reaching for the light, I decided to begin the day and head for the kitchen to sit at the table awhile and write while the ideas are still fresh.
When I think of the sixty years it took for a “beautiful bug” to emerge from the dry wood of the kitchen table, I cannot help but look back over my own sixty years of hacking through my own wilderness of earthly experiences. The voices of teachers, words from texts, co-mingled with sights and colors of my surroundings have combined their efforts to weave a tapestry that I survey daily with hope of a fuller undersanding.
As I write this at the kitchen table in suite 207, I think of a partial watercolor on the drafting table on the floor below me in The Gallery at Redlands. I worked on it till nearly 10:30 last night before turning out the lights and coming upstairs. Now I think of the painting lying in the darkness below waiting for me to come back for today’s visit, and I am ready.
Yesterday during a watercolor class in the Gallery, Vanessa, Jessi and I mused over the perennial question asked of us about how long it takes to create a particular work of art. We concluded that the answer corresponds to the years comprising our ages–the watercolors we were making at that moment have been “under construction” throughout our entire lives. So . . . if someone asks me how long it took to create this watercolor of an Arkansas cabin, my answer would be “sixty-seven years.”
Sixty-Seven Years and Counting
I’m ready to get back to work on this watercolor, glad that the morning is early and it is still dark outdoors.
There is always a temptation to diddle around in the contemplative life, making itsy-bitsy statues.
Thomas Merton (quoted in Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek)
On this quiet Thursday, I completed my second reading of this magnificent Annie Dillard book, and am closing in on completing this watercolor I began yesterday. I am not happy that my Jeep is suffering difficulties, and was taken to the dealership Saturday, and as of today, they still have not even looked at it. Six days is too long for anyone to be without their sole possession of transportation. Nevertheless, being housebound, I am completing other tasks, that I hope are not “itsy-bitsy” by Merton statndards.
This truck I photographed while traveling across Arkansas last May on my first of two trips out there to conduct watercolor workshops and judge plein air competitions. The sight of the sun glinting off the corroded steel of the abandoned vehicle, as well as the liveliness of the surrounding landscape, filled my imagination with such delicious satisfaction, that I turned my Jeep around after traveling an extra mile, and returned to this spot, got out, walked as close as I could to the vehicle, and took several photos with my phone. Only now, two months later, do I get around to painting the scene. I was not able to get it out of my mind.
Painting over the past two days has yielded a large quantity of satisfaction for me, as I stared very closely at this composition, crawling around in the weeds and foliage, examining the barbed wire, and scrutinizing every square inch of the faded truck. The only breaks I took were to read more from Annie Dillard and rest my eyes from the visual details of the painting.
Today I am tired, and still waiting for word on the Jeep. But I’m happy to have finished a book, and am staring across the room at this watercolor to determine what else needs to be done to it, if anything.
Alas, I did not manage to begin a new watercolor today. I try to start something new and fresh daily, but this day was given to matting, shrinkwrapping and labeling watercolors for the upcoming art festivals. I will be participating in four art festivals over the next five weekends (not this weekend, fortunately). I found a closet-full of forgotten work that never had been matted, so there went my day. I still have plenty to mat tomorrow as well.
Taking a breather late this afternoon, I was delighted to return to an Emerson biography I read and loved a decade ago: Emerson: The Mind on Fire, by Robert D. Richardson, Jr. This magnificent bard had the following to say regarding Napoleon Bonaparte: Napoleon’s glory “passed away like the smoke of his artillery, and left no trace. He left France smaller, poorer, feebler than he found it.” On the other hand, Emerson wrote of Goethe that he stood “for the class of scholars and writers who see connections where the multitude see fragments, and who are impelled to exhibit the facts in order, and so to supply the axis on which the frame of things turn.”
As an artist and educator, I take delight in these sentiments. The world’s eye (through the media) remains focused on individuals who sometimes create and heal, but oftentimes spread destruction across our world. But in the quieter corners of this environ are souls who actually try to create, heal and thereby leave this world in better shape than they found it. I don’t pretend to be one who does great things. But I do take satisfaction in knowing that over the past 2 1/2 decades I have tried to grow students’ minds to think better, more responsibly, and to instill a sense of pride and ability to create a better world than the one that greets us.
At this juncture in life, I am certain of fewer things than what I thought 2 1/2 decades ago. But I do possess a renewed resolve to create images reflecting the better parts of my daily environment. The image posted above was one I captured early one morning in Eureka Springs, Arkansas last June. I had risen at sunrise and descended to the lowest parts of that sleeping town, and came across this abandoned structure that exuded so much charm and beauty in the morning light. As I worked on it in watercolor en plein air, I kept wishing that I had studio space inside! I pictured how lovely it would be to step out on that porch with a cup of coffee and say “Good Morning” to a world full of promise, a world waiting to be healed, a world waiting to be re-made in a better image.
To me, mornings that begin with making art are better than mornings that do not. Hopefully I can create a better morning tomorrow. Thanks for reading.
Last spring, while judging a plein air painting composition in Cotter, Arkansas, I was taken to this wonderful rustic cabin dating back to 1903. This structure was reportedly one of the first two homes built in Flippin, Arkansas, just about the time the railroad was coming through the town. I was taken to this site just after sunrise on a morning that was threatening rain. The cool, moist atmosphere and the gathering clouds cast such an amazing pall over the cabin that I set up an easel and went to work immediately, trying to capture a watercolor sketch of it. Once I returned to my studio in Texas, I used the original watercolor sketch along with some reference photos taken with my digital camera, and created this piece.
I was most intrigued with the light and shadow playing across the table and chairs lining the porch, as well as the rusty screen covering one of the doors. The entire cabin seemed alive with the dynamics of light and shadow flickering in the dim light of that spring morning. I hope one day to return to this cabin for further sketches and studies.
Thank you for reading. And thanks all of you who attended the opening of my One-Man Show Saturday night at the Weiler House Fine Art Gallery. (http://www.weilerhousefineart.com). I appreciate each and every one of you!
If you have been following my post, you may have read that I “froze up” on my first large painting of this historic cabin in Cotter, Arkansas. So, I began a second one, and once the juices began flowing, I went back to the original and finished it. Now I’ve decided to bring closure to this one (though it appears I won’t finish tonight, as much as I wish I could!). Right now, I’m up-to-my-elbows in it, and very interested.
Today was quite a day. I rose shortly after sunrise, went to the historic Handley neighborhood and took some digital photos that I think will yield some good watercolor compositions. By the time 7:30 arrived, I decided to go on into downtown Fort Worth to see how Sundance Square looks in the low-angle morning sunlight. Choosing to avoid Loop 820 and Interstate 30, I chose to stay on Lancaster, finding it smooth sailing, relatively free of traffic, and conducive therefore for a speed trap. Yep. Ticketed for speeding.
Once I got to Sundance Square, I found exquisite yellow sunlight all over the downtown architecture, and focused mostly on Haltom Jewelers, taking about 40 more photos from all angles. Then I settled into Starbuck’s on Sundance (hadn’t yet had my coffee-fix), opened Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past and found myself lost in a swoon. I cannot get enough of this guy! The more he spoke of primal sensations taking us back to childhood memories, the more I thought of the Cotter Cabin with its look, its smells, and its reminders of my parents’ roots in Southeast Missouri near the Mississippi River. The smell of the damp, rotting wood stuck in my throat, even though I was in modern upscale downtown Fort Worth. I didn’t want to leave. I don’t know how long I lingered there, reading, writing in my journal, and gazing across scores of years into my primal past. I couldn’t wait to get back to the house and resume this painting.
So, yesterday it was William Carlos Williams with his Imagism. Today it was Proust and his “recollections” (Ha Ha–I call my company Recollections 54) as well as William Wordsworth and his “child is father to the man” mantra. It’s been a fabulous day, traffic ticket notwithstanding.
Thanks for reading. Maybe I’ll finish this Cotter Cabin Deja Vu tomorrow.
The 4th of July has turned out to be a decent day for painting. Once my thermometer reached 106, I decided it was time to get out of the garage and retreat to my indoor studio (I cannot bear the dim light of the indoors, once I’ve indulged in plein air, nevertheless I’m not inviting heat stroke either). It’s nice to work in an air conditioned place now.
I began this small 11 x 14″ piece on the last day of class with my Eureka Springs School of the Arts group. It was Friday morning, and I felt a heaviness, knowing I was going to leave Eureka Springs and all its beauty that day, yet anxious in my heart to get on to the next appointment. I felt that great things were just ahead.
Once I took out this piece today, I realized that the antique steam engine really needed a set of wheels. So I fortunately had a reference photo taken on location, and set to work today trying to finish out the bottom of this composition. I’m glad to bring closure to this work. Again, I have too many conflicting feelings co-mingled, as this painting takes me back to the end of Eureka Springs and the transition back to life as I know it today. It has not been an easy shift, and I’m still working to get my feet back underneath me.
I have filled out an application for the 2012 academic year at Eureka Springs School of the Arts, and hope I can return to this remarkable mountain town next summer. This quaint Victorian mountain town is a plein air artist’s dream.
To those of you who have followed my blog, this picture may look no different than the one posted late last night. Exactly the reason for me to sign it and leave it alone. I have worked an additional 90 minutes on it this morning, but once I realize that each stroke I add does not radically improve the overall composition, and indeed may diminish it, it is time to let it go. Perhaps I held on to this painting too long because it reminded me of things in my life that I need to let go. So, there it is. Ironically, I have another of the same size started, but I have decided for the moment not to pursue it. Time to look at something else.
The morning of the 4th of July has started early for me. I’ve chosen to paint in the garage because of the wonderful light, though I’ve been shirtless for an hour and am still mopping my brow frequently with my gym towel. But I do love the light. Funny–I’m not a guy who takes sun well, and doesn’t particularly like it. Yet when I watercolor outdoors, I find a way to tolerate it. Granted I would not enjoy pulling weeds or painting the siding of my house in this climate.
I am listening with my whole being as the VCR plays behind me “Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.” That book by James Joyce touched my life at the very core when I read it back in the late 80’s. I really need to read it again, but I’m hung up in Proust right now, hoping to finish him this summer. Joyce and Proust both put me in touch with the important elements of my upbringing, and with summer vacation present, I have tried to spend more time pondering those matters. Unfortunately I let other elements intrude, and they managed to keep me away from my quality reading and painting. Perhaps Independence Day will be doubly poignant for me if I allow it to mark the first day of my return to what matters. All I need to determine at this point is–what matters?!
Anyway, for the moment, painting matters. And having said that, I have a couple of unfinished works at my side that need tending, so I will pursue those. With some good fortune, I’ll be posting them in the hours ahead.
Thanks for reading, and I hope your 4th of July brings good things your way. I’m happy to be painting this morning while my wife rides. The garage studio space is working, for the moment.
I’ve lost a few days of quality painting. Sometimes life takes a lousy turn, and mine is no exception. I’m glad I’m out of school for the summer, but hate to waste opportunities because I cannot seem to get myself back to work emotionally.
Having said that, I did return to this one this afternoon, and have stayed rather steadily with it throughout the evening. I hope to finish it tomorrow, and truly celebrate Independence Day. I have a second watercolor of this same subject also in progress. I started it because this one was getting rather tight, and I was fumbling with my next move. Then other personal things clouded my painting activities and both paintings got abandoned. At any rate, I’m resolved to work through the emotional baggage and get something creative accomplished. Perhaps I can finish this one tomorrow, and the other on the following day. I’ll try. I have other projects waiting in the wings and would like to move ahead with them.
I’m happy with how the chair emerged in this work, and am getting more satisfied with the table. I found the stone steps an absolute delight to work with, thanks largely to the practice I got in a few weeks ago when I painted that limestone bluff in Eureka Springs. I had no idea that that activity would prove so helpful with this current painting. Now that the masking has been removed, the flowers are showing beneath the cabin, and out front as well. I’m seeing a few elements emerge that are beginning to please me with this painting.
I’m surprised at how quickly this composition is shaping up. It measures 20 x 24″ and I began it yesterday evening with only about an hour of daylight remaining. I took a reference photo of this 1903 cabin in Cotter, Arkansas when I was visiting there last May. I actually did a plein air watercolor sketch of it during that visit, devoting about 90 minutes to the session. I blogged it in an earlier post. Though it’s taken over a month, I’ve had it on my mind to do a larger studio watercolor of this sketch, using the photo. I love working from natural light so much that I choose not to work on it inside my house. So, today, with temperatures soaring past 100 degrees again, I spent the morning and evening in my open garage working on it, ever so grateful for gusty winds (though at times they gave about as much relief as a hair dryer).
In order to work on this, I’ve spent considerable time poring over Andrew Wyeth drybrush studies of frame houses and barns. I’ve also looked carefully at how he renders grasses in watercolor. It surprises me that I’m moving so quickly through this piece, when I thought that I would be working slowly and methodically. When it comes to the ongoing art historical debate between the Poussinistes and Rubenistes (drawing vs. painting/Nicholas Poussin followers vs. Peter Paul Rubens followers–sorry, just had to throw that one in!), I always came down on the side of Poussin, Wyeth, and all others who approach painting as an extension of drawing. For decades, I’ve wanted my own watercolors to model fine draftsmanship. But over the past couple of years, I’ve tilted more toward color exploration and quality, and have found myself moving away from drawing. Drawing always slows down my work. I guess I’m surprised that I’m not spending more time drawing in detail on this piece. But . . . the painting is not yet finished. Who knows–perhaps tomorrow I’ll return to drawing and slow my pace. We’ll see. The bottom line is that I’m having fun with it.
A hot, humid, sticky day in Arkansas, thanks to midnight thunderstorms the night before. Our plein air class from the Eureka Springs School of the Arts began the morning at the Turpentine Creek Cat Refuge south on Highway 23 out of Eureka Springs. My students asked me to do a demonstration, painting a slumbering Bengal tiger in the shadows. I tried. She turned over about a dozen times in the first 10 minutes. My attempt of course was a disaster. The students paintings that ensued however showed much more promise.
Our afternoon session was spent on Spring Street near where I am residing this week. The students gravitated toward this beautiful bluff and flower bed shimmering in the sun. They called my bluff, asking me to do a painting demonstration of this scene, knowing I had never tried to paint a large natural rock surface. I suppose I did O.K. on this (much better than on the tiger, which I won’t bother to post!). After the students finished at 4:00, I noted that two students wished to remain for about another hour. So I took this sketch back out, having only roughed out the bluff, and tried to knock out some flowerbeds (another first for me). I lost the light as the evening shadows lengthened, so I will need to come back to this one. The flowers and foliage are not quite finished.
An inspiring day for plein air painting, once again.
Recollections 54 The Art of David Tripp 