The New Byzantium

The Gallery at Redlands (Lobby Window)

The Gallery at Redlands (Oak Street Window)

V.I.P. Artists Tent (Oak Street across from The Gallery at Redlands)

I think if I could be given a month of Antiquity and leave to spend it where I chose, I would spend it in Byzantium a little before Justinian opened St. Sophia and closed the Academy of Plato. . . . I think that in early Byzantium, maybe never before or since in recorded history, religious, aesthetic and practical life were one, that architect and artificers spoke to the multitude and the few alike. The painter, the mosaic worker, the worker in gold and silver, the illuminator of sacred books, were almost impersonal, almost perhaps without the consciousness of individual design, absorbed in their subject-matter and that the vision of a whole people.

William Butler Yeats, A Vision

In less than 24 hours, artists will arrive and begin setting up the 32 booths inside the V.I.P. tent. Today, with cold winds swirling and light rain sprinkling, I have walked all over this part of the city, feeling the spirit of William Butler Yeats and his vision of Byzantium. Already today I have visited with electricians, carpenters, work crews inside the tent, patrons inside the gallery, local artists dropping by to offer assistance, merchants, delivery truck drivers, city officials, police officers–everyone focused on the enormous task at hand. This tent experience already feels like a small village abuzz and under construction.

This will be the third year I’ve felt this “New Byzantium” vibe with all the warmth and unity of artists, musicians, writers and performers working alongside the craftsmen and technical people to put on this show. The stories I read of sixth-century Byzantium and mid-century Manhattan still fill me with enthusiasm. East Texas has spontaneously generated art communities in all the surrounding towns. Palestine has been enriched with the friendship of artists from Tyler, Crockett, Jacksonville, Winnsboro, Athens, Bullard, and Edom (and I’m probably leaving out other towns). Art galleries and performance venues are cropping up everywhere like wild mushrooms and the residents of the towns are aglow with this fresh spirit.

I hope to have time to write more later. Thanks for reading.

I make art in order to discover.

I journal when I feel alone.

I blog to remind myself I am not alone.

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If you Build It, They Will Come

View of the Big Tent across the Street From The Gallery at Redlands

It is actually a double tent combined into one cavernous whole

Artists toil in cells all over Manhattan. We have a monk’s devotion to our work–and, like monks, some of us will be visited by visions and others will toil out our days knowing glory only at a distance . . .

Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way

In less than 48 hours, thirty-two artists will descend upon Palestine to set up their creations beneath this gigantic tent. The crew finished erecting the structure today, and already we’ve been measuring out the booth spots inside the cavernous space. Excitement is building. All over town we have volunteers working on a myriad of tasks, and my head spins just thinking about it.

In the midst of this flurry of activity, The Gallery at Redlands stayed quite busy with patrons coming in throughout the day. I don’t know how long it’s been since I’ve enjoyed such extended conversations as I have with this afternoon’s and evening’s visitations. I’m thrilled every time I find myself in the company of kindred spirits who love art, books, and the precious memories of our past experiences.

The weekend is going to be chilly but the art experience will be hot! Patrons attending the Friday night VIP event under the tent will receive in exchange for their $20 admission (available at the entrance) an evening of art splendor seasoned with live acoustical music, heavy hors d’oeuvres, and drinks from Stella Artois and Roadhouse Liquor. Patrons will have the first chance to make purchases from the artists’ booths.

Saturday from 9-4:00 will be the Festival proper, the streets lined with vendor booths, food trucks, children’s entertainment, live music on stage and a parade. Thousands of visitors will flood the streets downtown, and admission to the art tent throughout the day is free.

The Gallery at Redlands will be open, hosted by gallery artists Steve Miller, Kathy Lamb and Amanda Hukill. I will also tend the gallery as much as possible while also responding to needs under the tent. We want to make sure all the artists are tended. Gallery at Redlands artists under the tent include Deanna Pickett-Frye, Cecilia Bramhall and Orlando Guillen.

We’re also excited to host local artist William E. Young under the tent as well. He will be selling signed & numbered editions of his latest acrylic painting celebrating this annual festival. The painting will be unveiled at a special Chamber of Commerce-sponsored event tomorrow. More on that later.

Neita Fran Ward, a premier art agent from neighboring Tyler, will also welcome patrons to her booth under the tent Friday and Saturday. Sandi and I only became acquainted with Neita over this past year, and deeply appreciate her enduring friendship. The work she devotes to promoting the arts in East Texas has been extremely fruitful these recent years, and we’re looking forward to her perennial exhibits that enrich the University of Texas Tyler Schools of Medicine, Nursing and Pharmacology. Her Saturday morning show, “The Art Connection of East Texas, on KTBB 97.5 FM, has been a delight to local listeners, and last weekend I had the privilege of taking part in her show with William E. Young and Greg Gunnels, president of our Dogwood Arts Council.

If you are in our area, you won’t want to miss this weekend’s celebration. For the past couple of years, I’ve been captivated by this artistic fervor that has spread across East Texas. In my personal studies, I’ve been looking seriously at parallels between our East Texas experiences and those shared in sixth-century Byzantium and mid-twentieth-century New York City. I want to close this blog by sharing a comment received on this blog two years ago when we were celebrating this event under the tent and drawing our parallels with the New York City experience. I had devoted several blogs building up to the event and then discussing the festival itself. My life-long friend Wayne White from Missouri had made the trip and exhibited his photography with us. Following the festival, he and I had plans to return to Missouri by way of Oklahoma so we could fly-fish the stream at Beaver’s Bend State Park. Here is the communication we received:

Thank you for the moment-by-moment description of your show, the gallery and all the artists who make up your Twelve. It is true, I live in NYC. I have been to a lot of art exhibits, and have a BFA in sculpture, from back when no women were in the Sculpture Department. But I am still more interested in the artists than the hype. You gave me the artists, in such a way that I can imagine myself there. Now that I know the history of the gallery and some of the artists, I can follow along. Thanks again. And, when you are on the river in OK, and if you happen to see an osprey fishing (returning from their migration), that’s probably me, sending you a “hello” message.

That sculptor probably has no idea how much her message lifted me that day, and has remained with me. When I received it on my phone, I gathered The Twelve around me, read the message aloud, and they all broke out in spontaneous applause. No doubt this remains one of my most memorable experiences in this wonderful life of the arts.

Thanks for reading.

I make art in order to discover.

I journal when I feel alone.

I blog to remind myself I am not alone.

Kicking off a Busy Art Week

Quality “Executive Time” this morning

Hello art friends. The weekend was end-to-end action in Palestine, Texas, so I found no time to stop and blog. We have the 85th annual Dogwood Art & Music Festival arriving this Friday and Saturday, March 17-18. In a couple of days, an enormous tent will be erected by two crews that will cover the entire parking lot across the street from The Redland Hotel. Friday morning, thirty-two artists will arrive to set up for the VIP event that will run from 5-9:00. Tickets for the Friday night VIP event are $20 that provide the patron access to heavy hors d’oeuvres and an open bar hosted by Stella Artois and Roundhouse Liquor. There will also be live acoustic music, and patrons will have the first opportunity to purchase art from the artists who were carefully juried into this show, a host of paintings, photography, sculpture, ceramics, jewelry, glass-making, fibers, and graphic design. Tickets may be purchased at the tent’s entrance. We’re expecting a blockbuster night with nearly twice the number of artists featured than last year.

Saturday’s festival will run 9-4:00. A parade will open the morning’s festivities, and the entire Palestine downtown will witness thousands filling the streets lined with merchandise booths, food vendors, live music, children’s entertainment, and of course, the Art Tent which will have free admission, as well as adding several booths of work created by local high school students.

This will be the fifth year of the massive Art Tent addition to this long-running festival. Local artist William E. Young, son of the famous Ancel E. Nunn, will be in our celebrity booth under the tent, offering for sale signed and numbered editions of his fifth and final installment of art commemorating this festival. Every year, William has created acrylic paintings of whimsical animal musicians busking in the streets in front of historic Palestine landmarks. I can’t wait to show you his latest contribution; it will be unveiled Thursday at a special event and must be kept under wraps until then. But below you can see the artist from last year under the tent, standing among his previous four editions:

Artist William E. Young

This year I have chosen not to occupy a booth under the Big Tent, but let my work remain in our Gallery at Redlands across the street, and instead be on hand to assist the artists with the loading in, registration and setting up. During the times I’ll be helping under the Tent, we have been fortunate to enlist the help of several of our gallery artists in keeping the Gallery at Redlands open and operational. They will be bringing in new work of their own to add to the already existing work in our gallery exhibit, and offering their pieces for sale. These artists include Steve Miller, Kathy Lamb and Amanda Hukill. You will truly enjoy visiting with them in the Gallery as well as meeting the VIP artists under the tent. Three other gallery artists from our group will have their work under the tent: Deanna Pickett-Frye, Cecilia Bramhall and Orlando Guillen. Sandi and I are proud that The Gallery at Redlands will be well-represented in this Festival.

The hour is getting late, the laundry is nearly done, and we have a multitude of chores bearing down on us before we return to Palestine. As chairperson of Hospitality, Sandi has been working overtime for several weeks now, and there appears to be no letting up in the remaining days before the celebration. I will be doing a demonstration and leading a watercolor workshop in Granbury Tuesday before heading to Palestine, anticipating that Sandi will get there ahead of me.

Maybe tomorrow I can share some of my current ideas about journaling. I’ve chosen to snap a few pictures of recent journal doodlings from my “executive time” bliss. When I go back to read old journals, I’ve found it easier to flip to the start of each day by having some kind of collage assembly embellish the page before I scribble out the stuff that’s on my mind.

Thanks for reading.

I make art in order to discover.

I journal when I feel alone.

I blog to remind myself I am not alone.

Back to Work

16 x 20″ watercolor underway

The sketch hunter has delightful days of drifting about among people, in and out of the city, going anywhere, everywhere, stopping as long as he likes–no need to reach any point, moving in any direction following the call of interests. He moves through life as he finds it, not passing negligently the things he loves, but stopping to know them, and to note them down in the shorthand of his sketchbook, a box of oils with a few small panels, the fit of his pocket, or on his drawing pad. Like any hunter he hits or misses. He is looking for what he loves, he tries to capture it. It’s found anywhere, everywhere. Those who are not hunters do not see these things. The hunter is leaning to see and to understand–to enjoy.

There are memories of days of this sort, of wonderful driftings in and out of the crowd, of seeing and thinking. Where are the sketches that were made? Some of them are in dusty piles, some turned out to be so good they got frames, some became motives for big pictures, which were either better or worse than the sketches, but they, or rather the states of being and understandings we had at the time of doing them all, are sifting through and leaving their impress on our whole work and life.

Robert Henri, The Art Spirit

I open this blog, after a lengthy hiatus, with this soulful selection from Robert Henri, one of my heroes of art history. The man was truly a prophet, a visionary, capable of inspiring a circle of illustrators to become great artists, including one of my favorites, Edward Hopper. Throughout my life I have sought out role models, and what Henri has provided me as a template for life is this: the artist has value as teacher as well as creator. Throughout my decades of teaching in public schools and universities I often fretted that I lacked quality time for making art because of the teaching responsibilities. Now retired, I am discovering that teaching remains as important to life’s enrichment as creating. Now that Sandi and I own The Gallery at Redlands, I am surprised at the demand for art classes here in the gallery, and am loving every minute of these opportunities. I just finished a class yesterday in perspective drawing, and have a watercolor class filling up for tomorrow afternoon.

On top of all of this, I am still finding time to fulfill my dream as Henri’s “sketch hunter”–I have five new watercolors now in progress that have been cooking in my visual consciousness for weeks now as I’ve traveled about and spotted locations I wished to capture in sketchbooks and watercolor pads. Several completed watercolors are in storage, awaiting frames. Less successful ones are also in storage for future evaluation. Limited editions have also been processed, including my recent Clydesdale piece:

I’m proud that the first edition went out the door before I had a chance to make labels. These are now available in The Gallery at Redlands, measuring 11″(h) x 15″(w) and priced at $100 unframed.

The only reason for my recent blog hiatus has been demands in other areas preventing my sitting down to the computer. Our 85th annual Dogwood Art and Music Festival will descend upon Palestine March 17-18. Sandi has done ten times the amount of work I have in preparing for this. So have other members of the Dogwood Arts Council. We have reason to believe this will be our best festival yet, as we have a large tent covering the parking lot across the street from The Redlands Hotel that will feature 32 artists in their booths. This will be the first time I’ve opted out of being under the tent, keeping my art work in The Gallery at Redlands which will remain open for business throughout the festival. Thanks to artists and volunteers, I will be able to move back and forth from gallery to festival throughout the weekend and enjoy the company of all the artists coming into town.

Gallery at Redlands. My work area is always untidy

The watercolor started above will feature the Sacred Heart Church across the street. As I’ve blogged several times before, I enjoy waking up in our apartment upstairs to the sound of the 7:00 church bells, tolling nine times. I’ll never stop chuckling at that. I’m posting one of my earlier paintings of the church below. We’ll be painting this composition in tomorrow’s watercolor class.

Thanks for reading.

I make art in order to discover.

I journal when I feel alone.

I blog to remind myself I am not alone.

Planning #3 of the Palestine Series

First vision. June 11, 2022

Palestine Blues. 1st of series

Nearing completion of 2nd in the series

“It is very well to copy what one sees. It’s much better to draw what one has retained in one’s memory. It is a transformation in which imagination collaborates with memory. One reproduces only that which is striking, that is to say, the necessary. This one’s recollections and invention are liberated from the tyranny which nature exerts.”

Edgar Degas

“It’s hard to define how they come about,” Hopper said of his pictures, “but it’s a long process of gestation in the mind and a rising emotion.”

Brian O’Doherty, “Edward Hopper’s Voice” in American Masters: The Voice and the Myth

The three-week hiatus has been restful for me. As we approached the second anniversary of owning The Gallery at Redlands, Sandi & I decided we needed to take a couple of weekends off before the annual Dogwood Art & Music Festival gets underway. In three weeks we’ve enjoyed our fireplace during the Texas freeze, traveled Oklahoma, Missouri & Arkansas, and rested here at home.

Above all, I’ve bathed in the warm, soothing waters of imagination through sketching, reading, journaling and composting ideas for new art work. Edward Hopper has been my guiding spirit lately as I’ve pondered ways to continue my Palestine blues series of watercolors.

This series began on June 11, 2022 while walking across town one morning as I’m accustomed to doing during our weekend stays there. Looking across Spring Street (actually Highway 287 through Palestine), I was arrested at the beauty of the contrasting warm sun and cool shadows around what once was the Pearlstone Grocery.

On August 22, after a lengthy gestation, I finally began my first attempt at painting this, adding the ghost of Lightnin’ Hopkins walking along the tracks. This bluesman used to perform thirty minutes away at a juke joint in the town of Crockett.

I began my second painting on January 2, adding a harp player to Lightnin’. The harp player is actually a guy I watched play one Sunday morning in Dallas at the Sons of Hermann Hall some years back. We were beginning the final day of our Randy Brodnax Christmas Art Show. I took pictures of him with my phone and used them for this composition.

On January 18, something happened that gave me fresh inspiration for the 3rd of this series. I began work on it yesterday, though I’m still finishing the second one. The quotes above I posted because of the severe editing of this third in the series; there are a host of items removed from the scene as well as new objects added and others repositioned. I’ve already changed my mind a dozen times and chuckle at the thought of my characters and sign posts getting up, walking about and repositioning themselves somewhere else in the scene. I keep saying “Stop that!” but they won’t listen.

More later. . .

Studio Eidolons Saturday Morning

Enjoying Cowboy Coffee on a Saturday Morning in the Studio

An artist must never be a prisoner of himself, prisoner of a style, prisoner of a reputation, prisoner of success.

Henri Matisse

This is my first morning back in the studio after a short vacation home to St. Louis to visit my parents, siblings and friends. I’m getting ready to make some new and fresh art after a lengthy and restful hiatus and wanted to share some of my most recent moments and memories with my readers. I’ve been enjoying this new book Last Light that I have mentioned before, and am nearing the end of the Matisse chapter. The quote above arrested me, as I had been entertaining second thoughts about pursuing some art that lies outside my normal practice. The swift kick in the pants reminded me that a real artist is free to pursue whatever holds his/her attention. And I shall respond to these new stimuli.

I’m enjoying Cowboy Coffee made on our stovetop and thought I’d share the picture of the pot I brewed when our power was out. Much has been written of late about the political ramifications of Texas and its perennial boast of being a major energy capital of the world, yet cannot seem to keep electricity flowing when the state hits a winter deep freeze. We were fortunate that we only lost power for a few hours; many in this state have gone for days without it.

Today is the tenth anniversary of the photo taken above. It was during that winter that I converted our garage into a Man Cave and created probably my best still life while working in that space.

I now have this watercolor hanging in our Gallery at Redlands in Palestine. I used a full sheet of watercolor paper, so once the matting and framing were added, it turned out to be an enormous piece to display.

I have been more faithful recently to my pledge to sketch more, and have enjoyed the sensation of a pencil dragging across a page and leaving its tracks. I recall artist Paul Klee describing drawing as simply a line going for a walk. The act of sketching has ways of relaxing me that other activities cannot seem to accomplish.

After our St. Louis sojourn, Sandi and I headed south to Bentonville, Arkansas to visit the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. After my recent watercolor experiments in rendering trees, I was held spellbound while viewing the paintings of George Inness, Asher Durand and William Trost Richards. I feel like I have barely scratched the surface of watercolor landscape painting now. And I have little doubt that the works of these kindred spirits will improve my future endeavors.

George Inness, An Old Roadway

Asher B. Durand, Kindred Spirits

William Trost Richards, Landscape

We closed Gallery at Redlands for two successive weekends so we could enjoy some relaxing vacation time. The Texas winter storm occupied the first week and the Missouri/Arkansas travels filled the second. We plan to return to Palestine a week from today to resume our normal gallery hours.

Thanks for reading.

Friday in The Redlands Hotel

Great things are not done by impulse, but by a series of small things brought together.

Vincent Van Gogh

This Friday morning has been pure stream-of-consciousness. Alarm woke me at 7:00. I lay awake in the darkness, waiting. The Sacred Heart Catholic Church across the street from The Redlands Hotel has a bell that tolls three minutes after my smart phone clock. Sure enough, at 7:03 my time, the bell tolled nine times. I have posted this frequently in my blog, but it still makes me laugh. The rest of the day the church tower will toll the correct number before it goes silent during the night time sleeping hours. Then, next morning, at 7:00, it will begin with nine tolls.

After showering and dressing, I enjoyed some “Executive Time” reading at the dining room table, sipping my morning coffee, and scribbling new thoughts in my journal. My attention was arrested by a poem from Adrienne Su, “The Days.” In this piece, she wrestles with the value of keeping a journal and recording one’s own thoughts. I have never second-guessed this value since I began in 1985. Two hundred volumes later, I acknowledge that I’ll never catalogue all those entries, nor do I need to. After I die, I don’t care what happens to them. They could be burned or trashed. But I won’t be discarding them. I take great joy in going back to them and reliving the memories much like one who flips through pictures on the smart phone. And I enjoy reviewing ideas I’ve visited in the past, and revising them.

But that is not why I practice journaling. The poem I just mentioned contrasted journaling with living “in the moment.” For me, journaling is living in the moment. When I journal, I am peeling back the layers of my current experience, savoring it, dwelling on it. As I wrote these words, I heard the clatter of men outside, beneath my fire escape, emptying the restaurant dumpsters into the waiting truck. It was 27 degrees outside. My mind was immediately transported to the 1980s when I worked jobs outdoors during the winter, and dreamt of a better future. Next thing I knew, pages of the journal were filling with memories of those days, contrasted gratefully with realities of these days. For me, the life of the mind is a luxury; I relish any morning that I am allowed just to sit, ponder, and feel gratitude for life and the gifts offered.

After journaling, I went back into the bedroom, retrieved my guitar, and went to work re-learning a song I had stopped playing more than ten years ago–“South City Midnight Lady.” I have always loved those guitar riffs! The death of David Crosby last weekend has gotten my mind back on alternative tunings, and I had to re-tune my guitar to play this song. I just loved the sounds coming out of those strange chords! Next thing I knew, I was playing variations on that theme, enjoying the moment. I stopped playing in bands long ago, but am considering a return to the open mike. There are so many venues opening up these days, and I just might step back into that pool one day.

Once I opened the gallery downstairs at 10:00, I got out my art supplies and went to work sketching a younger version of Neil Young. I had tried to draw him last night when I was tired, and the weariness showed. Today’s sketch turned out better. I’m trying to talk myself into drawing more consistently. Making it a daily practice would be a good thing.

One of our local artists dropped by the gallery for a visit this morning, Mike Harris from Malakoff, forty minutes away. Mike has been a participant in Palestine’s monthly Art Walk for quite some time now. We plan to re-open Art Walk in April, since January through March brings unpleasant weather for getting out. Mike enjoys using a magnifying glass to burn images into birch wood, then coloring them with acrylic pigments and wood stains.

I use the word “emerging artist” carefully. Mike Harris indeed fits this category as he’s decided to test the market. His inventory is sufficient enough to show in festivals and he’s ordered a booth tent and now seeks venues to show. We had an energetic discussion about online presence, application guidelines and ways to send one’s work up the flagpole for others to see. Mike has gotten plenty of attention from the Palestine Art Walks and private commissions. Now he’s ready to get out more into the public. I trust you’ll be hearing plenty about his work soon, and I’m proud to play a part in introducing him.

Thanks for reading.

I make art in order to discover.

I journal when I feel alone.

I blog to remind myself I am not alone.

Saying Good-Bye

Who wants to see an abandoned soul?
Who wants to try and open it?
Who wants to know what desperate is?
Who wants to buy what’s broken?

David Crosby “What’s Broken”

In my narrow life’s narrative, celebrities seem to be dying weekly, sometimes daily. The loss always gives me pause. The end of the songs, the poems, the novels, the visual works of art. No more new creations from these perennial creators. The book is closed.

But day before yesterday, the largest tree fell in that enormous forest of musicians who have enriched me. From 1969 till now, if I could name only one, it would be David Crosby.

In 2014, I would drive through the darkness of the pre-dawn listening to the lyrics posted above from the album Croz. I couldn’t believe the man remained so prolific in his seventies.

In 1969, we were playing electric guitars in high school, trying to copy riffs from the Beatles, the Stones, the Monkees. I was bored with the scene. And then, one day in my friend’s bedroom, on his portable stereo, he put on the new album Crosby, Stills & Nash. The very first song I heard from them, “Suite Judy Blue Eyes”, totally astounded me. The tight vocal harmonies, the acoustic guitars. From that very day, I dropped all interest in the electric guitar. I purchased an Alvarez 12-string acoustic, and my musical life changed. Now, years later, I still play an Alvarez 12 and a pair of Martins. So much has changed in my musical tastes and abilities, but one musician still towers above them all. I no longer play in a band. I no longer perform. But in the stillness of my room, cradling an acoustic guitar, I feel his Presence affirming what I attempt.

In 1969, when I looked at their faces inside that first album, I was amused at the red-haired musician with the walrus mustache and mischievous twinkle in his eye. When I learned which voice was his, that rich baritone that always found the sweet spot in the chord, and later learned of his amazing assortment of alternative tunings, I knew I would be spending the rest of my life trying to figure out all the possibilities of acoustic guitar riffing and song writing.

And of course, I drew his portrait. Over and over and over again throughout the years. And now again early this morning at my gallery desk, I draw him yet again as I say Good-Bye.

I lived in Texas when he was arrested in 1982 at a Dallas night club. I cried. And then I cried again in 1985, the day he turned himself in to the FBI as a wanted fugitive, his hair full of lice and his body wasted by disease. His imprisonment cratered me. And then . . . he was out again. Writing music. Performing.

I finally saw him in person in 1992, in Dallas of all places, when Crosby, Stills & Nash were doing an acoustical tour. When they finished singing “Deja-Vu”, Graham Nash chirped: “So. You think you have been here before, David?” Crosby then cracked a smile and said, “Yeah, but at least now I’m not getting arrested!”

I saw Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young later in Dallas, then the trio two more times in Grand Prairie. David’s stage presence, to me, was always riveting.

Since his liver transplant, I have anticipated his death. But when it finally came, I was not prepared for how I feel. For two days, I’ve wanted to draw his portrait and post a blog tribute, but the gallery has had me covered up the entire time and today is also filled with appointments. Hence, this early morning attempt to get something out there. I have to say something. Write something. No matter how many months go by, I’ll never get the words to come out the way he deserves.

So, for now, all I can say is Good-Bye, my Friend. I’m sorry you never got to hear the words from me, but at least you got to hear the words from thousands, hear the applause from countless thousands, and know there were millions more out there touched by your creations.

Waking
Stream of consciousness
On a sleeping
Street of dreams

Thoughts
Like scattered leaves
Slowed in mid-fall
Into the streams

Of fast running rivers
Of choice and chance
And time stops here on the delta
While they dance, while they dance

I love the child
Who steers this riverboat
But lately he’s crazy
For the deep

And the river seems dreamlike
In the daytime
And someone keeps thinking
In my sleep

Of fast running rivers
Of choice and chance
And It seems as if time stops here on the delta
While they dance, while they dance, while they dance . . .

David Crosby, “The Delta”

Thanks for reading.

Good Morning from The Gallery at Redlands

For then I saw

That fires, not I,

Burn down and die;

That flare of gold

Turns old, turns cold.

Not I. I grow.

May Sarton, from “On a Winter Night”

I managed to go downstairs into the gallery by 8:00 this morning. Eschewing my custom of going to the desk to read, I went directly to the drafting table, picked up my brush and pencils, and completely rendered the harp player that was only a line drawing last evening.

Now I’m enjoying coffee and reading from a magnificent book acquired recently, Richard Lacayo’s Last Light: How Six Great Artists Made Old Age a Time of Triumph. This is not a self-help book. I didn’t purchase it because of a diminished art output or interest lately; I was just curious to read about the “winter years” of artists including Hopper, Goya, Titian and Matisse.

German art historian A. E. Brinckmann identified elements he referred to as altersstil (old-age style), and I was struck by his observation of “a reduction of forms to their essences and a preference for unfinished surfaces.” I have been moving in that direction, not because I read of it from another artist, but because of my fascination with Xie-He’s “Six Canons of Painting.” I have wanted to go to the “spirit essence” or “vital force” of subjects I paint, and spend less time with the peripheral elements of the scene. I’ve been happier to leave blank spaces for the viewer’s imagination to fill with whatever s/he perceives in the narrative I’m illustrating. Throughout the years, looking back at photos I’ve taken of works in progress, I nearly always like my paintings better when they are about 60% complete. My framed, finished works (to me) often appear over-worked.

The May Sarton poem at the top of this blog opens this book that I’m now reading. The words stirred me profoundly. I’m grateful that life and art have not diminished for me in these retirement years. It was always my hope that I could harvest something sublime from these years after all that time spent working a job to please others.

Thanks for reading.

I make art in order to discover.

I journal when I feel alone.

I blog to remind myself I am not alone.

Working Friday Night in The Gallery at Redlands

. . . and the philosophical light around my window is now, my joy; may I be able to keep on as I have thus far!

Friedrich Hölderlin, letter written December 2, 1802

My sentiments match Hölderlin’s as I work on this watercolor tonight in The Gallery at Redlands. We stay open till 9:00, so I still have another hour, and have decided to let this painting rest till the morning and settle into some comfortable reading before I shut down and go upstairs for the night.

Though January usually brings a considerable drop in business, the gallery has been busier than normal throughout this day and evening. Still I managed to squeeze out some quality time to study and continue work on this painting. In my previous work (pictured below), I featured the ghost of Lightnin’ Hopkins walking the rails with his guitar. This bluesman actually played in a juke joint in Crockett, Texas, thirty minutes down the road. A life-size bronze of him playing guitar graces the park across the street from the establishment where he played the blues.

The watercolor I am working on now features a seated guitarist. I’m using David Honeyboy Edwards as my model for this fellow. Beside him, playing harp is Don Gallia. I met him a few years ago while participating in the Randy Brodnax and Friends Christmas Show at the Sons of Hermann Hall in Dallas. Part of that festival’s tradition was “Church in the Bar.” An hour before opening, artists gathered for worship on Sunday morning in the barroom of the Hall. Don played harp masterfully as he accompanied guitarists leading the music part of the services. I decided to insert him into this composition.

It is nearly time to close the gallery for the night. I’ll return to open around 8 tomorrow morning and remain open till 9 p.m. I’m looking forward now to going upstairs to cozy up to a good book and read myself to sleep.

Thanks for reading.