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5.19
Once again, I've had to face mortality, this time during a training
ride in Valley Forge Park.Laying on my back in great pain, I focussed
on staying in the now. Too much to live for.
Ambulance, hospital,catheter, two new stents.
I've now had four knock me down heart attacks, which required
emergency care. Just how muchof this can my body endure?
EEEEk, a mouse. That's how I feel today. Any squeak in my
body and I'm up on a chair screaming (metaphor/simile or other).
What a pity party I'm having for myself! I'm just so lucky
for the people that love me. I will miss them terrible when the time comes.
And will leave as much good of me as I can behind to comfort
them. Ever so grateful for all they have given me.
5.3
I am slowing down with this painting as I feel the lure
of the figure.
What is this nude? That I lope off with on my waspy back?
Under the guise of "Rape of Europa" the Zeus in me sneaks
into my lexicon of old work and grabs a supine woman to
take away to artless embrace.
Besides that, I have been changing the painting,
isolating the figure with a grey made from the black and
orange on my palette, and creating a terra cotta color
to all but erase the yellow in the background, leaving
the yellow on the figure more distinctly
like tribal body marking.
4.27
With no goal, no show, other than the pleasure of brush
in paint and on canvas, I am treating this painting like
an inkblot in a therapist's office; seeing what ever lurks-
according to me, at the moment. So, what began as an
attempt to focus on paint at the expense of narrative
has fallen away and a story emerges. Maybe the rape of Europa.
We'll see. In my version an African princess rides
the wasp body of a satyr with a big black head and
white body. Who looks back on his prize; or is that
his journey in the from of a nubile woman?
I'm torn between keeping the painting flat and finding all the space
and form it wants.
I don't want it to become a fantasy or surreal piece however.
I'm not interested in proving the visual possibility of these
characters. They are mythology to me and exist in narrative
but not in my space. The canvas is 63 x 47.
4.23
I've been moving as slow with my work as the beard growing on my face;
but even so, cultivating and grooming each.
starting with the newest,
two days old. There are two figures hiding in this painting.
One, a satyr whose head is black and looming. Riding him, a small
gremlin? Maybe? With a couple of days away, I wonder what I'll
see next.
There will be lots of changes on the way
to the end of this painting, and I cannot know what they will be.
So I jot color and current composition into one of my journals
to see an option, and also to keep a visual diary.
I had been vacillating about this sculpt for months. There was
something about the head which bothered me terrible. My lovely Muse
suggested that the head, mask like, needed an apparatus to suggest
it could be placed over my head. Brilliant! I found some thin apple
branches and went to work. I'm finally settled with this sculpt.
I think it turned out okay.
3.17
thought I'd throw a watercolor in.
why not, I do them during the summer, up
in Maine, along the coast. Year after
year, to keep the brush wet, the eye awake,
to breathe the air.
but really,
here's the struggle.
back and forth on this one. I'm one of the
very few who are happy with the figure that
sits on the beach, pondering the BIG QUESTION(S)
What I have had many doubts about is the
background, particularly the sky, which I have
vacillated about.
I thought this would do it:
but changed my mind again and reverted to a blue sky
but this time a night sky. With stars and a quarter moon,
like the one the cow jumped over,
because the gods know
I've had several cows over the sky!
2.23
Combined, I think they make a complete piece: that part that
prays for help, and that part that ridicules the idea.
The good boy v. the bad boy. Whatever, as sculpts go, I
think this works and it amuses me; which is all I ask
from these various woods.
2.21
So, Ive been slogging along with this "Fiddler" sculpt,
trying to find a conclusion, to give it some.....snap.
Here are different views on the way to the, I hope,
end.
Seems I didn't edit the images correctly. Sorry they are on
the side. It gives the idea though.
I haven't lit these images as well as I might, but the group
together gives you an idea of means and intent. Because the
features on the back are indented, they seem much flatter here
than in person.
You might wander what I'm up to with this piece and while
I have suspicions, I'm not entirely sure. It has put it
self together, pretty much telling me what to do and where
to do it. Since I don't believe in hogwash like that, I
suppose some inner part of me wishes to express the
haunted, cynical version of myself. When I show you the picture
of "Fiddler" together with "Pig" I think you will see a pretty
conclusive portrait of the artist!!
Till then, ta.
2.8
I've been fussing with a painting.
I may never solve it, but change is always a start.
Since it is about equations, this all seems appropriate.
This to give you a sense of scale. What you can't see
is me pulling my hair out and screaming at Erato.
This for the close up.
It looked like this before
and this to start with.
1.24
I have both simplified the background of the
painting and I have added some text to ther surface
to 'activate' the area without having to manufacture
some sort of landscape. The construct of the letters
is as important to me as the words they evoke. I have
'drawn' the letters as I have drawn the painted figure
or constructed those sculpted.
When we see, or better, when we imagine what
our fate or future is, it is only with hope
and belief that we can still progress toward
what is likely to be a difficult outcome.
I use the crucifixion as a metaphor, not
because I am religious, but because it is so
easily recognizable for its trauma and legendary
results. Like the figures in Greek
myth, only gods and demi gods undertake such
hurculean tasks. The rest of us will
turn to safety and comfort.
1.19
read this in this morning's paper. found in the boot of a boy
who died by accident. Morbid in its association, but relevant
to me in my down days.
James 1:2-4
Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of
many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith
develops perserverance. Perseverance must finish its work so
that you may be mature an complete, not lacking anything.
So onward I must, despite the difficulty of the job. What a
fucking path I've taken! The rock gets heavier, the hill steeper
till rock and I tumble down, and I have no choice but to begin
again. Beer's in the fridge, mateys, time for a Pity Party.
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