on teaching art…seeing and doing

“In middle adulthood, the challenge is to develop the capacity to focus on the generations that will follow…generativity…failure to resolve this stage will lead to feelings of stagnation, in that one has made no contribution to the world that will last after he or she is gone…” Erik Erikson, human development theorist

I think another distinguishing predisposition of Erikson’s “middle adulthood” is a healthy pondering on life-to-date. This may be because I am on the tail end of “middle” or maybe I am just a mature “middle”…..no matter. I think I would have been wise to engage in a bit more reflection in all stages of my adult life, but objective looking back for the purpose of moving forward well is hindered often by the blinding nature of our circumstances.

So, in looking at “life-to-date”, I want to waste no more time waiting for the right set of circumstances or the ‘perfect’ answer to offer clarity….In recent months I am as clear-headed as I have known myself to be concerning what resonates in me and what is deadening. Life direction seems to flow best when we follow what sings inside.

I am captivated when I paint. Nothing else matters….I forget to eat and my normal insistence on domestic order fades in a frightening manner. As much as I want and need to participate in this image creating, there is always a scratchy sense of egocentricity that calls me to a balance. 

I find that balance in teaching. I think that at least a part of my “contribution” (as Erikson discusses) lies in this arena. Teaching is an outflow of what is contained inside …as an artist these are the infinite lessons learned and internalized from repeated attentiveness to light, shadow, color, form, and nuance.

The movie, Local Color, is an entertaining testament to this generativity (and regeneration) potential of teaching. It is the story of an accomplished elderly alcoholic artist whose life is given renewed meaning when he takes on a young and eager student…

But to say, “I teach art”, to me, approaches arrogance. I think that the gift I have to offer students is not my ability to grapple with perspective, or the human form, or the world of color and mixing, or design. Granted, I need to have a working knowledge of these and these need to be shared. But the gift lies in facilitating students to see and to do: Seeing and Doing.

Seeing was not something I learned in school directly. It was not taught straightforwardly (as per Frederick Franck—in a previous post). The seeing is something most “artists” do but seldom seem to articulate clearly to the one who needs to know--the student. Once the student begins to see rather than duplicate or perform for others---once the seeing is experienced in its purity, doing “art” is never the same.

The “doing” is a bit more pragmatic and less mystical, but no less essential. Doing art (without drudgery) is the child of attentive seeing. Doing becomes the joyful and sustained response to the epiphany of a new kind of seeing. This responsive doing, when exercised with a degree of diligence, produces a lively art that evolves in satisfying ways over time.

Done. I did not plan to post here until after Thanksgiving, but was busting after an elevating conversation with some student/friends today. I am looking forward to next semester.

an unwanted blogging sabbatical

I had so hoped to post a couple of times a week back when I began in August. With my Fall schedule, I altered my goal intentionally to once per week. With more schedule additions, I am now hesitant to set a goal until after Thanksgiving. I am preparing for application to a graduate program --a process requiring forms and lots of writing and gathering of letters and on and on...

I am still painting. I am currently working on a commission for a floorcloth (look at the additions to my floorcloth page that I did last week).

As soon as I finish this rather large floorcloth--it's 3'x 5', I will post a picture.

world of detail

Bunter is an English Bulldog. He lives with me. It is late and I am sitting here at my laptop and he is busy digging into the kitchen cupboard that is home to my plastic storage containers. He is looking for a toy because he continually searches for playthings. 

Recently he was in the living room pouncing on some object of play near the window. The commotion was distracting, so I investigated and found that his “toy” was a bee. Bunter had killed it quicky without maiming (he’s much better at this than me) and was tossing it about the room.

I thanked him as I picked up the tiny insect body and added it to my collection of interesting things to draw and paint. I don’t mind working from field guides or photographs, but having the subject in hand generates an intimacy… a familiarity that is far superior to a flat photo. I ran a needle through the bee’s body and stuck it in a Pink Pearl eraser. Using a 10x magnifier with a light I began my study.

Study implies attention…absorption. Barbara and I were out walking last week and she told me how she really would like to take a year and really study just one author’s works. That would involve reading the books and the commentaries and then generating questions and feedback with others who have a similar focus. It would lend to a deep understanding of that author and the mind that birthed those literary creations. This same idea plays out well with paint and canvas….and a bee.

Under the lighted magnifier is a world of detail that is by and large valued by a marginal group of individuals like Henri Fabre and some friends (authors and fellow artists) who love to notice the underappreciated.

For several days I looked at the bee and recorded what I saw. I could not help but wonder if this fascination with my discoveries is much like the experiences of early naturalists like Fabre, Muir, and Audubon who studied and recorded the life around them. I think it is how we experienced life about us when we were toddlers.

Concentrating on a single subject…like a bee… to know it intimately and to record it well….not shifting to boredom…is a kind of contemplation or prayer that is transcendent.

I have loaded new pieces in several of the "pages" on the left.

ghosts in the studio

“Why is it that some children cannot joyfully dive in (to creating art)? There are a myriad of reasons, I’m sure, but the most common one I have seen in children and adults alike, is that they have become limited by being self-conscious of their abilities.”  Barbara Coleman

I like to think of myself as a person who is unburdened by others’ opinions. But frequently notice that I really do care and this concern is injurious to any vestige of creativity…in art, in writing, public speaking (or whatever form creativity takes). It all becomes stiff and lifeless. 

Putting my stuff “out there” is an exercise in humility, not a product of narcissism and ,hopefully, not too much a product of naiveté. (It is risky to the ego, but I am discovering value in a dose of ego mortification).

 I have been experimenting with a series of self-portraits born out of several  years  of private journaling…..some  of the drawings are imbedded in those very personal pages and I am redoing them as stand-alone images. I was sharing some of these recent paintings with a friend. He looked at them quizzically and then looked at me and said, “What are they for?...they don't even look like you." What a blow.

Crap. I really do care. He’s right I really don’t know what they’re for. I didn’t know they had to be FOR something when I play with them.

So, I stopped for a few days and cowered in fear. But quickly I resolved that I like these impressions. They are fairly good drawings. More than anything, the idea came from a good place in me. A friend on Facebook said they "are how you see you"(thank you, Laura). Without freedom of interior confidence there is no fearless originality. So, I am going ahead…..free of the encumbrance of that voice.

Barbara Coleman writes of “ghosts in the studio.” She says that those ghosts include her teachers, critics, friends, husband, gallery owners, favorite artists. I think those ghosts are ubiquitous in a much wider world than the studio. They have an almost physical presence.  So much so that it tightens muscles, knots the stomach, and constipates that needed “flow”  that  Mihaly Csíkszentmihályi proposes as “completely focused motivation.”

But, when I really paint—when I am kicking it in, the ghosts are gone. I think there may be no other way to get them gone except by proceeding as if they are not there at all. (a small glass of Merlot really does help…several of my non-alcoholic artist friends are firm believers in this)

I am proceeding with more of these (and other) drawings. I don’t know what they are for and am moving gradually to a place where it really does not matter at all….

I am going to start a new page "self-portraits" some time this coming week..

making art is hard

 “Artists get better by sharpening their skills or by acquiring new ones; they get better by learning to work and by learning from their work.  They commit themselves to the work of their heart, and act upon that commitment…making art is hard. Talent is a snare and a delusion.”Art and Fear: Observations on the perils and rewards of artmaking. David Bayles and Ted Orland.

In the summer of my freshman year in high school, I attended a national arts camp at the University of Kansas at Lawrence consisting of specially picked kids from across the country ages 14-18…. It was six weeks of intensive classes in painting, life drawing, and cartooning. I had been a big fish in a little pond in my high school and it was easy to be confident about my abilities…

…until I watched Diane work at her art.

Diane was my roommate. She had curly red hair and dressed like she did not care what anyone thought. She was difficult and arrogant. I did not like her but her facility in interpreting any object of her gaze was irrefutable.  She worked confidently and her pencil easily went to all the right places ..capturing nuance, shadows and gesture….maddenly adept. And it was not because she worked hard at it…she just had it…a rare (albeit obnoxious) natural genius. We managed the summer together via avoidance. She paraded her unfair advantage throughout the dorm. My stuff was stiff and hard won. Hers was loose and she could accomplish with three well-placed lines what took me a dozen.

 I never heard anymore about Diane after that summer. The dark side of me has imagined she got married to an Allis Chalmers mechanic, had half dozen kids, got fat and never drew again. I was altogether intimidated.

I think that my summer with Diane contributes largely to the healthy response I have to the silly conversations that invariably arise at shows or in workshops or classes. They almost always include the refrain…. “You just have talent” or “I wish I had that kind of talent”.  The myth of the potency and exclusivity  of talent absolves us of the obligation to work hard. It evades the need for commitment to work and is a “snare and a delusion.”

Diane had talent. Michelangelo had talent. Marty works hard. Most of us have to work hard.

martial artists—energy to create

“Energy follows attention.”

I credit these words to a friend. She didn’t give a reference. I think it may be a martial arts term. She was introducing them into a discussion we were having of an ongoing personal problem of mine.  They did not seem particularly potent when she spoke them. She asked me to bring them to bear on my weighty situation over the next week.  She told me that the more I allowed myself to focus on my dilemma the more energy I was giving it. By the time of this discussion my difficulty had already morphed into a decidedly energetic beast.   She suggested that I practice being aware of my attention and gently remove it from the problem and consciously place it in a more positive place. Simple idea.

But wrenching my attention away from this now alluring leviathan was accomplished in forced and painful increments over the next few days. Surprisingly, the practice strengthened upon each small turning until I sensed that the Beast was in fact being divested of power. This is a great lesson worthy of creative application to life issues  as they unceasingly present themselves.  With that said….

“After making the decision that my art, whatever form it takes…writing, drawing, speaking, painting….is worthy of my time, discovering how to insert that creative space of time into my day looms large.” This is the beginning of a previous post that I am seeking now to continue.

 “It seems that the energy of these (creative) people is internally generated and is due more to their focused minds than to the superiority of their genes.”…..Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi  in Creativity

I hold to the idea that creating is supremely necessary to being human and not an elitist or selfish endeavor. It is imperative. Because of this, I can unquestionly make space for creating to happen. I will begin to view the obstacles to creative space in very much the same way I deal with the “Beast” of my personal dilemma. I turn my attention to making space. I attend to its possibility. I turn attention away from the critic  and the pressure for anal tidiness. My attention is on the possibilities and those possibilities are energized.

attention to painting

My intention to continue the last post has been derailed in a good way. With only so much time set aside daily for creating, painting has won over writing for a season.
Let me explain the paintings I have been doing the past few late evenings. I have created a new page for these "honoring the lovely loser" accessible  on the home page index of pages.
"Theodore:honoring the lovely loser" is the title of this series of post-work, post-dinner quick paintings  I have been doing after everyone in the house is in bed.  This is not the usual me. I am an early morning person. Getting to bed after 10 is one of several radical decisions that speak death to old routines and a sense of normalcy...shaking up old stuff is something I need at this time in my life.

Concerning the subject of these paintings.... I am not seeking to be cute or pander to popular ideas..I am hoping for some degree of honesty in revealing what is deeply meaningful to me. The idea of giving honor to what is inconsequential aligns itself with previous posts about seeing well or seeing with a kind of third eye. The beetle is indigenous to southern NM...or at least to my front porch...where I found him/her and inhumanely ended life for the sake of adding to my stock of models.

Concerning the challenges to my painting style..."tight" would be a fitting adjective for much of my work..not that this is "bad", but in these paintings I am seeking to combine careful seeing with a looser hand.  So far, I am excited about the results.  You might notice the progression in that if , at a later time, I dated the paintings.

Concerning the name...It evolved from a Facebook posting conversation that was kind of organic. Naming work has always been something I have found distasteful and I usually let someone else do it.

I will post more as they dry.  I would covet comments and good criticism. marty