Blog
Posted on 11/30/2010 10:40:24 PM
By Donald Fox
1 Comment
As a writer and writing teacher, I often have to watch out for clichéd statements. These frequently repeated phrases and sayings usually skim over what can be a truly memorable or powerful experience. Many times when we are caught off guard and don’t know what to say to an unexpected comment, we respond with a cliché. Once upon a time, though, every cliché was an original thought that no doubt perfectly served the moment. One of these that rattles around in my mind with the persistence of flies on fruit is “you’re never too old to learn.” Sure, there is the obvious truth of the statement; that’s why clichés are so often repeated. For a writer, though, clichés are like dead weight. The perceptive reader will begin to dismiss what the writer is saying because he or she hasn’t taken the time to be original. This is no great matter in ordinary conversation or daily emails, perhaps even in letters to friends, if anyone actually writes letters anymore.
Painting, too, can be muddled by clichés. Any image that is so frequently portrayed as to become overly used (even abused) is in danger of becoming a cliché. A weathered barn, a rusted milk can, a winding road, a babbling brook, bluebonnets (especially in Texas) – well, perhaps the idea is clear. The problem with these kinds of images is that the viewer, especially the experienced viewer, loses interest very quickly if not outright dismisses the work entirely. But, what if you genuinely like bluebonnets or rusted milk cans? What if you’ve not seen these things as often as those who consider them clichéd images? Can’t there be something new discovered in a moment of inspired looking at even the most often observed scene, something like a sunset? I think so, and I feel certain that many would agree with me.
Think – “beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” How many connotations can that muster? Let’s don’t, however, use the cliché as an excuse to skirt the issue. What we’re really talking about here is originality. Long after easel painting was declared dead in the 60s, we still find marvelous examples of landscape paintings filled with potentially clichéd images like sunsets, barns, wildflowers, cows, and on and on. The painters respect the images, discover something new and unique, and imbue them with the power of personal vision and learned experience so that we, the viewers, gain a different insight into something that we thought we knew so well. That, to me, is the real power of painting, or any art – to take the ordinary and transform it into the extraordinary. What a challenge for us all.
Posted on 11/23/2010 7:55:34 PM
By Donald Fox
1 Comment
Whenever I enter a room in a private residence or a public building, one of the first things I look for is the artwork that may be gracing the space. I am curious to see new and unfamiliar work, but I am also curious about the choices residents or occupants have made regarding the space in which they live and work. Unfortunately, I’m often disappointed by what I encounter. It’s sad to see a wonderful space wasted by pieces of colorful fluff that could just as easily be a swatch of colored fabric or blandly painted wall. Hardly anyone would notice the difference. Imagine the joy, though, when a lively painting full of energy and life graces a foyer, a lobby, or a living room. The passerby or visitor has an open invitation to linger, to come closer and contemplate the artistic statement that has changed the room into a conversational place, at once warm and friendly.
I have never understood the practice of using a painting as a decorative accessory. There are wall hangings or other kinds of decorations that can be used to add color to a space, but paintings are far more than that. I doubt any serious artist would want his or her artwork reduced to the level of rectangular room accents. A good painting is to be read like a good novel or a good poem. It can be appreciated time and time again with new discoveries awaiting revelation as the viewer becomes increasingly familiar with the intricacies of the work. What a travesty when an interesting painting is relegated to a darkened corner or partially obscured by a contrasting plant or chinoiserie vase. How is it, though, that this circumstance is so prevalent within the world of interior design? Don’t get me wrong. I deeply appreciate those designers with the artistic eye and interest in creative expression who have chosen my work and that of my friends to brighten a boardroom or bedroom. Somewhere, though, there seems to be a breakdown in education about what a painting is.
Of course, as a painter I am biased. I have chosen to educate myself about art and its history, but I’m also aware that art history and even art appreciation are not a priority, nor much of a concern, among most educators in this country. Only rarely do children have the opportunity to learn about the artistic past of civilizations except in modest portions in a few history classes. Never mind that artists have often chronicled their times and certain artists like Leonardo, Rubens, or Holbein to name a few, have actually mingled with the power brokers in official capacities. To say that the role of art and artists is often misrepresented and misunderstood is an understatement of the highest order. Even a cursory look at past history will reveal that this has not always been the case.
As artists we can complain about this state of affairs, and often do, or we can take responsibility for implementing change, which I believe we are. It is encouraging, in fact, to see the continuously growing presence of artists on the internet. As we market our work, we also serve as ambassadors for artistic expression. When we present both ourselves and our work as professionals, we elevate what we do in the eyes of others. It is also gratifying to see many visual artists blogging about their work as well as utilizing newsletters and social media to enlighten and to educate. Not too many years ago this widespread dissemination of information was unheard of. As the old myths of artists being perpetually poor, depraved and deprived, irresponsible social misfits, and other misrepresentative clichés fade away, a new understanding and appreciation for the work of dedicated creative contributors will continue to grow.
Posted on 11/16/2010 5:49:41 PM
By Donald Fox
Comment on this
My earliest memory of nature as something outside myself is the undeveloped lot behind the garage apartment we lived in on Keaton Avenue in Wilmington. A tiny porch outside the kitchen door on which my mother sometimes hung hand washed garments overlooked this pristine landscape of twisted tree branches, vines and variegated foliage, densely green in the summer and infinitely brown in the winter. So thick was this forest that the house the next block over was completely hidden, even when trees had lost all their leaves. All of the fairytale witches, goblins, and fanciful characters I discovered in stories inhabited this strange, inviting, and forbidding land. Stairs led from the porch down to the back side of the garage, but a heavy wire gauge fence prevented small boys from venturing into this wonderland. I could only view from one floor up the enticing mystery of something just beyond my reach yet not beyond my imagination. To this day I am captivated by densely wooded areas whose multiple openings and hollows created by overlapping branches, crossed tree trunks, bushes, stones, and fallen forest remnants invite the eye and mind on endless exploration of colors, textures, and secret passages of both time and space. I still feel the excitement of promise and the fear of lurking dangers that my parents in their desire to educate me to the real world instilled within me as part of my educational process in wariness and caution.
Most of my explorations in painting have been derived from this early experience of natural color and form. The perceived space of two dimensional painting resulting from overlapping planes, diminishing size, shifts of position, contrast of value or color, elements so innate to our viewing experience that it is easy to overlook their fundamental power, is itself a magical experience that is one of life’s many miraculous features. We often speak of an artist’s vision, meaning that quality of symbolic perception that leads us to new levels of understanding through word, image, or symbol, and think that the artist sees more keenly than most. No doubt there are insights that the artist communicates to his/her audience, but the viewer-listener-reader has to be perceptive enough to decipher them. The most profound insights often come from the simplest of experiences. Simplest could also be read as direct, obvious, fundamental, overlooked – or many similar terms. In short, the artist sees the familiar and makes it seem new and fresh through re-inventing it in some artistic medium. For myself, I think of paintings as translations of some experience – observed, felt, or imagined – rendered visually. Perhaps all of them are attempts to recapture or reinterpret that early experience of the mystery landscape that I saw as a three-year-old from the tiny platform outside the kitchen.
Posted on 11/11/2010 7:40:44 PM
By Donald Fox
Comment on this
What is it about art that pulls us in and captures us, not just our attention, but our very heart and soul? That mysterious desire to create (that many anthropologists link to the desire to procreate) certainly appears to be one of the fundamental urges that we as humans feel and express. I don’t doubt that many artists would claim that creative expression is the most important thing in their lives. Personally I would add that appreciating art is equally as important as making it. A great work, a powerfully realized painting, can generate emotional responses just as powerful as that in-the-zone feeling that accompanies the act of art making when everything just feels right and falls into rightful place within the borders of the canvas.
Artists may vary in how they express their thoughts and feelings about what most attracts them to art and art making. The variety of response is interesting to see and to ponder, for just as I learn things from looking at good paintings of other artists, so do I also learn things from the thoughts expressed by them. Whether an artist may identify color interaction, the interplay of shapes and form, the sensuous texture of paint, or a seductive combination of these and other factors, I sense that there is another element that runs through and connects the varied experiences of artists in pursuit of their art. That element, I believe, is resonance.
If you look up the definition of resonance in a dictionary, you’ll find a string of definitions, some very specific and some general. Resonance in physics or chemistry is quite specific to the discipline. The language is very technical. Other definitions speak to ideas that include these more arcane explanations yet are more simply expressed. My two favorite definitions are “a quality of richness or variety” and “a quality of evoking a response.” Certainly the best art has richness that we experience at a deep level. There is no question that art is as varied as the artists creating it. Also, there is no question that we respond to art as we make it as well as to the art of others, but there is another level of understanding that can be revealed through analogy.
A simple experiment with two tightly stretched strings placed closely together demonstrates that when one is plucked causing it to vibrate, the other is affected and begins to vibrate as well. This form of resonance is basic to music and is observable in single instruments as well as in the sounds of instruments playing together. We hear because our ear drums resonate from the sound waves that act upon them. Similarly, we see because our retinas resonate with the light waves that activate them. This has led metaphysicians to explain much of our experience with the phrase “like attracts like.” They would say that we respond to the things to which we are attuned. We are set into vibration by those resonant things: a beautiful woman or a handsome man, a field of brightly colored flowers, a glorious sunset, or the uniquely rhythmical brushwork in a painting by Sargent or Pissarro.
The complexity of physical, emotional, and spiritual response we may experience in the presence of art, another’s or our own, may never be quantified if one would even venture to do so. However, to imagine that I am vibrating resonantly with the painting before me is an image that greatly appeals to me. I can understand something beyond the mechanical actions or situational observations and decisions that may be part of the thinking-feeling experience of the moment. I resonate with what is before me and within me. I feel privileged to know that resonance will continue as another stands before one of my own paintings. This also suggests to me that painting is a great responsibility, for my desire is to contribute in a positive and uplifting way. The desire to create is a desire to connect, which we as artists do in our wonderfully resonant way.
Posted on 11/8/2010 10:05:34 PM
By Donald Fox
Comment on this
“What do you see when you turn out the light?” – McCartney/Lennon.
What do you see when the light is on? Observation is fundamental to the appreciation of painting. For many painters, observation is crucial to the making of the painting itself. In western culture observation is perhaps most strongly linked to scientific pursuits, particularly as a way of knowing. In Alan Watts famous book, The Book, he suggests the dilemma of western thinkers that only one thing can be fully seen at a time. As soon as the focus shifts to another thing, the first thing has gone out of focus. This experience may lead to a cultural neurosis. We pride ourselves on our ability to multi-task, especially in this age of computers. Yet, we often feel pulled in many directions at once. We try to do more and find that ultimately, though we may achieve more, our results can also be diminished. The eastern mind, however, understands singularity of focus as a possible pathway to enlightenment. Perhaps it is to our detriment that so few of us can commit to one purpose or to each other.
Many painters still learn their craft through time-honored observation, drawing and painting from a model, from arrangements, or from plein air painting. The challenge is to take the observed information and translate that into the language of painting. In spite of 20th century philosophizing to the contrary, there is still much to be explored in representational painting. I would suggest, though, that even abstract painters are observers of their inner worlds and of the painting as it progresses through its developmental process. For all painters, regardless of stylistic approach, are concerned with the observation that follows – that of the viewer when confronting the finished work.
For me there is something else, a deeper sense of interaction between observer and subject, that informs any painting on which I may be working. Ultimately there is a dialogue between me as observer and the colors, shapes, and light-dark patterns that I observe. Associations and memories come into play as well, but there is a blending of experience within the moments of observation. The process is a form of meditation that transcends the moment and results, hopefully, in a timeless expression in the painted image even if it represents a particular time and place.
It has been argued that representational painting is only a lie because it gives the illusion of reality. We have greatly developed our sense of observation, from the infinitely large to the infinitely small, since Renaissance painters first developed linear and aerial perspective. In spite of the esthetic spin of modern critics, many painters still follow the path of observation and chronicle those observations in paint. Are these painters hopelessly outdated? Well, consider the range of representational painting since the early Renaissance. How much variety do we see? How many painters, even when painting the same subjects, create paintings that are interchangeable? Keen observers like Pissarro and Cezanne, when painting side by side from the same subject, create very different paintings.
What continues to be true is that painters that work from observation always filter their observations through their own sensibility. A painter learns to observe through drawing and painting and perhaps with the guidance of an experienced teacher. The painter is also training his or her sensibility and developing that personal vision that will take the ordinary observation and make it into a powerful visual expression. Observation is the stimulus for the resultant painting that becomes the stimulus for the appreciative observer.
Posted on 11/4/2010 7:59:18 PM
By Donald Fox
Comment on this
There was an earlier period in my life as a producing artist when my focus was on abstract painting. During this time I put together a number of one-man shows and participated in many group exhibits. My work sold reasonably well, which was gratifying, but I’ve tended to be more motivated by the reaction of viewers as I would dialogue with them in the gallery or the studio. Fortunately, my audience has always included an abundance of supportive friends, some of them creative people in their own right, but most of them don’t think of themselves as creative. Word of mouth from these friends and advertising in local media often generated quite diverse groups of attendees at these various art events. To the people I didn’t know, I didn’t always introduce myself first thing; I wanted to hear what they might say about the work unhindered. To me their responses were often enlightening. How close they frequently were in expressing their feelings to what I had felt when creating the painting. If I introduced myself first and then asked how they liked the show or a certain piece, a discomforting look might appear on their brow. Something might be mumbled in embarrassment.
A typical response from someone unused to talking about art is “I don’t know much about art, so I don’t feel qualified to say,” or “I’ve never thought much about painting,” or “I’d rather hear what you have to say about it.” It’s always tempting to jump right in and explain every nuance of my esthetic theory. The old saying, though, that what’s interesting to you might not be interesting to someone else, is very useful to remember at those times. My response, then, is to ask a few questions. I might say, “I’m not sure my work communicates my intention. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?” Most people will readily agree. Then I might ask them what they first felt when they looked at the painting. Depending on their response, I might ask them to tell me more. I probe for clarification if the response is too general, but my experience has been that most people, even the reticent ones, are very aware of their feelings: they’re attracted, confused, annoyed, interested, intrigued, put off, mystified, angry, and so on. Another question or two and they will speak what they know including the reasons why. Sometimes they are becoming aware of this as they speak. When appropriate, I connect something they say to something that is true for me about the piece in question. We continue dialoging about the painting almost as if we are two artists intently discussing art over coffee at a local café. Here and there I compliment them on their perceptiveness. I do the same process now that I have moved back into representational work, which often leads us beyond talking about what the painting represents into what the painting might mean. Most art is, after all, symbolic expression.
Whether viewers become buyers or not, they have given me the pleasure of knowing their appreciation, and, hopefully, I’ve given them validation of their own experience. This they can take to the next show and the next artist, but more than once I’ve had someone call me later and say, “You know, I’m really interested in that painting we discussed. Is it still available?”
Posted on 11/2/2010 8:58:40 PM
By Donald Fox
Comment on this
Many of us hear suggestions from an instructor or workshop leader and attempt to incorporate those into the painting or drawing before us. Maybe the ideas work, and the improvement is visible. Later, though, we either forget or old habits interfere with the new information that hasn’t yet reached the level of assimilation. Often the path to progress is long and change slow to develop. Such is the nature of acquiring skill. Understanding may also proceed slowly or come with a flash of insight. The ideal is when understanding and skill blend into effortless creative expression.
Many of the ideas that govern a successful painting or drawing are not in themselves difficult to understand. It is the process of execution, the level of skill necessary, that is the area where most work has to be done. Practice, practice, practice is the mantra that will either embolden us or inhibit us from achieving the desired results. Perhaps art teaches patience and humility more than anything else.
One idea that is simple enough but that eluded me for quite a long time is to always proceed from the center. As a young student I was captivated by the interplay of color and light, the seemingly endless patterns of light and dark within any given scene. Edge was always the place of comfort, the zone to which the eye could retreat with some sense of reliability. That was where the lighter could be delineated from the darker. So easy to see. How come, then, those symmetrical shapes didn’t quite make themselves with the same regularity with which they so boldly stood forth? I, like so many students before me, worked to make the round be round and the oval be oval so that the right side actually mirrored the left side. And what if, then, those ovals had to be portrayed in perspective?
I observed many master drawings to see how the wizards of old had done it. Look how wonderfully the curves of body or vase filled the spaces they occupied. For the most part, though, these masters covered their tracks. We were led to believe that their genius was innate and had sprung full blown onto the canvas or paper as effortlessly as a flower opens to the morning sun. Any words of instruction were like chatter, white noise against the insistent internal monologue that I should be able to do this just as effortlessly.
Who knows how many times I was told or read the simple truth that I never heard or understood. One day, while reading about the Romantic era in art, I found a statement by Delacroix to always draw from the center outward. Something clicked, and I finally understood what I am sure had been told to me many times before. Soon I read variations on the statement from Leonardo, Rembrandt, Ingres, Cezanne, and many others. That simple idea had been discovered and rediscovered by artists through centuries until it became an academic tenet and finally included in practically every “how to” book on the market.
How often we struggle and resist when the simple idea is right before us. The obvious is not always so obvious, but once we see, the understanding truly becomes our own.
