Random Thoughts from a Painter in the Middle of the Night

Beam Me Up

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Sun Apr-30-06 12:29 AM
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Random Thoughts from a Painter in the Middle of the Night

I'm listening to Ravi Shankar play the sitar on my iMac as I type this. I'm relaxing after a long day's work on my art. Things have been good for me and my art this past year, strangely so. I thought at one point, "It must be the end of the world, my paintings have begun to sell!"

Beginnings and Endings are such 'edgy' things; what about transformation? As a painter I watch how paintings begin and end and I see it isn't so simple, isn't as obvious as one might think. At least it isn't for me. I guess I shouldn't speak for all people who paint as an art. Painting is like "music" -- there are a lot of different kinds. I'm in the tradition of what is called "abstract" painting, but I don't like the word very much and never have. The problem with it is when people read it they get the idea that "abstract" painting is fundamentally different from "realistic" or "representational" painting. I argue that this is not the case in an essay HERE.

Painting is a language. It is not "like" a language, it actually is one, a visual one, just as Music is a language of sound. The language of music speaks to our innate sense of rhythm and harmonic proportion. It speaks to our feeling as well as our intellect. It is a communication between the musical performer and his audience.

Painting is sort of like that, too, but it is also quite different. Making a painting is something like performing a jazz solo. It's not an exact analogy but it will do. Thing is, in most instances, the act of painting is done in solitude. What people see when they look at a painting is a culmination of all the things the painter did and all the decisions the painter made along the way.

This is one of my paintings:

It is five feet square, painted with oil paint on aluminum. There is no frame. The aluminum is supported by 2" aluminum square tubing on the back, so the image appears to 'float' off the wall. There is no colored paint in it, it is solid black. What color you see is a result of the light in the room reflecting off its surface. There is some blue from a large skylight and there is a yellowish light coming from halogen track lights. The black paint has been textured with a brush so that it reflects light, somewhat like a black vinyl record, only warped. This particular piece has a slightly sinister quality and is subsequently called "Probosis."

I've been painting off and on all my life; well, at least since I was about 8 years old. I haven't gotten a lot of 'recognition' for it -- some, but not a lot. Two of my paintings were included in a group show of Oakland artists in the Oakland Museum in 1990. I was one of two painters in this exhibition that no one had ever heard of before. I don't know what happened to the other one but, despite my best efforts at the time, I continued to be 'unheard of' in the gallery scene.

At one point I got so fed up with the whole ordeal of trying to get my work represented by a gallery, I just gave up and stopped painting. Still, I always kept my art supplies around me and continued to live in an artists loft. Eventually, after a lot of personal loss (father passed, lover passed, mother passed, best friend passed, another lover passed), somehow I began to pick it up again. I would say it has taken me about 10 years to get back to where I was when I quit. Strangely, the difference is, people are beginning to pay more attention to my work. I've sold more paintings this past year than ever before in my life. I'm still 'under represented' but at least I'm not UNrepresented. Still, I support my art, it doesn't support me. I work two part time jobs to support my art habit: I manage a small, family owned retail business three days a week and I manage the artists' loft building in which I live the other four. This gives me most of my rent, which, in the San Francisco bay area, ain't cheep. Art supplies are expensive but the most expensive things a painter has to buy are TIME and SPACE. The space part I got covered, it is the time that is hardest to get. Ideally a painter would be able to develop his art for days and days on end with little to no interruption from the outside world so he could master this mysterious substance.

Here's another painting:

This one is oil on wood, 20" high by 60" long, framed in a wood 'floater' frame (there is quarter inch space between the edge of the painting and the inside edge of the frame). It is titled "Dying Sun." It sold a couple months ago but I don't know who bought it. That's another weird thing about being a painter. Something you spent a lot of time looking at and thinking about, modifying, one thing and another, sometimes working on off and on for years, goes off to a gallery and then it sells and, chances are, you never see it again -- except, perhaps, as a 'picture'. The picture isn't the painting.

To give you an better idea what I mean by that, here is a close to life size detail of "Dying Sun":

Gives you a better idea of the texture and subtlety of collor.

Well, I'm sure I've bored you all with my ramblings. Thre's no point to any of this except to share a little bit about myself. It's not that I think I'm all that 'great' or anything, just thought someone might find it 'interesting' or 'entertaining' in some way.

Thanks for reading!

BMU