A Long Year Behind Me: My Head and My Heart But Not My Hands is in Art

About a one year hiatus from the blog.  I haven't anguished over the blog contributions necessarily but I sense that I must have missed many opportunities for personal growth and insight as a result of not contributing to it. Many missed moments of failing to study, investigate, ponder, and share within the context of the daily contributions and doing art routinely. To some degree, I have lost myself and my way along the path I intended. But it has been a year of Duty. A return to Duty. And long hours to stay on watch and station. Sometimes with duty and responsibility one can get caught up and lose the sense of self within. A triggering event and a moment of epiphany can re-instill a need to return to core values and activities. I have the sense that my Mission is accomplished in my present assignment. It is time to return to the Mission stated in "Impressions from Idle Acres" in a new phoenix.

Imperatives and ideas and wishes have been building but not acted upon explicitly. A resetting of priorities may be required to re-calibrate to the Original Outlook. A redirecting of Life Force and Energy is coming. It comes from the still, small Inner Voice whispering its guidance.

There are two images to share today that reflect my feelings after this year's hiatus from Impressions and may portend the future as well.  "Winter's Discontent" depicts a solitary, dried corn husk amidst other fallen fruitless stalks located in an urban, curbside garden.

Original Photo: "Winters Discontent", Copyright James E. Martin 2014

The garden from which "Winter's Discontent" is taken seemed to be a feeble, half-hearted, but well-meaning attempt at balancing the modern life with a semblance of one of the basic values tantamount to the human endeavor. Growing one's own food is a basic value but, in this case, not in a quantity sufficient for annual survival and sustenance. This garden was a fleeting, false gesture. Perhaps it made one person feel good about their personal endeavor and there was some enjoyment of it. The photo was taken on an extremely frigid day with temperatures so low that it was startling to go outside and painful to remain outside. Taking the picture was awkward with bare hands to the camera controls. The depiction is after the fruitful harvest season of green, verdant opportunity in sunshine and rain and depicts the leftover remnants that remain in the cold, frigid season of days gone by. The opportunity for growth and nourishment is now past. Any kernels of well-being that remain are suitable for birds and field mice. If a new crop is to be sought, a new season and a new seeding is imperative. The Spring season of refreshing is near.

The second image is of "Winter's Urban Sunset" in the proximity of the garden and provides the feeling associated with the most recent leg of Duty's journey.

Original Photo: "Winter's Urban Sunset", Copyright James E. Martin 2014

Again, the setting of an old day in the urban environment with only the hint of a new dawn in the near term. The colors and layout of the sunset are captivating but only for a moment's enjoyment. Change is ever present and the enjoyable beautiful moment of Impression is momentary. The time is not yet here to know where the dawn will be seen from or what it will look like. And it will have to appear on a different horizon. One must turnaround in an opposite direction to see the dawn after the sunset.

My thought is to start a new blog with a new look that continues this self-taught artist's journey from "Idle Acres". Perhaps "Impressionism from the Journeyman" seems appropriate. This morning I hobble up and shakily move forward but with some measure of internal mental determination, perseverance, and fortitude. The Daily Walk continues.

Inward Perception: Using the Same Constructions

Today's sketching effort was like walking with a wooden peg leg. Felt slow, mechanical, and non-prolific. Didn't get far. Didn't sketch many. I have the inward sense that I am using the same constructions and that I need to induce deliberate variations and challenges into my approach.

Daily Sketch: AM Likeness - Copyright James E. Martin 2012

Alignment: A Return to Core Values and Activities

As a family, we have opted to travel cross country to Ohio to retrieve our oldest daughter from a seven week summer venture. This was my wife's idea. We have planned for tent camping along the way and haven't done this for a few years. In my childhood and teens, I hiked and camped a lot and remember it fondly. My gear included backpack, one person tent, sleeping bag, canteen, tin cookware set, hatchet, jacknife, and topographical maps of numerous stomping grounds. Developing a simple discipline of self-reliance through discovery and exploration was the Journey then. Getting away and being on my own were the motivations then. This week will be a return to core values.

"Learn to limit yourself,
 to content yourself
with some definite thing,
and some definite work;
dare to be what you are,
and learn to resign
with a good grace
all that you are not
and to believe in
your own individuality."

Henri Frederic Amiel
Filosoof Zwitserland
1821-1881

Fragile Weave of Earth's Bounty: Interconnected

In February of this year, I had a dream about a certain set of brushstrokes, couldn't shake it upon awakening, and played with that idea painting small tradecards throughout the day. I developed numerous experiments that were quite abstract compared to anything I have ever done. It was a very serendipitous moment based on a tiny dreamt inspiration. The artifacts were almost more craft than art and I chose not to re-post them in this latest blog phoenix. But in reviewing the works, the original idea about brushstrokes had morphed into topological representations of left-and-right, step-by-step, chains, networks, particles, patterns, hidden wholes within segmented patterns, innovation with methods, different-but-equal, similarity, diversity, sizing, and finally, a small multimedia piece about conflagration of separated pieces. The resultant overall theme, however, was one of Interconnectedness.

During my three month respite from blogworld, I had to wrestle with numerous personal challenges that required my complete focus. But along the way, I read quite profusely as my sole recreation. About a lot of things affecting the world, the USA, the economies, the role of businesses, the peoples of the world, religions, governments, certain countries, certain events, certain issues, beliefs, cultures, group dynamics, the role of the individual, etc. I do not normally engage with political theory and dynamics but have increasingly been reading in that area over the last two years.

I have some ideas and conclusions I am not yet certain what to do with them. Somehow incorporating them into my art seems the most reasonable thing to do. Talk is cheap. So I won't do much more of that for now. Perhaps it will become part of a artistic Manifestoa and commitment in the future?

The very last artifact that I constructed out of the Connectedness journey in February I never posted but I offer it today after this prolonged respite. It characterizes my thoughts and feelings this morning as I get started.

Original Artifact: Fragile Weave of Earth's Bounty-Copyright James E. Martin 2012

Can we craft our future?

Torn Between Two Things: The Struggle Continues

Once Upon a Time.... [all good stories start this way], I saw a movie, the title of which I completely forget. Only one line in the movie was memorable to me.  While seated in a convertible, a man and a woman are discussing life-changing events that effect each other and the line is: "I will always be torn between two things....like living in the country and living in the city....."  And that phrase has stuck with me ever since. It is suitable to build a novel around.

So today, dear Readers, I re-posted the first 90 days of blog entries [which were previously removed] as a way of re-entering the blog world. There is a large part of me that is reticent to do so in that I am aware of the commitment and follow-through required to sustain the blog effort in continuing to build and share. There is a part of me that says so to do. I recently perused the book "14000 things to be happy about" by Barbara Ann Kipfer and found that many of the items I rated as satisfying from her given list had to do with creativity associated with visual art. But I am having difficulty verbalizing the level of commitment I am willing to make in the near term. It is very much about who I am and/or who I am to become. Torn. A struggle.

Since this blog is a visual arts venue, I feel compelled to provide a somewhat suitable graphic to depict my feelings. This one comes to mind. And I don't have time to paint it in a timely manner to blog it promptly so the photograph must suffice for the moment.

Original Photo: Moonlight Motorboat in Maine - Copyright James E. Martin 2009 

I thank you, dear Readers, for your forbearance.

Evidence of a Struggle: Authenticity

I am listening to the still, small Inner Voice. Look for the royal color in future blogs and see where I venture.

"For all artists the problem is one of finding one's own authenticity of speaking in a language or imagery that is essentially one's own, but if one's self-image is dictated by one's relation to others and all one's activities are other-directed, it is simply not possible to find one's own voice....The painter cannot expend their precious energy in polemic.... Every painting by anyone is evidence of a struggle...."  from The Obstacle Race by Germaine Greer.

Eowyn Wilcox maintains a nice art blog with numerous links to other interesting resources. One of her entries provides the above-mentioned quote. That last sentence is a great insight. I enjoyed surveying her blog and links in my early hours over the last few days. She seems to like the Van Gogh story as well as I.  She got the Greer book for three dollars so she is a bargain hunter too. A kindred spirit. Her melodius name from the Old English means "delightful charger" as in "joyful horse". She also located a great Vincent quote about the Artistic Endeavor in the early venture....

"Do you know what has come into my mind, that in the first period of a painter's life one unconsciously makes it very hard for oneself - a feeling of not being able to master the work - by an uncertainty as to whether one will ever master it - by a great ambition to make progress, by a lack of self-confidence - one cannot banish a certain feeling of agitation, and one hurries oneself though one doesn't like to be hurried. This cannot be helped, and it is a time which one must go through, and which in my opinion cannot and should not be otherwise. In the studies, too, one is conscious of a nervousness and a certain dryness which is the exact opposite of the calm, broad touch one strives for, and yet it doesn't work well if one applies oneself too much to acquiring that broadness of touch. This gives one a feeling of nervous unrest and agitation, and one feels an oppression as on summer days before a thunderstorm. I had that feeling again just now, and when I have it, I change my work, just to make a new start." from Vincent Van Gogh letter to his brother Theo, February 1883

 Photo Courtesy: Artist on the Road to Tarscon - Van Gogh 1888 - Internet Commons Fair Use 

So we shall struggle along in this Artistic Endeavor. Knowing that other's greater than us have gone before us in the same manner. Weigh the anchors. Set the sails. Look for favorable winds. Charging forward to find the momentary joy. Focusing the nervous agitation and unrest of precious energy expenditure in a purposeful direction to the extent that we can. A new season may be emerging. Spring forward.  

Thank you Germaine Greer. Thank you Vincent. Thank you Eowyn.

The Creative Pursuit: Trial and Error

So I attempt a different pose from the several in Gustave Dore's engraving for this portion of Dante's Inferno and change the palette.

"For all the gold that is beneath the moon, Or ever has been, of these weary souls, Could never make a single one repose." Dante's Inferno Canto VII, lines 64-66

Original Art: From Dante's Divine Comedy: Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise

Wealth and Fortune - Under the Moon - Study 03  Souvenir of Dore

Copyright James E. Martin 2012

I may have worked this one too long not stopping when the image and the color was a bit fresher. The color values started to get muddier and the brush strokes less definitive over time. I finally decided to just get to a stopping point consistent with another reading of the source material and not let it get away from me.

It does constitute a different data point and interpretation from the other former studies. It is not yet the approach I wish to use in the larger work. I have a sense however that I am starting to surround the target point in the total visual space with alternatives that each have something that I might want to capture in the end result.

Frolic in the Sun:

Another sketch from the early book. Impressionistic. Bright color palette. Beach motif. Daughter dancing in the warmth of the sun. Expressing a feeling.

Copyright - Frolic in the Sun - James E. Martin 2010

 

This was during a period of time where I was just becoming aware of the Daily Painting initiative. There is much to be said for the skill and fortitude of many artists making that commitment. As Shakespeare said, "Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished!" I still have work to do.

Daily Walk: Splash and Play to Your Hearts Content

In April 2010, I was developing an increasing sense of wanting to re-emphasize the Artistic Endeavor and Creative Pursuit in a more deliberate manner in my life. I purchased two simple sets of drawing pencils, colored pencils, and colored markers with drawing pads of three sizes and kept one set in my vehicle and one set in my drawer at work. During lunches, I was then free and able to take some time and focus on Art to Relax by getting away from the daily grind. Materials were available and the mind was ready. This sketch reminded me of my then three-year old daughter's direct approach to joy in life - giggling, marching, splashing, twirling, hand waving, kicking, and jumping in the water to a full heart's content with her eye's intent on the effect of the splash in the warmth of the sun. I kept it at my desk as a constant reminder of my deep need to return to these basics and to visualize the benefit in my child's experience and in the Me as Child.

Original Art: Copyright - Heart's Content by James E. Martin 2010

As adults with responsibilities in a demanding and dynamic world, it is so easy for us to forget or avoid the riches of childlike play and exploration as a contributor to joy in life. In the Practical World, other Forces direct what we do with our Time and our Money and our Spirit and even our Self. And then it becomes an adult habit....to not play and miss the fun.  We might even lose some of our sense of Self over a period of time.

Dear Reader, let's agree not to forget about including those activities that bring us fulfillment in our Daily Walk. It's a daily time for repose, recreation, remembering, recovery, restoration, reaching back, and reaching forward. Welcome and prepare for the effects of Serendipity in the Creative Pursuit. Apply and direct our Life Force and Energy purposefully and with deliberate intent to those things that we know are of Value and contribute to expressing our individual Unique Potential.

Lessons Learned: Prepare for and make ready. Listen to our still and small Inner Voice. Return to our roots. Fill the cup on a daily basis to your Heart's Content.

The Equilibrium of Reasonable Art: The Artistic Endeavor

Oddly and somewhat unexpectedly, I have been drawn by Serendipity from my longstanding preference for the Impressionist era into reading and research about the origins of Modern Art evolving from the Impressionist roots. I have been extremely fortunate to come across a copy of Matisse: His art and his public (1951) by Alfred H. Barr, Jr. published by the Museum of Modern Art in NY.

Guillaume Apollinaire, a poet and art critic, interviewed Matisse and wrote up an article in La Phalange in December 15, 1907 and numerous excerpts from the article are noted in Barr's book [underscores below are my editing emphasis]. I am superstruck by those written precepts that resonate with me in these economic times today - more than a century later. This is all about The Artistic Endeavor even though some of the quotes are about Matisse's specific Creative Pursuit leading to the development of his Original Artifacts.

Photo Courtesy Guillaume Apollinaire: Internet Fair Use

• "When I came to you, Matisse, the crowd had looked at you and as it laughed at you, you smiled. They saw a monster there where a wonder was taking shape." [Apollonaire]
• "I have worked to enrich my knowledge by satisfying the diverse curiosities of my mind, striving to ascertain the different thoughts of ancient and modern masters of plastic art. I tried at the same time to understand their technique." [Matisse]
• "...retrace for me the adventures of this perilous voyage to discover your own personality. It proceeds from science to conscience, and leads to complete forgetfulness of everything that is not your own self.....Instinct is no guide; it got lost and we are trying to find it." [Apollonaire]
• "I found myself or my artistic personality by looking over my earliest works. They rarely deceive. There I found something that was always the same and which at first glance I thought to be monotonous repetition. It was the mark of my personality which appeared the same no matter what different states of mind I happened to have passed through." [Matisse]
• "But this took place at its own good time." [Apollonaire]
• "I made an effort to develop this personality by counting above all on my intuition and by returning again and again to fundamentals. When difficulties stopped me in my work I said to myself: 'I have colors, a canvas, and I must express myself with purity, even though I do it in the briefest manner by putting down, for instance, four or five spots of color or by drawing four or five lines which have a plastic expression.' " [Matisse]
• "You have been reproached, my dear Matisse, for this summary expression but you have thereby accomplished one of the most difficult tasks: to give a plastic sense to your pictures without the aid of the object except as it arouses sensations." [Apollonaire]
• "The eloquence of your works comes first of all from the combination of colors and lines. This is what constitutes the artistry of a painter and not - as some superficial spirits still believe - the mere reproduction of the object." [Apollonaire]
• "Henri Matisse makes a scaffolding of his conceptions, he constructs his pictures by means of colors and lines until he gives life to his combinations so that they will be logical and form a closed composition from which one cannot remove a single color or line without reducing the whole to a haphazard meeting of lines and colors." [Apollonaire]
• "To make order out of chaos - that is creation. And if the goal is to create, there must be an order of which instinct is the measure." [Apollonaire]
• "To one who works this way the influence of other personalities can do no harm. He has his inner conviction, which comes from his sincerity; and the doubts which harass him only stimulate his curiousity." [Apollonaire]
• "I have never avoided the influence of others. I would have considered this cowardice and a lack of sincerity toward myself. I believe that the personality of the artist develops and asserts itself through the struggles it has to go through when pitted against other personalities. If the fight is fatal and the personality succumbs, it means that this was bound to be its fate." [Matisse]
• "It is by incessantly comparing his art with other artistic conceptions and by keeping his mind open to other related arts that Matisse has attained the greatness and confident conviction that distinguish him." [Apollonaire]
• "...Know the artistic capacities of all races...[also know] our inheritance.....find here the nourishment that we love....and the spices from other parts of the world can at most serve us as seasoning....in spirit....meditate upon.....standing at this crossroad......look at himself.....find the path which his triumphant intuition shall follow with confidence....." [Apollonaire]
• "We are not in the presence of some extremist adventure....the essence of Matisse's art is to be reasonable....The conscience of this painter is the result of his knowing other artistic consciences. He owes his plastic innovations to his own instinct or self-knowledge." [Apollonaire]
• "Because there is a relationship between ourselves and the rest of the universe, we can discover it and then no longer try to go beyond it." [Apollonaire]

Dear Reader, this is precisely about the Artistic Endeavor...it is precisely about the Creative Pursuit.....it is precisely about the Inner Voice....it is precisely about finding Self in the universe of greater things...it is precisely about creating Order from Chaos....but in my humble opinion, it is not only about Creation or about Art or about Objects, not only about the development of an Original Artifact, and not only about being just an Artist.

It is about the application of one's Life Force and Energy. It's about reaching one's Unique Potential.

The "Equilibrium of Reasonable Art", a phrase that Guillaume Apollinaire instantiated in 1907....is a lot about Changing the World. But in a form and a format that has Informed Reason by the Individual, of the Individual, and for the Individual. It is all about the buying and selling of an Individual's developed Self and Expression in whatever Occupation the Artist endeavors in the Market Realm of Greater Things. This is not a trivial notion.

But what about Resistance, and Impedance, and Controls, and Differences, and Opinions? What about Tyranny and Oppression and Famine and Poverty? What about Selling Out? What about Giving Up? What about just Getting By? What about Respect and Diversity? It's about the Struggle. It's about Supply and Demand. It's about our personal Exchange through multiple Transactions with Others in the grand Marketplace for Things of Value. We each define what Value is for us at a moment in time, do we not? What do we Buy? What do we Sell? What do we Produce? What do we Consume? It's about Freedom of Expression. Are we actually free? And to what degree? It's what we choose to surround ourselves with. It's about  practical matters such as "Is_Anyone_Demanding_What_I_Want_to_Supply"? Or Is_Anyone_Consuming_What_I_Am_Producing? At what Price? At what Cost? It's about Change. It's about resolving Fairness and Equity. It's about the Past, the Present, and the Future.

Art has always been a Lightning Rod serving as a conduit for Potential Energy that Changes the World. Individuals expressing Self. Individuals who wish to criticize and Control Others. Individuals working and laboring to obtain what they Want or Need. It's a grand scheme of Equilibrium. My personal opinion is that it is not just about Art. Thank you Mr. Matisse and Mr. Apollonaire.

The Artists Manifestoa: A World View and Basis for Personal Commitment and Progress

Many art manifestoas have been declared throughout history and if one loves history, philosophy, political science, social science, activism, etc., some time and effort can be spent on their review and critique out in WebWorld.

At this time, I am willing to personally commit to something simple and straightforward that supports artist personal development that will help guide me and that embraces the many roads that others may take as well. I do not yet care to adopt a much larger or far-reaching one that may address the type of art to which I commit or that promulgates a particular social agenda or that tries to change the world through artist collaboration as yet. I sense that my commitments to further principles will continue to evolve over time. I appreciated this one which is outwardly inclusive with Respect for Diversity but focuses to a great extent on nourishing the strength of one's own Inner Voice by Amelia Critchlow.

(1)   We are all artists/ creators
(2)   Know the source of your passions. Therein lies the root of your art.
(3)   Research continuously
(4)   Ask questions relentlessly
(5)   Never accept anything anyone says as a given "truth". Find your own truth and express it.
(6)   Know what you enjoy
(7)   Do what you enjoy
(8)   Master and refine your own talents (Not others)
(9)   Do something every day, if not every week, to feed your art
(10) Never let criticism stop you from doing your art, ever

Conclusion: I will walk this walk. Continue to nourish and listen to the Inner Voice. Be Inclusive and Respect the Diversity.