That’s sophomoric

The Magazine Women Believe In was a spoof of style of 1950s publications. I painted it back in the day; I wouldn't paint it today because my feminist thinking has matured. So has my painting style.

As a young person, my brain was fizzing over with half-cocked ideas. Some of my projects were musical—like writing a rock opera with my chum Michele, or writing and recording a cowpunk album with my husband. Some were literary. Most were visual. But some were just larks, like going on the Maid of the Mist in my bikini or going skiing in grease-stained Carhartt overalls—what today we might dignify with the label ‘performance art,’ if we could find funding for it.

I grew up in a time and a town which was too conservative for performance art, and my parents tended to cast a jaundiced eye on my antics. So I burrowed into the art form I knew best—drawing and painting—and gradually left the more conceptual stuff behind. I don’t think I’m any less creative at this advanced age, but my creativity is more yoked to what I do best.

Submission was painted during the first phase of the Iraq War and addresses the still-thorny issue of whether oppression or libertine impulses are more stifling for women. It's one of the paintings that got my RIT show closed down.

Old Masters and Young Geniuses: The Two Life Cycles of Artistic Creativity by economist David Galenson looks at the schism between the creativity of youth and that of maturity. Galenson says that some of us work by trial and error, and arrive at our major contributions incrementally, usually in old age. In contrast, there are conceptual innovators who make sudden breakthroughs by formulating new ideas at an early age. Galenson puts Michelangelo, Rembrandt, and Cézanne in the “old master” category, and Vermeer, van Gogh, and Picasso in the “young Turk” category.

Would I have painted The Beggar of St. Paul today, with its cynical depiction of Starving Africa as part of the money cycle? Probably not. I'm weary of hectoring people.

I think he has the division in thinking right, but not the outcome. We are all more daring thinkers when young, and more methodical workers when old. The difference is in when we’re discovered and what the society in which we live values. Today we live in a society which values audacity above craftsmanship, which tends to highlight the conceptual over the incremental.

Message me if you want information about next year’s Maine workshops. Information about this year's programs is available here.

The first artists called by name

Creatures on the shrine doors in the Egyptian pharoah Tutankhamun's tomb. Since they’re more-or-less contemporary with the Bible narrative, they probably provide a good idea of what the cherubim over the Mercy Seat were intended to look like.

I read four chapters of the Bible every day, and when I get to the end I just flip back and start again at the beginning. (This is hardly brilliant for exegesis, but it works for me.) Right now I’m at the end of Exodus, reading the story of the building of the Tabernacle.

Bezalel was named the chief artisan of the Tabernacle by God himself. Not only was Bezalel a skilled engraver in his own right, he was versatile enough to be put in charge of artisans and apprentices in all the other crafts. He had an assistant, Aholiab, who was described as a master of carpentry, weaving, and embroidery—a strange combination to modern readers.

According to Exodus, Bezalel was called by God to direct the construction of the Tent of Meeting and its sacred furniture, and to prepare the priests' garments and the oil and incense required for the service. That’s a pretty wide remit; it’s probably similar to running a major design house today.

Moses and Joshua In the Tabernacle, by James Tissot, c. 1896. Even the best painters seem to go haywire trying to interpret the instructions in Exodus. It's hard to see where Tissot got anything right.

The Bible is clear that both his remit and his talent came from God:  “I have endowed him with a divine spirit of skill, ability, and knowledge in every kind of craft.” (Ex. 31:3). The “divine spirit” mentioned is the Elohim Ruah, or the breath of God Himself.

This representation of the Ark of the Covenant was sculpted in the fourth century AD. From a synagogue in Capernaum.

There is great disagreement on the age of the Torah, but it’s clear that Moses was an historical figure and that Exodus records the origins of the Jews as a people. (How literally is a question for the reader to decide on his own.) That means that early in human history, an artist was elevated for his skill and his value to his civilization. I’m all for math, science and engineering, but next time you're thinking of discouraging a kid from pursuing a career in the arts, remember that some of us are called to be artists, and our contribution hasn’t been negligible.

Message me if you want information about next year’s Maine workshops. Information about this year's programs is available here.

What does style mean?

A Pool With A View, by Bruce Bundock, is an example of the artist's worldview.

The women I lived with last week are all at the top of their game, but paint in a variety of styles. Tarryl Gabel paints meticulously detailed, ethereal landscapes. Crista Pisano’s are minute but less about detail and more about form. Mira Fink is a high-chroma pattern-maker, a lot like me but in watercolor. Kari Ganoung Ruiz paints in the subdued palette of her native Finger Lakes. The two pastel painters were as different as chalk and cheese: Marlene Wiedenbaum is a romantic, while Laura Bianco works in bold, fast strokes.

Baroque Arch, Rome, is an example of Brad Marshall's meticulous drafting.

What do those differences mean? Do they reflect something about the personality? I doubt it. Brad Marshall (whose show Italia is opening at the Fischbach Gallery on September 12) is a far more methodical and controlled painter than me. He’s more of a risk-taker in his 9-to-5 life—hanging from scaffolding on the side of tall buildings—but there are no glaring differences between our values, our lifestyles, the cars we drive, or our homes.

Certainly the content of a painter’s work reflects his worldview. Consider, for example, Bruce Bundock’s Faces of Vassar: An Appreciation, which opened last February. I love his work because Bruce is less interested in the grand than he is in the everyday.

Millbrook Hill, a pastel by Marlene Wiedenbaum, is wonderfully romantic.

I had a conversation last week with a successful, professional painter lamenting her lack of formal art education. Many formal art programs teach very little about actual painting and most artists do most of their learning on their own, after the classes and workshops end. Since she paints beautifully and her style is fully realized, there is little she can gain from a teacher now, and much she could muddy up.

Whereas Autumn Glow, a pastel by Laura Bianco, is absolutely graphical.

I don't think style comes from the personality, but I do think it comes from the soul. The goal in painting is to get rid of the stuff that stands between us and our true self. Personal style is what’s left when we have tried our hardest to tell an accurate story with our brushes. It’s an artifact of imperfection. True personal style can’t be taught or learned. It comes from within. That's why teachers who try to create copies of themselves among their students inevitably fail to foster greatness.

Message me if you want information about next year’s workshops. Information about this year's programs is available here.

It's a wrap

Weather Moving In At Barnum Bog, 12X9, oil on canvasboard.

I’m home, finally, after a very tiring five and a half weeks on the road. Much of the time, I was working so many hours that blogging was an afterthought. That is why I posted only a few of the paintings I did last week. Today I thought I’d share the rest from Saranac Lake with you.

Whiteface Makes Its Own Weather, 16X12, oil on canvasboard.

I painted nine works in three days. (Three of which I’ve already posted.) That’s unusually prolific for me, and I blame it in part on my housemates, who worked so diligently that I constantly felt like a piker.

The Au Sable River at Jay, 12X9, oil on canvasboard.

Not only was I prolific, however, but I felt that I was painting very well. I’ve been in a style shift over the last year, and this work reflects where I’m going more than where I’ve been. To me, that’s important, because in some ways the Adirondacks are closely tied to my past, so that I’m able to paint them without intimations of the past is a healthy sign for future progress.

Whiteface and Marsh, 16X12, oil on canvasboard.

If I am ever complacent in my painting, just take me out and shoot me. Painting is exploration. It should always be a challenge, a personal battle, a jousting match.

Town Hall, Saranac Lake, 10X8, oil on canvasboard.

Message me if you want information about next year’s workshops. Information about this year's programs is available here.

Special Trout Fishing Area, 12X9, oil on canvasboard.

The night before exams

Sunset over Saranac Lake, by little ol' me.

This week I’ve lived with a group of women painters in a house overlooking Lake Flower in Saranac Lake. I’ve known two of them for a long time, but the rest were strangers to me before the week began. We are strangers no more; there’s intimacy in living in an all-girls’ dorm, which is probably lost in a world which no longer segregates college students by gender.

Crista Pisano touching up her work the night before the show.

Not that we were living in the others’ pockets: we crept off silently in the early morning to paint where and when we wanted, meeting up for dinner. Occasionally we painted together, but most of the time we went our own ways.

My roomies, from left: Mira Fink, Crista Pisano, me, Marlene Wiedenbaum, Laura Bianco, Kari Ganoung Ruiz, Tarryl Gabel.

The sun wasn’t in evidence much last week, so when it made its appearance on Saturday we all made the most of it. When it finally dropped, we reluctantly set down our brushes and went back inside for the serious work of framing, signing  and titling work. This included a group critique session, targeted toward culling the work for jurying. Crista Pisano offered a great insight: work for a jury ought to be consistent, so we worked to make our groupings-of-three coherent small shows in their own right.

I painted with other pals as well. Here with Sandra Hildreth, left, and Carol Thiel, right.

Inevitably, someone made the suggestion that a work would look better in a different frame. The business of swapping framing materials began. It was like being in school again, except that we were swapping art supplies rather than makeup.

Among my favorite places to paint was the bog at Paul Smiths College Visitor Interpretive Center, where Pitcher Plants were much in evidence.

Our house made a strong showing: Crista Pisano took Best in Show (for the second time in three years) and Tarryl Gabel took the Saranac Lake Cover Art Award.

And then this morning we demonstrated that seven women can clean a house in no time flat.

Message me if you want information about next year’s Maine workshops. Information about this year's programs is available here.

لعبة قصة أسدا Asda Story - العاب متصفح اون لاين

لعبة قصة أسدا Asda Story - العاب متصفح اون لاين 

لعبة قصة أسدا Asda Story - العاب متصفح اون لاين 

لعبة قصة أسدا Asda Story - العاب متصفح اون لاين 

لعبة قصة أسدا Asda Story – هي لعبة من العاب متصفح اون لاين بدون تحميل, هي لعبة من انتاج الشركة الرائدة Maxonsoft وهي لعبة ضخمة ومشهورة جدا وبحاجة الى مهارة عالية, حيث تنقلك بين الواقع والمناوبة والترفيه, كن مستعدا وجهز مهاراتك العالية, العبها الان اون لاين بدون تحميل.

فيديو اللعبة