Friday, May 27, 2016

A SENSE OF SPACE & PLACE




A SENSE OF SPACE & PLACE

has been in my DNA since birth.  There is no other explanation for this phenomenon that has played a significant role in my life long before I was aware of it. As an only child with my own bedroom, I was mindful of it being a space of my own, and learned at an early age to appreciate the experience of privacy.  As a young boy it was the repository for my comic books, toys, and assorted accumulated treasures.  Over the years my room “grew” with me, reflecting my interests as they evolved, from stacks of comic books and toys, to Playboy magazines, baseball gloves and art supplies.

Our farm, with its out buildings, fields, and trees, provided security and an abundance of intimate places to serve the imagination of a boy and his playmates.  My childhood was comfortably contained in this place with all of its “nooks and crannies” for me to claim as my own.  Although the full significance of my good fortune was lost on me, I believe even at a young age I had some sense of appreciation for my lot. Perhaps it wasn’t appreciation as much as it was the enjoyment of opportunities to explore and create places of my own: a fort built in the stacks of hay bales in the barn, a secret club room in the loft over the garage, or a hidden camp site in the woods.

Sharing a space with someone else was never a problem.  In college and my first two years in medical school I did so with a number of roommates, never wishing for a room of my own.  Our first apartment after I got married during medical school had a spare room that became my study.  And ever since then, wherever I lived, I have always had a room, and or space to call my own: a study, workshop, or studio.  It all happened with little to no conscious effort on my part, and it was easy to take my good fortune for granted.  It wasn’t until my divorce, and the painful departure from what had been my home for over 10 years, that I became acutely aware of how important a sense of place was my wellbeing.

The small two bedroom apartment on the second floor of a city duplex paled next to the elegant three story stone Victorian home with its grand yard that I left behind.  The furniture was sparse, and there were none of the accumulated accessories that mark our lives and create a sense of home with their warmth and intimate reminders of who we are.  In my determined struggle to create a new home and escape the sadness and pain of the divorce, I discovered the journals of May Sarton.  Her description of her daily life, punctuated with friends, books, writing, solitude, and flowers, always flowers from her garden, brought to me that powerful urge of nesting.  The need to create warmth and comfort in a place of my own assumed an importance like never before.  I’m not sure I ever succeeded, but that apartment marked the beginning of the second half of my life.  And in the years and places that followed, I continued to have the luxury of spaces of my own.

I have come to believe that this innate, unconscious awareness of space and place has been a major influence in my art, long before I became aware of it.  In the beginning, my focus was primarily on the urban environment, stores, shops, streetscapes, markets, and architecture.  It was more graphic and illustrative than painterly, and I thought of myself as a “story teller”, using visual images to evoke memories and fondness for a particular place or scene.  Without realizing it, I was capturing or creating a warmth and intimacy that may have only existed in my vision.  In the years that followed my interests expanded to include rural landscapes, barns and farms, grand urban skylines, and utilitarian architecture and industrial skylines.  And when I tried my hand at clay printing I began exploring for the first time, abstraction.  But common to all of this work has been my efforts to create a place of comfort for the viewers, a sense of place where they can experience familiarity and the pleasure of beauty in both the mundane and the elegant, the humble nobility of a corner family market, and the grand vista of the high plains.





Thursday, May 26, 2016

FULL MOON


I’ve always had the ability to make people laugh, usually with a spontaneous remark or comment that appears without pre-meditation.  Sometimes I worry that I am close to being a “smart-ass” with some of the things I say.

A few years ago I began writing a studio-galley newsletter on a regular basis (once or twice a month), and in the process discovered that just as in conversation, something humorous would suddenly occur to me and find its way into the writing.  Eventually I became determined to make the letters entertaining as well as informative, but sadly discovered that my humor is like my smile, it cannot be forced or brought about my sheer will power. It is totally unpredictable, emerging during conversation, when writing, or when my thoughts are elsewhere.  I am entirely dependent on the inspired, unconscious quip.  When someone points a camera at me and says “smile”, my face turns to stone. Unless…

Let me tell you a story about one memorable “unless” moment. We had just opened our new medical office in one of the barns on our small Maryland farm.  The local paper thought that was news worthy, and sent a photographer to take some pictures of me in front of the office, holding a piece of my artwork.  As this was happening, Patience was walking several horses to the paddock adjacent to the office and saw me standing there with an idiotic forced smile. Stopping behind the photographer, who had no idea she was there, dear sweet prim and proper Patience (that may be hard to believe, but yes, she really is quite proper.) turned her back to me, dropped her drawers, and gave me a full moon that is forever seared in my memory.  Needless to say, I smiled.  In fact I think I didn’t stop smiling for at least 3 days.  It was a great photo, thanks to a great wife.

Humor is a funny thing.



Tuesday, May 10, 2016

PRIDE & HUMILITY





I am a proud, but humble man.  Is that even possible, and if so, how?  I think it is.  Allow me to explain why.

I am proud, because I have taken advantage of the opportunities that have been provided to me, and I am humbled to have received gifts and opportunities that I did nothing to earn.  So much has been given to me.

I have been blessed with good health, reasonable intelligence (some may disagree with me on this.), and amazing parents and a warm and supporting family.  I was fortunate to be born in this country, growing up in the 1940’s and 50’s, somewhat of a golden era for America.  There was little money in our home, my father was a farmer and my mother worked at home and in a clothing factory, and I had a job since age 14.  We were never hungry, and  never had to fear for our safety or for losing our home.  I had my own room my entire childhood.  My biggest obstacle to overcome was being the shortest boy in the classroom.  Thanks to Raphie Donato, I was not the shortest student.  I had a wonderful, almost idyllic childhood, and I did nothing to deserve it.  It was given to me.  All I had to do was act on those gifts, and that was easy.  I was born into a privileged class.  Not one based on wealth or social prominence, but just as privileged.  I was the recipient of the comfort and security of a stable community, and the encouragement from a loving and supportive family that valued education, work, and family.  I never had to struggle with isolation, hunger, fear for my safety, and indifference from my family and community.  The path to my success was well cared for, and all I had to do was follow it.

There are millions of people in this country who cannot claim even some of the gifts I’ve just mentioned, children growing up hungry, afraid, without family support and educational opportunities, and worst of all, without hope.  Unlike mine, their path to success is strewn with obstacles that require an almost super human effort to overcome.

I am offended when people of privilege disparage those who remain stuck early on that path, or never have the opportunity to get started.  They are too quick to take all the credit for their accomplishments, too quick to blame others for their lack of success, and for whatever reason, they are reluctant to acknowledge what has been given to them.