Yeah, you–what’re *you* staring at?
Got my little camera out, for I’m in a Gathering groove these days. Overlord of visual overload. Seems I’m just hungry for pictorial input and inspirations, imagery and ideas. So I’m heading on an expedition to capture goodies that will reload my mental files and give me that friendly little poke in the snoot that’ll get me moving again. Pictures that will lead to more pictures. Get ready.
No, really, it’s just that you intrigue me deeply.
When ideas and inspiration have ceased, at least for the time being, to well up from the inside, it’s a mercy that the wide world contains so many and will hand them to me if I keep my senses ready enough. I often find myself too distracted by the busyness and pedestrian chores of the workaday world to see the magical other dimensions right within my reach, and need some helpful pricking from a sight or sound or scent as I pass through to remind me to open up the eye and ear and heart and take advantage of the universe’s generosity when it’s poured out so liberally right within my grasp.
I walk in a haze of dully daily thought, lost to the world of rich and rare delights I’m walking in, when suddenly a mockingbird appears and turns its bright eye on me and seems to contemplate how absent I must be to almost pass it by when it’s quite nearly underfoot. In that shining eye a world reflects in which the other me is wrapped around with blooms, with drifting clouds sailing across a broad blue sky; with jasmine-scented breeze, with mist as the sprinklers spring to life, with happy shouts from a handful of little playing school kids passing me, looking for miracles of their own everywhere because they are yet too young to have forgotten them so foolishly as I have done. When the bird takes to its stripe-blazed wings and dives back into the air, my thoughts begin to follow and fly with it again: I am awake once more to flight and tune in to the rippling, rolling variations of its song as it rises to the trees, and soars above, and makes me remember that I am in a world full of wonder, if I will only let it fill me again.
Gleaming Afternoon
While I would soar, would gladly fly
Wide, in an arc across the sky
Whose dome of hotly burnished brass
Encompasses at every pass
The great wild height of atmosphere
That would engage to hold me here,
I can, eyes shut and spirit wide,
Pierce heaven to the great Outside.
Ingvar Lidholm
Well, Honey, when a mommy artist and a daddy medium love each other very much . . . .
I can’t imagine that there is an artist or creative person alive who hasn’t been asked many and many a time where he gets his ideas or what inspired her to make this piece of artwork, write that song, take whatever photograph or choreograph any given ballet. In many cases, the answers are hard to condense into sound-bite-sized, manageable pieces for the occasion, because much creative endeavor is the tangible end result of a whole lifetime’s experience and train of thought, and we all know how often and how easily that particular train gets rerouted, redirected, diverted and derailed along the way.
But in general, most of us can point to pivotal moments that shaped our thinking, whether on an individual project or about our artistry as a whole. We can cite particular persons and their artistry that inspired and enlightened us and informed our own work as we grew. And for many of us, even we who are relatively late bloomers, a lot of the fodder for this inspiration begins early in life and creeps up on us subliminally to a certain extent.
I’ve already mentioned my long-ago irritation at being ‘bundled’ with Edvard Munch because of my Norwegian roots–and, of course, how ridiculous I realized that irritation was once I discovered that contrary to my belief, the more I got to know his work the more I actually admired it. Now, naturally, I take it as high praise (if perhaps hyperbolically so, though I’m happy to take it anyway) when my stuff is seen as meriting any such comparison.
My personal Style, if there is one, is defined more by a tendency toward slightly aggressive lines and bold coloration and faintly eccentric leanings when it comes to subject treatment than by any distinctive media, techniques or actual subjects. My affections in art are too fickle and my attentions too fleeting for me to be easily contented with any defined set of materials and topics and applications. But I find ideas and encouragement and guidance in the work of many painters, poets, draftsmen, printmakers, essayists, storytellers, architects, boat-builders, jewelers, botanists, lycanthropes . . . dear me, have I wandered again?
Part of the trick in pinning down who has been an influence on my work and where I’ve gotten my inspirations and ideas is that I’m very much a holistic, integrative and analogous operator, so in true Liberal Arts fashion I pull my many threads together from many divergent and possibly unrelated sources. The only consistent thing is that I try very hard to steal from the best.
My gifts are not musical, but I love music. So although my piano skills are fit only for personal amusement and my singing limited by spasmodic dysphonia and lack of practice to in-car singalongs and serenading my spouse with occasional outbursts of bent versions of formerly-familiar songs, I often work with music as my inspiring accompaniment. My paintings could be said to derive more from Aretha Franklin or Felix Mendelssohn, The Real Group or Tomás Luis de Victoria, than from Munch or Vincent van Gogh, though both of the latter have lent me many of my ideas about brushwork and coloration. My writing is more directly writing-derived, perhaps, but all of the favorite writers that spring to mind (Ogden Nash, Vladimir Nabokov, Dr Seuss, JRR Tolkien, S.J. Perelman, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Tomie dePaola, Geoffrey Chaucer) are on my hit list because of the lyrical, even musical, qualities with which they treat poetry and prose. I love children’s books as much now as I did when an actual child, because the best of them of course comprise a perfect and literal confluence of verbal and visual imagery, something that becomes more deeply ingrained in me by virtue of drawing the senses together. And in that way, my writing is often led to incorporate certain textures and moods and colors or to carry a particular ambience by either pictures (real or imagined) or simply the weight of a visual experience I’m hoping to evoke with words. I’m no synesthete, but all the same I do depend on the interaction of all my senses to shape each of the creative works I’m developing.
I did once make an entire exhibition devoted to portraits of people (mostly historical figures) who had had influence of some significant sort on my art and my creative life, and perhaps the most telling thing about the gallery besides that I had deliberately filled it with nothing but portraits (a form I’d studiously avoided all along in my artistic journey until then) was that very few of them were of visual artists. Most were of composers, singers, and writers. A few were agents of social change, a couple were people I actually know, and a handful were influential in the philosophical or spiritual realms. The writers and musicians ruled the room. I doubt that would change hugely if I were to do such a survey of inspirational influences again. I do know that there would be a new character added, but I’m not certain how exactly I could represent in a portrait my network of online muses in blogdom.
Igor Stravinsky
Surprising as it sounds and contrary to all expectations, it turns out she was the heroine in her own story.
Sometimes the pivotal, crucial piece of information on which the plot hinges--the fantastical and showy part--doesn't wait for the denouement . . .
Whatever the exotic and thrilling final chapter of my life is going to be, nothing could fully prepare me, let alone anybody else, for it; I think, however, that I may have tromped through the facts of the event many times already without even recognizing where I was. Heck, I may exist in a universe parallel to the one I think I’m in as it is. It’s as though I’d backed through a door into my life and discovered I was somewhere well into the whole chain of events, been mystified by them (though everyone else is in on the joke, having started someplace more logical), and dashed back down the hall in hopes of a do-over. Pretty sure I showed up in my underwear onstage, come to think of it–everybody else seems to at some point.
Here I am, then, living a serio-comic mystery story, ending utterly unknown, and apparently it was written by a bunch of clowns more interested in spectacular pratfalls and occasional bouts of farcical action with absurd and incongruous outcomes than in logic or meaningful purpose. This is not, mind you, a complaint. Once it occurred to me that my calling in the grand scheme of existence was as comic relief, things got a lot simpler and less intimidating. There’s no grail for me to hunt, no world-saving invention for me to create, and certainly no audience expecting anything beyond my appearance in the olio portions of the program, say just after intermission and before the serious third act commences. Even in my own life I might end up playing a bit part, and that’s kind of comforting to me, as opposed to having some dreadfully high purpose to accomplish before curtain call even though nobody’s bothered to spell it out for me.
I make art that way most of the time.
Some drawings and stories start with a title that has no inherent plot or direction implied in its wording but is hoped to goose my brain in a fortuitous direction. I told you before about my [nonexistent] spy-mystery tale used (along with a few nonexistent chapters’ headings) as a springboard for illustrations. My sister donated another title for me that led to a couple of drawings that turned out to have no detectable connection with the title, “Penguins in Peril.” Much of the time, my mind takes such convoluted routes from Point A to Point B that I’ve exhausted the entire alphabet and gone into numbers before looping back to B, where I thought I was headed. If I ever really go there at all. “Penguins in Peril” is such a great title that I’ve tried, really tried, a couple of times to get it right but it just hasn’t happened yet. Ah, well, I like the drawings I got out of the attempts and I still have this fantastic title for future reference. A bonus!
There are other tales and pictorial ramblings that spring from the convoluted mental meandering itself, and these too can take their own tangents and drag me right along with them. If, as I’ve posited before, everything is research, then whatever I discard, carom off of, or don’t include in the current project is fair game for the next.
I figure that ought to apply in life as well as in art. What I didn’t succeed in becoming or discovering or doing this time around, maybe I am just saving up to do when I’m older and more, erm, mature (okay, that’s just not gonna happen). Maybe I’ll get lucky and either someone else will get it done, or karma will plunk me into a future person-place-or-thing better equipped and more highly motivated to get the job done.
And that’s what this is all really about, isn’t it. Motivation. I’m just hiding behind the actor’s persona and pestering the director to tell me “what’s my motivation?” when I know perfectly well that it’s I who am supposed to weasel that information out myself. Sigh. That’s why I prefer to keep goofing around on the edges of sanity purposefulness when making my various stabs at art, and just see where the jollity of the moment takes me. So much more fun, so much less, you know, <makes a face like a baby that just tasted a spoonful of pureed broccoli instead of the expected bananas> responsible. This way I’m also able to be just as surprised by the thrilling finish of the story as all of the innocent bystanders. Whatever it is, guys, I’ll see you there. Wear a Kevlar® jumpsuit, and perhaps also a water-squirting boutonnière, just in case.
Writing good mystery stories is tough enough--solving the mysteries of one's own life, toughest of all . . .
I may have mentioned–some few blog entries ago–that the visual world is full of stories for me. It’s not just me, though. You’ve heard it plenty yourself: “A picture is worth a thousand words.” There’s no end of people inspired to find tales, ideas, inspirations of every kind in things seen, in the real world and in all sorts of visual images, and what we like to imagine they mean, or could mean. So have at it. I give you now a digital collage and know that no one else will see precisely the same collection of Stuff or relationships between the things collected here exactly the way I see them. You might guess why I put some of this together in a single image, maybe even could see some of my motivation more clearly than I do myself (you shrink you), but the fun of the whole thing is the same as what I love experiencing when I have an art exhibition: seeing my own work through others’ lenses and knowing that they always bring something different to it than I did either in looking at the finished piece or in revisiting any part of its birthing.
All these things together . . .
Every sighted person “reads” the world through his or her own filters, and for the most part, that’s good. It’s not only what helps us to be ourselves fully in the world but what gives us a large measure of pleasure in existence: we can create the world in which we find ourselves as well. Imagination and interpretation are colorful ways of coping with reality and reshaping it as we go. We can be horribly misled by our crazy or wrongheaded or under-informed explication and conceptualization, and that usually leads to trouble of one sort or another (not least of all making one be a chump, a dimbulb or even a full-fledged jerk). But really, isn’t there a lot of fun in just giving ourselves a moment of fiction to stretch our boundaries and enlarge our existence in some small measure?
I like weirdness. Eccentricity, outsider thinking, silliness and the bizarre–I’m generally repelled by danger and anything remotely aggressive, but I have to ‘fess up and say that my own differences from the so-called norm are not just habits and hints of wilfulness but also deeply ingrained and naturally occurring parts of who and what I am. Yes, I am weird.
But I’ll also say that “weird” is simply, for me, an equally comfortable name for being unique. Every norm is only an average, each with plenty of exceptions to prove and/or flavor the rule. While I’ve grown into embracing [most of] my quirks and distinctions, it isn’t always easy being a quagga in a world of pretty ponies. I woke up again today from a dream I’ve had since my memory began: the details vary, but it’s always about being in a group of people, all earnestly working on some project, and having the leader and my peers try in one way and another to steer me to do it Right and not as I’ve been doing it–even while they all assure me that they approve of and appreciate the excellence of the different thing I’ve been doing. This will sound mighty strange to anyone whose life has gone ‘as planned’.
Welcome to my synapses
Those with any little anomaly (physical, mental, or other), however, might sense something familiar.
It was only as an adult that I–having grown up in the Olden Days long before “dyslexia” entered the common parlance, and then as something rather negative or at least problematic–realized that I have a nearly magical variety of dysfunctional characteristics that come under that broad umbrella. My worldview is shaped by all kinds of tweaks that mimic but do not match the ordinary: lexicographically, to be sure, since I have the ability to watch words and letters move around a page in ways that if amusing are not necessarily conducive to fast and accurate reading, so I’ve always had to read rather slowly, and about four times over, through anything to feel I’ve grasped its essence. Despite this sometimes frustrating methodology, I’ve never disliked reading, only been surprised over the years to be classified as reading ‘above my grade level’ if it took so much effort to keep up with expectations.
Along with dyslexia of the most obvious sort I can lay claim to numeric, directional, spatial, and temporal experiences that stray from the ordinary a great deal. Numbers play around on a page just as actively as words and letters. There have been times when I was able to surprise my math teachers with the expected answer to relatively complicated computations, but only after I learned not to admit to the process by which I divined said answer, as it bore little relation to the assigned progression from Q to A but was rather intuited. I have no inner compass, so don’t try to guide me to your cozy home with Left and Right and North and South, let alone Up and Down. I do understand what those concepts mean, but they have no relation to locations in my own being other than perhaps as niggling desires. I can you tell whether I’m located right next to the baseball diamond or up in the cheap seats, but not how to get from one to the other (without flying) nor can I experience the action of the game much more vividly from one point or another. And don’t get me started on trying to discern the details of the play: if it happened quickly enough, I have to mentally freeze the moment of action and stare at the “snapshot” in my head for a while to figure out how, where, or if the ball crossed the plate and what the batter and catcher did about it.
This is all a (perhaps appropriately) convoluted route to informing you that I don’t see the world the way other people see it. But honestly: does anyone? If each of us is genuinely unique, then any norms we’ve posited should only serve as starting points for communication and coexistence, not ends in themselves. I’ve been told countless times by well-meaning Professionals and advisers that if I wish to succeed or gain acceptance in my field (whether as artist, writer, teacher, or any other labeled category of mortal being), I ought to work at fitting in better. It’s always couched in friendly terms but boils down to my being too hard to categorize, define and package because my interests and personality (and therefore my work) wander too far afield and are tangential, at best, to expectations.
My answer at last is Vive la Difference! I’ve spent more than enough of my first half century thinking I ought to redesign myself to please the common demand before realizing that I’m really okay with being uncommon. And I sincerely hope that everybody else not dwelling directly on the dot of Normal finds his-her-or-its contentment and delight wherever and however possible. In that lies endless possibility. Especially if one has the attention span of a gnat, as I do.
Behind what is perceived is What Might Be
My interest in reality is limited, it’s true. What intrigues me about life–my experiences and my thoughts and perceptions about them, the places I go, the things I learn, and the people whose lives intersect mine–is far from merely fascination with the truth of them. It’s just as much about the unseen and unknown, the possibilities inherent in the facts, that inspire me. Every reality seems to me to contain infinite potential storylines for those with open eyes and imaginations. It’s why I seldom make predetermined images in my own artworks, but instead follow where the developmental processes take me, just in case there’s a much more exciting or provocative or ridiculous or even beautiful possibility than in the concept with which I started. Most of the time I don’t even have to start with a concept–there’s so much delightful stuff just waiting out there in the wide world wanting to be discovered that every breath, every corner turned, might lead to the revelation of who that shadowy figure in the hallway ahead is and what lies beyond the light-filled doorway ahead of him. I’m pretty sure it’s going to be worth following him–only telepathically, of course–to find out.
Art-Colored Glasses 