In sorting through some old artwork left at my mothers I found this piece that I did while in High School. Recently I have been talking to a very good friend of mine (Anna Wakitsch) about art styles. Through all my classical training I have decided that it is boring. My re-occurring urge to use colour keeps sneaking up on me. And accidently, while working on a landscape--I decided to leave out all the fussy stuff and just whack down a bunch of colours. Basically I was getting eaten alive in the midst of a forest on a day where I remembered my sun tan lotion but forgot my bug spray-typical! Anna and I were discussing leaving an art style behind. I fear that if I stop drawing real stuff and just do large colourful shapes--that I could never go back....and what if 20 years from now I want to do that sort of stuff? Would my eyes get lazy...like an oversized pair of pants and just fall off?? But then again I believe that everything happens for a reason--my painting just colours is the creative side trying to speak to me....or maybe next time I just need to remember my bug spray?

I discovered a life drawing group in London, England where you can basically draw every night for roughly 10 (pounds) per session. The class(s) have been going on for 10 years and are run by a french photographer. Absolutely wonderful! The great thing about these classes is that they are open, life drawing classes that are organized in different areas of London. Thus, you get a real mixture of artists. Some students, some professionals, some visitors (like myself) and some just looking for something new to do with a date. It was while partaking in one of those classes (that are un-taught) I decided drawing realistic is boring!!!!!!! And thought I would try and do something different (to my usual practices). So left out all the "stuff" and just drew the lines/shape of the forms. I quite like this idea....I guess mostly cause it's kinda lazy...I was done within 10 minutes which meant for the rest of the 30 min. pose I could stare at the other artists drawing.

Andddd to mix it up a bit more I started playing with Pan Pastels that are dryer in content--not a oily as most and you can apply using sponge like brushes...this was the 1st time I have used such a tool. I did no drawing in making this short sketch...I used the brushes right away and cut out shapes.....than just kept trying to lighten things up a bit--as if it were a painting. The last few seconds I drew in some eyebrows(ish).

So I am talking about a taboo in the art world that makes alot of people uncomfortable- but it's my blog I can say what I want to- so nah! Talent/Genius and that very special "VISION"- that outweighs any talent or genius I have seen. Over the years of drawing at various schools I have met some pretty talented people. One student while studying in Italy. He could draw a line so clean and pure it would make your eyes fall out. His sense of shape, spacial connections and form were so direct and organized he could show up to class with a glass of wine, smoking a cigar and still create something most people spend years trying to do. Having saying that I watched him get rejected and picked on by the staff constantly. He was never welcomed to any of their "private parties" he was never offered a teaching job and eventually left the school (I didn't blame him). Many of the instructors that I have had over the years all have different abilities (which is why I went to so many). In watching what that student went through and my own experiences....I developed a way to protect what I can do/what I know. It is a choice. And the only reason I can really draw anything at all is that I do it ALL THE TIME!!!! But most art teachers you first meet don't see that. My gift is that I can turn it on and off---I can draw like crap and have an instructor come round and teach me basic principles (about line and how to sharpen a pencil) and then turn it on (and combine all those principles plus more that I have worked so hard at getting). So Why? You ask why would I protect myself? Socially to reach that "VISION' we (as artists) rely on social interactions to enhance our thoughts about art....sometimes one's talent gets in the way of speaking to other artists--. And the "VISION" is more important than any talent or gift!!!! 

With an impending trip to London (UK) my intentions are to devour as much art as possible. As a rule of thumb since before I can remember I go into galleries with pure hatred in mind. Every image that hangs on the wall I despise. Reverence must be earned by the artwork, only then can my eye discus it visually. I am not talking about intellectual appreciation of art....that is taught and understood. I am talking from and always from an artists eye. My desire has always been to suck the life out of a Monet, Michelangelo or Vincent Van Gogh. As a young grasshopper I can recall going to an Warhol exhibition at The National Gallery in Ottawa with my father. The place was packed. The rooms were like Noah's Ark. Art lovers with flyers and headphones listening intently as they munched on each painting one by one. I couldn't grasp the concept. I tried following the rotation around the rooms. I miniked the other movements when one adult leaned in the read a label, I leaned in to read a label. Halfway through the shoffel I stopped dead in my tracks. My father noticed. I felt emparrassed that I couldn't do what the others were doing. "This systematic viewing of art was werid to me" and "I couldn't take in an image that had not yet spoke to me" I quietly explained to my father. "Well then you do the show how you want to do the show" he answered back. So I did. Top speed I ran through the show only glancing at images that caught my eye naturally. I didn't worry about the writing on the wall or the procedure. All snap shots of colour, lines and composition. This behaviour made the docents uncomfortable (but what did I care??!!--). Then once I had captured a few distinct images I went back to them. I stood in front of them until my eyes felt like they would bleed. People pushed and shoved, "Tough" I was consuming art. We (as artists) have to find our own way of looking at art. Art should earn our personal respect--we should be critical of the work (appropriate to the stage in our artistic lives) Since then I have never felt obliged to take in every painting or to "ohhh and awwww"...I don't care when it was painted or how long it has been in the galleries collection? Those facts only become important to me as the art grows and stays with me. It's okay to go to the Uffizi and only view a few paintings, or walk through quickly. And now after many years of going back and forth to London-- in The National...I can't wait to see Mr. Turner again. Perhaps this time I will understand him more. Of Course I am always eager to meet someone new--like Mr George Henry (Japanese Lady with a Fan- oil on canvas-below)

While  sitting at The Robert Macklin Gallery on behalf of The Salon Prize winners an elderly lady came in. Very hunched over, white hair long and scraggly going in a thousand directions. Short, her legs were long, but her body was short. She kinda hopped and in less than a second she was standing in front of me. One eye bright, open wide and glaring at me. The other not so good. Her dress was kinda childish. Pink rain boots, yellow fall coat, and bag, actually many bags. But nothing in them. She was my first visiter of the day so I was ready for anything. (I must admit I did make a judgement-but my years of experience in the art world has taught me otherwise and to ignore whatever shallow judgments I make). She said the first word- and I was glad. "What's this?"- kinda low grunt like. "It's The Salon Prize- an art contest". She looked at me, not at the walls. But me. So I looked at the walls and pointed out the winners--explaining the various prizes. (By now I had gone back to my original sin-and figured that she knew nothing of art--and was just in the gallery "to use the bathroom"-which was fine with me). She set her things down, and started to rustle through them. "My daughter paints, well actually she's quite good! I should bring some of her stuff in to you, you would like them, but she's very far away--you know!". I listened and watched-like a hawk with no where to land. she pondered the artworks on the walls--her back was too hunched to really view the whole painting on the wall--but she managed to swivel her eye around most of the colours on the lower parts of the painting. 
"You know I used to paint!" she stammered. 
(As an artist/gallery person/lost soul--I have heard this lots! And until her next statement it used to be the worst thing that I could ever hear from someone's voice--USED to paint!!!)
"BUT I HAD A BAD MARRIAGE AND IT TOOK ALL MY TALENT AWAY"- at that moment I could see a huge fist, like a dark cloud named "marriage" grasping her talent and TAKING it away.
"I studied with Andre Bieler you know" she sputtered out.
My eye's now wide open...like a child who has seen the boogey-man.
"What was he like?" (Knowing that he is a very famous art teacher at Queen's University (who helped create the fine art department) whom knew William Brymner. "He was strict, and very intelligent, but he would move fast" she said pointing her finger at me. She said that she hadn't been in an art gallery in years and that now she was glad she had come. It took her a while to gather her bit's and pieces---eye glasses here, one bag here, adjust her left shoe, 10 mins to find her keys..."Thank you!" and she disappeared abruptly. 

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