Moonblog 2023

Sunset, Kilhooley's Lagoon

I just made up the title Killhooley's Lagoon. It's part of a new series of paintings I've been meaning to get back to since we moved four years ago. I suppose it's not really a new series, it's a scaling up from a series of small paintings I did several years ago, some of which can be seen right here on this site at Pluvia and Dawn Studies. These new paintings are in the range of 26 x 28 in.; the earlier ones are in the 8 x 9 in. range. They all look pretty much the same on a computer screen but quite different in real life. For the moment I'm thinking of calling them “Implied Landscapes” since the detailing is quite loose, you might say incomprehensible at close range. This is based on a very early aesthetic surprise in my life. My mother took us to the Worcester Art Museum in Worcester, Massachusetts, perhaps the first memory I have of visiting an art museum. I vividly remember seeing paintings that when viewed at close range were very loose smears of paint but from a little distance were luminous scenes of hills, horses, people, buildings. As I child I thought, “How could the artist know it would work?”. Now as a teetering old man I find myself replicating the excitement of that childlike amazement. I do worry that some of these paintings might look like things you could buy at Target or Walmart, but who's looking?

New Moon ~ March 20th, 2023

Southwest Dreamscape

Here's another one of those accidental paintings. It suggests the kind of parched and lonely landscape you might encounter in Arizona or Utah. Are those clouds or pterodactyls in the sky? Whatever you like. This image is really a photo detail showing many layers of peeling paint on an old bench. Making images or designs out of randomly occurring surfaces is an enjoyable pastime. A visitor here noticed the landscape on the old entryway bench.

Full Moon ~ March 7th, 2023

Ringling Brothers

This painting - a triptych - is from the collection of side trips, probably from some time in the early 2000s. I was at the time intrigued by various interlocking patterns. This one is based on a very old pattern called wedding ring. The trio shown here was part of a much larger, multiple panel piece that resembled a sewn quilt in some ways. A sewn quilt would probably have been much more appealing; and you wouldn't get warm trying to snuggle under a painting. I did hang on to these three because of the way the surface was developing into something I wouldn't consciously recognize for some years to come. These paintings don't exist anymore. I painted over them recently to make way for newer things. I've been doing a lot of that lately: pulling paintings out of storage and, if they're not up to a certain level, painting over them. Why pile things up, really?

New Moon ~ February 20th, 2023

Mississippi

I've been reading Eudora Welty lately. Apart from a few excursions away to college, Europe, and brief spell in New York City, she was a life-long a native of Jackson, Missippi. One of the many pleasures of her writing is the vivid descriptons of place. She conjures the sights, weather, sounds, topography, and people with such poetic economy and vividness. I dug out this small painting a few days ago during a reading of The Ladies of Spring, one of her short stories. The painting echoed something of my being steeped in a literary journey to Mississippi and rain falling after a long dry spell.

New Moon ~ January 21st, 2023

Area Sixteen

This was one of those moments of noticing an accidental composition. In this case it was a mess at the bottom of our studio sink, a deposit of previous painting cleanups, along with the imprint of a watercolor palette. I named it Area Sixteen in the manner of an affected aesthete; it's really just the bottom of a studio sink in need of a cleaning. But do look for these fortuitous coalescences; they are everywhere and they can add a little zip to your day.

Full Moon ~ January 6th, 2023