by CarlOwen » Sun Mar 12, 2017 11:04 am
Good morning. I have a little to say about my past life, when I worked for a living, before I move on to drawing and painting process descriptions. Why? Because it is the foundation of how I think in order to create objects of beauty. And while of course, all our life paths are different, I think it is not that much different from any other artist involved with this endeavor.
I have been a student, a marine, a steel worker, a correctional officer, lieutenant, counselor, counselor supervisor, court liaison officer, assistant mental health bureau chief, an adjunct professor, a UCSD senior trainer, a drug treatment program designer and director, a union activist and a contract negotiator. All of those life experiences were intense human interactions of cooperation and conflict involvements.
Being an artist in the process of creating that object of beauty is not. Being an artist is being in the existence of one's own mind. It is almost autistic. It is isolation. It is a state of solitude even while being in the company of a crowd, for they do not exist. To be in the "zone" is to be totally unaware and uncaring of the world both in time and space. To reach "deep down" to pull out the ideas, the concepts, the methods of how to do it requires a depth of thought and emotional involvement that excludes everyone and everything. That state of mind is at times euphoric causing the artist to seek it again and again. It is also dangerous in the destruction of human relationships that leads to the path of isolation which is the exact opposite reason why we create in the first place. Recognizing this reality is the primary reason I have chosen to slow down my production of objects of beauty. The above commentary is another lesson I learned from doing Grand Canyon IV but did not know it until I started this production. I enjoy life as has been dealt to me and hope some of the thoughts expressed here will help other artists with life balance.
Now moving on, here is the single post for today. In doing this update I started out with a desire to do more canyon description working from the top moving down the page. That approach was quickly abandoned because the demand for structure of the forms started to kill the spontaneous and free look of the forms. So, I decided to just let my eye catch what stood out anywhere I wanted and drew those forms. I think that worked as the energy of the drawing returned. The unexpected and seeming less shadows of forms started to define the spaces of interest. I will be doing some more drawing today.
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