Why do I make art? Why do I write? I suppose I could ask, why do I do
anything I do? I am willing to try
answering the first two queries, but the last one is too overwhelming for
me. Then again, it may be
foolishness to think I can answer the others.
I have struggled with
these questions for years, hoping to understand what compels me to do this
work. I did not choose art;
it chose me. Art reached into my
almost perfect world, placed its hand upon my shoulders, and against all odds
pulled me into its breast. Tenacious
and unyielding, it would not loosen its grip, determined to overcome all
obstacles I placed before it. The
desire to be an artist and live an artist’s life inserted it self into the
fabric of my thoughts, overwhelming everything else. Eventually it transformed from something I wanted to do to something I had to do.
Almost 35 years later,
I’m still doing the work, which now includes writing as well as painting and
drawing. I have learned how to
explain why I paint the way I do, and how I choose my subjects, but why I paint
at all remains a mystery. At least
it did until last year, in the fall of 2013 when I wrote the following in my
journal:
“Why it has taken me this long – 74 years – to
see myself so clearly is beyond comprehension. While most of my “ah ha moments” occur in the proximity of
my morning shower, I can’t recall when this one poked me in the head; it
happened about a week ago.
I cannot let things simply “be”. I have this unrelenting need to act on
things, to make them more than an experience or knowledge.
Ideas, thoughts, or feelings must be put into
words, spoken, written, or both, and more often than not, they must be shared,
quietly and personally through conversation, or publicly through writing
(blogs, facebook, etc.).
In my encounters with the world around me the
same phenomenon occurs. When a
particular scene, natural or manmade, inspires me, I am driven to re-create it
on paper or canvas, directly or via a photograph. Living with the experience and memory is not enough for
me. I have to make it into “
something” that I can see on demand, and, as is usually the case, share with
others.”
For the lack of a
better term, I think of this as “materialization”, an act of expression as well
as recording. I am archiving the
moment, the vision, the emotion, the revelation, so that it can be revisited as
well as shared. Something in this
act of “materializing” provides the validation of the experience that I seem to need.
It happened it Boston
in 1976 just as it is happening as I write these words.
