On Drawing

To draw is to look, examining the structure of appearances.

A drawing of a tree shows, not a tree, but a tree-being-looked-at.

Whereas the sight of a tree is registered almost instantaneously,

the examination of the sight of a tree (a tree-being-looked-at) 

not only takes minutes or hours instead of a fraction of a second, 

it also involves, derives from, and refers back to, 

much previous experience of looking,

Within the instant of the sight of a tree is established a life-experience. 

This is how the act of drawing refuses the process of disappearances

 and proposes the simultaneity of a multitude of moments.

Berger On Drawing - John Berger

COUNTING TREES, drawings and a poem

Four Trees - upon a solitary Acre

(poem 742)

by Emily Dickinson

Four Trees - upon a solitary Acre

Without Design

Or Order, or Apparent Action - 

Maintain -

The Sun - upon a Morning meets them - 

The Wind -

No nearer Neighbor - have they - 

but God -

The Acre gives them - Place - 

They - Him - Attention of Passer by - 

Of Shadow, or of Squirrel, haply - 

Or Boy - 

What Deed is Theirs unto the General Nature - 

What Plan

They severally - retard - or further - 

Unknown - 

 

TWO MONTHS LATER after a busy summer!

LOOKING AFTER TREES

Tomorrow is the last day of this exhibition at The Art Center in Grand Junction, CO.

You can view the online catalogue at

 http://www.issuu.com/lookingaftertrees/docs/looking_after_trees/1

 VIEW OF THE SAN JUANS from MILLER MESA

"When you go out to paint try to forget what objects you have before you, a tree, a house, a field or whatever.

Merely think, here is a little streak of blue, here and oblong of pink, here a streak of yellow, and paint it just as it looks to you. The exact color and shape, until it gives you your own naive impression of the scene before you."

Claude Monet 

 LONE CONE - Hand Colored Woodblock Print
www.twelveviewsoflonecone.blogspot.com

A VERY busy summer! Thank you to all our friends who welcomed us back to the USA.
We have decided not to return to Spain for work, but will continue to visit and learn more about that fascinating country!
I will stay here in Colorado and continue to paint this landscape and these trees. Also teaching and exhibiting my work. TWELVE VIEWS OF LONE CONE,  the woodblock prints will be exhibited in October at Stronghouse Studios, Telluride Arts.
Please check the above website for the latest information.

EPILOGUE ONE - Cantabria

 The remains of Santa Juliana are in the Colegiata, a Romanesque church and Benedictine Monastery in Santillana Del Mar in Cantabria. The cloister is ringed by columns, each with a different sculptural design on the top. The Celtic influence is strong in northern Spain.

 As I reflect on the past seven months I spent in Spain and try to find meaning in what I experienced

I will post items that I continue to think about. I am trying to come up with a focus for my next year's work there in a new city on the coast of the Bay of Biscay!

CLAUSTROS, COLUMNAS Y TRONCOS

Leaving Spain in a couple of days to go back to the US.

A germ of an idea in is the photos above. 

After all that I have seen these past seven months here I keep coming back to certain images.

Will keep writing and thinking and see what happens next!

Primavera, Parque Del Ebro

It's a late spring in northern Spain. Just like in Colorado, at altitude in the Rocky Mountains,

it's changeable from winter to summer like weather in the same week. Last week gave me some beautiful days in the Parque Del Ebro along the river to go out to draw and paint.

The scene above shows the variety of trees one finds here: palms, beeches, cypresses and here and there and old olive or fruit tree like the apple I drew here.

What drew my attention to this tree is the curious way it was growing all alone surrounded by a circle of pine trees. The contrast of the blossoms with the dark needles of the pines was stunning.

Judging from the trunk, it looks to be well over a hundred years old. The thoughtful gardeners who planted the pines were considerate to leave the apple and create such a nice space for it!

SOME MUSINGS ON TREES

FISH, FEET AND FRESCOS

Foot and Fish

Foot and Fish

Fresco drawing of saint

Praying Woman

Gameboard?

 It was in the Cátedral de Santa María de la Regla in León, Spain that I first noticed the fish. 

I am always looking for tree and bird symbology in the crests, friezes and frescoes here,

at the top are two images of the drawings for frescoes in that cathedral.

When visiting these places you are surrounded by so much art, centuries old, and of course, unlike in an art museum, there are no labels. I photograph what catches my eye and is intriguing in a way I haven't encountered before. 

The "praying woman" is underneath two trees that could have come from any modernist painting or a landscape by one of the Group of Seven. The geometric configuration in the image above is a mystery.

Angel

An early Jewish temple?

I will dedicate another post to Sephardic Jews in Spain but I wanted to point out in this fresco in the

León cathedral the building above with the two Jewish stars. There are old buildings all over Spain like this. Every town has it's "juderia".

STUDIO VISIT IN SPAIN - 4/17/2013 - Mercedes Blanco

Last fall Mercedes Blanco and I were introduced, via email, by Eduardo Alvarado, an artist living near to Logroño.  I was looking for studio space and also someone to have an "intercambio" with. Intercambios are common here among ex-pats wanting to practice their Spanish. A fair exchange, one-half hour conversation in Spanish, the other half in English.

After our first few meetings I realized that we not only shared a desire to learn each others' language but also shared the language of art and a certain way of looking at the world. Our small talk included big talk about painters, writers, philosophy and I am grateful to have met someone here who is interested and engaged in the life of the artist on a daily basis.

Mercedes' paintings follow the path of the Abstract Expressionists. Emotional, strong color put down in a gestural manner suggesting the landscape. Her blog - www.descubriendocolores.blogspot.com

contains this quote from the Prologue of the 1967 Autobiography of Bertrand Russell:

"Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge and an unbearble pity for the suffering of mankind. These three passions, like great winds have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course over a deep ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of despair. (...)

APRIL TREE DRAWINGS

Spring has finally arrived in Northern Spain. Semana Santa was still cold and rainy which cancelled or cut short many of the processions. 

Now the temperatures are feeling like summer in comparison. 

The outdoor cafes are filled with people and I am going to the park to draw!

All of these drawings were done along the Ebro River. The first four are done using Micron Pigment Markers. The next three are using a seed pod dipped in India Ink 

(see previous post - Drawing With Trees)