Compassion: Recognizing Ourselves In Others
Here is a thing that boggles my mind: we need to convince other - we need to argue about - why people should be compassionate towards one another. We need to debate why we should guarantee a living wage? How is the bottom line more important than the basic needs of your workers? We discuss into absurdity why we should pass laws to guarantee that our veterans are cared for. And we need to convince people that we should care for the planet instead of just dumping toxic chemicals will-nilly everywhere. And we have the world we've created... that echoes all of these struggles.
Why should we be compassionate and how far should that compassion extend? Just to people who look like us, act like us, think like us? What about the people who are different than us? What about to, say, a tree, a bird, or the air? What's the use - the utility - of compassion?
Recognition (The Compassion of St. Francis)
St. Francis - he always seemed to be around when I was growing up. I had a St. Francis nightlight of glowing yellow translucent porcelain. A two foot tall concrete statue of him lived in the garden. He was over our big console TV, as a cross stitch on burlap or something - some coarse material. It was made in the 70s. In that image, St. Francis was walking outside and had a bird in his hand. I remember, too, a rabbit, another bird flying, and a butterfly. The stitching was sparse but there he was.
So he was around - the image and idea of him anyhow. But who was he, to me, growing up? Of all the characters of Christian pantheon - and I heard about plenty, having been raised Roman Catholic - he seemed to be the least mythic and the most human. He was a simple and gentle man, a monk, who loved nature and walked amongst the animals and saw the Divine in all things.
Fierceness: “First World Problem Child”
"My kind of loyalty was loyalty to one's country, not to its institutions or its officeholders. The country is the real thing, the substantial thing, the eternal thing; it is the thing to watch over, and care for, and be loyal to; institutions are extraneous, they are its mere clothing, and clothing can wear out, become ragged, cease to be comfortable, cease to protect the body from winter, disease, and death."
Mark Twain, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court
Some thoughts on a painting. Or - what's this about? So.... here we go...
What’s In a Name (And the Choosing of our Own)
Names: what we name things. We name things all the time. Often we are using names we've been told to call things. Those names serve the purpose of being a point of reference in a conversation. Sketchbook. Pen. Cat. And then there's more signifying names: my cat's name is Figaro. Or Lukki. Or Maceo.
I had a name that was given to me when I was born - Michael - and it accompanied a middle name - Robert, my dad's name - and Brown, my father's last name. And that was my identity for many years, tying me to a long family heritage and, on a broader scale, a long system of patriarchy.
Some Thoughts on ‘Gifting Circles’
The other day a friend - a 24-yr old woman - asked me what I felt about "gifting circles" - what I knew about them and how it jived with me.
I said I felt that these gifting circles prey on an innate greed* along with an innocence and naiveté in people. They operate under the guise of 'female empowerment' or 'manifesting abundance' and the 'law of attraction' (which is about the most materialistic spiritual belief system out there) and this 'circle of sisterhood' where women can share what they are going through, etc. Yet, at its core, there is this offer of an up to $40K 'dessert' they will receive when they reach the inner ring/top of the pyramid/head of the table, etc. Having nothing to do with sisterhood, that is the ultimate driving force leading people to join. After all, most women already have a circle of girlfriends to share with.
Seeing the Spontaneous Creation Through to Completion
There's much to be said for the value of doodling. I've probably even said a bit of it already. I think so much importance is put on the idea of 'a finished drawing' that it's sometimes possible to loose sight of the looseness of the spontaneous flow. In fact, the specificity of a 'finished drawing' (said with such grand eloquence) can cause one to over think what one is setting out to do.
When I make a drawing of a painting I'm going to create there's a lot of, well, doodling that goes into those first intimations of the image. When an idea comes to me it's never a fleshed out finished thing. It's sort of like a big broad brushstroke that says 'something like this.' What follows are a lot of scribbles, dashes and dots, lines and curves, and trying to understand my lines, my motives, my reasons for making it.
In the Beginning (of a Painting)
I spend an enormous amount of time thinking about paintings I want to paint. And not just thinking about them but seeing them, feeling them, considering them. Sometimes they are in my vision when I'm making dinner and I'm chopping a carrot or a stalk of broccoli and I'm seeing this painting. It sort of lingers in the vision - in my mind, in this place between hallucination and imagination...
Small paintings: I make small things like 11x14 and such and they are relatively quick... They are a small facet, an aspect of myself - they are very precise and don't require as much forethought. They come from drawings and ideas of course, but they don't have as much going on with them of course. Likewise, they allow depth and scope and that, too, require some consideration - some allowance of what it might be but not like a larger painting. Why? I think in part it's because if I'm going to invest the time it takes to paint something that's larger than a couple of feet tall, then there is serious intention… there's serious consideration about how I am going to spend my time - IS THIS WORTH IT? Do I want to go there?
Setting Up the Studio (Some Suggestions)
It's true: one CAN paint anywhere. And paint anywhere I have: on a board propped up by a chair surrounded by jungle. On a canvas taped to a wall in a downtown studio. Small shared spaces where what I called 'mine' was merely the space of the stool, the canvas, and the paint… One CAN paint anywhere in the same way that grass pokes through a crack in the pavement, or there's a bird's nest on a telephone pole, a flower in a metal pipe poking out from the ground in the ground.
But, given the choice - and when presented with options - I've found certain factors provide a more ideal situation. Here's a list of some… Your mileage may vary…
On the Subject of Bitches
When a man in charge is frank with his opinions, curt with his commands, and just has abrupt no-nonsense way about him, he is seen as a guy who knows how to lead and is respected and well-regarded. He may not always even be the nicest guy - he can be kind of a dick even - yet something about him seems to command respect. Well, people say, it's the fact that he's intelligent, level-headed, and knows what he wants and, though he might even be a bit headstrong, he really does know how to do it and he gets it done. He may not even be the clearest and most honest person in every corner of his life but when it comes to work, he knows what he wants and how to get it and goddammit, people say, you just gotta respect that.
Put a woman in his place, though, and people call her a bitch, if not to her face then behind her back. So hard to work with, they say.
Fire Paintings from September 11, 2001
On September 11, 2001, I was living in Burlington, VT - painting, enjoying the coming autumn, etc. I didn't have a TV (still don't), never listened to the radio (still don't) and the internet was still just a plodding dirt road through the hills - not the information super highway it was to become.
I woke up that morning with a desire to paint big red fiery paintings. I had a couple of large pieces of masonite - a 4' x 4' square and a 4' x 2.5' rectangle - and a few cans of red, yellow, orange, and purple latex paints. So around 8 am, with a cup of coffee, I went at it. The diamond/square painting I called 'Phoenix.' The other was 'Unsquaring the Circle' and felt like a great release of energy.