Observation and Knowledge

Welcome to my blog. 

I need to start somewhere, so I’m going to start in the present, with the work I’m doing right now. Some time in the future I’ll wander into the past when things get boring, redundant or depressing. At the moment I’m preparing for a new project by doing research, drawing and photography.

We spent the Memorial Day weekend driving a big loop from Los Angeles to Stallion Springs out Routes 58 and 40 under Las Vegas and then around the city to the Red Rock area for a short stay at Bonnie Springs before returning home. 

With gas over 4 bucks a gallon in LA, why would I do that? I feel that most of the artwork that resonates deeply with people is rooted in intense personal knowledge, passion and experience. It’s not a fresh opinion and not original. Paint what you know. Dance what you feel. Sing the songs you know from your roots. I need to get to know what I plan to paint.

Mental pictures form before the painting starts. The pictures are a balance of observation and knowledge. Think of figure drawing, where you draw primarily what you see in front of you, or think of painting in the field. Over time you add to what you see with what you know and what you see adds to what you know for next time. Each artist and each work of art is a balance of both knowledge and observation. Even if the  observation is of the inside of your own head, your dreams, your imagination. I think of drawing and painting as both a way to express my passion and a way of capturing the world. I take in all I can, I give back all that I’m able. 

If I’m going to paint something, someplace new, I need to gain knowledge and experience. In my work I expand my knowledge base by observation and research, guided by my passion. I go where the image lives. I don’t search the web for the image, crop it and try to be just barely legal. I think of landscape work the same way I think of figurative work, still life or any new or old genre of image. If I’m painting a mountain I want to understand it from several sides, over seasons, different times of day and in different contexts. I want to know what I can to inform my work with a more than superficial knowledge.

This is tricky. It makes me humble because I start out knowing nothing and after days or even months of observation and driving, hiking, climbing and taking pictures, I still don’t know much. Superficial is relative. I don’t know what these particular mountains look like under snow. Or twenty years before the freeway came in. I don’t know who lives here and who is visiting, where they came from. I don’t know the local mythology, but by the time I leave I know some history. I will never know as much as one of the local kids, working hands or dishwashers. But I know more than I did. And if I work hard, I know enough to allow the image to relate to the people who know it well and not contradict their intimate knowledge with bad assumptions. I can inform the work with enough truth and informed opinion to introduce the place to new viewers and record some sense of place and time for the future when the context, environment and knowledge base of the viewer will make this a historical document of a lost place and time. 

Historical, how? Because just last week is already a lost time, one landslide, a hard rain, a wild fire or closing a single trail will make some of my images difficult or impossible to duplicate. And sad experience has taught me that moving the trail is the least of what the future holds for natural observations. Some of my favorite hikes have burned, closed, been paved or sleep under mini malls and condos. It’s progress, but I’m not always optimistic about what we are progressing toward. Enough editorial. 

So, observation through experience. Hike, drive, sit and watch, nap and listen, take a few hundred photos, sort the photos, organize the experience through drawing, notes and conversation. Read, research and study. With the goal of being informed enough to paint, on a very large scale, the landscape that other people live in and work in, in a way that lets a viewer project their personal experience onto the image. 

Guided by knowledge, by my training and experience, I observe and start to form images that may become paintings. 

Each day in the studio is an education. Exposing my weaknesses and gaps in my knowledge, teaching me new skills and strengthening old working habits. It’s the opposite of research. I start out knowing all I know and start discarding all of the information and opinion that is irrelevant to the current work, with the goal of creating enough room in my small mind for both old knowledge and new experience to combine in a fresh way which will excite me enough to stay motivated over the weeks or months it may take to paint a mural. And more importantly, will inform the mural or painting with both passion and content enough to be interesting, beautiful and relevant to a diverse audience. 

This is the hard part of art for me. Getting into a huge volume of information and imagery is like being neck deep in the Pacific on a hot day. It is wave after wave of pure joy, deep pleasure and natural refreshment. Walking out of all that wonder with only a few drops clinging to my skin, a sense of place and time that evaporates just as quickly from my mind and crossing the hot sand to do the work...

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