April 5, 2009
March 21, 2009
Went to a small studio in Miami and started some self-portraits today. Here they are in progression. The painting is all underpainting so far.
Beginning of underpainting.
Further along on the underpainting.
Photo of the studio I was working in today.
Charcoal and chalk self-portrait first state. Should have left it alone. This version, after ten minutes, is better.
Final version of quick charcoal and chalk drawing on 300 lb. Fabriano wc paper with an acrylic gesso ground, sanded smooth.
March 17, 2009
Self-portrait, 2007. Pencil on paper. Drawn as demonstration for Drawing DVD/podcast
Model, pencil on paper, 2005. Private collection
Myst (silly title). Acrylic on canvas. 11 x 14 in. Collection of the artist.
Everglades Fireflies, 2007. Acrylic on canvas. Private collection.
Everglades Smoke, 2007. Acrylic on canvas. Collection of the artist.
Everglades Sun-up, 2007. Acrylic on canvas. Private collection.
Danielle, 2003. Pencil on paper. Private collection
Unfinished Self-Portrait, 2006. Oil on canvas. All underpainting. I'll probably never finish this...I lost 30 lbs. since then.
March 11, 2009
So I’m writing a scene in my book. The protagonist meets the girl of his dreams. I’m writing their initial meeting, and it’s like I’m reliving the first meeting I had with my wife, with whom I was already ga-ga. Very surreal. That hand that grips the heart and starts playing Beethoven’s 9th on your cardiac musclelito! Exciting and kind of weird. I can see now how completely fearless (clueless) one is when in the throws of romantic passion. I never stopped courting her for a second, and it took me a year-and-a-half to get an engagement ring on her finger. Boy did she put me through the hoops.
Now, does my character’s paramour do the same? Snicker, snicker.
March 5, 2009
Flapdoodle I knew awhile back.
March 5, 2009
Good memory of an important time in history.
more about "Bob Dylan Blowin’ In the Wind", posted with vodpod
February 11, 2009
I reread A Good Man Is Hard to Find yesterday. It had been a long time since I had read it. I’m not just talking about the short story, but the collection under that title. I respect the way she writes. Her imagery is masterly. I came upon an audio file of O’Connor reading her story last night. The story is fascinating, but maybe I need to read her letters before I get it. I got it. I got it.
Now, I teach high school at a large inner city school. I know surly characters, and there are some I wouldn’t trust with a wooden nickel. I’m thinking of one who looks like a pink fireplug, out on bond for stealing a bag of money that he thought was valuable but the cops said only had ten bucks in it. A whole bag of quarters worth only ten dollars? The cops here aren’t any better than a 16-year old troglodyte. They’re a lot better organized, however.
A writer or artist is exampling the world. He is saying to his/her readers This is the way the world is. Whereas the world is mean, it is also beautiful beyond compare. The grandmother in A Good Man Is Hard to Find seeks to reach the good in The Misfit, to no avail. Once a person has made up his mind to do something, something horrible, they’re probably going to do it, and in this story there is no countervailing principle in which the antagonist believes that can moderate his behavior. O’Connor is saying The Misfit is the world without God. The real God, one of love and who suffers with us. The Misfit never knew that someone was suffering with him in that cell. I believe O’Connor leaves much unsaid that the reader is supposed to flesh-out. Like life. There are layers of meaning in the story that develop into a whole family laying in a heap in the woods, blood draining from their bodies, irredeemably dead. The story says to me that one wrong turn, the world of unredeemed man, in its ill temper, will do you in. The evil in the world is in man. I can see that.
My mother just died a month ago last Friday. I know what the world can and will do. But O’Connor is a Catholic. She knows there is something more than this veil of tears, but you can’t tell the entire tale of the world in a short story.
I am quite enamored of The River. That story hits me where I live. I see neglected children all the time, so little Harry is no stranger to me. I have also seen and known wild-eyed fundamentalists and encountered Jehovah Witnesses and Mormon missionaries on the street, the former without any English-speaking skills, and the latter without cars. But, as a person who has lived nearly sixty years, I may have different view of the world than O’Connor, who died at 39 and lived a sickly life with lupus. I believe strongly in living to as old an age as possible and acquiring wisdom that is unavailable to a person in their thirties. Longevity transforms some people. Not everyone, but some.
What would a completely sane person who is not deathly boring look like? Could a sane, fully developed, happy person be the subject of a great story? That person would not get there without some side trips into the wild side.
February 10, 2009
I can’t help but love John Updike. Don’t know what other people necessarily think. No matter. God rest his soul.
more about "Night Talk: An Interview With John Up…", posted with vodpod
