Perhaps because of my love for Wagner's Tannhäuser, or perhaps because I have simply spent so much time traveling and observing the world myself, the imagery of wanderers and pilgrims, travelers, and spectators fascinates me. Airports and railway stations are full of people who are escaping, returning, leaving their familiar surroundings to accomplish something significant or to re-evaluate perspectives, families, soldiers (particularly in the past several years), friends and lovers parting or reuniting, businessmen and women. . . in fact, airports and railway stations are quite often the places that I have found most conducive to contemplating humanity and culture.
Winter Traveler [above] was inspired by a young woman whom I saw on a train while crossing Europe. She stood by a door, her backpack in hand, dressed in a bulky jacket, scarf, and boots, and with her back turned to me, she seemed like the universal anonymous traveler. With the train moving so quickly, the scene was rather hypnotic, the cold earth outside the windows became a blur, a scene worthy of Schubert's Winterreise. Of course, I did not wish to make this particular painting feel as isolated and dramatic as Schubert's song cycle, I simply wanted to depict the mystery of an unknown traveler heading out into a cold yet magically beautiful world of unexplored potential. I used quite a bit of red, yellow, and pink in the painting as a suggestion of good cheer, warmth, and humanity and I intentionally left it unclear as to what she is stepping out from (Her home? A train? Her workplace?) I would like the viewer to wonder about her story, to wonder about the nature of travels both physical and spiritual.
When my good friend Jamie Hoffman asked for a custom painting, I immediately began to think of how I could incorporate some of her favorite elements from my other paintings and the color scheme from her home into something original and interesting. She mentioned how much she loved The Niña and Pinta at the Docks, but talked about Showers Over University Drive as well, a rather different work indeed. My painting of Columbus' ships is quite clean and delineated, whereas I purposely made my depiction of University Drive wild and even a little sloppy. One painting makes me think of travel and the meeting of the Old and New Worlds, the other is about urban planning and how it can have an impact on community life. As I was contemplating the paintings, I remembered that there was a scribble in my sketchbook that I had done while staying at a friend's apartment in Garching, and from there my composition continued to take shape. [The edge of the canvas, below, painted to go well with the greens in Jamie's house.]
Garching is not a tourist destination; it is simply a fairly pleasant suburb of Munich. It does not sprawl uncontrollably and it is pedestrian-friendly. I could awake on a cool morning to the sound of birds singing and shopkeepers greeting each other on the street before opening time. The bakery was right around the corner. Germany's famously excellent public transportation system is not an afterthought in this small town, in fact, the subway station is bright, admirably clean, and decorated artistically with vivid panels of color. While I was there, a local art group had even placed some of their work behind glass panels in the station. Being able to paint what was, in my mind, the antithesis of University Drive gave me an opportunity to use the common compositional elements that a street scene provides to create new contrasts-- to clean up some of the mess, to brighten the scene, to make it more comfortable, to give it a sense of adventure. I am happy to present this painting, filled with friendship, travel, good memories, and warm wishes, to Jamie and her family and hope that they will enjoy having it in their home and much as I enjoyed painting it!
Most of the things I scribble in my sketchbook are there for the explicit purpose of plotting out larger or more "finished" works, but as of late I have had little thought of further developing anything beyond my eyes, the sweep of my hand, and the relationship between my work and my spirit. This is not to say that I have not thought of making new "finished" paintings at all, in fact, I have been contemplating very intricate ideas that I would like to put on canvas. However, I have not hurriedly leapt into polishing those ideas; instead, I am spending most of my time out in the woods or around town drawing in my sketchbook, or using acrylics to make quick, loose paintings, such as Study of a Girl in Nature and Study of a Lifeboat [above], perhaps refining or developing certain habits, helping my hands and eyes memorize a shape, making the rendering of a certain texture or form smoother, effortless. The studies will not be held to any standard of perfection, completion, or beauty (quite unlike my other work), and they will not all be in one particular style, but they will provide educational challenges that could potentially lead to new insights.
For the next week (or perhaps even a month if I find that I would like to practice more than I previously anticipated), I plan to sketch, mix colors, and hone my skills purely for the sake of research and study. The long walks, freedom, and vibrant observations that go along with this plan have already proven pleasant, but more than that, I expect that the rewards of intelligent practice will prove extremely valuable to me as I continue my artistic work.
I had the pleasure of seeing replicas of the Niña and Pinta at Ditto Landing last week, and considering how interested I am in history, civilization, and dream-like juxtapositions of the Old World and New, the full-size ships, entirely black with pine tar, manned by crews of adventurous volunteers, and resting at the edge of Huntsville, were surreal and fascinating, perfect subjects for one of my abstractions [above, The Niña and Pinta at the Docks].
The colors of the marina are grayed greens, blues, lilacs, yellows from the occasional wildflowers speckling the grass, and now that the air is cooler, patches of yellow, orange, and deep red from the Fall foliage. I mixed my paints in strategic groupings [above] before beginning my work so as to properly capture the variety of colors at the marina without upsetting the overall harmony of the piece; I wanted everything in the painting, whether completely wild or completely man-made and however disconnected, to become comfortably connected.
In the design of this piece [above], two things were very important to me; that is, first, to depict the ships clearly enough that they suggested historic vessels without going into any kind of photographic detail. I wanted a bit more subtlety, I wanted the ships to be dynamic, dignified, mysterious, and I wanted it to be unclear as to which era the scene belonged. Second, I wanted to pay homage and create a connection to an earlier work, painted after a day spent at Ditto Landing three years ago. I did this by echoing some of the lines of the highway bridge in the previous painting, far off in the background, as if the painting itself were a sort of timeline of past, present, and tentative future sojourns.
Perhaps because of my love for Wagner's Tannhäuser, or perhaps because I have simply spent so much time traveling and observing the world myself, the imagery of wanderers and pilgrims, travelers, and spectators fascinates me. Airports and railway stations are full of people who are escaping, returning, leaving their familiar surroundings to accomplish something significant or to re-evaluate perspectives, families, soldiers (particularly in the past several years), friends and lovers parting or reuniting, businessmen and women. . . in fact, airports and railway stations are quite often the places that I have found most conducive to contemplating humanity and culture.
2013Wegman.JPG)
