Changes...............

A few months ago, I discovered a new and softer palette. I was quite happy with this new direction, and I was making a lot of new work. Then one day - without warning - I went off in a completely new direction…….and I haven’t looked back. No texture, no grid, no rocks…..it was almost as if I was channeling some long, lost part of myself…not completely unfamiliar, but certainly new. The connection I did feel was to my charcoal drawings, which I have always considered some of my most compelling work. I’m using charcoal again, though this time into oil paint. Now the new paintings are flowing. I’m trying to remain “in the zone” and follow this work where it takes me. An artist friend commented that it is a bit like some of my familiar icons got loose and are now floating free in a soft, mysterious space. For now, that’s as far as I want to go with a definition. I am tempted to wax philosophical…..or do my usual psychological analysis… but I think I’ll just go back to painting. Stay tuned.

Taking Stock Mid-Year

My mantra for 2009 has been “Embrace Uncertainty”. When I started this blog in early 2009, I was looking toward cyberspace for marketing and sales opportunities, feeling hopeful that this was the new reality. I was willing to jump in, put my work on the 1000 Markets, Zatista, etc. It’s been an interesting experiment, but it feels to me that things have come full circle – back to more face to face networking and local projects – actually more than before the current financial crisis turned our worlds upside down.

While working on a series of linocuts earlier this year, I wrote something about how I thought one positive outcome from this recession would be that people would want to go back to buying handmade things, rather than more electronics or a new car. That was wishful thinking at the time, but I think it’s actually happening. I can feel the difference in my studio – more people coming in and really appreciating my iconic imagery and the direct experience of seeing and touching original paintings. Wanting to meet and talk to the person who made the art rather than seeing it in a gallery.

My palette has softened this year, and that’s been challenging, too. The imagery is more mysterious again, and it looks more like a code, or the primitive expression of basic life forms.

I have certainly not given up on the internet (or this blog)…. although I finally gave up trying to use Twitter. I do still enjoy Facebook, and I think it can be a fun and effective networking tool. (or a big black hole…..)

Onward to the remainder of 2009….thank you to all who inspire me and support my creative work.

The Zen of Fireflies

These days I find I don't have a lot to write about. I think about a lot of things, yet they seem fleeting and/or trivial. I would rather stand on the back porch and dusk and watch the fireflies. There is a time to be a deep thinker. There is a time to think nothing and just watch something miraculous. For a lot of us, the latter is much harder than the former. Although explaining a miracle can detract from its effect, my curious mind gets the best of me every year and I have to research what makes fireflies glow. So, for those of you who have forgotten (like I do every year....)......
Fireflies have dedicated light organs that are located under their abdomens. They take in oxygen and, inside special cells, combine it with a substance called luciferin to produce light with almost no heat. Firefly light is usually intermittent, and flashes in patterns that are unique to each species (there are more than 200 species!). Each blinking pattern is an optical signal that helps fireflies find potential mates. Scientists are not sure how the insects regulate this process to turn their lights on and off.
So enjoy them while they are here! They don't grace our presence for long each year, and now is the time.

New Painting.........

Negotiating with Memory

This is a picture of my father, Robert Fisher, circa 1926, sawing wood in Indiana. A few weeks ago I went to visit him (he is now 94) in Florida. After years of talking about it, I finally interviewed and recorded him for about 30 minutes. He is a very mellow guy, and his epitaph could read, “What you see is what you get”. Hard as I tried to extract long lost stories and juicy details from the past, he seemed unwilling or unable to relate anything beyond facts.
He has had an incredibly interesting life, yet he is humble and unassuming. The experience got me thinking about the nature of memory: not just why and how we remember, but how our selective memories form a narrative of our lives. Do we all edit ourselves to create the persona of the person we want to be? How do we decide what to leave in, what to take out?

While I was pondering some of these questions, I began to read a book called A Fraction of the Whole by Australian novelist Steve Toltz. It’s a long, idiosyncratic, epic saga that reads kind of like a marriage of Dickens and Vonnegut. I came across this paragraph near the beginning of the book:
“Negotiating with memories isn’t easy: how do I choose between those panting to be told, those still ripening, those already shriveling, and those destined to be mangled by language and come out pulverized?.....in any case, mine’s a damned good story, and it’s true.”

How do we tell our life stories? Is blogging the new storytelling? Sometimes I feel like what I'm blogging about isn't "important" enough. But it's all mine, and it's all true.....in my unique life's narrative.

Calculating Happiness

A new constitution in the remote Buddhist kingdom of Bhutan requires that all government programs – from agriculture to transportation to foreign trade – be judged not by economic benefits but by the happiness they produce. The government has created a Gross National Happiness (G.N.H.) index, which names four pillars of a happy society: economy, culture, the environment and good governance. It then breaks these down into nine domains: psychological well being, ecology, health, education, living stardards, time use, community vitality and good governance. Mathematical formulas have been devised to track and measure happiness. Prime Minister Jigme Thiney sees this approach as a response to “greed, insatiable human greed” that is the root of today’s worldwide economic crisis.

Imagine if this idea catches on in other countries. Unlikely, but wonderful to imagine.

How do you define happiness?

Riverside Cemetery, Asheville

Spring is in full bloom at the historic cemetery in my neighborhood. Along with the dogwoods and azelas, I found two more interesting photo ops:

Kenneth Noland is alive and well (as far as I know) but he has already erected his mausoleum in Riverside Cemetery (he's from Asheville). Kinda creepy. or not.??

This has always been my favorite tombstone at Riverside. These people were obviously huge party monsters. Do you think they dug their own grave as a parting gesture?