“Great art is born when Apollonian form and Dionysian ecstasy are held in balance”

“The Botany of Desire”   Michael Pollan

My Art and It’s Stories:

Michael Pollan’s quote, above, encapsulates for me what I look for in art, what I seek in my own pieces, and explains why the work of some artists is so meaningful to me, while other, equally praised work by others is not.

For me, the quote articulates that balance between mastered technique and the human touch, a balance readily apparent in the works of many of the masters of figurative art, like Rembrandt, Monet, and Sargent, yet indiscernible, to me, in most abstract and modernist works.

When I first read the passage, I was immediately reminded of a trip I’d made to the Bowers Museum in LA, to see a collection of Pharonic and pre-pharonic funeral goods (mummys and grave goods).  There was a hand-painted inner coffin on display and while examining up close, I realized that I could see the layering of brushstrokes, the way one stroke of paint overlapped or crossed another, and so, I could trace how the painter’s hand and brush had moved, and to a degree, what order he’d painted the strokes.  Suddenly, it was if the unnamed artist was right there with me, and the experience personalized the artwork for me.

In that revelation, something crystallized for me about art, and Michael Pollen’s statement articulated for me.  In  my works you’ll catch me searching for that balance between perfection and accident, technique and passion, form and ecstasy.

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The collection featured in the top header bar “Wild Life Portraits: The Eyes Mark Their Intentions” represents my recent focus on paintings of wildlife.  The lower menu bar provides groupings of my paintings based on category, allowing you to find all of my landscapes, or all of my paintings of places in France, for example.

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When I’m reading about art, I enjoy most books and essays and monographs that go beyond the bare-bones technical information about a painting to include what is currently known about the circumstances the painting was executed in, the cultural and emotional and spiritual context of the work, and whatever we know about what the artist intended. For me, that information becomes a sort of gallery wall that the painting hangs on – a support of time and place and people and beliefs and values, that adds to my understanding and appreciation.

So, though it may go against the conventions and expectations of our day  for artists to explain or verbalize about their visual works, much of the work I present here will be accompanied by some sentences describing what I was thinking or feeling, where I was, what inspired or conspired to bring that piece into  existence. One of my primary goals for this website is to keep my  friends and family up to date with what I’m drawing and painting, and to even hint about what I plan to work on next.  As time goes by, you’ll find images of works in progress, and information about the masters I’m reading about.