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Portraits 2008
2008 In View of the Feminine
Portrait of North American Indians
Portraits of Pet Friends
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 I am American living in Paris and have been for about 20 years. Now I have moved to Italy and a new life. I have always painted because it was natural to do but that has not been my main occupation so far as I was trained as a professional musician and then became a teacher in Paris but still kept on painting. The paintings on this site are of course the most recent ones for many were done and left in the US. These paintings are all oil, the newest ones being on canvas and the older ones from 2000 to 2002 on wood using oils too but also a special mixture of paint that I found worked the way I wanted it to on wood.
Faces have always been a major interest but lately (this year) I have started to let go a little and paint directly from dreams and inspiration. Drawing is a separate activity in itself for me in another place and time.Usually there are many "sittings" as it gains in depth layer after layer until the effect I wish to create is there on the canvas.Sometimes the image or images just come out like that.
I am autodidact as I spent most of my time studying music, however painting is becoming and has become now a major focus of my time and energy. Philosophy and Concepts : | My work has revolved primarily around people for the last six years. I'm a teacher and always observing and studying people in real life and this helps me greatly intuitively when I am painting portraits. The portraits are painted on wood in oils with a laqué paint base to coat the wood before I start. The portraits to be seen on this site at the moment are Indian portraits. Alot of Hopi Indians, but I didn't do that on purpose. I am just naturally attracted to these Indians, especially the women and the medicine men-healers and warriors. lWhen I have the total vision of the person then I start to paint. I am currently working on (this was in 2002) a series of Asian portraits from all parts of Asia, but again I am especially attracted to Mongolian, Tibetan and Chinese personalities. Color and form are of course very important and sometimes, as is the case of the Indian woman draped in a many-colored blanket, the subject becomes more abstract. There is also a universal or global idea behind these portraits seeing bits and pieces of parts of ourselves when we paint portraits of others. I had an exposition of this group of paintings in March 2001 just outside of Paris. |
June 2005 : As far as painting goes, I tend to agree with those that say little, and prefer to let the paintings speak for themselves, however I do think it is important to talk about what happens on the” inside” and particularly when we are propelled into another dimension through paint, colours and forms and when this propulsion becomes so intense that it becomes an every day occurrence and need, not a “sometime” or a “one time, from time to time” occurrence. I want to talk about what happens when we are on this particular path,( I see it within myself as well as in my students who have also chosen to use painting as a tool and a path.)
What seems to be important on this path is when there are “breakthroughs”… when all of sudden the “pieces” of what we have been working on for a short or a long time seem to coagulate into a mainstream idea within our own imagination.. This is an exciting feeling ! Like discovering a new land or a new space to explore.
Things also seem to “bottleneck” just before the breakthrough,meaning we have the impression of being in a space that is just too small and no longer comfortable..so of course the feeling of discovery is even greater. This is what has just happened with the “Collage” works on the .
All of sudden I started seeing how different paintings actually fit together into a whole in terms of colors, ideas and forms . Repeating the motif (in the form of the painting ) also help to increase the effect when you see the paintings re-united together. It is as though we were able to start painting the “pieces” of the master plan and then were able to see at last how these pieces all fit together. I know this is going to have an effect on future paintings. I don’t think it can be any other way as there has been a sort of altered vision now when I sit down in front of the canvas.
. May 2007
A new life and a new vision of things. Tara in the fields was done in September before I left for Italy. The most recent painting is Madonna in the fields. These two paintings have been done with a different approach, not only in my mind's eye ( a consolidation of sorts of the the major themes of the last five years) but also a change in technique which has happened gradually and as a consequence. Teaching has had an effect on this change in my way of painting as well. My students have taught me as much or more than I ever taught them, that is a fact. All stems from one's "vision" and perception of things and the technique follows in line as the vision changes. To be continued. 2008 New Forms Painting again after months without, reflecting and consolidating in a certain sense, in terms of colour and forms, product of the past and the present..looking for and going deeper into the essence where it all comes from..
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