Dear Artist, If you feel yourself at times an amateur — do not despair. Some of the great amateurs are the ones who show the way. Think of Cezanne fidgeting with more than fifty views of Mt. St Victoire — never…
Dear Artist, The Canadian painter Emily Carr (1871-1945) thought an artist’s growth was beyond explanation. She thought it was best to be silent on the subject. “One does not keep digging up a plant to see how it grows,” she…
Dear Artist, Richard Nelson is a color-guru who lives and works on the slopes of Haleakala on the island of Maui. The life-long work of Josef Albers is never very far from his thoughts. Albers (1888-1976) painted and taught at…
Dear Artist, The Lahaina scene makes a little more sense when you realize it’s a microcosm of the world of art itself. There’s intense competition; the good, bad and indifferent side by side, hucksterism, jealousy, plagiarism. The real question is…
Dear Artist, This coming Friday evening, February 4, 2000, my daughter Sara is having a one-woman show. It’s not her first, but it’s the first since a year of travel and work in Europe. The paintings are mostly from Spain…
Dear Artist, In order to keep your integrity and at the same time keep up your enthusiasm you have to press on in your experimentation. I think of this every morning when I pull the chair up to my easel…
Dear Artist, The next time you have one of the instruments of your craft in your hand, take a minute to see exactly what it is, and try to rethink what it’s best cut out to do. Paint brushes are…
Dear Artist, Here in Lahaina I’m told that Wyland is the best environmental artist in the world. In the same gallery there’s the work of “America’s greatest living artist” — John Pitre. Down the street there’s Christian Riese Lassen’s work,…
Dear Artist, In Lahaina, on the island of Maui, there’s a weekend outdoor art market around and under the world’s biggest banyan tree. I’m watching the entrepreneur-artists set up their spaces in the early morning. There’s a wide range of…
