Search Results: g (2707)

Letters Purple Haze acrylic on canvas 75 x 75 cm by Brian Crawford Young
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Yesterday, Brian Crawford Young of Inverness, Scotland, wrote, “I’ve been having a crisis since I got back from a wonderful residency at the Art Students’ League, Vytlacil Campus in Rockland County, New York. The ambience was great, the staff helpful, the scenery brilliant, and the quick access to Manhattan exciting. But when I got home to the Highlands of Scotland everything crunched to a halt. All my fears and self-doubts emerged and creativity stopped. Any thoughts on this sort of blues?”

Letters Thelonious Monk, Paris, 1964. Guy Le Querrec photo
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In 1960, saxophonist Steve Lacy transcribed 25 musical “tips” from jazz pianist and composer Thelonious Monk. Monk was, at the time, highly regarded by his peers and cutting-edge jazz critics, but his music was considered inaccessible by the mainstream — his abstract, shadowy, percussive and spacious style was far from the exultant, hard and fast-swinging bebop of his most popular contemporaries. Monk had been experiencing poor record sales, did residencies at the Five Spot Cafe in the East Village, changed labels, had some minor trouble with the law and would soon sign to Columbia and record the highest-selling album of his career — Monk’s Dream.

Letters Repos sur coq et chevauchée au village rouge, ca. 1975–1978 gouache, tempera and ink on paper 65.3 x 50 cm by Marc Chagall (1887–1985)
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Yesterday, Ann Price of Little Rock, Arkansas wrote, “You’ve written a lot about doing versus talking, and how speech inhibits creativity. I’ve been a talker since infancy. My parents swore I spoke sentences by six months. These days I’m repeatedly blocked creatively by my own verbal overload. Have you ever met someone who successfully made the switch from talker to doer?”

Letters Julie Mehretu at work, 2017.
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A guru once told me about an idea she called, “compassionate witness.” “When we bear witness,” she said, “we lovingly give our attention to another.” She told me the greatest gift I could give my friends was understanding — to let them know I saw their struggles and their triumphs and I recognized the effort they put in to achieve their dreams. She also said that when I allowed another to be my witness, I gave myself the freedom to be known.

Letters An adult Bald Eagle that has been restored to health by the Juneau Alaska Raptor Rehabilitation Center is released on the Chilkat River, Haines, Alaska.
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Here at the American Bald Eagle Festival in Haines, Alaska, releasing eagles back to the wild is part of the program. This year there are five. Wounded or sick birds that have been revived by local animal shelters are brought here for this purpose. A prominent Chilkat Chief of the Raven Clan released one at dawn today. Dressed in full regalia — button blanket and traditional wooden hat — he said a few words in the Tlingit language. Then, on the count of three, he threw the bird into the air.

Letters Quiet Morning, 1994 34 x 30 inches acrylic on canvas by Robert Genn (1936-2014)
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When my husband, Peter, attended his first Genn family gathering, he was delighted to find that after the meal everyone scattered to their respective rooms for what our family fondly and only half-jokingly calls, “quiet period.” No communal digestion, no idle chatter, no one’s company sought. Within minutes, everyone was under the covers in their own bed with a book or writing tool. Quiet period is when you get to go to your room to work on that thing you’re quietly working on.

Letters Drawing of Eugene Street (n.d.) soot and saliva on found paper by James Castle
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Last night I met with five of the 17 million artists who currently need to sell more of their art.

Two of my visitors came originally from a sales background. Two were young and disliked the subject of selling but were eager to get on with it. The other one had read a lot and taken courses — online, on the phone and in person. These courses included art marketing, eBay sales, art blogging, display advertising, selling yourself and your art, the business of art, licensing art…

Letters Composition VII, 1913 oil on canvas 78.25 by 119.1 inches by Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944)
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In the incredibly dark and grubby Odessa airport, waiting for the short flight to Kiev, I find a crumpled copy of the English-language Herald Tribune. While most of its words appear well used by previous travellers, there’s an interview with 76-year-old American author John Updike. “I’ve tried to avoid teaching,” he says, “which for all its charm takes a lot of your energy and makes you doubt yourself.”

Letters Venus de Milo, 101 BCE marble sculpture 6 feet, 8 inches by Alexandros
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Peter and I are rumbling along a dirt path on a rented quad, switch-backing the volcanic slopes of Milos, the southwestern-most island in the Cyclades. The road is ours — the last of the summer cruisers have embarked for still-hopping Santorini or returned home. Along the shoulder, shiny, amber hens peck at split watermelons, content with the honey and walnut breezes carried in from the Aegean and across the sun-baked olive groves. The sea, once worshipped as the goddess Amphitrite, the consort of Poseidon and mother of the fish, seals and dolphins, winks and dazzles into an infinite, cobalt sky.

Letters Portrait of Lady Charlotte Campbell, 1789 oil on canvas 197.2 x W 134 cm by Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein
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For two hundred years Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) has had something to say to creative people. Goethe (pronounced GER tuh) was a German poet, novelist, playwright and scientist. Some things he didn’t get right. Going against the findings of Sir Isaac Newton who had determined that colour came from white light, Goethe figured colour was merely a form of darkness. Too bad. An aristocrat with financial resources and terrific connections, he could turn his mind in any direction he wished. He was fascinated with the spirit and methodology of art-making.

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