Processing

Facing three works, I find my eyes resting mostly with the painting of my daughter and two of her friends. The smaller cityscapes that I’m also currently working on, balance the larger work, allowing me the time and energy to step away and assess what’s necessary for each of these canvases. I’ll return to the larger piece when I know more about it.
Meanwhile, the cityscapes require urgency, as the remaining light threatens to leave. I look at these same streets most nights until they are partially committed to memory. Cars squeeze and compact, creating a palpable energy of people trying to get home. The honking, gestures and sirens are not always pleasant, but it’s real, and it’s alive!

Painting on multiple works helps me linger in a way I might not without this process. I can step away from one work, see another one with fresh eyes, and return again to the first with clearer understanding. This slower road to completing paintings is important. I begin spontaneously, but later, slow down and wait. It’s similar to listening for a sound before you can quite make out what it is…a living, breathing thing, unpredictable, layered…complex…it’s the potential, something mysterious, something not quite nameable that’s held in expression and is worth the waiting.

I keep looking at the large figurative work. The colors are enticing, deep and rich, with a feeling of intimacy and gangly grace. There are drawing issues to attend to, the surface needs to grow, the balance is not quite there, but there is something to think about, there is a beginning.

November Exhibition Announcements: If you are in the Portsmouth area, I’m showing a couple of drawings at the Robert Lincoln Levy Gallery on State Street, and have a painting in Manchester at the NHIA Biennial, along with a couple of drawings at Art 3’s “Treasures” show. Drop me a line anytime at forarts_schappler@comcast.net.