July 25, 2012

As a painter, I think you shouldn’t expose the public to things they already know, almost as an obligation.  You have to take them beyond where things are easily explained.   I think of myself as a very conventional person, very ordinary person, but I do believe that one of the obligations of an artist is to go toward transcendence, and that seems valuable to me. That’s good enough for me to keep going. -Wolf Kahn

I'm still working on sorting through things in the house: a pile for garbage, a pile for sale, a pile for Goodwill. Endless Summer. It was hectic for a week or so and just when I felt I made some progress, my garage studio flooded while I was out of town-about 4 inches of water according to the water marks left on the studio furniture legs. I didn't have any artwork on the floor. I know better. I'm guessing an electrical cord, the one connecting my battery tender to my motorcycle was submerged in water which caused the breaker to trip. The water eventually drained out, even though I don't have a drain. Since sweeping silt in 90 degree heat is not something I'm willing to spend a solid 8 hours on, I've put in about 2 hours a day cleaning up. I should have it swept up by the weekend. I don't know why I pretend I can work out there. I'm a Romantic, but not that romantic.

I opened up the inside studio again and pulled out some watercolors.
I thought about abstraction. I even called a few times just to hear its voice but hung up before it answered.


Untitled watercolors

2 comments:

Nomi Lubin said...

"Pulled out some watercolors"? From a drawer, or you just made these? Serious question.

Either way, these are both pretty great. The scale is really interesting to me. Almost like they should feel too "zoomed in" but they do not. Exciting.

M.A.H. said...

Thanks Nomi. I pulled out some watercolor paints after not working with watercolor for a while. These paintings are new-within the last few days. They are 14 x 11 inches, and on Yupo.

It's over.

Nov 7, 2020. Tears of joy and relief. It's been unreal and I'm ready to get back to a sense of normalcy. The desert has been tough.