A Walk in the Woods: Small Happenings

There are small bright announcements of spring in the woods, but you have to keep your eyes to the ground to see them. Most brilliant are the yellow rays of coltsfoot, growing on dry banks alongside the path, their frilly heads atop scaly red stems.

The cheerful tiny, 1/2 inch, flowers of Spring Beauty spot the duff with white and shocking pink.

I'm surprised I spotted this demure 1/4 inch flower.  Its little pom-pom like white stamens(?) add a touch of whimsy.

There are a few yellow violets blooming, but they'll become more profuse as the days pass.

I think this might be a maple seedling, trying its best in the dry earth of the path.

Along with the cheer of spring flowers, I can see the stress of plants as they deal with the dry weather. We had very little snow this winter, and barely any rain this spring. The mosses, which are usually emerald green at this time of year after soaking in the moisture of covering snows, are dull and parched looking. But nature is very resilient, so when rains come, the greens will be vivid again. 

A New Painting: "Twin Uprights" and the Zigzags That Show Us Where We are Going.

 Twin Uprights, egg tempera on calfskin parchment, 5 1/8 x 5 inches.

I completed this painting last week before I went to New York, so I've had plenty of time to reflect on it. I like the way it's painted and the quality of light; I even like the composition. But...but...When I look at it alongside other paintings I've done recently, I feel uncomfortable about it. Then I began to think about the last painting I didn't like, Black Dot, which oddly enough is also primarily green.

Black Dot, egg tempera on calfskin parchment, 4 5/8 x 6 inches.

I wrote a blog post on this work, which I titled "How Do We Evaluate Our Work?", which you can read here. In the post I listed some criteria that I hold are necessary for success. After finishing Twin Uprights, I realized that almost all my paintings have images that are frontal, with forms mainly parallel to the picture plane, which contributes to the "stripped down simplicity" and "strong sense of presence" that I aim for. I hadn't pinpointed the diagonal space of Black Dot as the source of my discomfort, but now with the additional example of Twin Uprights it seems to be the culprit. When I look at the next 8 paintings I have planned, they are all frontal, with enough variation in composition, form, and color to keep me interested and challenged. This doesn't mean I'll never try another painting with a diagonal movement into space, but I will be more aware of its difficulty for me. Of course, some of my readers might like both of these paintings; isn't art marvelously subjective!?

A Passover Favorite: Matzoh Brie

I have favorite foods for different times of year, many determined by what is growing in the garden; in another month or so it will be all things asparagus. This week is Passover, and each year I look forward to making these delicious matzoh pancakes for lunches or supper. As you can see above, my results are not perfect, but expressively misshapen. I didn't remember what topping I preferred, so tried apple sauce and rhubarb jam; the jam won hands down (applesauce for potato pancakes). You can also make a more savory pancake by adding some grated onion. My recipe is from The Art of Jewish Cooking by Jennie Grossinger.

2 eggs
1/2 teas salt (these days I think that would be changed to 1/4 teas salt)
2 teas grated onion (optional)
2 matzohs
butter or fat for frying (I use vegetable oil)

1.Beat the eggs, salt and onion, if using, together.
2. Hold the matzohs under running water until beginning to soften; let them drain.

3. Crumble the matzohs into the egg mixture and mix well. (This photo looks golden because I was using local free range eggs which have a deep yellow, almost orange, yolk.)
4. Heat the oil or butter in a frying pan; drop the matzoh mixture into it, flattening it to about 1/2 inch thick. Cook until lightly browned on both sides.
serves 1 or 2 (I eat the whole thing)

Fred Sandback: Lines Shaping Space

Untitled (Sculptural Study, Three-part Wall Construction), ca. 1986-87/2012; red, blue, and yellow acrylic yarn; Situational: spatial relationships established by the artist, overall dimensions vary with each installation.

When I walked into the Fred Sandback exhibition at David Zwirner last week, I had a physical sensation of release and expansion. The three simple lines of yarn on a wall facing the entrance announced, in a modest manner, a quiet approach to what is essential about visual relationships. I had just come downtown from MoMA and the Whitney, and the contrast couldn't have been more stark. From hip and crowded and new and loud, to this minimalist exploration of space through line. 

 Untitled (Sculptural Study, Twelve-Part Vertical Construction), ca. 1987/2012; black, blue, and yellow acrylic yarn; Situational: spatial relationships established by the artist; overall dimensions vary with each installation.

Sandback's work, although it can be large-room sized, is so reserved in expression, so almost-not-there, that it is an antidote to the giantism of some contemporary art. What can be less grandiose than ordinary yarn? In this Twelve-Part construction, three different colors of yarn stretch from floor to ceiling; as you walk around it, the pattern of the colors and their relationships become clear: 

 another view of Twelve-Part Vertical Construction.

what had seemed at first to be a random arrangement of lines is in this view ordered and rational, with four yellow lines at right angles to four blue ones, with doubled black lines adding a different kind of rhythm.  

Untitled, (Sculptural Study, Four-part Mikado Construction), ca. 1991/2011; aqua acrylic yarn; Situational: spatial relationships established by the artist, overall dimensions vary with each installation.

This piece stretched through the space of the largest room in the gallery, making me aware of the energy of empty space: up, down, back and front, the lines moved like delicate spider threads flung from one anchoring place to another.

detail, Four-part Mikado Construction.

In this piece, one of the lines was made heavier by tripling the yarn; in others it is doubled, or left just as one strand.

16 Variations of 2 Diagonal Lines, 1972; yellow acrylic yarn; Situational: spatial relationships established by the artist, overall dimensions vary with each installation.

This work consisted of two rooms with a yellow diagonal line in each. This shot of the smaller of the two rooms shows the Four Part Mikado Construction through the doorway. From these inadequate photos it is hard to imagine how exciting it is to see a space completely transformed by a yellow line running through it; it is art that must be physically experienced. I also find it hard to describe why this work moves me so strongly; it is not just its formal qualities, though those are very satisfying. I think it is partly that the ambitious aims are achieved by such ordinary stuff: the vulnerability of the yarn and its self-effacing quality are very touching. So much with so little. 

Spring in New York

I love visiting New York City and environs in spring. Here in Vermont, I'm in planting zone 4, while the city, much warmer, is in zone 7; that means I get to see an earlier spring in New York, and relive it in Vermont a few weeks later. During autumn, it goes in reverse, with the earlier autumn here in Vermont. In the city, there's the fascinating contrast between the geometry of the built environment with the organic confusion of the floral one. The display on Park Avenue is always a treat.

A small iron fence surrounds flowers and tree, a visual counterpoint.

In Central Park, the glorious blues of grape hyacinths stand guard in front of a grid holding back the tulips.

Some green fluffy seed heads catch a textured light as the limbs of a tree arch over a small Victorian-styled park building.

On Long Island visiting my sister, I saw other trees in bloom, including the ancient Magnolia. They evolved before bees, so were pollinated by beetles.

A weeping cherry was a waterfall of frothy blossoms.

The flowers of maple trees in Vermont are usually red, so I loved seeing this lime green bouquet fallen on a granite ledge, a perfect color for the fresh green of spring.

For Passover

Passover, the celebration of the Jews escape from slavery, will begin on Friday night. I always enjoy the reading of the Haggadah during the Seder, chanted in the Sephardic manner, and the eating of symbolic foods. It is a time to also wish that everyone on this globe had political freedom and freedom from want.

I wish all my friends a happy Passover, or Easter, or just a few beautiful days. I will be visiting my family and seeing a bit of art; see you next week!

Nature's Metaphors

When spring arrives we think of renewal, of hope and energy, as a seemingly dead earth greens again. With such powerful imagery it's not surprising to me that so many religions have resurrection or rebirth myths, such as the Greek goddess Persephone, Jesus Christ, or rebirth in Buddhism. In his magisterial book Landscape and Memory, Simon Schama reminds readers in his introduction that "although we are accustomed to separate nature and human perception into two realms, they are, in fact, indivisible. Before it can ever be a repose for the senses, landscape is the work of the mind."

Language itself, and human spirituality, is based in nature, as Ralph Waldo Emerson writes in his essay "Nature" (full text here).

1. Words are signs of natural facts.
2. Particular natural facts are symbols of particular spiritual facts.
3. Nature is the symbol of spirit. 

He points out that a word used to express a "moral or spiritual fact, if traced to its root, is found to be borrowed from some material appearance. Right means straight; wrong means twisted; Spirit primarily means wind..." and that "man is an analogist, and studies relations in all objects".

We look at eggs, here those of a wood frog, and think of the fragile beginnings of life.

Young leaves covered with snow are persistence against adversity,

there are many thorny issues,

while some leaves, though dried, keep hanging in there. We tend to find poetic resonance in nature, an equivalent to our feelings. Fernando Pessoa argues against this tendency in his poem "The Keeper of Sheep"

Only if you don't know what flowers, stones, and rivers are
Can you talk about their feelings.
To talk about the soul of flowers, stones and rivers,
Is to talk about yourself, about your delusions.
Thank God stones are just stones,
And rivers nothing but rivers,
And flowers just flowers. 

I tend to I flip back and forth from an Emersonian to a Pessoan view of the world around me; there is great spiritual comfort in nature, but it is also just itself, not existing to serve humankind's needs.

Samuel Palmer, Garden in Shoreham, 1820s or early 1830s; opaque watercolor and gouache, 11 x 8 1/2 in.

I am ending with this painting of a tree in flower by Samuel Palmer, a follower of William Blake. Palmer's early paintings have a density of feeling, a mystical quality that shows nature as more than just flowers, stones, and rivers. Our responses to nature are mysterious and complex, based on cultural conceptions and personal history; they evolve, and they surprise, and for me they always enrich my life. 

Two New Hooked Wool Drawings

 2012 #6, hand dyed wool and egg tempera on linen, 15 1/2 x 15 in.

These two pieces are the last in a group of six that came from a doodling session during a meeting, which you can see here. I had originally thought I'd use a deep kelly green for #6, but after I had painted the blue, I thought this lighter lime green was more lively. I like the way my eye bounces from the points where the triangles meet out to the larger shape.

2012 #7, hand dyed wool and egg tempera on linen, 14 1/2 x 12 in.

I love playing around with difficult colors, and pink can be one of them. I'm trying to contrast its frothiness with a darker red, with shapes curving as though inscribed in circles.

 2012 #6, detail

2012 #7, detail

These two details give you a better idea of what the paint looks like on the surface of the linen, and what the linen looks like which is hidden under the fully hooked pieces. I usually hook the loops through every other or every third hole. I'd also like to point out that although the linen seems to be a different color from one photo to the next, it's actually all the same. When I attempt to adjust the color of paint and wool correctly the background often shifts. This is one of the small annoyances of sharing work online, but the benefits far outweigh them. 

The Wisdom of Emerson

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.
Hitch your wagon to a star.
All mankind loves a lover.
If you write a better book, or preach a better sermon, or build a better mousetrap, the world will make a beaten path to your door.

These concise sentences are embedded in our culture; they seem to be old proverbs, yet they came from the pen of one man, Ralph Waldo Emerson. Emerson (1803 - 1882) was an essayist, lecturer, and poet, a Transcendentalist who can be thought of as one of the founding fathers of American letters. Emerson's essays are a tough slog, the prose dense and difficult, some of the ideas hard to fathom. But there are gems within them, as I wrote in the blog post "Build therefore your own world". In the essay "Nature" is this:

The invariable mark of wisdom is to see the miraculous in the common. 

Robert D. Richardson points out in his richly rewarding small book, First We Read, Then We Write: Emerson on the Creative Process that for Emerson "the sentence...is the main formal and structural unit".  I first read this book a couple of years ago and decided to reread it to bring back to my mind Emerson's insights on reading and writing, many of which have been helpful to me, such as:

The first rule of writing is not to omit the thing you meant to say.
All writing should be selection in order to drop every dead word.
All that can be thought can be written. 

In his first chapter, "Reading", Richardson points out how reading was a foundational creative act for Emerson. He read very widely, but what is most interesting to me is that he grazed; he looked for understanding that echoed his own thoughts:

What can we see, read, acquire but what we are?
The glance reveals what the gaze obscures.

This seems so true to me as I dip into books that become festooned with little colored stickers as they send arrows straight to my heart. I find that I am losing patience with reading books that don't in some way deepen my understanding of the world, or provide aesthetic pleasure. Yes, sometimes I read just to be entertained (I love a good mystery), but I have little patience for bad prose. Richardson guides us through the thickets of Emerson's prose and gathers its nuts and berries and flowers. He finds the practical advice and descriptions of writing in Emerson that are helpful, encouraging, and inspiring.

 Avoid adjectives. Let the noun do the work.
It is the best part of each writer which has nothing private in it.
Art lies not in making your object prominent, but in choosing objects that are prominent.
Literature is a heap of nouns and verbs enclosing an intuition or two.
The poet is representative. He stands among partial men for the complete man, and apprises us not of his wealth, but of the common wealth.

The last quote above shows Emerson to have, as Richardson put it, an "anti-elitist view of the artist". For him, nature was the great teacher and the origin of language, not learned men. And though he thought about his audience, he was aware of the single reader. He offers this very valuable advice for all artists:

Happy is he who looks only into his work to know if it will succeed, never into the times or the public opinion; and who writes from the love of imparting certain thoughts and not from the necessity of sale––who writes always to the unknown friend. 

Working in Series

 Empty Center

I've just realized that much of my recent textile work has been fitting into expanding groups, variations on several themes. It's not something I set out to do, but I've become interested in the challenge of coming up with fresh solutions within specific parameters. And it's fun and engaging. When I began this textile work a few years ago, I did not work in series, except for doing a large group of 12 x 10 inch works;  I also made some multi-part pieces.

 Figure/Ground

Each series brings forth quite different kinds of images.

 Volume

This recent group of volumes has been a pleasure as I play with illusionism, very different from most of my other textile work and closer to my painting.

 Pattern

The blue and yellow piece was the first in the pattern series and was inspired by a photograph of medieval church tiles. I like the idea of paying homage to the world of design in this series, even to a play on textile design. 

 Shape

The technique of rug hooking lends itself to making shapes different from the standard rectangle. 

 Line

Here's a notebook page with sketches that are a first step in thinking of a new series. I envisage them quite small, maybe 8 x 10, with backgrounds randomly hooked and dark colors for the lines. It's interesting that I can do such different kinds of compositions and yet the work holds together as that of a single artist; I think it's because the medium of hooked wool and the way I use it ties these disparate images together. 

 Hooked Wool Drawings

I've included a wall of drawings even though I don't think of these as a series, but rather as a body of work. Here we get into a problem of semantics and shadings of meaning. 

12 inch square paintings on panel, 2007-08

I've never worked in series with my paintings. They have progressed slowly along a path, moving from landscape to a sort of still life, from a more complex and realistic space to one that's more abstract. The closest I've come to a series was when I did a large group of 12 inch square paintings during 2006-08. What do you think of the use of series? For me it helps to come up with new and interesting variations on a theme. And for you?

Curried Parsnip Soup

The first vegetable of the garden season is one that was planted last May; parsnips stay in the ground all winter, sweetening up, and I dig them as soon as the ground thaws, which this year was on March 18th. I love the candied flavor of parsnips when they are simply roasted with some olive oil, but I also love them in this curried soup where their sweet flavor is a nice counterpoint to the Indian spices. The recipe comes from the marvelous Deborah Madison, in her Greens cookbook. When the weather cooled off after the week of unseasonable warmth, I made a big pot of this soup and have been enjoying it for lunch. It's made with a simple stock, a step I often forgo, but in this case I love the flavor of fresh ginger, so I make it with whatever I have on hand; this is usually just carrots and onions.

The Stock
The parings and fibrous inner cores of parsnips
1 1/2 cups leek greens, chopped
2 carrots, peeled and chopped
2 celery stalks with some leaves, diced
5 whole branches cilantro
1 oz ginger root, peeled and sliced (Madison says this is optional, but for me it's essential)
1/2 teas salt
7 cups cold water

Put everything together in a pot and slowly bring to a boil, then cover and simmer for 25 minutes. Strain immediately. There should be 5 to 6 cups.

The Soup
3 to 4 parsnips, about 7 inches long (my only quarrel with Madison's cookbooks is that she rarely mentions amounts by weight. I like a thicker soup so I used 5 roots, 2 thick ones and 3 thinner. Then I forgot to weigh them...sorry)
4 Tbs clarified butter (I didn't have this so used 2 Tbs butter with 2 Tbs vegetable oil)
1 medium yellow onion, cut into 1/2 inch squares
1 Tbs curry powder
4 Tbs cilantro leaves, chopped
2 to 3 leeks, white parts only (8 oz) chopped. (I use an onion)
2 carrots, peeled and diced
2 celery stalks, diced (I never have celery and don't miss it much)
1 teas salt
5 to 6 cups stock
1 cup light cream

1. Scrub the parsnips, trim tops and quarter lengthwise. Cut out most of the fibrous core. Use parings and core for the stock. Chop the parsnips roughly into pieces.
2. Heat the clarified butter in a soup pot and add onion. Cook over medium heat until a rich golden brown.
3. Stir in the curry powder and half the chopped cilantro and cook for 1 minute.
4. Add parsnips, leek, carrots, celery, salt, and stock. Bring to a boil and cook until vegetables are soft.
5. Cool soup briefly, then pass through a food mill or puree in a blender or food processor, leaving a little texture with bits of color. 
6. Return soup to the pot, add the cream, and taste for salt.
7. Serve soup garnished with remaining chopped cilantro and a few whole leaves. 

I've only eaten this soup hot, but the recipe can also be used for a cold soup. It makes 4 to 6 servings.

The Distilled Art of Vilhelm Hammershøi

 A Baker's Shop, 1888; oil on canvas, 44 1/2 x 35 1/2 in. 

A woman, dressed in black, the ample shape of her back turned toward us with only a glimpse of graceful neck; three rows of shelves on a white tiled wall; the only color a subdued warm ocher of counter tops. The close harmony of grays and blacks, the stillness, the soft light, the simple compositions lend to Hammershøi's paintings a sense that we are seeing what is essential in his world and thus in ours. I was introduced to the work of the Danish artist Vilhelm Hammershøi (1864-1916) on a trip to Scandinavia thirty years ago. I fell in love with the paintings then, along with those of the Danish Golden Age painters (I wrote a blog post on the figurative work here, and the landscapes here.) I photographed the images for this post from a 1981 catalog of a retrospective held that year in Copenhagen. During his lifetime Hammershøi's work was admired in Europe, but often ignored in his native Denmark. In recent years there has been revived interest in Danish painting, even here in the US.

 Portrait of a Young Woman, the artist's sister, Anna, 1885; oil on canvas, 44 1/4 x 36 in. 

In this early painting of his sister, Hammershøi had already found his form and his content. The simple mass of black with the surrounding muted colors of wall and door allow us to focus on the quietly introspective face and gently placed hands. There is a feeling of expectation in her slight lean forward, but it is a self-contained energy.

 Young Woman Sewing, 1887; oil on canvas, 14 1/2 x 13 3/4 in. 

A second portrait of Anna is even more stripped down. I love the way the triangular white shape of the cloth repeats the larger shape of the figure. There is a poetic grace in the gesture of the figure, the downward looking head, the raised arms, set in front of a gray wall.

 Portrait of Ida Ilsted, later the artist's wife, 1890; oil on canvas, 42 x 34 in.

Many of his portraits have a feeling of deep melancholy, even this of his bride to be in her dark clothing, with curled fingers on her lap. Her gaze is direct, but also wistful.

 Resting, 1905; oil on canvas, 19 1/2 x 18 1/4 in.

I have thought of Hammershøi as a "poet of the back" for his many paintings of figures turned away from the viewer. It is surprising how eloquent a woman's back can be, as in the baker's shop painting above, and here in Resting. The slope of the woman's shoulders adds a flow of energy, and the soft back and arm pressed against the rigid geometry of the chair speak of vulnerability. But there is also the feeling that a person turned away is denying us their attention and presence, and that they are maintaining their core of mystery.

 Interior with a woman seated on a white chair, 1900; oil on canvas, 22 1/2 x 19 in. 

Here we look through the geometry of interior spaces, very much like those of Dutch 17th century painters, but the figure animating the space is again keeping her distance.

 Interior with a Punch Bowl, 1907; oil on canvas, 25 x 23 in.

Hammershøi painted many interiors, mainly of his own house. To the clear geometry he adds interesting kinds of balance, as here with a large empty wall anchored by a table with a bowl on it; the blue of the bowl converses with the desaturated blue of the wall in the distant room. The light is a soft northern light, gently illuminating the interior.

 Dust motes dancing in sunlight, 1900; oil on canvas, 27 1/2 x 23 1/4 in. 

Very few of Hammershøi's paintings have direct sunlight, so this painting of dust motes pleases me very much; what a delightful idea. But even in the light the room is empty and quiet and solemn.

A Farm, Refsnæs, 1900; oil on canvas, 21 x 24 1/4 in.

I am most interested in Hammershøi's figures and interiors, and have concentrated on those, but he also painted landscape and architecture, so I end with this painting of farm buildings, starkly outlined against a sunlight that is leached of color, and pressed by the weight of the sky. It is interesting to think of him working at the same time as the impressionists and post-impressionists with their vivid light and color. He is a far-northern painter, with a northerner's sensibility, a subtle poet of minimal light and of quiet.