What the Hell is That?

"The Emperor Has No Clothes"

mixed media

9" x 12"

So, at long last, I actually post a picture of a painting.  I'm assuming most of you would rather look at paintings than read my blather.  I'll give you both for good measure. 

I worked on this picture at school, in 5 minute bursts at the end of a few classes, over a 5 day period.  It probably won't sway you to like the painting, or dislike it less, but I'll have to admit, the original is much more enjoyable to see.  There's all sorts of texture and transparency that my limited photo skills can't capture.  This painting is currently at the Brown County Art Guild, in Nashville, Indiana, with four other pictures I'm pretty proud of.  I'll save the long story for another night, but "The Guild" will soon be one of just a couple galleries to show my work here in Indiana (hurry, start the car).  

Working on things at school is a lot of fun.  I don't have any spare time throughout the day, but I occasionally plan my classes so that I can work for a few minutes while the students are finishing up.  I don't advertise that I'm working on something, I just sit down at a table and let them come to me.  Here's an example from last week, while I was working on the painting above...

I sit down with my materials and start to make a mark.  

"LeGrand?"  I get up and help someone with their work.  

I sit back down.  

"Hey LeGrand?"  I get up again. (Chumbawamba moment)

I sit back down and get to work. 

"Whatcha doin' LeGrand?"

"Experimenting"

"Looks to me like you're painting, LeGrand."

"Yes, I'm experimenting with some paint."

A few students gather over my shoulder.  "What is it?"

"It's a painting."

"Of what?"

"Of this."

"What is that?"

"I'm not sure, an experiment, I guess."

Another student chimes in, "What is it?"

"A painting," replies the first investigator.

"A painting of what?"

"It's just a painting.  It's an abstract painting.  It doesn't have to be of anything, right LeGrand?"

I reply, "I sure hope not."

The now slightly larger group of students behind me continue chattering with uncertainty or newly discovered confidence about the merit of my work.

"I like it, whatever it is, LeGrand."

"Thanks.  Is your work done?"

"For today?"

"Oh, does the bell ring earlier today?"

"Alright, Alright...I'll get back to work."

Someone across the room yells, "LeGrand?"

I get up from my unfinished "abstract painting".  I'll return to it for a couple minutes sometime during 6th period.  It's 2nd period now.  I sat down to make a mark 90 seconds ago. 

With any luck, enough of those fleeting moments will have an impact on a student or two.  If for nothing else, I think it's a good practice to make myself a little vulnerable from time to time...to keep my ego in check and to keep the kids on their toes.  I've been critiqued up one side and down the other by all sorts of "art authorities".  So much so, I don't really care to put myself out there for any feedback from my peers anymore.  Truth is, after you've experienced the blatant, untainted by preconceived notions of what art is, honest opinions of high school freshman, you realize all of that pretentious gallery chatter doesn't mean a thing.  You can keep your critique, save your analysis, and just tell me the truth...

Is it bad?  Is it good?  Is it stupid?  Is it interesting?

What the hell is it?

From Rosewater, Indiana

"Hello, babies.  Welcome to Earth.  It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter.  It's round and wet and crowded.  At the outside, babies, you've got about a hundred years here.  There's only one rule that I know of, babies...

"'God damn it, you've got to be kind.'" 

-Eliot Rosewater

Maybe One Good One

I tried to sit down and write something over the past week or so (true 6 days ago when I wrote this first paragraph, but it's been almost two weeks now).  Sitting down is problematic.  When I do, I typically fall asleep.  I'm embarrassed to admit it, but I'm tired when I come home from school.  I should be painting, drawing, reading, or anything else...just let me catch a quick nap first.  Then it's 9 o'clock...do I go to bed?  No, I stay up to work.  Now it's 3am.  Three hours of sleep, school day, portrait sitting, dinner, and another nap...so that I can stay up long enough to be productive another day...or night...or morning.  It's exhausting avoiding exhaustion.  I've got a pretty easy gig, I'm not complaining.

I'm I said plenty about my lack of confidence and accomplishment of late in my last post.  There's been no change, but to my surprise, I just discovered that I've got about 60 paintings awaiting "final touches" and signatures ("final touches" is a bad way of describing how I deem a painting finished...I'm at a loss).  Some are more complete than others.  Some more impressive in subject or scale.  Some will be finished this week.  Some might not get finished.  Somehow, I've managed to produce a large amount of work in the past few weeks without realizing it.  Good news, right?  

The thing is, regardless of how much work I produce, I'm still as stuck as I've ever been.  I've got a bunch of good ideas going nowhere, bad ideas turning into bad paintings, and no idea how to proceed...with painting, with everything.  It's been a rut of a couple weeks.  I'd love to show you some pictures of the good and bad, but as sure as I am that there's plenty of both sitting in the studio, I'm also sure that I can't tell the difference between the two.  There might not be a difference.  

Who cares.  Here's whats up.  Some of my students have their artwork included in a couple regional student exhibits.  I could go on and on about the individual accomplishments of these students, but I'll let them blog about it on their time.  I'll just say this...

Teaching middle school and high school art is an absolute thrill.  I take a lot of pride in my work as a teacher.  However, in consideration of a heated debate I've recently had with a colleague, I'd like to say, I'm not going to pretend I'm making a sacrifice to be a teacher.  I love teaching.  But in all honesty, as much as I'd like to assume I'm making some sort of "difference" in the lives of our youth, I'm mostly teaching because I feel like I've got something to gain from it.  That may sound selfish, but I'm not sure convincing yourself that taking a high road by sacrificing some part of your life for the good of others is any less so.  I love feeling great about a good deed done as much as anyone.  But if feeling good about a good deed is the motivation for said deed, it's no longer about the deed, it's about yourself, isn't it?  I've learned a lot from my students and I'm forever indebted to them.  Hopefully, they've been able to take a thing or two away from my own education via education.

Picasso said, "The meaning of life is to find your gift.  The purpose of life is to give it away".

Maybe, every so often, your own search is the "purpose" that mister modern art was speaking of.  For the sake of my students, I hope that to be true.  Not just because I want a more guilt-free validation of my personal journey, but because I hope all of those students will do us a solid and think for themselves, follow their own dreams, and find satisfaction in sharing a ceaseless journey with those they love.  I guess the best thing I can hope for is that I leave my students with more questions than answers and they leave my classroom with more curiosity than contentment.

Here's to all of those lost folks that say it's not about destination.  But seriously, don't take anything I say too seriously.

Where are the paintings?

I have no clue what I'm doing.  

I guess the cumbersome accompaniments of progress and confidence are frustration and doubt.  I have a very hard time finding satisfaction in anything I do without a fairly immediate feeling of uncertainty.  It might be a good thing...a way of keeping an even keel or finding zen or whatever.  It might be the realization that I'm a little dysfunctional, or I take myself more seriously than I'd like to, or I'm just a dissatisfied person doomed to searching for satisfaction in pursuits that will forever be beyond my capabilities or understanding.  I feel better already...wait, no I don't.

So here's my latest conundrum...

Last week, I traveled to Houston, Texas.  After the plane landed, my wife and I loaded into the world's smallest rental car and drove straight to a destination I've longed to see for several years now...the Rothko Chapel.  I'm not a religious person, or at least not in a conventional way, but I found myself thinking of the trip like a religious pilgrimage of sorts.  And while I didn't have any sort of spiritual epiphanies, I did have a profound experience that has stuck with me the past several days.  If you don't know Mark Rothko, have already dismissed  him as a drunk with a big brush, or just don't care, you're probably not missing much that you'll regret...I've discovered that abstract expressionism isn't something you can easily coerce a person into admiring.  For some reason, though, I have become fascinated with his big paintings of floating squares.  And while I'm probably romanticizing the whole experience,  I really feel that spending time with those inky black canvases in that silent, windowless building was one of the most powerful experiences I've had in my adult life.  Or at least, something tricked me into feeling that way...does enlightenment still count if you're sure it's the result of smoke and mirrors?  Let's hope so.  It only took me an hour.  

Why am I frustrated?  Well, to be honest, I haven't really figured it out quite yet.  I left that little building in Houston a few days ago feeling pissed off, and content, and hopeless, and nervous, and loved, and young, and old, and heartbroken all at once, as the result of staring at washes of color brushed onto big rectangles of fabric.  I won't say I was some sort of emotional mess, that kind of response is too convenient, but I was, without doubt, perplexed by the whole experience immediately afterward...probably more perplexed now.  Funny thing is, I had made up my mind, at least three years ago or so while really studying up on the chapel, that I wouldn't allow myself to fall victim to the Rothko cliches I've become so familiar with.  I secretly wanted to discredit the work and scoff at those who found something special in pictures that were, what I mistakenly assumed, very simple.  It didn't work.  I guess, every once in a long while, despite the most inadvertent but stubborn pessimism, the hype really does measure up.  I'm afraid I'm on the verge of chalking up my experience at the chapel as an indescribable emotional happening, as much as I want to resist restating what's been overstated by art critics and non art critics alike for the past forty years.

I could go on and on about how great the paintings were, how powerful the space was, how blah blah the blah blah was...but you can YouTube that stuff and get a better synopsis of Rothko's work and the chapel in particular.  Better yet, go see it in person for yourself.  

After such an experience, I'm afraid no amount of clever writing could convey the impact.  What I'm sure of, however, is my incredible ineptitude as an artist.  I desperately want to have the sort of emotional investment and release in my work that a Rothko painting seems to exude.  His work is like artistic plutonium, slowly emitting emotion, impossible to escape once you've found the fallout.  How can I "feel something that much" without falling back on reactionary subjects, sentimental subjects, or representational imagery.  At the very least, how do I merge my interests in representational painting with the emotive qualities of profound abstract art.  How do I do what I do, but in a totally new way?  How do I start fresh without actually having to start over?  I don't know.

Expecting something of Rothko proportion out of myself is stupid.  The notion that I'll be able to change up my artistic approach and eventually discover something reminiscent of my personal artistic grail is unrealistic.  Delusions of grandeur seem to be unavoidable in the business of "making art", but I've decided to refuse the idea that I'll ever reach an "artistic high ground", even if it's a strictly personal endeavor.  I'll just keep working, and if some of the thoughts in the back of my mind sneak into my process, I'll try and make sure to cite the source.  I guess my biggest fear, at this moment, is my inability to discriminate delusion and misconception from honesty and aspiration.  The more I think about it, it's all the same anyway and none of it matters at all.  I'm a bummer.

I'm getting around to those lighthearted posts, but in the meantime...

You’ve got sadness in you, I’ve got sadness in me – and my works of art are places where the two sadnesses can meet, and therefore both of us need to feel less sad. 

― Mark Rothko