Thursday, July 10, 2014

The Lost Art of Just Being

Over the course of life, we all encounter periods where it is difficult to create. Perhaps it starts as a grayness nibbling at the edge of your reality, a slight fog or out-of-focus perspective as if your eyeglass prescription needs updating. It bleeds into your life, tainting everything you touch and eventually the flow of ideas stops. It could be due to the stress from your day job, a relentless hen-pecking of details that keeps a distracted mind even more so, leaving little energy for anything else, especially creativity or just plain "being". Or maybe it is one of a million other little things that occasionally clot together to form a personal thrombosis, from which we are tempted to seek solace through cable TV, the web or the refrigerator; anything but to feel the disconnectedness.

Ah, there it is; a theme. What I'd like to extemporize on today is the "The Lost Art of Just Being". I wasn't sure where this was headed when I sat down at the keyboard this morning but this feels like a good direction so let's see what unfolds.

There is this mantra that we need to have a "reason" that keeps us motivated, gives our lives purpose. But what if we didn't? Let's assume for a minute that we weren't created "on purpose", put here to fulfill some mission but merely "happened". If we cut loose from the ties of expectation, what happens next? Hmmm. This is interesting. There is no one to disappoint, no afterlife to worry about, no expectations to keep us awake at night. No one to impress. Our to-do lists are in flames. This feels great!!

But suddenly with this "freedom", a terror appears; there is no foundation, nothing upon which our feet can stand. Everything is fluid, nothing solid. All that we know is an illusion. Isn't this death, a nothingness without form or end?

As horrifying as the vast unknown can be, isn't facing it required to create something new? Breaking from the old order, the structured ways of seeing things? Sometimes, we just need to sit, watching, listening, thinking, creating an emptiness for no reason other than to create it and see what appears. If there is such a thing as God, and I were "it", this is just the kind of exercise I'd try. Create an emptiness so vast and then just sit and watch what happens next.

So we sit in the darkness, waiting, a dull anxiousness pervading. And then a door opens. Or an explosion occurs. Take your pick. And we follow its tail, or hang on for dear life. Or do nothing and watch the energy/opportunity/life fly away. As Douglas Adams once quipped, "I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by." Your choice. And sometimes in the darkness someone taps you on the shoulder to point the way.

I was once a Boy Scout, and not a very good one at that. I joined the organization at about the same time my body commenced poisoning me with an overdose of hormones transforming me into something non-human where everything I met that hinted of authority caused me to subvert the rules and rebel. I cared not for advancing in the ranks or for the structure of the troop but reveled in knowledge and being outdoors and so managed in spite of myself to make it to the rank of First Class.

On a particular camp-out in the evening after dinner, I was sitting alone at the edge of the restless opaque waters of the Kankakee River outside Chicago, my legs drawn to my chest in folded arms, my knees supporting my chin. I was intrigued with the rippling surface manipulated by unseen things, its swirling motion coaxing me to become fully absorbed in its unfolding. Eventually I became aware of someone standing near me and out of the corner of my eye recognized one of our troop's scoutmasters. We had several with widely differing personalities and this one was the sternest with a temper that could be fired in a flash, commanding respect and to my unkempt teen-aged mind, distrust. A silence enveloped us as he stood above me on the bank, his hands casually stuffed in the front pockets of his pressed leader's uniform khakis, looking out to where my eyes gazed. "What are you watching?" he asked gently respecting the solemness and peace of the moment. I thought about it for a bit and then looked up at him and said "The water going by." He nodded as we looked at one another, before turning back to the river. "That's a good thing. You should keep doing it." he said. After a minute or so, without another word from either of us, he turned and walking back to camp.

In the stillness that followed as the dying sun pierced holes through the distant trees, there was no way for me to know the impact those words would have throughout my life. I learned later he was an architect, an eye for the aesthetic as well as order contained he, and perhaps in the midst of my anger and rebellion saw something that I myself couldn't. That in the maelstrom of life we all need a life ring to hang onto. It is only by being ourselves and creating this space, to ponder and to endure while the patterns of life fall into place around us as we blindly lurch do we reconnect to what is important. Whether we sit in stillness alone in a crowd and feel our human-ness or watching the elegant mundanity of a flowing river we need to create a space in our garden for something new to grow.

So what does this have to do with art or creativity?

We've all lost the thread at some point and will continue to do so again. Not just feel it, but live it, under a shroud of mist so dense that we loose our bearings, the details of life smothering us, obscuring little voices inside before they have a chance to be heard. Where the words no longer appear on paper, the canvas repels the brush, the fingers no longer able to stand the thrum of strings. Though there are times to fight back, to rage at the Resistance as Steven Pressfield encourages us to do in the War of Art and to continue the ceaseless struggle of a Type-A society, there are times that we need to stop, to surrender to the moment and let it, let you, be.

And in these soft moments of nothingness, a twinkle of light on a wetted stone, a chord change, a turn of a phrase, a breeze across the cheek and we are instantly in love again. A universe explodes from nothingness. Life screams from our finger tips, pores oozing technicolor so rich as to defy vision. And we wonder briefly looking back how we got here from there, before being swept forward too fast to care. And then we begin anew; to create, to stand in awe of all that is around us and let it move us to create beauty, or perhaps if only to mimic the beauty that already surrounds us and hope that we pay it due homage.

It is with these words that I post the following images; the twinkle of the water's edge, emerald water over rock. And I paint again.

BruceKerrArt-2015
Observatory Point
Plein Air, Oil on Panel, 8 x 10

BruceKerrArt-2015
On The Rocks
Plein Air, Oil on Panel, 8 x 10
BruceKerrArt-2015
Coral Head, Karens Cove
11 x 14, Oil on Panel

Sunday, June 15, 2014

Des Plaines River at Flood

I recently spent an afternoon at Ryerson Farms, to walk along its muddy trails, sit under the shade of an Oak Tree in a meadow, the soundtrack a hum of honey bees around a hive or the occasional screech of a Red-tailed Hawk. Along the rushing waters of the DesPlaines River I stopped to capture a small grouping of trees leaning over the coffee-colored waters that rushed by. Several feet below me on a bank next to the water sat an American Bullfrog motionless the entire afternoon basking in the warm summer sun while I sat painting.

BruceKerrArt-2015
Des Plaines River at Flood
Watercolor on hot press paper, 9 x 12

Tuesday, June 10, 2014

More Underwater adventures

Another piece I am currently working on which is titled "School's Out" started out as a crappy video I took on my iPhone while snorkeling a couple of months ago. Swimming between coral heads just off shore with my wife, we were instantly surrounded by a school of thousands of 3-4" fish flashing brilliantly in the sun. As we moved, so did the fish, swooping and diving in shimmering synchrony.

After coming home and reflecting on the experience and then watching the video, I started doing some oil sketches to play with color and composition. The images below are studies for this piece as well as playing with color from underwater images take around Vancouver Island from a trip a few years ago. 

In the meantime, I've been so taken with the underwater world, that I am reupping my scuba license (I was quite active in the sport about 25 years ago, including a stint as a Coral Reef Diver at Shedd Aquarium in Chicago) with my son who is getting his for the first time. My goal is to return to Vancouver as well as a number of other spots in the world to gain reference for future paintings. Stay tuned!

BruceKerrArt-2015
School's Out - Oil Study, 8 x 10















BruceKerrArt-2015
Abyss - Color Study

BruceKerrArt-2015
Vancouver on My Mind - Oil Color Study. 
Looking up through the kelp beds
 towards the shimmering sun. 

Sunday, June 8, 2014

Completion of Moray

The month of May disappeared as my three kids all graduated college over the course of three weekends, so I've spent a fair amount of time on the road visiting them. Now that things have settled down a bit, I've been able to get on with my latest paintings.

I put the finishing touches on Moray! which is shown below. If you are curious to see what the preliminary studies look like, please visit my earlier blogposts from April and March which show sketches and some oil studies. It is the result of a chance encounter I had with a Moray Eel while snorkeling near Stingray City on Grand Cayman back in March.

Bruce Kerr Art - 2015
Moray! 18 x 36, Oil on Panel

Tuesday, April 8, 2014

A Fish Tale: More Island Inspiration

Years ago, I spent hours underwater as a scuba diver while many a Midwestern lake or quarry and a few warm water locales floated in front of my mask. But it was long enough ago, that what remained were mere wisps of memory, more emotional traces than visual imprints. Until recently. 

The trip I took with family last month triggered something in me that won't rest. I feel as if I were set back in my native environment, my gills breathing anew after having flopped about on the beach of life. Having long been a tropical fish aquarist, I set up a saltwater tank (reef-friendly) to remain a bit closer to the source while continuing to draw inspiration from video and images shot on site and underwater. While not yet having a specific image in mind to make into a larger piece, I am exploring a variety of themes for which I created a couple of oil sketches. 

The first is based upon a pen sketch I published back in March just after returning, in which I was snorkeling in about 10' of water and leveled off at the bottom to swim up to the base of a coral-head. As I approached it a fairly large Green Moray Eel swam out to greet me. Lodged in my head is the moment she came rushing out taking me by complete surprise. 

BruceKerrArt-2015
Moray! 12 x 6, oil on panel

The other image is based upon one of many videos captured using my iPhone with a plastic-bag type affair. Though close to shore and fairly picked over, the diversity of life on the reef was none-the-less stunning. Every nook and cranny was filled with life as schools of fish worked their way around sea fans and coral, the scene caressed by the dappled sun. 

I hope it is none too soon before I once again feel the stinging of the salt in my eyes as I am bathed in the crystal blue waters of life. 

BruceKerrArt-2015
Karen's Cove, 12 x 6, oil on panel



A Quick Portrait and Remembering the Falls

While trying to get my feet back under me after returning from the recent trip, I returned to Richard Halstead's studio for a visit a couple of weeks ago. I was able to do an oil sketch of one of his regular models. Thank you as always Richard, for your kindness and ready access to your vast knowledge of portraiture and all things art-related.

Steve, Again. 9 x 12, oil on panel. 

Ryerson Farms Falls
As the snow took a while to leave the area and I didn't feel like donning warm clothes to paint outdoors, I decided to dig through some reference material taken over the past few months and came across a great series of photos I had take of one of my favorite nature preserves in the Chicago area, Ryerson Farms. If you haven't been there, plan on spending part of an day walking around their grounds, which includes a farmstead with a number of animals and fowl, a new visitors center and miles of walking trails in the Des Plaines River basin. 

At the end of one of the trails sits a cabin at the river's edge, sidled up to gently rolling falls. It was a fall day with all sorts of great colors, all reflected in the water on the upriver side of the falls. 

BruceKerrArt-2015
Ryerson Falls, 11 x 14 oil on panel. 



















Tuesday, March 18, 2014

A View from the Islands


While traveling with family in the Cayman Islands recently, we snorkeled the reefs along Seven Mile Beach, Stingray City and Smith's Barcadere. The sketches below were completed after returning to shore, so that I could remember some of the sea life for later identification.


After a longer, deeper dive, I captured these images from Cemetery Reef, which was 20+ feet below the surface with the distant coral heads presenting as ghostly shapes outlined by brilliant white sand, through the translucent water.

Cemetery Reef, 5 x 7, Watercolor











Coral Life, 4 x 5, Watercolor