Seeds of Change In My Artwork
Brand new work - still untitled.
My recent work has been getting comments like, “Wow, that’s a big shift!”
But although my new work does look different from my previous work, the change has been much more of an incremental evolution than an abrupt shift.
Most change is like that – incremental rather than seismic – even though it might not look like it. I’m no Picasso, but even his work evolved incrementally. He learned traditional painting techniques, continually played with new ideas and expression, and soaked up African art. When seen against this background, his seemingly sudden “invention of Cubism,” was an outcome of the interactions among layers and layers of input. But that makes it no less magical.
What drives my own evolution? It’s almost impossible to connect the dots of change in a straight line – both because the path is usually convoluted and because there are things that have an impact but of which one is unaware. But because of my interest in the brain and how it interacts with the environment, I couldn’t help but reflect on some of the drivers of change in my own art practice:
I am standing at a post-exhibition doorway. One unexpected result of my last exhibition was the feeling of completion that it gave me. Seeing that particular body of work framed, hung, and shared put it to rest, freeing up mental space and energy for the next thing. I had been thinking of the exhibition as a capstone – but what I didn’t realize is that it was a capstone that completed an archway that invited me into new territory.
Previously planted seeds are starting to bear fruit. Last year, I took a number of short online workshops in order to push myself in new directions. One of those was a six-week online color course that was both practical and theoretical. Through creating many color charts and swatches and paying attention to how colors mixed and played with one another, I built the type of integrated knowledge that is likely to have some impact on future thought and behavior. Although there is not a direct line from this or other classes to my current work, they have wormed their way into my own way of working.
New ideas call for new techniques and materials. My work is inseparable from my ideas and I give quite a bit of thought to the techniques and materials that might best communicate what I’m thinking about. Lately, I’ve been planting and nurturing some new ideas by reading, writing, and generally mulling things over. These new notions – although still scattered and in various stages of germination – are affecting my artwork while at the same time being clarified through the physical process of creation.
I’m working in a new studio. Since my last body of work, I have moved into a new studio. This has meant, among other things, that I have more room to lay out and mix paint. I also find that I can see better both because I have better light and because I can stand back farther from my work. Surely, these things have sparked changes in my work.
It’s a different world. I started my last body of work during Covid quarantine and although that is not what the work is about, I’m sure that it had an impact. Our perceptions and emotions are an interaction between what’s going on inside ourselves and what’s going on in our world. And these interactions almost inevitably influence our work — in way both apparent and hidden.
Cultivating Change and Innovation
Reflecting on the paths to my new work highlights how important planting seeds is for change and innovation. Interesting ideas grow from something even if we are not aware of what. The more we plant the more we potentially reap, so why not plant for a bountiful harvest?
You can’t always determine which ideas, knowledge, or skills will germinate and take root or in which directions they will grow. But that, for me, is part of the magic of creation.
What are you planting?
