This is Kate Laurel Mac Intosh's blog. She's Here&Now! revitalizing The Sargent House Museum in Gloucester MA by inviting artists to work in the gardens, making their art on Sunday afternoons this summer. Sound like fun? it is! If you are an artist and want to help revitalize Judith's house through your presence, contact Kate! and it's ok to sell your art too.
Somerville artist Sarah Meyers Brent at work in The Sargent House Gardens last Sunday. Sarah incorporates dried botanical elements into her acrylic paintings.
deb clarke represents at The Sargent House Museum! Sunday 7/17.
Spent a white hot afternoon working in the gardens of The Sargent House Museum in beautiful downtown Gloucester yesterday. 2 reverse glass paintings in process, 2 drawings. a ton of photos. the newly painted blue chairs and tables interest me. I will go back later in the summer for another afternoon of painting. The fish painting is not what I worked on (it is from 1995), it was there as an example of a finished verre eglomise. will post pics later of what i did, and need to finish.
The Sunday series of "Here & Now" under the direction of Kate Laurel MacIntosh is a 'revitalization' project to draw interest to this historic house, the one time home of Judith Sargent Murray. Stop by and chat with the artists working on Sunday afternoons in the garden and get $2 off admission to the museum; pay $8 instead of $10. the museum is raising funds to re-place the Main Street fence with a fence more in keeping with the house. here's the link to The Sargent House Museum. the homepage is breathtakingly beautiful. If you are an artist and would like to work in the gardens this summer, contact Kate Laurel MacIntosh at the museum.
best,
deb
ps: if you work in the gardens on a bright sunny day, bring a hat, sunscreen, and an umbrella. there is no afternoon shade. i hid in the bushes from time-to-time to escape the sun.
the link will take you to goodmorning gloucester, where there is a great write-up about the artists that will be working in the gardens of the Sargent House Museum this summer. Some of John Singer Sargent's early 'doodles' are on display this summer. along with Judith Sargent Murray's little desk, and the shoe that was nailed against the chimney? The Sargent doodles are equated with today's 'refrigerator magnets' in one of the write-ups about the museum. The gardens face Main Street (up the steps). Entrance to the museum is on Middle Street. come on down and say hello!
there is fruit growing in this garden. it's going to be hot; so wear a hat. i will bring some glass, some sharpies, some foil, some water, a hat, and see what happens. oh, yes! I am one of the artists working in the garden tomorrow!
mixed media on laminated fiberboard. a palimpsest. Marilyn Buckles, an artist friend of blessed memory, gave me this drawing board to work on. She had used it as a drawing support for several years, then I used it as a drawing/painting support for a decade or so. Yesterday the memory of the plant series that we worked upon, together/apart led me to consider drawing. This I did while all of our art conversations, visits flowed through me. A figure emerged: Marilyn at 3 and !/2 ' (a glass drawing of Marilyn advancing towards me. her exact shape drawn upon the front of the glass, the exact size she appeared as i stood 2 feet in front of the glass, while marilyn stood 3 1/2 ' behind it.) the painting broke. i kept the shards. after the memory moved through me, the marsh paintings appeared, dissolved, then the face began to emerge. Marilyn's remembered words: it is everything. it is the surface, it is upon it, it is in it, it is object. it is just everything. yellow light fills the south window where we last met.
took the red chair outside yesterday, re-worked the canvas with fusion acrylic spray paint and some oil paint. next step? loaded palette. brother Mike asked: 'do you go through this process with all of your paintings?' yes. 'you work until your happy with it.' no, it's not about happiness. it's about the energy. i work until there is understanding, then the paint and action take over. the action ceases when the energy is 'right'. it may take weeks, or days or hours. something happens, the work then goes quickly, it may be minutes seeming like hours or hours seeming like minutes, then it is good. then it is finished, and done with me.
while preparing this post yesterday i read this about Cy Twombly's process in the New York Times article about his passing yesterday.
“It’s more like I’m having an experience than making a picture.” The process stood in stark contrast to the detached, effete image that often clung to Mr. Twombly. After completing a work, in a kind of ecstatic state, it was as if the painting existed and he barely did anymore: “I usually have to go to bed for a couple of days.”
the acrlic layer failed. i was able to peel it off to the canvas. it tore the silver leaf. why? i sealed the drawing with egg yolk. egg yolk layers will accept thin oil layers, as well as, additional egg yolk layers. for up to 6 months. acrylic must be kept below the egg yolk layers: fat over lean.
either it's time for me to mix up some egg tempera or pull out the oils. either way it is time to paint. and the failure of these paint layers have a lot of potential.
it's official, sometime this afternoon the sun will hit its northern zenith, then start heading south. the primroses have infiltrated the garden. i always think of the yellow blaze in my grandmother's garden when these bloom. the plants in my garden from nana's: primrose, creeping veronica (some call this a weed), sedum, phlox, bee balm. all carefully collected, planted and moved from one garden to another over these past 30 years. the veronica was collected three years ago from a crack in the sidewalk of a house i lived in when i was 20. noticed that it has vanished from that particular house, it thrives here!
best to you, enjoy your solistice fire! i sure will.
Progress report. This little red chair always gives me a workout; sharing some growing pains. Perspective is a challenge as most of the planes are fairly close to, but not quite parallel to my eye level. why do i put myself through the struggle of understanding? to make sure my skills are intact, to go someplace i have not been before, to feel the unfulfilled desire of the visual potential, submersion/merging with the object of desire, and then? eventually an inner sounding of 'it is!' happens. then i will stop and the work will 'be' of itself.
best,
deb
ps: no oil paint: chalk, gesso, egg, water, aluminum gild.
this is my little red chair, the subject of many drawings. sat in it when i was wee, still use it to sit upon, and observe it through my hands and eyes from time to time. 32x44", a beginning. greek keys and french curves are my favorite way to travel through complicated visual data. chalk on unprimed canvas. will add gesso as needed, maybe not, may seal the chalk with egg yolk and move onto another one. i have plenty of canvas. if i seal this work, i can take it off the stretcher, roll it up, then stretch another drawing surface.
here's my observational reference. for many of my training years, i was training my hand to follow my eye. it has become so intuitive that i now find my hand instructing my eye where to go. very interesting change of view point. the drawing becomes a record of my experience of moving through space with eye, hand, body. an inner sounding happens.
Here's the set-up, palimpsest on gessoed canvas 26x26" . that's Capt Joe's in the background. again the geometry confounds me. thought to give it a try, but...
the light was shining through the canvas. turned the canvas and did this instead. says it all. now what do i do? go find some more stretchers.
have a stretch of good hot summer weather setting in. better go to the art supply and get some stretchers.
best,
deb.
ps: there's an intimation of Heasley's house on the upper left. and how could i ignore that big tree? easy...i just didn't see it until the end.
Juni Van Dyke is curating shows in The Empire Windows at 169 Main Street, Gloucester. Three of the windows are dedicated to the art efforts of the seniors that participate in her art programs at Gloucester's Rose Baker Senior Center. One window is for invited artists to exhibit for a month and then talk about their work at the center. May's offering is the work of Gloucester artist, teacher JoiyDai Buell. Joi's paintings can be viewed 24 hours a day until June 4, and on June 5, I will install my work.
Transferring Hokkusai 'The Great Wave". 4 panels complete. Brother Mike notes the images get very dimensional when the voided space of the 8x8" stretchers is considered during the re-construction.
copyright debbie clarke 2011
gloucester ma
vinyl transfer, packing tape, aluminum leaf, Kanku dye (non-edible, not for human consumption)
Hokkusai "The Great Wave" from the 36 views of Mount Fuji. This image was on my shower curtain. A few weeks ago I started to 'see things' in the shower curtain. What I was seeing was the slow dissolution of the vinyl print dripping down the plastic curtain. It was not The Virgin Mary. It was not the face of Jesus. I replaced the shower curtain with a light green leaf printed affair. the price was right $4 from Bananas. long/short on the way to becoming a drop cloth I experiemented with lifting the print with clear packing tape. yes, success. below is an image of the work table with the transfer in process. i will use it up, print, plastic, tape and all. 8x8" on stretchers.
family matters have caused a hiatus in my updates to this nest; however, the art continues. my travels bring me to burlington where my baby brother has just undergone open heart surgery. he is progressing well and should be out of hospital by monday (fingers crossed).
i changed his diapers for the first time when i was 4 and he just wee..3days, 3 weeks? one of my earliest memories is carrying his swaddled body from the center of a military double bed to my mother in the kitchen. her mouth dropped at my simple words "i was afraid he would fall off the bed". the next memory is my brother pissing in my mother's face, may have been a few days before or a few days after my intrepid carry. he is a good man and should heal well.
thank you for sharing your time with me. i will capture some pics of my art, when i can. but, i think i will first share some pics of the Indian grocers that i have found in my travels.
eat your fiber, give up the salt. in our family it is genetics.
best to you all.
deb
btw: know of any good Indian grocers in the Burlington/Woburn MA area? let me know. i have time to explore and compare.
If you click the title, it should take you to goodmorninggloucester wherein a discussion about art is going on.
This all started from my Facebook Friend Paula's link to a video share about art; which I then shared through my wall. I then posted the link on Paul Frontiero's Facebook wall, with a suggestion to post it on goodmorninggloucester. Paul posted the Creature Comfort's video with a question to consider art, thus the discussion thread. I love the irreverent ending of this video.
I will now tweet this message. I don't use twitter often, but would love to see where this post goes. looking forward to seeing where this post gets shared to whether twitter, gmg, facebook, your blog, your friends.
My contribution to the art discussion on goodmorninggloucester is about art as an energy exchange. This idea was first presented to me through the writings of American artist Audrey Flack. This little book has been a studio companion for 20 years. always recommended to my students and artist friends. She covers vast territory of contemporary art thought, process, the market place, the national juries. always thought-provoking. "not everyone can be in New York. there is a place for regionalism."
more true today, than when American regionalism was the rage.
happy travels post! time for a game of Hop, Skip and Jump!
best, deb.
