NEWS FROM THE STUDIO

JAN. 2008 Volume 2 Number 5
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Creating Rest

Hello everyone,

As we slowly ascend out of the darkest and shortest days of the year, I have reflected on how rest is important to the creative process.  Also hear about my visit to the Guggenheim in New York in November.

“It is time to drop out of all patterns and start a new way of life, a natural way of life, a nonrepressive way of life, a life not of renunciation but of rejoicing” - Osho

Private Art Classes

I renovated my home studio last spring making it a suitable space for private art lessons for adults and children. Now, I have between 5 and 10 regular students (not usually all at one time).  Teaching on a small scale has worked out very well partly because I find it allows for much flexibility for myself and my students.  If you think you may be interested in private art lessons and would like to know more, please visit my website or contact me directly.

Exhibitions

Coffee, Tea or Sake; January 19 – March 1; Arts and Crafts Gallery (CVAG on Duncan)
For this exhibition I painted, “An Artist’s Brew”.  The price is $225 with 40% of the proceeds from the sale going to help fund gallery programs. 

"An Artists Brew", acrylic on canvas, 9" x 12", 2008; $225

Local Colours Festival; September 2007

This fall, as part of the Local Colours festival in Courtenay, I painted "en plein air", along the river by Tomato Tomato.  It wasn't exactly downtown, but I did see many people walking by and really enjoyed being in that location and watching the seals gorge themselves on salmon.  Here's the painting I did (I spent a few more hours completing it in the studio).  

"To the Sea" acrylic on canvas, 16" x 20", $600.00

Photo on right courtesy of Sharene Popeil

A New Look

I did get my hair cut, but that’s not what I’m talking about.  With the help of talented friends Anne and Leif, I’ve had my website as well as logo redesigned into a refreshed  look.  Check out the website and let me know what you think.

Art Cards & Prints

A new series of art cards of four different paintings have just been printed.  I will keep you posted on where they will be available in town.  I also have a new giclee print available, called “First Bloom”.  The original was painted in my garden in the fall.  Prices are available on my website or by contacting me.

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum - A Brief Visit

This November, my family and I went to Rhode Island to visit the in-laws and were presented with the opportunity to venture into Manhattan for a day.  A day was enough time to be put in shock by the sheer volume of visual stimulus packed in every crook and cranny of New York.  We chose to focus in on one or two activities; one of which was visiting the Solomon R.Guggenheim Museum.

Unfortunately the exterior of the museum is being restored and so was hidden by tarps and scaffolding.  I found this just enhanced the effect of feeling like you were entering a self-contained living structure.  Once inside, above was a wide open column of light space that guided your eye up seven levels.  Once we bought our tickets, we made our way up a gradually ascending spiral ramp to view the exhibits (or you can take the elevator first and descend).  The inside wall of the spiral ramp is only waist high so at any point you can look to the other side of the structure to see people on the floors above and below.  To enhance the whole luminous, “heavenly” effect, everything is white.

The main exhibition was called “Spiritual America” by Richard Prince – not the same Richard Prince who was born in Comox and teaches at UBC – as I originally thought!  The New York Prince’s large photographic work and colour saturated paintings held their own within the stunning architectural space.  It seemed appropriate to see an artists’ life’s work in a spiral fashion, echoing a circular passage of time; rather than all in a line or in separated rooms. 

Reading a bit of history on the museum validated my notion of this space acting as a monument to the creative spirit – and not surprisingly, I learned in reading that it was a struggle to realize amidst the straight lines of capitalist New York. “I need a fighter, a lover of space, an agitator, a tester and a wise man. . . . I want a temple of spirit, a monument!”, exclaimed Hilla Rebay (the art advisor to Solomon R. Guggenheim) in a letter to Frank Lloyd Wright in 1943  (www.guggenheim.org). Wright was requested to design a new building to house Guggenheim's four-year-old Museum of Non-Objective Painting.  The project ended up “pitting the architect against his clients, city officials, the art world, and public opinion”.  It is hard to believe that both Guggenheim and Wright died before the museum was completed in 1959.

As you are walking up the pathway you may leave the main spiral and enter any one  of the separate gallery rooms to see work by some of the 169 different artists in the Guggenheim collection.  I saw rooms full of Kandinskys or Picassos; but one of the paintings that struck me most, because of its exuberance, was a painting by lesser known artist, Franz Marc, Yellow Cow, 1911.  Marc thought of the colour yellow as a symbol for the feminine spirit.  I think the feeling I got from the painting echoed my experience of the museum itself.

Franz Marc, "Yellow Cow", 1911

Being in the Solomon R. Guggenheim museum felt as close to being in nature as you could when not surrounded at all by anything natural.  It gave me a fleetingly warm sense of admiration for the ingenuity of the human imagination.  On an initial visit it’s easy to just be seduced by the building itself - a few more visits and I could digest more of the actual paintings.  It’s fortunate the Guggenheim is a public architectural space for all (who have a spare $18) to enjoy.

Creating Rest

I have sometimes thought that someday I’d like to take a whole year off to devote to looking at things more closely and following the flow of life wherever it takes you (like I picture the lives of the authors Annie Dillard and Henry David Thoreau or the visual artist Andy Goldsworthy).  Reason tells me, however, that this would be much harder that I think.

Having a small child is also like immersing yourself in a different world.  Simple everyday matters such as, laundry, dishes, naps, shopping and cooking outline the structure of most of your days.  There is much less time, energy or even need to spend inside your imagination and then to actually create paintings. 

Now I am discovering that time spent unwinding from the “busy-ness” of daily life is as, or more, essential to creativity than actually creating a picture.  Another way of looking at it is to compare the life of an artist to the life of a surfer.  How much of a surfer’s time is spent working at some job, travelling, exercising, paddling past the breakers, sitting out in the water or wiping out?  Probably 99.9999% (unless you’re someone like Kelly Slater I guess). The thrill of the few precious seconds actually riding a wave live on forever in a surfer’s imagination providing enough energy to sustain her through all the other moments needed to make that happen.  However, if the surfer gets too attached to that magic moment, she probably gets frustrated whenever she is not able to surf.  But if she simply lives the “life of a surfer”, keeping the intention to catch a wave alive, then she will be ready when that perfect wave comes – it will come.

So - in case you are still with me here – the point I’m trying to make is, that rather than getting too attached to the idea of “creating paintings” or whatever it is you like to do, it is also important to create the conditions you need for your mind to be ready to create. 
Here are some ways of “swimming out in the water” and getting ready to catch a wave; however, if all you do is swim out in the water, you are still living the “life of a surfer” – or I mean, “artist”.

• Do absolutely nothing for an hour; better yet, a day (way harder than you would think).
• Sit and read something meditative (eg. Anything by Thich Nhat Hanh)
• Do yoga or breathing exercises everyday
  
• Go skiing, snowshoeing or do some other activity in nature with friends
• Doodle/Scribble with no intentions to “create” anything
• Empty your mind; set aside an hour to plan, write lists of all the things that will distract you from creating or “doing nothing”.  If you just can’t get some jobs or things off your mind, then do them or deal with them before you create.
• Go for a mindful walk (try to notice as many little things as you can…also harder than you would think).
• Set aside a time everyday; that even for 10 minutes, you completely unwind – whether you are going to create or not.

Now I find, since I have less time, it is even more important for me to find that time to totally relax (and despite what you may think, painting is very fulfilling for me, but not relaxing).   I have less time to paint, but I find that the time that I do paint I can often totally focus and “be in that moment” and I can do more in a short amount of time. 

Being an artist is all about being creative and open minded in all aspects of your life.  I think it’s an essential exercise (through writing, silence or walks) to try get at the source of what is the particular sustenance you need in order to make you feel alive, love more and be a more “present” mother, lover, friend, pet owner, worker – whatever and all the things you are.  Once you figure it out, use your imagination to find a way to make it happen.

Thanks for reading and all the best for 2008.
Sincerely,
Tracy Kobus