Reflecting On The Past
CHERRY TREE BUDDING OUT 10X13 PENCIL 1972
CHERRY TREE BUDDING OUT 10X13 PENCIL 1972
My mother so loved this drawing that I gave it to her. It hung in her
library only coming back to me upon her passing. She thought it to be
majestic.
Like many of us I become a bit reflective about past years when the new
one is upon me. And within that old cliche, saying something about
turning the page, I think about all the landmarks that have trickled
out of the spout which has been my life's experience - contemplating
them through countless meanderings of introspection.
At this time my cultural heritage suggests I'm supposed to
revolutionize some aspects of my life by way of making New Year's
Resolutions. Thus making me a better person through their fruition.
This is always about two things. Giving up something or embracing
something. And so from now on I'm going to or not going to, blah, blah,
and blah. For me this is a wholly nonsensical tradition. I don't think
I have ever accomplished a cold turkey anything. Real change for the
better in my life has always been preceded by lots of screwing up and
for the most part it's been a drawn out evolution of trials and
tribulations, blah, blah, and blah aside. It's been my experience too,
that in the realm of personal change one essential constant seems to be
required - it needs to permeate all else - and that is my undivided
attention. Huge concept, undivided attention! My daily life divides me
into so many parts that I often find myself in that pitching or
catching conundrum. Separating me from my heart's desired pursuit -
bullying me around under the lash of responsibilities. That, life got
in the way thing.
Through Facebook, this past year, I've hooked up with some old friends
I haven't seen in decades. Boy some reflecting there I'll tell you.
They see that the majority of my Facebook posts revolve around the
painting that I've been doing. A number of them have told me that they
still have some piece of art work that I did eons ago and they have
sent me pictures of them hanging in their homes. Frankly I've been
taken aback at seeing them. Not because they are all that good or that
someone has held onto them all this time but because when I look at
them anew they appear to be honest to me. Then the lament begins. Where
would my painting be today had I not put down the brush some forty plus
years ago because life got in the way?
I'm showing a number of them here recently reunited with my eyes
through social media and two that I have held onto all these years
myself because their embodiment is so endearing to me.
Margarets Barn
Margaret's Barn Pencil 1975
My old friend John Bean, made a present to his sister Margaret, of this
plein air pencil drawing I did in 1975. She sent along a picture of it
to me still hanging on her dinning room wall. I remember at the time I
drew this thinking it was odd that a farmer would fence his pond off
from his livestock. I also remember now that it was a frequent habit of
mine to put birds flying in my landscape drawings back then.
Rodney's Drawing Charcoal 1976
Rodney's Drawing Charcoal 1976
Just last week my old friend Rodney Green, sent this picture to me in a
Facebook post. A plein air charcoal drawing done in 1976. There was a
period of time when I used both sienna and black charcoal pencils for
my outdoor drawings. I would sand the pencils to load the paper with a
dusting of powder using a stippling brush to impregnate the tone into
the paper. Then with erasers I would work back to the white base. This
would evoke quite a mood as you can see. I remember that this old place
was off of Hacker Road in Howell, Michigan and coincidentally not very
far from where my art teacher Heiner Hertling currently lives. At this
time I was renting an old farmhouse nearby with my brother and a
carpenter friend who was restoring the steeple on the old Catholic
church at the corner of Hacker and M-59 right around the time I drew
this. Talk about memories.
Jim Stevens's Childhood Home. Pencil 1978
Jim Stevens's Childhood Home. Pencil 1978
There's a story here. I use to work with an old Hillbilly from
Tennessee named Jim Stevens. Among so many other things, he taught me
how to make cornpone he called it, which was basically corn bread in a
cast iron skillet. I'll never forget that. One day his wife Arvazine,
also from the hills, showed me an old wrinkled up black and white
photograph of his childhood home and asked me to make a pencil drawing
of it for his birthday present. I made two because I didn't like the
way this first one turned out. Jim told me when he was a boy living in
this old log cabin it was his job to go to the creek every morning and
draw the day's water for the family. He did this two buckets at a time,
five times and barefooted, every day for years. He told me in the
hottest part of the summer that the water from this creek was so cold
it would hurt your teeth to drink it. He also told me the best present
he ever got was when his father brought him home his own mule. Can you
imagine? Anyway somewhere along the way I sold this lesser one to Doc.
Dudley. Years later, at Doc. Dudley's estate sale my old friend John
Bean bought this in the auction and I recently was able to get a
picture of it. Notice the birds in the sky again.
Rembrandt's Bed Pencil 1978
Rembrandt's Bed Pencil 1978
The drawing at the top of this article and this one are two of very few
drawings I've kept for myself over the years because they resonate such
a chord in me.
I copied this drawing from a book on Rembrandt which I had borrowed
from the library. It had lots of his pencil drawings in it and I copied
dozens of those for the purpose of learning how to draw more
succinctly, like he did. They are copied the world over by art students
for the same purpose.
This is one of the beds he slept in located near a fireplace in the
workshop of his studio in Amsterdam. There is such an inviting and cozy
feeling about this little wall bed to me that I've always kept it on
either my bedroom night stand or dresser ever since I copied it.
Today I have come to realize that all the twists and turns of life
getting in the way weren't really derailing the improvement of my art
work at all. Actually it's all been resource materials coming into the
mix. Those ins and outs are part and parcel of a pertinent reality
here, the common denominator - art - is indivisible in me. Only the
mediums I have pursed have changed, and there have been dozens of
these. Moreover, I have been faithfully persistent with my art work.
It's doing is as essential an element to the sustenance of my life as
breathing is. Sure I could have been a much better painter today had I
continued on with it back then - but I didn't - it doesn't matter why.
I started building copper lanterns then beautiful ships in bottles, on
and on, was always something and I was fully invested in the fine art
of it. The good news is that between then and now I have created so
many other pieces of accomplished art with as much merit as any drawing
or painting that I have ever done. There's nothing really to lament.
Where do I go from here? I'm already doing it. I'm painting again and
with as much undivided attention as life will let me. It's all good. I
don't have to change a thing this year. Phew!! What a relief.
I hope you have enjoyed my first monthly Pushing The Brush article of
the new year and would like to hear your opinion of it. Please share it
with your friends if you think they may find it interesting, too.
I'm sure we all will see many changes in 2017, some intentional, some
not so much. I'm planning on creating all sorts of emblematic
visualizations of things that are beautiful in my eyes. How about you?
As always, thank you for your time.
With appreciation, Bruce Foxworthy.
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