PAINTINGS IN THE WOODS
Saturday, November 7, 2020
Temperature: 71°F
Sunset: 4:54 PM
On a mild evening in early November, a hundred souls gathered in a clearing in the woods. Brooke’s abstract paintings hung along a specially prepared trail. Guest musical artists, North Meets South, performed on a small stage. As the autumn sun set, the paintings glowed under their spotlights.
“Layers of paint, some poured in delicate colors formed translucent ribbons of light that became the image of branching, slender trunks of trees dusted with starlight.”
Special Musical Performance
North Meets South is John Wesley Wright and Danielle Cumming. Together they performed a program of songs from the middle ages to the twentieth century, including their unique arrangements of American spirituals for classical guitar and vocals. Their selections were on the the theme of trees–and nature more generally–as metaphor, love poem, spiritual balm and passageway to freedom. As the sun went down, an unusually-warm Autumn afternoon became a soft and still evening.
Vocalist, John Wesley Wright
Tenor John Wesley Wright, D. M. A., is known for his soulful interpretations of music from baroque to Broadway. He holds degrees from Maryville College and the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. He has performed as a soloist and in professional ensembles throughout the United States, Europe, and Japan.
Guitarist, Danielle Cumming
Classical guitarist, Danielle Cumming, has given recitals in North America and Europe, served on international guitar competition juries and is in high demand for her skill as a teacher of master classes. She holds a Doctor of Music in Performance from McGill University and a Master of Music in Performance from the University of Toronto
The Paintings
Abstract painting is a meaningful equivalent for what is sometimes called experiential religion, in which faith and reason are not at odds. American spirituals like “I Couldn’t Hear Nobody Pray” or “He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands”, call on a rich tradition of religious expression that often found voice in natural settings like these woods. When the virus hit and lockdowns started back in the spring of 2020, I looked for a way to share my work outside of a regular gallery space; out of doors where we could gather safely. On a family farm on Maryland’s Eastern Shore I found such a place, and then spent the summer making a group of paintings with this site in mind.
American Coverlet, acrylic with glass and silver glitter on raw canvas, 72 by 72 inches
The squares-within-squares pattern is a mathematical model: Sierpinski’s Carpet, but with a twist. The liquid layers flicker in front and behind. The picture isn’t a ‘plane’, it is a very loose weave; a spiritual metaphor–more sieve than surface–for a kind of passing through. The broad flows of paint look like the trees all around the painting. The dark spine down the center, in particular, almost makes it look as if the tree trunk it is pressing forward through the canvas.
Invisible Scene, acrylic on round canvas, 48 inches
Whether it is an orderly system gone haywire, or an unwieldy force-field that is barely contained, the tension between chaos and constancy here is palpable. The design speaks of an underlying logic, a timeless wisdom down deep in the bones of the good old world, while the color and surface have an urgency and presence about them: spirit and flesh at bay.
Bark, acrylic and oil crayon on raw canvas, 60 by 48 inches
A painting’s surface, like a tree’s bark, is the skin of the thing. Surface and color in a painting, more than anything else, signal embodiment. The image is incarnate in the weave of the canvas, the texture of the paint, the way it all catches the light. Here, columns of poured paint on raw canvas are like a thicket, while the diamond pattern is like a detail of one tree’s bark. The flowing, liquid layer underneath is crusted over with a thick, waxy texture. Each level is luminous in its own way.
Sudarium, oil crayon on canvas, 30 by 30 by 30 inches
The sudarium is either the cloth that Jesus used to wipe his face while carrying the cross to Golgotha, or else the cloth used to cover his face for burial. Both are said to bear His after-image. In my ‘portrait’ the chunky features of the face are surrounded by a ring of spiky triangles like the crown of thorns. It was painted with a mixture of oil paint and wax–sort of a cold-brew encaustic–which calls to mind Egyptian mummy portraits.
Golden Gasket, acrylic and flower petals on canvas, 60 by 60 by 60 inches
Borrowed from chaos theory, the shape of the canvas is echoed in the ever smaller triangular holes removed from it. The pattern is called a “gasket” because it looks like the rubber piece between two engine parts. Gaskets allow for less-than-perfect mating surfaces: the seen and the unseen. A painting is a permeable membrane. The picture plane isn’t a barrier, it’s a junction.
Forest Eyelet, acrylic and silver glitter on raw canvas, 48 by 60 inches
Turned upside-down, the pours of paint seem to grow up and branch out like the trees all around. I take abstraction as a given, and then I paint my way back to the world as we see it, back to simple observed reality. An eyelet is a hole in a piece of fabric (or a piece of fabric perforated by lots of holes). A piece of fabric you can see through sounds a lot like a painting to me.