Thank You, Mother Mine

Margaret Mair, Come With Me, Original Art

It has taken me this lifetime to realize all that my mother gave me. Love, support, guidance, comfort. Encouragement to spread my wings, even when I didn’t feel ready. A place to leave, a place to come back to. And something more.

My mother was a very important part of my development as an artist.

Art covered our walls, artists and art lovers were among the people we knew. There were art books for looking at, art shows and exhibitions to visit. There was thoughtful commentary, and support for rising artists. My mother loved beauty, but she also loved work that made her think, awoke questions in her. Work that was not always comfortable to look at. She gave me a foundation for my own work, though I did not realize it at the time.

Later, after she saw some of my pictures (I was living far away), she encouraged me to keep working and learning, and hung one of my pastels in pride of place on the dining room wall. And she shared others’ appreciation of it with me. Encouragement which gave me courage to keep going forward.

Now, as I think about her, I am grateful for all this and so much more.

I am grateful that she encouraged me to explore, to stretch my wings even when I was afraid. That she taught me to be self-critical without being self destructive.

I am grateful that she shared more and more of herself as I grew older – including, to my initial surprise, a bawdy and irreverent sense of humour.

I am grateful that she taught me to look closely at the world around me, with an observant eye, an enquiring mind and an open heart.

I am grateful that she showed me that the world was full of many different people, good and evil, poor and rich, and that worth is a matter of character not circumstance. I am grateful that she let me see that talent achieves nothing without hard work, and that no-one succeeds by themselves.

Thank you, mother mine.

Laughter in the Rain

Utagawa Kuniyoshi, Women (13)

They’re laughing in the rain. After looking at this picture a while, I thought – there must be a story here. But I don’t know what it is.

What drew my eye in the first place? The unexpected. Looking at the background I would have expected something more formal, more formulaic, flatter.

Instead the women in it have a sense of mischief, of movement, of brightness. I see it in the way they stand, how they look at each other, the clothes they wear. It’s in the unexpectedness of their bare feet, their laughter in the rain. It’s in the way their kimonos, lifted or blown, expose bare legs and red undergarments.

And then there are the differences between them. The young woman in the middle wears a bright, ornately patterned kimono, though I can only guess at the details of the images on it. Body elegantly arced, feet facing one of her companions, face the other, shoulders toward us – she includes everyone in her movement, even us.

Contrast that with the others. They wear kimonos more modest in design, more everyday, more informal. They are looking at their brightly dressed companion, bodies turned toward her, framing her for us, guiding our eyes back to her. She seems the center of their attention.

Where are they coming from, where are they going, these barefoot women clutching their umbrellas in the grey rain?

And who created this picture? The artist is Utagawa Kuniyoshi, a 19^th century Japanese master of print-making. He was best known for creating pictures of Japan’s historic and legendary heroes and brigands, and for including dreams, apparitions and heroic feats in his images. But he also worked actively in other genres, creating prints like this one.

There is a name for the kind of art he created: floating world art, or ukiyo-e in Japanese. It was art that was meant to reflect moments in time, in a time and place far from the cares of the everyday world. It was an art for dreaming on, full of beauty and mythical heroes and popular entertainments.

And it was art that was meant for a wide audience, for people who had not been buyers of art before. Because the pictures were produced in large quantities as woodblock prints so they were less expensive than a single original work, more affordable to the then-growing merchant class.

But success and sales, then as now, depended on an artist building a group of supporters who love his work. It took Kuniyoshi time to develop his own style, then to become popular and well-known. And as he developed he was influenced not just by his Japanese teachers and fellow artists but by the Dutch and German engravings of western art he collected, by the way they were composed and the light and shadow effects used in them.

So there is more than one story behind this image – there is the story of the artist himself, and of the time he lived in. Those we can learn a little bit about.

We can see how he learned from other artists, studying one their work even when he was separated from them by time and place. We can catch a glimpse of what it was like for him, working in his own time and place, under an authoritarian regime, for a particular audience.

But – I still don’t know the story of the women laughing in the rain. I guess I’ll have to imagine it myself.

And really, isn’t that one of the things art should do? Waken curiosity and imagination?

Spring Rhythm

Margaret Mair, Dancer in Green, Original Art

My dancer makes me think of the world in spring. She radiates restless energy, attention turned inward, dancing to a rhythm only she can hear. And she’s clothed in green, like the new-grown leaves that promise deeper greens to come.

Spring has been a long time coming this year – cold winds, falling snowflakes, icy hail have all conspired to keep it at bay. As March turned into April those winter friends did not linger long when they came – but they refused to stay away, bracketing each promise of warmer days with their cold storminess. We might declare that is was time for Spring to be here, but they did not agree.

But now they have retreated. Spring is actually here. There’s green grass and the promise of leaves on the trees. There are buds and birds and warming temperatures that bring the hardy (or foolhardy) out in shorts and shirts. The sun shines differently though my window as it comes closer to our northern climes, lingering longer each day and angling its beams towards where my plants sit, waiting. Like me, they are hungry for its light.

And then there’s the feel of things, a kind of restless excitement that tingles the body and wakes the imagination. There’s a sense of good things coming. As day follows night and happiness follows sorrow so spring follows winter, and after the dark days we are glad again. It’s the rhythm of being, the dance of life.

As my dancer in green reminds me.

Thought and Imagination

Walter Smolarek, Abstract 100

For some reason this painting touches me. Perhaps it’s the colors, iridescent and luminous. Perhaps it’s the sharp break between background and foreground, like the breaks between different times, different states, different ways of living. Perhaps it’s the roundness of spheres, containing what? Possibilities? Perhaps it’s the sense of quiet movement.

The background moves from a blue-grey misty softness through the colours of a foggy sunrise to light. Over it a dark mark hovers, sharp and angular and broken, rough edges driving outward, darkness smattering into the background. In front, as if they were coming toward us, luminous spheres hover and glow, delicate as bubbles. Their colours lie lightly on them; the ones at the top hold the most darkness.

The curves of the spheres contrast with the straight marks behind, their luminous quality with its darkness, their softness with its strength. It’s as if a world of beauty is bubbling out through the darkness.

In one sense, all art is abstract – even what looks most realistic is only an illusion, an abstraction from reality. After all you can’t reproduce the real world on a flat canvas.

But this is abstracted from a world of thought and imagination.  Which made me wonder: what kind of imagination? What kind of person created this? And why this?

When I went exploring, this is what I learned:

Waldemar Smolarek was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1937. During World War II his family was separated by the occupying Germans, and his father died just before the end of the war. Then times were hard, the family was poor and he had to become independent and self-supporting as soon as he could.

He became interested in and studied metalwork and painting, and by 1958 he was taking part in unauthorized exhibitions at the Barbican (Barbakan) in Warsaw. Through them he became friends with many other independent artists, and his circle of friends and acquaintances was wide.

And since the Barbican was a place to which foreign visitors came his work was seen and appreciated by many from the West. He was invited to exhibit his paintings in Italy, Sweden, Austria and the U.S.

With his reputation growing and life in Warsaw becoming more repressive he left Poland illegally and made his way to Sweden. There he developed more friendships with artists and within the Jewish community, but he wanted to be as far away from Poland as possible. So he left for Canada, going to Vancouver, where he continued to work and to exhibit internationally.

Waldemar Smolarek was a quiet, solitary man who channelled everything into creating his art. He sold a few of his paintings, donated some to charitable causes and kept many for himself; and when he passed away peacefully in 2010 he died surrounded by those paintings.

Quiet and solitary and brave. To work abstractly takes both courage and faith: courage to strike out into the world of imagination and faith that others will take the time to contemplate and understand.

Now I think of him working, thinking, crafting the images he shared.  And you – now that you know more about the man, how do you see this painting?

(Image licensed under Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike 3.0 Unported License)

Contemplation

Margaret Mair, Between Earth and Sky, Original Painting

Spring is a busy time for me. We are getting our boat ready to sail, and the work spreads into and occupies all the time available. As time runs shorter other things are pushed aside. By the time we are ready to leave our winter resting place I am reminding myself that it’s all worth the time and effort.

The reward for all the work? Time spent on the water, reaching and exploring new places, seeing new things that will become part of my life and my work.

As happened with this painting.

We were in the Canaries, where volcanic rocks are rich with color, when I saw her – a young woman sitting, waiting, on a flat rock by the sea. Later I took what I had seen, and mixed in my own feelings about waiting, about being alone, about being by the sea…

We all need a place to breathe, a place where we can simply be ourselves. I breathe best by the water, or on it – in a place between the earth and the sky where the water stretches out before me, the sky arches high overhead, and the air moves freely.

Here I can think my own thoughts, dream my own dreams, contemplate and explore.

Here I feel in tune with the world. I can meditate with the sounds of water all around me, feeling the rhythm of the waves, the rhythms that give us life – and many other creatures too. I can feel the wave-beat in my body.

And I remind myself that a rock by the sea feels solid, as the earth seems solid. And yet the waves moving against it are washing that rock away. They are taking their time, doing their work patiently, whether we are there or not.

I think: we build our lives as if the foundation we have laid for them were as solid as that rock feels. Yet life itself, moving in its own rhythm, constantly changes us.

Rock slowly becomes part of the sea – and we, do we become part of the wider world around us?

Looking Slowly, Watching “Rising”

Zhang Huan, Rising – photo by R. Mair

On visits to Toronto I watched this sculpture as it changed from simpler elements to complex combinations of shape and surface.  We would walk along University Avenue, already rich in public art, and pass this new and very different piece.

At first it looked like twisting, thrusting vines, or like the limbs of some great sinuous, headless creature rising and bowing and bending.  Then it began to sprout birds.  And then the birds were flying up the building.

It fascinated me.  It was something that I wanted to stop and look at, to walk around and see from different perspectives.  I wanted to, but I didn’t have time.  Now I’m waiting till I go back again to take another look – or several.  I want to see it in different light, at different times.

Zhang Huan, Rising, photo by R. Mair

Because even though I’m not there it still stays with me. There is the sinewy underlying shape. It touches the ground, rests in the water, reaches up toward the sky. The vines/limbs contort like muscles working, twist and curve. They are more strong than peaceful, nature demanding attention.

They are also a strong, supple support. The birds rest and preen on them, land and take off and fly away upward. Their wings are multi-faceted and gleaming, reflecting the light, reinforcing a sense of business and activity. They want to fly away, and yet they can’t – the vine underneath and the building above must support them. They are, in the end, as earthbound as we are.

Zhang Huan, Rising, photo by R. Mair

Birds and branches respond to the light. Sunlight moves across and reflects off the multiple surfaces. They change with the light around them, reflecting bright sun or cloudy skies or the gleam of lights at night. And the sculpture itself is reflected by the water beneath it.

It was created by Shanghai artist Zhang Huan, as a commission for the developers of Living Shangri-La, Toronto. Almost complete, it was officially unveiled last May (2012) after an incense burning ceremony and a poetry reading by the artist. The stainless steel sculpture is called “Rising”; the birds are peace pigeons and the twisted branches are designed to resemble the body of a dragon. According to a press release on Marketwire it represents the artist’s wish for a beautiful city life to be shared by man and nature.

I know that, like me, many people walk past it, sitting as it does beside a busy sidewalk. I wonder how many stop to really look at this sculpture, and wonder what lies behind it? Or do they walk past without looking, or glance and mean to stop one day?

Browsing through some of my favorite art blogs I came across a phrase that described what this piece needs: “slow looking”. When I read that I knew that was the phrase I’d been looking for. Slow looking – savoring what you’re looking at. Taking time. Exploring with your eyes, opening your mind and letting it wonder – and wander.

It’s a wonderful way to look at art. Or at life.

Wishing you all time to enjoy some slow looking…

 *****

I wanted to explore the idea of slow looking, so I put the phrase into my favorite search engine. I found Peter Clothier, who encourages and demonstrates a combination of meditation, engagement and contemplation that allows you to explore every part of a painting as well as the painting as a whole, just as it is. He encourages everyone to see art in a way that is completely their own.

And I found out that there’s a Slow Art Day, on which groups of people are encouraged to get together and look at five works of art for ten minutes each. Ten minutes is longer than most of us spend in front of a painting! This year (2013) Slow Art Day is April 27^th.

Or you could do what I try to every now and then, give yourself the gift of time and use it to immerse yourself in a work of art. You’ll be amazed at what you find.

Together We Soar

Margaret Mair, Butterfly Hands, Watercolor, original art

Today is International Women’s Day. It’s a day to celebrate how far women have come. It’s a time we can rejoice that so many can now make their own choices, can contribute their intelligence, skills and talents to building the world they live in.

It’s also a day to remember that around the world many women find themselves in difficult and dangerous situations simply because they are women.

When I think of us I think of butterflies, flying like dreams, like hope.  Before it soars the butterfly emerges from its chrysalis, spreads and dries its wings. Only when they are dry and ready can it fly.

Around the world we too need to emerge, spread our wings, and fly together. Imagine such a world, in which we accept and celebrate our similarities and our differences.  In which we give what we are capable of, no matter who we are.

International Women’s Day – a day to celebrate how far we’ve come and to imagine how much further we can go.

Stormy Times

Francisco Goya (Francisco de Goya y Lucientes), Winter

February has been a very stormy month, here and elsewhere. The storms have rolled through, coming up from south of us or in off the sea. I’m glad I can watch them pass from the safety of our apartment, while our boat sits – safe too, but rocked by the waves and wind – at a dock not too far away.

And I think about the fact that the same storm can feel completely different to different people. So much depends on where you are and what resources you have. I’ve experienced bad storms tucked safely away inside a sturdy building. I’ve also experienced them out at sea in our sailboat, surrounded by the noise and turmoil of waves and wind.

Goya, too, knew how different the same storm could feel to different people. And he wanted other people to know. That’s why his picture of Winter is not of some beautiful, snow-filled landscape but of people struggling through a winter storm.

You can tell how cold it is. Three of the men huddle together as they walk, blankets or shawls wrapped tightly around their heads and their thin coats. Their heads are down, their arms wrapped around themselves, their faces grim. You can see snow on their clothes, on their leggings; you can almost see them shiver. The poor dog beside them, tail between his legs, looks as if it would rather be somewhere else, somewhere warm and out of the wind.

These three men are empty-handed, returning home with nothing to show for all their work.  No wonder they look so grim and tired.

The other two walk independently. They are dressed more warmly: one has his head covered with a hood of the same material as his coat; the other has tied his hat on so that it shelters his face from the wind-driven snow. They have been hunting, and their hunt has been successful – one has a gun, the other leads a pack animal, a horse or a mule, with the carcass of a pig tied across it’s back. Wherever they are going these men will be well fed, and probably warm.

The painting is a sketch painted by Goya, the design for a tapestry to hang in the dining-room of the Pardo palace near Madrid in Spain. It’s one of a series of four depicting the seasons. So there is a third layer here – those who gazed at the stormy cold of the tapestry would be warm and comfortable themselves.

And people would gaze at it; Goya has made it beautiful. No doubt he hoped at least some would see beyond its beauty, beyond the richness of the colors and the skillful use of technique, to the differences between these two groups caught out in the storm. Maybe they would compare what they saw with their own lives.

Because Goya himself saw these things.  In many ways he was unusual, a tempestuous man who lived in stormy times, though his life started conventionally enough. Born in Spain in 1746, he spent his early years in Fuendetodos before his family moved to Zaragoza, where he began to study art at fourteen. From there he moved to Madrid to study more, then spent time in Rome before returning to Spain and to Zaragoza.

Despite his talent and growing skill, he found it hard to find work as an artist when he came back. Then he became part of the Bayeu family when he married Josefa, sister to the artists Francisco and Ramon. Her brothers were working at the Spanish court, and through them Goya was offered work painting designs for tapestries for two newly-built royal palaces. He went on to be a court painter and to paint for the nobility – though he broke from the courtly tradition by painting portraits of people as they were, not as they wished to be seen.

His later work was touched by an illness that left him deaf, less communicative and more introspective, and his fortunes fluctuated with changes at the court and the effects of wars and revolution, particularly the war between France and Spain. In his later work there’s anger, a sense of pain and despair, and a recognition of the ironies in life.

Because through it all he continued to work, to share his thoughts about difficult things and tragic events in stark and beautiful paintings and dark prints. Beauty has its limitations, though. Some of his paintings and drawings I find very difficult to look at. The horror overpowers the beauty.

But not the compassion. He understood that the storms of life can blow most cruelly when we are least equipped to deal with them.

A compassion we all should share.

The Month of Love?

Margaret Mair, World in our Hands, Original Art

February, I’ve read, is the month of love. A wonderful idea, warm and comforting to think about. But what kind of love, and how should we celebrate it?

Thinking of love we think of people first, of lovers and family and friends. And so we should. But what about love for the world we live in?

This earth sustains us, feeds us, gives us the water that we drink and the air we breathe. And it’s state affects us all.

Which means they are woven together, these loves. We want those we love to live in a world that is good, that they can enjoy, that sustains them. And in loving the earth we find ways to create that kind of world for them. And for those who will follow us all.

It is so strong and yet so fragile, this world. Seen from space, as the astronauts see it, it is a small blue marble whirling through the immensity of space, carrying us and all that makes life possible for us.

Down here we each see a much smaller view, circumscribed by our own horizons. We live in a smaller world within the greater, and act as our lives within that world suggest we should. When we think of the world we love, we think of the world we know.

And so our actions often seem insignificant to us.  After all we are each only one, and what effect can one person have? Yet there are so many of us that, paradoxically, it becomes more and more important what each one of us does. For the sum of our actions has a greater and greater effect.

So as you think about love I hope you will think about loving the world we share, and honoring it with thoughtfulness.  For the love of those you care about.

Winter Tales with Monet

It’s the middle of January, and the middle of one of those blasts of winter that make you remember why you love summer so much.  There doesn’t seem much to say about this – after all snow and blasts of cold air will come in their season.

I suppose that I could spend my time longing for summer, dreaming about warmth and long sunny days.

Or I could find my comfort somewhere else.  Perhaps in Monet’s paintings, which are so beautiful they could make a person love winter. At least for a while.

Thank you, Feishtica.