SPIRIT can be an adjective, defining ROCKS. Or, it can be a noun, and ROCKS a verb.
Breaking from the narrative thread of last year, I returned to direct visual and visceral contact with living subject matter. Seeing has always been bedrock for me, and the rock outcroppings of Abiquiu were calling. Painting from life helps me see what is not visible to me when I am simply looking, and it puts me in touch with the vibrations of my subject. It takes me out of my mind and into the energy field, and the optical impressions in my eyes.
Cerrito Blanco offered itself in the immensity of space around it, that included me. When I set up to paint in close proximity to Kitchen Rock, I felt we were in a more intimate conversation. I addressed her, ‘speak to me in your language’. After I left the site, I felt I had been literally shaken in my core all day.
The small rocks, were also collected in Abiquiu. When I brought them to my studio to paint, it was not their solid weight that struck me most, but their shimmering immateriality. They seemed not to have firm edges as I expected. Enlarging them suggested outer space to me, the loneliness of planets. I chose to carry the blue skies, the visible ether, which are a given in the landscapes, into the other images, for continuity, and it gives presence to all of the subjects in these paintings.
The portraits I wanted to paint from behind, to connect with the hidden spirit that goes with us everywhere, guilelessly. We consciously put our faces forward, and our backs are mystery to us. Our backs retain innocence and vulnerability, while bearing scars and strength of experience. With our backs we shoulder burdens and responsibilities. We feel abandoned when someone turns their back on us, we associate strength or weakness with our spine. I was surprised at how our backs flush and fade, in much the same way our faces do, and in a more subtle demonstration of what octopi and other undersea creatures do. The changing colors and shades were far more dramatic than I expected, and impossible to paint.
Rushing to get somewhere, I was stopped in my tracks coming upon the back of San Miguel Chapel, the Oldest Church. I knew instantly I had to come back and paint it for this show. No matter how often it is painted, it cannot be reduced to cliche. It belongs with backs and rocks. So on the hottest days, I went there, and made this sketch, with tourists swarming. Its windowless, doorless hulk, reinforced and strengthened in any way necessary, seemed potent with the past, and full of potential – stuffed with spirit rocks.
