Preface
I reflect back six semesters ago, when I first began ADP, and I see myself as a person who had little direction and even less confidence. How I arrived at the decision to attend the Adult Degree Program is a mixture of both timing and circumstance. When I first heard of the ADP, I was working as a full-time staff artist for the U.S. Army Center of Military History in Washington D.C. My former supervisor, Peter Varisano, now an ADP and MFA graduate, was attending the program and told me about it. At first I was skeptical and to be honest, I thought the Adult Degree Program was a waste of money. "How could I possibly learn anything without a teacher, a classroom, and textbooks?" To further encourage my doubts about the ADP, I was attending an Art History 101 class and found the professor's teachings to be a great inspiration. She was an older person who would go through great lengths to make the class enjoyable and informative by being full of energy and enthusiasm and going way beyond the requirements for the class. Ancient art history was not a dust-laden era of the distant past, but a living quest that was part of the here-and-now. Armed with my satisfaction with this class, I was totally against the ADP experience. However, my attitude about traditional learning would soon change when I took the follow-up class at another campus.
Art History 102, if it could be called that, was a total contrast to the first art history class. The professor did nothing more than flash a series of slides on a screen and read off dates and artist's names to the class. There was no depth to his words. No excitement. No intrigue. The class was absolutely boring. After attending this class, I reconsidered Pete's offer to get me more information on the ADP. The total contrast of my art history classes sent a strong signal to me that I had no control over my education. Whenever I signed-up for a class, it was the at luck of the draw. I also wanted more detail from my education and to have the option to "dig deep" if I chose to. I didn't want to just punch a ticket. This need for control and specificity is what brought me to the ADP.
My first semester's study with Lois Eby entitled, A Study of the Human Form in Western Art, was an overwhelming first study for me. I put myself in a situation from which it was difficult to recover. Having the time-tested phrase "Trust the Process" fall on deaf ears, I went headfirst into a broad-based, unfocused study. Rather than narrowing the focus of my study to certain period of art, I was determined to cover all of Western art history in six months. The seasoned ADPer knows that this feat is not only impossible but also foolhardy to even ponder.
Three months into my study, I realized what the term "digging deep" meant. I had started the study with a plan to survey the human form in western art and after coming up for air I realized that I had read over ten books on Egyptian art, architecture, social life, language, writing, and religion. Of the many books on Egyptian art and culture, I believe Richard H. Wilkinson's Symbol & Magic in Egyptian Art was the most influential in the early parts of my study. Wilkinson described eight characteristics that most Egyptian artworks possess. Form, size, location, material, color, number, hieroglyph, action, and gesture that are present in many Egyptian artworks. Some characteristics are more obvious than others are and without having read Wilkinson's book, I would have overlooked many of them. In some aspects, the Egyptian artists were creating in a rigid social "code" that could only be read by them and select members of the priesthood. Having gained a thorough understanding of these eight characteristics, I felt that I had cracked that "code." The mysteries of Egyptian art faded after learning, not only its basic structure, but also how to read its hieroglyphs, identify its symbols, and recognize its goddess and god figures.
Once the barrier of mystery was gone, I was able to appreciate Egyptian art on a purely aesthetic level; however; this was only one part of a many-faceted study. I was in quite a bind with ten more books to read, more artwork to produce, and an artist's journal to write. All of this in two months! Regardless of the time-crunch, I did have a great feeling of satisfaction from what I had read so far and wanted to press on with my study of Egyptian culture, but I also felt that I was deviating from my original study plan.
I reluctantly moved forward to the human figure represented in Greek art and again found myself re-inspired in the same manner I had while reading about Egyptian art and culture. Two books that come to mind, when I think of this portion of my study are Carl Bluemel's Greek Sculptors at Work and Susan Woodford's Cambridge Introduction to the History of Art: Greece and Rome. Bluemel's Greek Sculptors at Work contained a wealth of information and insight into the working methods of ancient Greek sculptors. From Bluemel's book, I was able to learn the different tools and working methods used by the sculptors from each period of Greek art history. For example, I learned that early Greek sculptors, during the Archaic period, would carve a sculpture beginning with a very vague, geometric form and consistently revise the form until the details were complete. In contrast to this, a sculptor from the Hellenistic period would begin a sculpture from one side of the block and work through the block to the other side, completing details along the way. This is only one of the many insights I gained from Bluemel's book.
Susan Woodford's Cambridge Introduction to the History of Art: Greece and Rome was a helpful source in getting the bare bones of Greek and Roman art into a workable timeline. Before reading this book I knew very little about the numerously varied styles of Greek sculpture and how early Greek sculpture was a direct descendent of the Egyptian style. Woodford described the evolution of Greek sculpture and the Greek artist's progressive stages of solving the problem of form. By seeing these progressions together and explained, it was easier for me to understand the thinking of the numerous generations of Greek artists and how each generation moved closer to perfection of the human form. After seeing the progression of the human form presented in Woodford's book, I began to think about the progression that art history has taken between the abstract and realism.
What I found intriguing during this part of my first study is that realism in western art history had reached its first peak in Hellenistic sculpture. The first chapter of western art history began with the primitive cave paintings found at Lascaux and ended with Hellenistic sculpture. The second chapter begins with the illuminated manuscript and ends with the rigid art establishments in mid-nineteenth century Europe. Now the cycle is beginning again with modern and post-modern art. I have a strong feeling that art is going to gradually move toward another trend in high realism then back again to abstraction over the next thousand years.
The final part of my study involved the human form represented in Renaissance and Post-Renaissance art and ended with the sculptures of Rodin. Some of the artists' works that I looked at were Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Peter Paul Rubens, and Rodin. In addition to these various artists, I also read books on basic figure drawing. Some of the more influential figure drawing books that I read were Niclolaides' The Natural Way To Draw, Robert Beverly Hale's Master Class in Figure Drawing, and Nathan Goldstien's Figure Drawing. Each one of these books looks at figure drawing from a different angle. Nicolaides took a more expressive view of figure drawing while Hale took a more structured position on figure drawing. I found that after reading Hale's and Nicolaides books, my method of not only figure drawing, but also my drawing in general, had changed drastically. I was no longer drawing in small perfect parts and working each area to great detail, but was now concentrating on the whole image that I was building. I began to think of drawing as a unique type of construction that involves line, space, shape, form, value, and texture.
Goldstein's book I found to be most informative and well rounded. Goldstein looked at both sides of the argument presented by Nicolaides and Hale and brought them together. Goldstein has a theory that all successful figure drawings have to have four elements or factors as he calls them. These four factors are the structural, anatomical, expressive, and design factors. After reading this, I found myself questioning what my drawings were lacking and what each needed to be successful. I placed a strong emphasis on becoming a better observer and began a rigid, self-guided schedule of drawing sessions that filled three sketchbooks over the remainder of the study. Goldstein had such a strong influence on me that I caught myself judging old master drawings at the National Gallery, which is something that would've been unusual for me. Masters are master and everything they do is good, isn't it?
My second study, also with Lois Eby, was entitled, French Impressionism: An Exploration of Impressionist Painters, the Science of Color, and Literature of the Impressionist Period. This study would have to be the study that really captured my interest and got me totally involved in the ADP process. I found that the more I read into the lives of the Impressionist painters, the more I wanted to know. I won't hesitate to say that my other studies were like this, but for some reason, this study of the Impressionists was unique and special. I believe part my emphasis on this study came from the feeling that I was able to break through to a new level of painting.
The books that I found most informative and intimate about the Impressionist period were Bernard Denvir's The Impressionists at First Hand, Richard Kendall's Degas, by Himself, Denis Rouart's Degas: In Search of His Technique, and Richard Thompson's The Private Degas. It is quite obvious that my interest in Degas grew as the study grew. I found in Degas' work a unique quality of bridging the gap between past art and art of the twentieth century. After reading many books on Degas' ideas on art, working methods, and personality, I can say that he is an artist that should not be considered an Impressionist. It is a matter of timing and association that he came to be labeled as an Impressionist. In Thompson's The Private Degas he says that, "Degas believed that any serious artist should have a deep and sympathetic understanding of earlier art, and would reap its full benefits through copying" (9). Degas stated late in his life that "One must copy and recopy the masters, and it is only haven given every proof of being a good copyist that permission could reasonably be given to paint a radish from life" (9). To say this, especially after the success that he had during his lifetime, tells of Degas strong respect for the masters and that his working methods were based on rigid and continuous training. Unlike other Impressionists who painted directly from life outdoors, Degas almost entirely worked indoors from rough sketches and drawings.
I found, after studying Degas life and work, that my own working methods became more serious and introspective. Before this study, I just worked without regard or reflection as to where my work was going. After the study, I found that everything that I produced was given many hours of thought and preparation. I found myself constantly thinking about past, in-process, and future works even while I was not in my studio. I believe that this intimate look into Degas life charged my own life and work.
In addition to Degas, I also looked closely at the work of Monet, Renoir, and Pissarro. Of these three, I found Pissaro to be the most interesting. There is a period of his life, described in Richard Brettell's The Impressionists and the City: Pissarro's Series Paintings, that I find amazing and awe-inspiring. Between 1893 and 1903, Pissaro did a series of city-scapes of Paris and surrounding cities and what is astounding is the amount of work he produced during this ten year period. Over eight hundred works are attributed to the artist during this time. His working methods may have been similar to Monet's, however; his goals were entirely different when producing these numerous series of cityscapes. Unlike Monet who, by producing a series of paintings, tried to capture the effect of changing light on a subject, Pissarro wanted to capture the transitional French society and how people changed the mood of an artwork. Many of Pissarro's paintings during this period were painted from a high point of view, separate from the crowds of people below. By painting from this vantagepoint, the people turned into large masses of color and texture that changed drastically between each painting.
Becoming inspired by Pissarro and the other Impressionist, I began to slowly wean myself away from relying on the photograph for many of my paintings and started to go out to many locations near my home to paint. I produced a series of paintings from a nearby river that showed the effects of the changing seasons. What was most thrilling about this study was that I was becoming familiar with what painting is all about. I was no longer copying another person's work or painting from a photo produced from a camera. I was painting what I saw and felt. The images that I was producing were my images unaided by photography. I had finally divided painting down to its smallest denominator. The subject, the paint, the canvas, and me. My painting had finally become unique and I was developing my own voice.
With the thought of developing my own voice, I began to look into the spiritual aspects of my art. This became the focus of my third study that is rightfully titled, The Spiritual in Art: The Act of Creating. This study was with my second advisor, Rhoda Carroll. I wanted from this study the answer to questions such as, "Why do I paint? What is it that really inspires me about art? How do I create artwork that is in its purest form"? These were questions that I had been mulling over for quite some time, and during the third semester I'd found a book by Peter London titled No More Second-Hand Art that ignited a huge fire under me. After reading this book, I questioned my own existence as an artist. London took everything that I was comfortable with as an artist and tossed it out the window. Realism, copying, training, style, subject were all tossed out like yesterday's trash. He had me questioning what was important to me as an artist, why I was painting, where my life would be without painting. My initial questions seemed irrelevant compared to the questions that London provoked in me. How do I fit into life as an artist? Are my life and my art together or are they separate? Is there meaning in my art that is important on both a personal level and a social level? Am I responsive to my needs and the collective needs of others as I create? These are just a few of the questions that London coerced me to ask myself. This book was and will always be an inspiration because it makes me re-evaluate not only my art, but also my life and how I fit into the "big picture" as an artist.
Other books that I read during my third semester were Anna Held Audette's The Blank Canvas: Inviting the Muse, Marion Milner's On Not Being Able to Paint, and Stephen Nachmanovitch's Free Play. I found these to be a good supplement to London's book because they described the creative in greater detail than London. London described the "big picture" of art while these authors described it from a struggling artist's viewpoint. By reading books on the creative process, I found my work taking on a freer look. My methods of working were becoming quite unorthodox by my old standards. I began working in mixed media using sheet metal, nails, metal wire, and screen and attaching these various elements to my canvases. It was a rewarding experience to move from a tightly realistic style to a totally abstract style free of subject matter.
In addition to these books, I also read books on various twentieth century artists to include: James Lord's A Giacometti Portrait, Jack Flam's Matisse on Art, Dore Ashton's Picasso on Art, and Wassilly Kandinski's Concerning the Spiritual in Art. All of these books confirmed what London, and the other authors mentioned, wrote in their books. I found myself moving towards purer, freer modes of expression. I was becoming aware that the methods that I use to create a piece of art are just as, if not more, important than the artwork itself. If I could sum the findings of this semester in a phrase, it would be, "Process, not product, is the key to art." Ending the semester on a newly found notion of "product over process" would not have been a good idea for me. I was totally overwhelmed by my new findings and wanted to explore more. The findings of last semester had led me to personal acceptance of my art regardless of style, media, size, or subject. In contrast to this, I also felt uneasy about my findings during the last semester. The safe confines or boundaries of realism were gone now. There was nothing for me to cling to in my art that was a safe haven. The feeling of confidence and comfort in my art were totally replaced with unease and the big question, "What's next?"
The beginning of my next study entitled, My Life: A Story in Art, was a continuation of the third semester's findings. Again, I had Rhoda Carroll as an advisor, which made the transition to this new study easier. With this new study, instead of painting totally free of subject matter, I wanted to paint the inspirations of my life. I wanted to paint my surroundings and through my art show a personal celebration of life. I figured the best way to start was with self-portraits and move outwards towards family and friends as subject matter. I began by studying the realist movement that included artist such as Gustave Courbet and Edward Manet. I also studied American realists such as Edward Hopper, Robert Henri, and John Sloan. About two months into the study, I went to an exhibition of Victorian Art at the National Gallery of Art. In the exhibition, there was an overwhelming amount of Pre-Raphaelite art shown. I immediately became attached to the Pre-Raphaelite movement and wanted to know all I could about the artists behind the beautiful works I had witnessed. Many of the books that I read on the Pre-Raphaelites were survey books that covered the group in general. After about a month of studying them, I began to see a theme develop in their work, in which they were painting purely from literature, fantasy, and dreams. This was going totally against what my study plan dictated, but I went with it anyway and moved gradually towards books on dreams, and meditation to include James Hall's Jungian Dream Interpretation, and Robert Bosnak's A Little Course in Dreams.
As I drifted from subject to subject I painfully discovered that there was not a focus to this study. I was studying everything from painting dream interpretations to the art of the Pre-Raphaelites. In addition to this, I had to attend a two-month army leadership school that forced me to withdraw and take a leave of absence from the study. When I returned to the residency a year-and-a-half later and to a new group to present my material, I felt totally disconnected to the entire study. The beginnings of the study felt so far away and without meaning while the end of the study felt totally hollow and without feeling.
The one success during that disjointed semester however is that I did produce some fantastic images from dreams and my imagination. Painting from dreams was a totally new area for me, and one that I faced with apprehension and, in some cases, fear. I had many vivid dreams in the past and found that I could recall them in detail without difficulty. I began to record my dreams in a visual sketchbook that I kept at the bedside. One night for example, at about three in the morning, I awoke from a dream and immediately took my sketchbook out to the dining room table to draw. Bleary-eyed and half-asleep, I filled the entire sketchbook with drawings of a nude woman in the fetal position on a worn wooden floor with an infant lying above her head. They were in a crumbling, dilapidated cabin in the middle of nowhere. The walls were mildew-stained with patches of worn wallpaper torn away. Along the floor piles of rubbish and decay lies spread throughout the room. In spite of their surroundings, both the infant and the woman were clean and had a glow to them. I ended up staying awake the rest of the evening drawing and redrawing this woman and child. The image came easily and unfailingly. Where these images came from I have no idea, but it was a powerful image that I can recall without difficulty. Aside from the lack of focus and break in my fourth study, I can say that it was a success. One thing that I did gain from the study is that I can draw images from dreams and that dreams are a powerful source of expression.
My fifth study, with Gail Wheeler, was a new experience with an entirely new group, new advisor, new attitude, and new start that ironically involved a continuation of an old love for the Pre-Raphaelites. In this study, I wanted to become immersed in the literature and poetry that the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood was reading at the time of their greatest creations. This led me to read the poetry of Lord Alfred Tennyson, John Keats, and Dante. In addition to reading poetry that inspired the Pre-Raphaeiltes, I also read journals and letters by the artists themselves. I was able to find an online version of the literary magazine written by the Pre-Raphaelites called The Germ that was published at the beginning of their movement in 1848. This magazine gave me a wealth of information into the views and statements made by the Pre-Raphaelites. In the first issue, they had printed a manifesto laying the groundwork for their movement in the arts of nineteenth century England. I became very informed of the PRB through the writings of John Ruskin. I think my interest in the Pre-Raphaelites stems from the same area as my interest in ancient Egypt. There is a certain mystery about the entire movement that I'm drawn to and I feel that if I find out more about them, I'll find out more about myself. I never considered myself a very literary person, but found great enjoyment in reading the poems of Dante, Keats, and Tennyson. What I found fascinating about these poets is that the story lines in many of their works could be tailored to issues that are influential in today's society. In a metaphorical way, these poets were writing about life and I think this is where my interest in painting from my own life comes from.
My sixth and culminating study, also with Gail Wheeler as my faculty advisor, was a continuation of the urge to paint from life from my last semester. My urge to paint from life was heightened at the end of last semester by a painting class that I attended. On one occasion during the class, a woman brought in an oil portrait that she had painted of her daughter. What I found interesting in this portrait was that in some ways it was not a portrait at all, but a scene from her everyday life. The painting showed a young teenage girl, sitting on a sofa, watching television. What was remarkable about the painting was that it did not look posed or staged, but it had an air of spontaneity. It was interesting because in that painting, I believe the woman made an everyday event into art. She had taken the commonplace in her own life and boosted it into art, something unique and with substance. The painting was a celebration of both her and her daughter's lives. Influenced by her work, I wanted to attempt to paint family with the same idea of turning the everyday events in my family's lives into art. I was familiar with this stream of genre painting from my previous study of the Impressionists who were influenced by the Realists, but had never attempted it for myself. In addition to this, I wanted to establish, through painting, a better relationship with what family I had. I hadn't been in contact with my biological family in over ten years and the family that I had was mainly my wife's family and the family of my friend Rob, who took me in after my father passed away. I thought that my painting for this study might bring me closer to them.
Beginning with this idea in mind, I sought after artists who had painted family members and close friends during their careers. Some artists that came to mind were John Singer Sargent, Mary Cassatt, Manet, and Rembrandt. I was already familiar with these artists' works before, but had never studied their portraiture in detail. Overall, this study was divided into four areas. The first area contained study primarily toward Sargent and his portraiture. In the second area, I moved toward Mary Cassatt and her portrayal of family, infants, and images of women and how they influenced my own painting and views of my own family. The third area was dominated by the color theories of Robert Henri and experimentation with my own color. The last and final area contained a mixture of studying Chuck Close's works along with a return to Sargent.
In closing, I'd like to mention that over the course of my six semesters at ADP I tried to direct every study towards art. During those six studies, I can see the tremendous yet gradual growth in my work. I don't view myself as an amateur artist any longer, but as serious artist who has invested a lot of time, emotion, money, and sweat into my work and I'm ready move out on my own away from the ADP. I'm not sure if I'm ready to go on for my master's degree right now, but I have looked into attending the Master of Fine Arts program at Vermont College. The work that I've done during my studies is only the foundation to a lifelong study of art for me. My ultimate goal is to become, with the knowledge that I've gained during my studies in the ADP, a college art teacher.