A cove not easily reached. A wild country. The government here stalks on four paws and the cities are made of gray sticks full of poison. And life goes on, even off the grid.
Off the Grid
Bobcats Don’t Have Tails
For this one, I wanted to return to the scene of the first painting, I felt there was something more to see without trying to get the entire scene all the way to that white mountain. And I was right. As soon as I stopped to set up the easel, I looked back on the path I’d just walked up and about 20 yards back there was a wild cat on the path. Not a big one. I knew they saw a lot of bobcats here, so without thinking I assumed that’s what it was. And of course I had to paint it so I watched it closely; thick paws, big head, and a big fat tail. Not very big, but big enough that I was relieved when it showed no interest in me. Recorded as remembered. Then came the puzzle in hindsight… bobcats don’t have tails. At least not usually. Was it a small mountain lion? Did I just make it up in my head? It wasn’t solved until my host explained they often have bobcats come up to their house and one in particular always seemed interested in their cat, not threatening, just curious through the glass. When their cat grew ill and passed away recently this bobcat was there sitting beside the glass, a calm presence. My hosts puzzled over this bobcat too, because it had… wait for it… an unusually long tail. Feline vindication. Feels pretty good. Thought my eyes and mind had failed me for a minute there.
This Side of the Cactus
A lonely cypress stands on this ridge, holding on for dear life through every storm and gale it’s seen, and it’s seen a lot of them. It’s getting a good whipping from the north wind right now as I paint this, its roots holding firm and its muscular bows holding back the wind for myself and this happy little cactus patch looking down on one of the most beautiful beaches in all of California. One of the most photographed beaches in all the world, but you wouldn’t know it from here. Nobody goes here. It’s off limits. Private. One jogger wandered up the path while I stood here with my host, and she sent him right back down the hill, thwarting his plan to jog the ridge over to the next state park. Big Sur is a territorial place. Always has been. There’s a lot of it that I’d love to see one day, but find myself on the wrong side of the cactus. On this day though, it was enough to just be out of the wind on this side of the tree, and on this side of the cactus for a change.
She Called Off the Dogs
I only had to walk about a mile and a half down a steep and private dirt road to get to this vantage point of a beach everyone knows, but few have seen from this angle. About half way down, I was greeted by friendly dogs doing their best to act really unfriendly to strangers with funny backpacks walking down their roads. Good dogs. There was a clear point in the road that they did not want me to pass. Step over the line, bark and growl, step back, quiet, repeat as desired. Contemplating the options and the steep hike back up the road, I’d have to just risk it. Right about when I’d worked up the nerve to step over their line and keep walking I heard a voice from behind the fence down the road. She Called Off the Dogs.
Mountain of Mien Mo
Titled after Kerouac’s name for this mountain, a looming white peak visible from the canyon beneath the bridge where Kerouac stayed and wrote his novel, and also visible from this ridge a good distance down the coast. This peak is full of stories. Creation stories. Secret caves stories. Lost civilization stories. Mysterious dark figure stories. Get rich quick stories. Get rich slow stories. Lose everything stories. Find everything stories. Everyone has their own mountain to climb or else cower in fear beneath it. Onward. All of us! Onward.
22 Miles to Go
A bright morning and a fine start to the last road trip I took before everything got put on hold in 2020. In spite of how the title makes it sound, I certainly did not have another 22 miles to go neither by car nor on foot. It was a short walk from the road and back to paint this one and I was heading another 50 miles or so to Big Sur after this. The 22 mile reference has to do with the distance across the bay to the far-off blue ridge of land in the background, and the collector I painted this for who often paddles that 22 mile crossing for fun. That blows my mind. I get winded just paddling out to a lineup on a chest high day. I guess I will always have another 22 miles to go.
The End of Love
We knew things were about to get interesting, news of the pandemic was just ramping up in February. And here I was in Tourist Central, painting one of Monterey’s iconic focal points. We were not social distancing. We were in each other’s faces, breathing each other’s breath, like lovers but still strangers from all different parts of the world. The sun was setting and things were about to change. The Distance was about to come to us all – that new cold distance where fear would become an illegitimate surrogate for love.
For Those with Ears to Hear
This piece gets personal for me. It’s a prominent headland on a stretch of California’s coast that always reminds me of my grandparents who moved somewhere behind those mountains on the right when I was about 10 years old. We’d go visit them occasionally, always bummed that they didn’t have a TV or “anything to do”. We always thought it would be so boring. Looking back, those times with my brother, sister, and cousins where some of the best times I can remember from my childhood. I don’t remember actually being bored even once, we spent the whole time outside exploring, playing, fighting, dodging trouble the best we could. Real life. Our lives. When my grandpa passed away I was about 16 years old. To this day when I think of him (and my grandmother as well) I think of the wisdom of their generation and how once a generation passes, their particular wisdom passes along with them. Some of it is passed down to the next generation of course, but some is sadly gone forever. When I encounter whales in the ocean I have a similar feeling about them- that they have a particular wisdom- one that is beyond our understanding, but also one that could sadly pass from existence one day, should the last of the whales spout its final breath. This particular headland was once a prime spot for hunting whales, so I included one in the painting beneath those mountains on the right, an homage to the wisdom of my grandfather who breathed his last breath in his sleep just beyond that hill nearly 30 years ago. We love you, grandpa.
The Blessing of the Fleet
Who of us isn’t a ship about to leave harbor?
When the anchor is pulled
We’ll sail into a new tomorrow
As dark and unknowable
As the deep
Who of us isn’t a ship on the ocean?
Lines cast and waiting
To bring in a harvest
To feed the world
Maybe today
Who of us isn’t a ship out to sea?
Sinkable
Vulnerable
Driving against the storm
Or being driven further from shore
Who of us isn’t out there?
No land in sight
Bound to consequences
Of our own decisions
While provisions run low
The sailors in the street
And every pirate that you meet
Every one and all alike
Need the blessing of the fleet
An Invitation
I read the invitation on the last falling leaves of our apple tree.
Fall days like this are the best.“Come as you are” is all it said.So we went.Barefoot and happy.Soon enough I found myself standing on the wet sand while painting this one as this shaded creek flowed out to sea around and beneath my feet, pulling no small part of my life-force from my frozen soles and out to sea with it.Next time I get invited to this party, I’m gonna bring boots.Just in case.
Rise and Shine
Painted this one on location close to home on a November morning back in 2019. It was one of those days we don’t get very often here, perfect conditions, no wind, crystal clear… just not quite clear enough to see what was about to go down in a few short months.
When I look at my paintings from these days it’s like remembering a different version of myself, stirring a strange nostalgia for simpler troubles before the world turned upside down with disruption.
But the truth is that on this clear morning here in 2021 the light still fills the air around us.
Time to get moving.
The SLO Road | 2019
Chromatic Water Theory XIII: Abstract Jazz
Painted partially live at the Basement in Arcata, then finished recently for the Redwood Coast Music Festival.
It’s been a ton of fun creating artwork for the festival, and at the festival as well. This Chromatic Water Theory series was literally born in the presence of world class jazz musicians performing in the Morris Graves Museum of Art in Eureka. The first few pieces I did for the official festival artwork included different elements, but as I painted live as the jazz acts rotated throughout the days and nights of the festival a simpler theme emerged- a visual combination of musical instruments and moving water.
I can’t think of too many manifestations of rhythm in nature as elemental and profound as the breaking of waves on a shoreline. Sure there’s sound waves, light waves, all sorts of wave phenomenon in nature, but water waves are special in that they are scaled in space and time just perfectly for human interaction. We can ride one at a time, or get pounded by one at a time if riding them isn’t your thing (or even if it is). We can experience one water wave as a singular entity. Not so with sound waves, or light waves.Perhaps even more than their rhythms, it’s the ability to move us physically that causes me to associate them with music. But I don’t want to make too much of it or overthink it, because like music, these paintings are just fun and feel so right.
Previous pieces from the series have focused on piano keys, drums, and various stringed instruments. The brass and woodwind instruments- saxophones, tubas, clarinets all seemed so foreign to my sensibilities. I can reference something as simple as a vibrating string and feel like I’ve done enough to evoke a guitar, but these alien instruments, full of tubes, and levers, and knobs, and who-knows-what- how do you distill one of those to a simple element? I have no answer. Maybe a better artist could do so effectively but the task eluded me, so I just went with the whole enchilada… er, saxophone, front and center. The keys beneath and the drum behind rounded out a nice trio. So there you have it
And also a poem…
When the music ends⠀
The lights go on⠀
And everyone slowly leaves⠀
Yet somehow the room is strangely dim⠀
Somehow darker than it was before⠀
When the house lights were off⠀
And the music filled the spaces⠀
Between the empty glasses ⠀
That are now also slowly leaving⠀
White rings on the wood tables⠀
As we hum to ourselves ⠀
And dissolve back into the cold night air⠀
And warm beds that await⠀
⠀
If we’d known then⠀
That the music would end in this way⠀
We’d have stayed all night long⠀
Played all night long⠀
And drank the bar dry⠀
Letting the jazz⠀
Lead the revolution⠀
Until they came with lights blazing⠀
To pry the saxophones and drumsticks⠀
From our cold dead hands⠀
To confiscate the pianos⠀
And abolish this beautiful night⠀
⠀
So now we sit in the quiet darkness⠀
Of a bright winter day⠀
Humming sad tunes to ourselves⠀
That we’ll later play softly ⠀
On our contraband pianos⠀
Sitting in our empty rooms⠀
With the lights off⠀
Because everyone knows⠀
The piano is just a medicine cabinet⠀
And the music will never end⠀
A Man Among Giants… and Also His Cat
Over 20 years ago I read a story in the local press about an artist that would spend weeks on end out in the high mountain backcountry, living out of tent and cave, painting daily. Surviving snow and rock and ice and fire. On his return he’d see civilization’s blur of concrete and impatience through eyes made clear in the thin mountain air. He’d also return with 38 paintings. On his back. And that would just be one pack. He’d have another pack full of camp gear that he’d haul around in a game of alpine leap frog as he juggled these two packs all over the peaks and valleys of the country he loved.
I’ve never been more inspired by any artist’s commitment. Oh, you paint in the howling wind? Fun. Oh, you paint every day like a good devotee to the religion you’ve built around art in your mind? Bless you, my child. Oh, you paint large canvases outdoors, much larger than most plein air painters would attempt? Go big or go home, as they say. Those are all great, but get back to me when you’ve gone on a solo painting trip for a month on foot in the wilderness and have to wait out a blizzard in a bear’s cave punching holes in the snowpack to breathe as you shiver out the storm surrounded by half-finished paintings from the warmer, sunnier days that preceded this long dark day that could have held 4 or 5 ordinary days within it’s length*. That is the bar that has been set. When it comes to commitment, none of us, and I mean none of us, are Ken Jarvela. (Except Ken… so I guess one of us is Ken Jarvela. Hi Ken!)
I found Ken on a warm October day back in 2019 surrounded by giant old growth redwoods, working on a 24″ x 60″ panel from the road beside his car, watched by his cat, Charlie Wing Wang (may he rest in peace). Very few painters can make sense of these dense forest scenes and actually make them work, but Ken is truly a master. What was there to do? I was just another cat watching so I created my own cat’s-eye-view of Ken Jarvela, a man among giants.
Between the Music and the Beer
This was also a live painting done just recently at a benefit for a local nonprofit called Friends of the Dunes. I’ve been painting at their annual wine-sipping event for the last 6 years or so and always have a good time. This day was no different, but it was a bright sunny day, unlike some years, and I was supposed to set up and paint outside. I’d prefer to have been in the shade, but all the tents were sorta spoken for, so what was I to do? The obvious thing of course- wedge myself right in between the live music tent and the beer tent. I may not be smart, but I’m no dummy. Good times once again.
A Fresh Perspective
Long straight sandy beaches are a lifelong nemesis when it comes to composing a scene that holds my interest long enough to see a painting through. Down on the beach it’s all just sand and sky with that little strip of compressed sea level ocean. Aargh. Get me up on a hill. Give me a little more earth, a little more ocean, a little more of everything and a little less sky. Nothing against the heavens, I’ll be heading there soon enough, but for now my feet are still planted firm in the clay. Give me a beer and a sandwich. Give me anything at all, just give me a fresh perspective please.
Deep Calls to Deep
“The only people for me are the mad ones: the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who… burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow Roman candles.” ⠀
-Jack Kerouac, American Poet and Novelist (1922-1969)⠀
Printed and taped on my father’s fridge by my sister (1968-2014)⠀
⠀
Ok, hold on tight… ⠀
⠀
Enter Tom Curren, stage right, guitar in hand, gliding across an old Persian rug on roller skates. The same rug on which I stood painting live to his music after a surf festival just north of San Francisco. The same rug on which just a few hours earlier I nervously met Tom backstage behind a translucent screen where Jason Baffa’s film Bella Vita played (the part where Chris Del Moro paints a mural in Italy). The same rug that once belonged to Jerry Garcia, who was greatly influenced by Kerouac, and who also once laid his hands on my own mother’s womb in Golden Gate Park in 1969 and blessed my unborn sister who went on to live a fabulous Roman candle of a life and introduced me to Kerouac’s work before cancer extinguished her visible flames. ⠀
⠀
Bella Vita. Although my first encounter with the film proved deeply significant, I had no way to know just how far that magic carpet we stood on was going to take me in just a few years. If Jason Baffa hadn’t made that film about Chris Del Moro returning to Italy, Dwight Harrington wouldn’t have seen it and been immediately inspired to plan his return trip, catching me up in his slipstream. ⠀
⠀
Shortly after Bella Vita was released, Chris asked me to do a painting up in the hills near his home in California. I arrived with friends and we descended into Chris’s world like characters from a Kerouac novel and proceeded to hoot and holler and drink the afternoon right into evening, resulting in a rather questionable painting. He was gracious, but I knew I’d make it up to him one day. ⠀
⠀
Today was the day. I set up the easel in front of his mural in Italy and painted the scene in plein air. A gift for a friend. ⠀
⠀
Graffiti on the wall simply read, “READ KEROUAC.” Just two words, but oh how they burned, burned, burned…
La Tavola
As the Wheel Turns
End of the Rose
Cloud Theory
Waters Above
The Father, the Son, and a Very Still Wind
Ballad of a Crystal Man
Architecture, As a Weapon
