Chloe's
Clown! A strange name for a painting of an English fishing village.
There is an explanation. It all started when I complained to Suzanne
that my art work was "too uptight". I wanted to move away from
realism and into a more fluid style, I longed for my brush to
glide across the canvas with wild abandon.
And
so my oracle, my advisor, my solver of problems, Suzanne, suggested
that I try to reach the child in me. That sounded great to me.
I love to play. Following Suzanne's advice I thought about the
child in me. Her name was Chloe.
The
earliest memories I have of my own childhood were of a big box
of crayons and a stack of coloring books, companions that would
follow me for years, until I learned to do my own drawing. So....I
gave Chloe, who happened to be two years old, a box of crayons.
She began scribbling with a fury. "No, Chloe," I said, "you must
stay within the lines."
Wait!!!!!!!!!!!
Maybe
that was my trouble, I always stayed within the lines. I always
followed the rules. Maybe I should be just like Chloe. So we colored
together, me and the child within me. We made upside-down houses
that barely balanced on their chimneys, we colored balls that
held upside-down clowns rolling around. It was a fun afternoon,
coloring and drawing with the child in me. I like being little!
A
few days later I began a painting of Robin Hood's Bay, a fishing
village in England on the coast of the North Sea. After hours
of blocking in colors, I backed across the room to get a faraway
look to see if the colors actually were working right. I have
a strong sense of color and I cringe at two colors that don't
quite mix, two color's that the world's greatest scientists could
probably not perceive a difference in. But "I feel" the infinitesimal
difference and I have to repaint over an over again until I hit
exactly the right vibration. The one that goes, "Oh, yea."
When
I looked from across the room I saw what I had not seen when I
was so close. There was a clown-Chloe's clown! I stood there and
stared. Where did it come from? I was painting houses and a landscape,
no clowns, not even a single human being. .
The
clown is not quite visible in the final painting, since it appeared
when the painting was about one third finished and a lot of colors
were added later. The bushes at the bottom left of the diagonal
landscape were two big clown feet. The landscape that spread through
the lower middle made the outstretched arms, the houses made the
head, the finger of the right hand was bent. A clown that just
appeared from paint. I had no choice for a title, the painting
WAS Chloe's Clown.
The
clown did add something to my feelings about the painting. It
captured the fun, the silliness, the lightness, the feeling of
well being, that I had felt as I walked through the village.
When
something appears in a painting by accident, perhaps there is
a reason. And unlike Abstract Expressionist, Jackson Pollock,
who threw a bucket of paint on his canvas when someone suggested
there was an animal, then he said, "Now there ain't no more animal."
I prefer to let my visitors stay.
Michelangelo,
the famous 15th century sculptor and painter of the Sistine Chapel,
said that it was his job to release the figure out of stone. Everyone
told him that one particular stone he was working on was faulty
and should not be used. Michelangelo kept on working and out of
that stone came David, one of the most prized statues in the entire
history of art. In the same way that what is in a stone will come
out, what is in shape and color will appear on the canvas....all
by itself....uninvited. Michelangelo released David from the stone.
I let out Chloe's Clown.
