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The Artist’s
Almanac
August 2005
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Summer – the handmaid of the
poor.
- Anonymous
This is the season of
meatless meals. With fresh corn, tomatoes, eggplant, squash, green
beans, okra, stewed apples, cabbage and new potatoes, neither table
nor diners have space for meat. Watermelons and peaches are
abundant. The ancient man stirs within, and we celebrate the season
of plenty by fattening ourselves against the dark seasons of want.
Hurricane Dennis broke
the drought with a week of cool clouds and rain. Yesterday I picked
the first figs and honeysweet pears, and I believe there will be a
second hay crop by the end of this month. The trees celebrate as
well, blousing themselves with clouds of green.
This rich verdure
shortens our views to our own backyards and gardens. I remember one
gardener, famed for his huge August watermelons, who was prosecuting
a neighbor boy for stealing them in the night.
“You say it was at
midnight and you identified this lad here,” asked the defense
attorney. “Sir, just how far could you see in the middle of the
night?”
“Well, I could see the
moon. How far is that?”
Clouds are the angels
of August. John Ruskin calls them the only part of nature not
altered by man. Even on the sultriest days we watch thunderheads
parading far horizons and call our cousins to see if they got rain.
Rain has solved the
stagnant ponds and refreshed the creek. Bridges are the perfect
vantage for a summer’s afternoon of watching creek perch finning in
the current, studying the shoals of minnows at the head of the pool.
A stream is a perfect
type of time. Perhaps that is the subject of my wife’s meditation
pictured here in Crosscurrents. Art is subject to the viewer’s own
interpretation - the viewer is allowed to participate in the
creative process. Different analysts might interpret the missing
plank in all sorts of metaphorical or psychological ways never
intended by the artist.
The artist takes a
more practical view. The bridge only implies a stream; the missing
board shows it. Cover the opening and see the loss of depth and
dimension in the picture when the gurgling stream is no longer
visible.
Most of us are neither
rich nor poor. The richest are poor in some things the poor are rich
in, and the poor imagine that winning the lottery would solve every
imaginable problem. Only the saints are free of envy.
A wise friend once
observed to me that in judging whether a man was successful we first
needed to understand what he intended.
I met Claudia my
junior year in High School at the Beta Club Convention. When I first
danced with her I felt dizzy, and we talked the night away in the
lobby of the Hermitage Hotel. By the time we finished breakfast the
next morning, my heart was sealed by intention.
We are further down
the stream today. This August we celebrate our first fifty years
together, successful, by the grace of God, beyond all the dreams and
all the intentions of youth.
Coming Events
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September 17, Talk
before Williamson County Writers Group on Painting and Writing,
Williamson County Library, Franklin, TN
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November 4th Opening
Reception for Small Treasures, Art Sumner Annual Show at
Winchester Cottage Gallery, 154 South Water St. Gallatin
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November 11th
Opening Reception for Southern Light Artists Four-Man Show, Auld
Alliance Gallery, Westgate Shopping Center, 6109 Highway 100,
Belle Meade
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December 2-4, Fine
Art In Brentwood Show and Sale, Brentwood Academy, Brentwood
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