a no good rotten day

Today I made the painful choice to forgo time in the studio in order to take care of some business. I really hope it was worth it. Because now it is dinner time, and I feel... lonely. Which is a surprise. I didn't think that loneliness would be the end result of 8 hours of mind-numbing busy work, but it was, and maybe it shouldn't be a surprise. Painting does many things for me,  serves many purposes, but I have also made the point that the paintings themselves become -- um... well ones to hang around with, studio mates of a sort.  And I missed hanging out with my mates today. I will wait until Friday for my next studio day, and hope nothing will get in the way of that.

pale view of ordinary things, 2010

  

first post: gesture? really?

The problem with starting a blog is wishing you had started it six months ago. Or even six weeks ago. I already feel hopelessly behind.  But this is my start. I have started.

The title. Well, Mary Addison Hackett, a really terrific painter, already has a blog with the word process in it, so I can't use "process" because that would be derivative (or actually, copying) even though I love the idea of process.  Gesture will have to do because gesture has a meaning for both art and psychoanalysis, my two fields of work and interest.


gesture: quick drawing that capture energy and movement of a pose
gestural: vigorous application of paint and expressive brushwork
spontaneous gesture (Donald Winnicott): the baby's true self gesture toward something needed (thanks to Robert Stolorow for this succinct definition)