CONTEMPORARY EXPLORER

Painting has never been easy for me. So many different techniques, skills, colors and materials. This is not to mention the subject of what to paint in the first place or the style of you want to pursue. Still with all these things said, I love it when I have brush in hand and paint on a canvas. It completely absorbs me. The rest of the world is shut off for a while as colors blend and images emerge. I have painted now for several years. No real masterpieces have emerged, but the efforts have brought many rewards of satisfaction.  So many things in life don’t yield a finished product or results. So much in the world seems to hold such a high standard. You ask yourself why even try and do something? The work you do, the art you try and your accomplishments stand against all that. Results good and not so good, but always something you can hold in your hands and say I did it. Reason enough to clean your brushes and try again. As with all endeavors, it’s good to...

Often overlooked is one of the most important business tools for success, forgiving yourself. There are times when you make mistakes, bad decisions, underperform or hurt others. These failures are a normal part of life and striving to be successful.  In business, the repercussions of failures are swift. Clients are lost, partnerships broken, careers hurt and prestige damaged. If you allow them, they can pile up like wrecked cars in your mind. They affect your performance moving forward and can haunt you far after you retire.  It’s important to learn the art of forgiving yourself. Doing so, frees you to move forward and build new bridges for success. How to forgive yourself is a learned skill. There is much that has been written about this. Here are some of those suggestions together with my thoughts.  Clear the Debris:   Peel away the circumstances, other people involved and emotions from the event. Realize that in the end analysis, the failure was...

Business Parks are lonely places where work is forced out during the week. They are away from the city, a world unto themselves leaving little room for the mind to wander anyplace but the business of profit. On weekends they take on an eerie quiet. An enigmatic blend of aloneness and peace. The empty company event tent, the left over tools of business and the wandering person reflecting on all of it.

For a time, I helped artists sell their work and had a studio in the Georgetown section of Seattle. There I learned much about both art and business. One of my favorite clients, a painter, seemed to effortlessly turn urban landscapes into bold abstract paintings. Ones that restaurants and hotels sought for decor.  I marveled at how he could produce his works, asking myself if artists simply see things differently. Through discussions with him and research, I found that they do. A talent with important applications in both the art and business world.  Artists either have a natural or learned ability in abstract thinking and composition. Where we see a city scape, they see objects and shapes. Ones they can move around using color theory, composition and other techniques to create art. Their final work always bringing the best elements together. My painter went a step further. He added a quiet space in the painting for the eye to rest. It separated his art fr...