CONTEMPORARY EXPLORER

  I was recently reminded of the importance of color in our lives. Allen Reamer, an art instructor, once told me you should always consider color first in your painting. This thought was echoed by Steve Martin of all people. Besides being a great actor and comedian, he is a noted art collector. Enough so that MOMA ask him to select two favorite paintings from their collection for display. He chose two by early century abstract artists Stanton McDonald Wright and Morgan Russell, both considered ones who were first to understood the importance of color in abstract paintings.  Martin used the term synchronism to describe their work, feeling it lent harmony to the human experience where color was so important. As important as music to movies and life experiences.  He's right, of course, mastering the mixes of color on canvas remains a constant challenge though. There is color theory, your sense of things, the subject, meaning, and nature itself to all consider. Not to mention...

“When old tech dies, it usually stays dead” - C. Platt. Or so it seems. Having acquired most of the Apple products available and traveled to what seems the end of the internet, I surprisingly found myself bored with it all. Even worse, I was actually considering purchasing a Chromebook just to have something different to play with. Tech had seemingly taken the brightness from my life. I needed an escape, a reason for getting out and doing something again. Somehow I longed for the old digital world. You know the one where you actually had to move dials to find results and sometimes even get a hard copy in the process. In sorting through this, somehow having a pocket transistor radio became an obsession, but finding one proved a challenge. Truly old things do go away. The young turk at Best Buy looked at me strangely when I asked if they had one. I knew from his look that I would never work there. So it was back to the wired pages of Walmart and Amazon.  There, under pocket radios, I...

  You find them in off beat local places, ones that have been adorned inside with walls of graffiti, torn posters and other memorabilia. In slang language called “wall bombing.” It’s all about transporting you to a place of craziness, apart from where you are now, freeing you up to enjoy. There is so much that your mind fails to grasp it all, let alone make sense out of it. The message like “on air” standing apart from the other product tags and hand written comment. It’s all for fun of course, engaging you to like the place and come back, to drink another beer. Overtime though, the walls begin to loose their luster. As with all impermanent things, they fade and deteriorate. The wall still pulls at your mind. You think, what a “funky ” place and absorb past memories of being there. The word "funky” attributed to being abstract, unique, in the vibe. A closer reading of the meaning though is a sense of sadness, as in “I was in a funky mood.” Bombed walls take on a certain sadness w...

  It always caught my eye. Even years later reviewing my album library, the photo stood out. I was never sure if someone attempted to make it an art object or if time had done so, but it was. Boxcar AN 2256. So much it told about the city. How things were used and used, then just put on the side to languish on the edge of the city. You could see it in the distance, the pillars of profit. Far from where the boxcar rested against a worn warehouse of the same fate.  I could only guess how many miles its travels entailed, how it got all its marks and scraps. Reminding me somehow, everything has it time, to spend it well.

  There is a haunting feeling when you see a string of sidetracked railcars.  They served commerce well, but now they sit alone. Their future uncertain. Not unlike places we all find ourselves at times. We struggle though and eventually find a way to get back to the mix of life. You remember these things,  as we pass by the sidetracked cars…

  Many small Southern town heydays were during the textile and manufacturing years of the past. When those days ended, their downtown core became vacant of small business and life. Leaving in the wake, the forgotten classic architecture and faded colors of the South. Even in their waning state, they are often lovely places, ones that attract the curiosity and sometimes even movie sets. They surprise you with the depth of their beauty, making you want to take them in your arms and make things right. Walking on Main Street in Chester SC, the sun hit a window in front of me just right reflecting the buildings across the street. The reflection showed that beauty of the past, but when I turned, only the empty store fronts greeted me. I turned again, looking at the reflection and hoped the glory I saw would return one day…

  I never used libraries as much as I should, but loved them just the same. They have changed over time and now seem to reside in a middle state given all the online media. Even with these pressures, the library offers much in their many corners that cannot be found elsewhere. The larger ones have full departments such as music, art and even research. Each with a department head. The smaller ones are presided over by just a few general staff, each armed with the knowledge of the whole of the place. Their caring evident, scurrying about to keep order, answering questions, tending all the corners. At one time, libraries even had apartments on top for the librarian to reside. Sometimes you see librarians sitting at their desk, making special notations in the books. The marks always consistent are known as librarian scribe, keeping uniformity within the library.  The corners of these places draw you in. A place of quiet in an unquiet world. Where you can be at peace with a book, y...

  Forgotten shapes gathered and protected, apart from the real world. Used to hide behind, to surprise, corner and capture. All put there by a wandering mind, waiting to delight…

  It was long ago, but I remember it as yesterday, the joy that deep. I once had a gallery and art office in an old converted hotel. All types of artists were there. The building just had one elevator. Few of us paid much attention, its darkness lit by a dim light,  it just transported us from one floor to another. The painters liked floor 3, the light and all. Besides they always thought they were the best artists. Colorful to the one. Photographers took floor 2, the in-between one. Perhaps never sure of their status in the art world. The writers were scattered mostly in the basement and corners of floor 1. Like the painters they had an air about them, tearing off the numeral 1 on elevator keyboard and replacing it with an A, just so everyone would know. We all flourished there, sharing ideas and dreams. All the time being transported back and forth on a forgotten elevator between worlds...