River Drive

This is the road at the end of my street.  Only one side has houses.  The other side has a river.  It doesn't  flood because the road is high, and Pennsylvania on the other side is low.  The painting is a 12x24 oil.

Nelson House and Everything Cezanne

A 12 x 24 oil of the Nelson House with a view across the Delaware River at Washington's Crossing.

Another excerpt from the Cezanne biography: "Out sur le motif he mused on the fundamental.  'All that we see dissipates and disappears, does it not? Nature is always the same, but nothing remains of what we see of it.  It is our art that must convey the sense of permanence, capture the elements in all their changing forms.  It should give us a taste of the eternal.  What lies beneath?  Perhaps nothing.  Perhaps everything.  Everything, you understand?'"

Delaware River

In the early morning, I often find myself standing in the shadows of New Jersey looking across to the sun brightened shores of Pennsylvania.

Bright and Early Morning River

This is an 8x10 pastel of a familiar spot at Washington's Crossing on the Delaware River. I did it last week but forgot to photograph and post it. Too busy trying to finish the Matisse book.

Walk'nDraw and the Words of Matisse

Honestly, I am working hard, but nothing to show but a walkn'draw of a river tree in front of the Nelson House at Washington's Crossing on the Delaware done this evening. I changed my pencil to a large, flat carpenter's pencil. Delightful to use.

I am only ten pages away from completing the Spurling second volume of Matisse's biography. Here are some Matisse quotes:

After visiting the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City in 1930, Matisse said, "All the old pictures are dubious or mediocre--the modern ones are extremely good." I suspect that has changed somewhat.

Describing himself and the artist Georges Roualt to his son Pierre Matisse: "A man who makes pictures like the one we were looking at is an unhappy creature, tormented day and night. He relieves himself of his passion in his pictures, but also in spite of himself on the people around him. That is what normal people never understand. They want to enjoy the artists' products--as one might enjoy cows' milk--but they can't put up with the inconvenience, the mud and the flies." He was trying to explain why he sometimes wasn't nice to his family, but I like the part about the mud and flies.

One last one: "Artist are like plants whose growth in the thickets of the jungle depends on the air they breathe, and the mud or stones among which they grow by chance and without choice." This quote appeals to me, not only because of another reference to mud, but because it recognizes that an artist is best at painting what he knows and where he is.

Did I tell you that my middle name is Henri?

Delaware River Sticker

This one I threw against the wall to see if it would stick. 8x10 pastel.

Regarding John Berger, he can write insightfully about his own experience painting and drawing, and then he can write about art history, and art as property, and the end of landscape painting etc. , in a way the contradicts his own experience. Here's what he says about landscape painting: "Certainly there are no great modern landscapes comparable to those of the past...Cubism when it broke painting broke the landscape too." Fortunately, there's no inevitability about what one can paint. I know more because of what has preceded me, but that doesn't mean I can do less.

Here's what he says about his experience of drawing: "To draw is to look, examining the structure of appearances. A drawing of a tree shows, not a tree, but a tree-being-looked at. Whereas the sight of a tree is registered almost instantaneously, the examination of the sight of a tree (a tree-being-looked-at) not only takes minutes or hours instead of a fraction of a second, it also involves, derives from, and refers back to, much previous experience of looking. Within the instant of the sight of the tree is established a life-experience. This is how the act of drawing refuses the process of disappearances and proposes the simultaneity of a multitude of moments." This passage suggests the constant renewal and possibility of creativity, no matter what has already happened.

River Drive

This is River Drive early in the morning. 9x12 pastel.

Washington's Beach

One last visit to the usually desolate beach visited once a year by "George Washington" and his 18th century supporters.

Washington Crosses

Merry Christmas. In the first photo the re-enactors gather on the Pennsylvania side earlier today. The next photo shows the first boat landing at "my" beach. It ended up a bit further north than planned, so the crowd was thin at this point. In the next photo, everybody moved over. The last photo shows the fourth and last boat landing again at the same beach. Washington is visible in the center. Once a year on Christmas day the usually deserted Delaware beach is mobbed with people.

Beaching

I may be done with this beach for a while. Who knows?

Early Delaware Beach

This morning was overcast and darkish at the river's edge. This is just about the spot where "Washington" disembarks from the boat when he reaches the New Jersey side during the re-enactment. Usually there's nobody there.

Soft Spot

You may think the soft spot is in my head, but I have a soft spot for this soft spot on the Delaware river. If I do it about a dozen times, maybe I will learn one thing or two. This view is also early morning (this morning), but earlier than the first painting.

Cooler Beach

This is a view of the same place this morning. I almost fell down in the mud (more mud!) at the edge of the river. Much colder.

Delaware at Washington's Crossing

Early morning at Washington's Crossing at the edge of the Delaware River looking north on the New Jersey side. Sandy beach from the flooding. 8x10 pastel on Canson Mi-Teintes Touch paper.

Spring Water

The bottom painting depicts a collapsing bridge, the consequence of heavy rain and time, over a stream leading to the Delaware in the background. The upper painting shows the canal early this morning. The rains came late with the sun available most of the day.

Delaware River Early Morning

When not visiting the aircraft, I walk along the Delaware River, and hope the sun makes it through the clouds.

NJ from PA over Delaware

This is a view of New Jersey from the Pennsylvania side of Washington Crossing Park. This image will make more sense in color.

The Bridge on a Windy Day

This painting has been a challenge. It was still windy today when I crossed the bridge, but not as bad as yesterday.

Bridge over Choppy Waters

The wind was creating whitecaps in the Delaware River today. This bridge attracts me, but drawing and painting it is difficult because everything around it is organic, while its structure is rigid, straight-edged, and precise. So the problem always is how to blend the two modes. The bottoms up approach works.

Spring!

I think I might just start doing pictures of spring time. This is an 11x14 drawing of the Delaware at Washington's Crossing. In these conditions, he would not have made it across unless he used the bridge.