19 July 2019
Prometheus
So now after two years of working from this beach motif I begin to understand it a little better, and yes, even respect it. In a quaint sort of way I may even worship it. It’s not a curse like Ahab’s pursuit of his Moby Dick, just more of a divine puzzle that beckons me further and further into its secret labyrinth of misty colours each night. Will I ever arrive? Not likely, but I’m getting closer to something in myself, and isn’t that why we paint?
Chilly nights! I’ve been making a fire each evening with some wood I recovered from a neighbor who had a large pile of fence posts. She kindly offered them to me and I quickly realised that it’s a hard Eucalyptus and very heavy. It only takes four or five small pieces in the stove to keep the house cozy for a whole night. And it’s a marvel to watch.
This picture came easily the other night. It had been a pristine sky all day long so I was hoping for a great big Bloom which did arrive but was sadly cut short due to the full moon which killed it. I had set up quickly in the still chill on my small dune and jumped into this painting, the only one of the night.
I deftly worked the surface like a cosmetic surgeon, patiently working my brush into rich peachy colours and stretching whole sections until I found an even harmony, always attentive to the overall effect of its proportions.
But unlike the surgeon, I wasn’t interested in superficial beauty, I was after the true character beneath all the pretty colours on the surface. It appears unusually fragile, like the scent of orange blossoms wafting through my window in the evening breeze. Looking at it now I'm surprised to see an air of impermanence in it, something I couldn't see the other night when packing up. As everyone knows, (or will soon find out in due time) Beauty is short-lived, but being an artist, or just creative, is the one way to short-circuit Nature. Though many try nips, lifts, and tucks, Mother Nature will have her way with us towards the end. But there is a solution. Align yourself with Art in any of its forms, for therein lies the truth of eternal beauty. One can vicariously bypass the whole system by simply just being creative. My unsolicited advice to anyone who panics over losing, either their youth, or beauty, is to go visit any large museum and see for yourself what it is, this timeless thing we call Art.
And when I use the word beauty, I refer to John Keats in his poem, Ode to a Grecian Urn whose last two lines are the following:
So, I packed up in the dark the other night and hung around a while waiting for the moon to rise over the black horizon. On the beach around me, the 'Moonies' were arriving despite the chill. They were scattered about with blankets and anxiously awaiting the moon's arrival. Like everywhere, these full moons at the beach are always a big deal around here and they seem to bring out the pagan in us all.
There were maybe a hundred people milling around in between lots of happy dogs and children all darting about. I noticed a pod of about twenty people huddled together at water's edge, their tiny phones were lit up and flashing randomly like fireflies. But when a speck of orange moon suddenly appeared on the horizon line, all the small white lights began rotating in unison making large circles as the moon rose heroically over the sea. I thought it was something one might see at the Paris Opera.
On most nights here, even in the dead of winter, this fragile twilight is offered up freely to anyone who wants it here at the beach. And me, like Prometheus, I get to steal it from the Gods each night.
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