Anchorage

Two years ago I started a painting (acrylic on canvas) that was to be dominated by the chroma white. Initially, I was inspired by the abstract paintings of Robert Ryman. Ryman is known to use an abundance of white. Rather than making an abstract painting, I wanted to paint a boat I called the "Arkadelphia" making its way to Anchorage, Alaska. My painting was to depicted extreme cold through extreme white.

As I started to paint, I quickly realized that what appeared to be white on the palette no longer looked white on the canvas. Any little bit of color mixed with white had a profoundly colorful effect when placed on my canvas and compared with other more pure whites. I found that my image began to suffer from two flaws: either I made it too white and the imagery became difficult to see or I added too much color and then it was no longer dominated by white paint.

Not knowing how to proceed, I left the painting alone for two years and this June, after what I consider a long detour, I began to work on it again. Forgetting about my original objective, I began painting portraits inside the boat. Later, as I worked I tried to make these portraits whiter and concentrate on cool colors (blues and greens).

After working on the painting for a couple of days, I arrived at a point of decision again. Rather than continue and obliterate the image with more white, instead I stopped. This is the point at which I dropped anchor and the painting remained still. This metaphor of "dropping anchor" became an apt description and I wondered if the city of Anchorage was founded in a similarly specific and arbitrary way. After finishing this not so white painting (see the image below), I wondered if I would ever successfully make a painting truly dominated by the color white. Perhaps this future painting will have to depict a scene in route to Antarctica.

Anchorage, by Kip Deeds, 25" x 26 1/2", Acrylic on Canvas, 2010

Crack Update

The cracks in my previous post (as seen in the photographs) are located on State Route 3003 near Laceyville PA.

Cracks In the Pavement

For the last two weeks I have been spending time in upstate Pennsylvania (about a 45 minute drive northwest of Scranton). Driving around this part of the state I have noticed and often tried to avoid patches of broken asphalt in the road. It seems dirt roads are less worrisome than these dreaded jagged piles of broken asphalt. Although I felt that the pictures of the ravaged roads were impressive just as images, I thought posting a few pictures might also highlight the need for road repair. I can't imagine what these roads would be like with a lower tax revenue. The following image was made while I was going for a walk.

The image below is a little further down the road.

The Digital Book

Cover of Key Note

I have yet to try digital book displays like the Kindle. I know that the digital book would save space. However, for my purposes I have found books made of paper efficient enough. Plus I like to make notes by hand in the margins of my books. This favoritism for the tangible has not stopped me from exploring digital possibilities.

Recently, I have been working on digitizing two of my artist book projects. One of these projects, entitled Key Note, I uploaded to my website yesterday. The analog version of this book was bound in the codex form. This book in part illustrates a scroll that continues from page to page till the end of the book.

Detail of Key Note

Recreating this exact scroll in a codex relationship online is impossible because a web page does not have a literal front and back. For the online version of the book, I created a window that limits what is seen to the scale of a single page and I added a scroll bar that allows the viewer to advance through the narrative. By limiting what can be seen, the online version becomes similar to the analog book and becomes manageable, given the size constraints of a webpage.

For my purposes, creating a webpage is about conventions of usability. In the case of Key Note, not being able to see the whole picture or story at once is beneficial because it creates a sense development and allows the audience to be surprised along the way.

For the complete online version of Key Note click here.

Steve Emmett

I am a little behind the times regarding news. Recently, I heard that the painter Steve Emmett had died suddenly in 2008 and in 2009 there was a memorial exhibit at Edinboro University of Pennsylvania's Bruce Gallery. From the memorial retrospective the University has produced an extensive catalogue. Emmett was a professor of painting and drawing at Edinboro University from 1988 till 2008. I got to know Steve during the fall 2004 semester while I also taught at Edinboro.

We would chat from time to time outside of the art building. Also on occasion I could hear him lecture to his class in the room next to mine. We shared some of the same students and I realized that Steve was a well-informed and serious artist. From his website and other information I found online I learned that he spent much of his life in the Northwestern part of Pennsylvania above Pittsburgh. His paintings often appear deeply personal and indicated a complex inner life that seemed to contrast with his calm outward personality.

Gallery director and Professor John Bavaro states at the end of an interview with GoErie.com that he would love to see Emmett get national exposure. Emmett's work serves as a reminder that there are artists quietly making important art outside of large urban areas. There were 60 paintings in the retrospective exhibit and many can be seen at his website. I have included several of my favorite paintings by Emmett below. Hopefully, I am giving Steve a little more of the exposure he deserved.


Steve Emmett, 100 Pound Wait, 1993


Steve Emmett, A Place to Stay, 1991


Steve Emmett, Shell of a Man, 1995


Steve Emmett, Hare, 2007

Spring Break

This March, I took a trip to Seattle and traveled into the mountains east of the "Emerald City". I did not venture into museums or galleries this trip but I did enjoy the outdoors. I have included here several views from this journey.

Above is a hill at Gas Works Park. The park is situated, not far from the University of Washington, at the edge of Lake Union . Below are two other views of the park.

Having grown up in Pennsylvania, I am continually amazed at the shift in landscape as one travels from Seattle east. One gets to see water, snow covered mountains, and then desert all in a three hour drive.

Above is a mountain found in the Wenatchee National Forest not far from Leavenworth, WA. On the return flight, back to Philadelphia, I was lucky to get a good view of Minneapolis and captured the image seen below. (Click on the image for a larger view.)

Re-Review Or Gone But Not Forgotten

The exhibit has come down (“Imprint/Impact" at Bucks County Community College). The review I wrote has been posted at The Artblog. However, I thought now would be a good time to post a link to the review in case it was missed. The review highlights not only the exhibit but also the state of the arts in Bucks County (a county known for the "Pennsylvania Impressionist" movement.) Click here for a link to the review.

Books of Mold by Gail Deery