What is it Good For?
March 8, 2010 by Steve
Tracks 24x36 1024x676 What is it Good For?

"Tracks" 24"x36" oil painting by Steve Alpert

Art mirrors society. Tom Hanks states, “War is a part of the human condition,” in a recent promo for the HBO miniseries, “The Pacific,” produced by Hanks and Steven Spielberg that premiers March 14.

Back in the 1970’s, “The Deer Hunter” was the first stab at reflecting the Vietnam War.  It was more like a dagger in the heart.  “Apocalypse Now” weighed in a short time after and gave us the psychedelic insanity of the era as Robert Duvall’s Col. Kilgore laments, “Charley don’t surf!”  ”Platoon” came later and director Oliver Stone, himself a Nam Vet, sobered us up with his tragic and bitter rendition.  One vet told me “Platoon” was right on the money, another vet told me it was not the way it was.  Then we were given, “Coming Home.”  Enough said.

If I admitted how times I’ve seen, “Saving Private Ryan,” well, I’m not going to so we’ll just leave it at that.  “Band of Brothers,” the HBO miniseries, I will admit to having watched all ten episodes five times.  That’s all I’m admitting to, anyway.  Everybody can get behind WWII, Hitler had to be dealt with and did the Japanese really think they were going to be sailing underneath the Golden Gate Bridge?

Hollywood is an unpredictable tribe.  Hard to comprehend, “Saving Private Ryan” did not win Best Picture in 1998.  What was Best Picture that year, you ask?  “Shakespeare in Love.”  Last night’s sweeping victory of, “The Hurt Locker” speaks volumes about where we are today.  You can compare the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq to Vietnam all you want, but one thing here is screamingly different.  The men and women in uniform doing the work, giving their blood — because as we all know freedom is paid for in blood — they are not being called bums when they come home, they are not being spat upon, they are not being refused a beer at a bar at O’Hare.  This crop of warriors are being thanked and honored.  And treated for PTSD’s.

I’m trying to figure why things are different now.  Us Baby Boomers, are we finally guilty enough about how we allowed the Vietnam Vets to be destroyed when they came home?   Has it finally sunk in?

I was at a dinner with a Vietnam Vet a few weeks ago.  A Marine.  After dinner, I asked him about the war.  His blue eyes bugged out, face reddened and he looked at the floor and spit the words, “That war is long over, my friend.”  A polite way of saying to me, “Back off, Jack.”  Awkward silence.  And then he exploded into a vitriolic rant against all Generals and politicians.  That war is definitely not over for him, I thought.  After you are in combat, is it ever really over?

Tom Brokaw, in his series, “Boomers” juxtaposed two Boomers, a 58 year old Marine, still active and embarking on his fifth combat tour (3 in Vietnam, 1 in Iraq and his 5th will be in Afghanistan), and a Conscientious Objector during that period.  Two guys diametrically opposed.  Both believe they are patriots.  The hardened Marine has strong feelings for his country, believes in what the flag stands for and willing to put his life on the line for it.  The CO is proud of the stand he took back then and believes we ought to bring everybody home.  Today.

I asked my wife, Dorothy who she thought was right.  “Both.”  I took issue with the CO comparing Afghanistan and Iraq to Vietnam, but both men absolutely believe they are patriots.  Is that what is so powerful about this country?  I think so.  I had a history teacher in high school, Bill Clark.  He was a wonderful guy, always wore an American flag in his lapel, a clear indication in 1968-69 what side of the Vietnam War he was on.  Mr. Clark was all Hawk.  Of course, we always discussed the Vietnam War at that time, as those boys who did not go to college would be elegible for the draft.  When any of us expressed dissent against the war, Mr. Clark would smile and say, “This is America, where you have the right to be wrong.”

I don’t know who is right and who is wrong.  But one final thought.  A few years ago my stepson Matt asked the question, “If you had one question to ask God what would it be?”  My knee-jerk response was, “What did you do with Hitler?”  Dorothy thought and said quietly, “What is the purpose of war?”

As the director and producers of “The Hurt Locker” gave their thanks to all the men and women in uniform, Dorothy is sitting on the couch, eyes welling up.  We talk about these kids all the time.  I continue to make paintings to honor our men and women in uniform.  At dinners where we hold hands and I lead the prayer, I always conclude with these words, “…and we think of our men and women in uniform wherever they are, who are in harm’s way fighting for freedom.”  I am never able to finish that sentence without my throat tightening up.  So as we may not all agree on the correctness of our involvement in the Middle East, at least we can all agree on one thing;  we honor the troops.  And that, I think is a giant step forward.

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My Man Monk
March 6, 2010 by Steve
Blue Monk 8x10 296x300 My Man Monk

"Blue Monk" 8"x10" oil on canvas

There are artists and then there are artists.  Artists who work in a particular era borrow and feed off of each other.   I’m talking specifically of the be-bop jazz era of the 1950’s, an era packed with powerful and inventive musical geniuses.  Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie were inseparable almost like one musical entity.   Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn were another pair of inventive genius musicians.  Duke Ellington and Count Basie were different from one another, but both bands seemed to be traveling on a parallel roads.  Miles Davis John Coltrane both incredibly unique and singular — again –somewhat parallel in their trajectories. There is one artist in this period who stood apart, so far out that many could not hold on to him — Thelonious Monk.  Monk was truly out there, no one knows really where.  Classically trained at Julliard, practically in his backyard since Monk grew up only a few blocks from Jullliard, Monk’s music is hard to describe.  The word, “elliptical” comes to mind.  The sound in Monk’s head manifesting on the 88 keys — and he used all of ‘em — is nothing like there ever was before.  Monk didn’t start a movement, Monk was a movement.

As far back as I can remember, there was music in my home, and most of it was jazz, be-bop jazz of the 1950‘s’s.  The leader of that movement, or one of them certainly was my man, Monk.  Thelonious Monk.  My father had stereo equipment and he played lots and lots of Monk along with the Duke Ellington, the Basie band, Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie, and Charlie Parker.  Those were the earliest musical memories in my early life.  So recognizable, and now, comforting to me.  This music is so imprinted on me that I feel like these guys, all long dead now, are my friends.

The Duke and The Count were so regal, so cool, and their signature sound so clearly individual and unmistakable.  They were all so cool, how could any one of these artists be more cool than the others?  But one man stands out of this pack, for sure.  As great as they all were, Thelonious Sphere Monk was the most unique, the most different.  The stuff he heard in his head to play out in his fingers on piano are unlike anything else ever heard, ever.  His music and personality was so far out, that a lot of folks never really caught on to Monk.

I was five or six and sit at the piano and try and plink along with Monk.  My mother, an accomplished singer and piano player in her own right, had no ear for Monk, she couldn’t stand it.  Duke Ellington once said about how can one can tell if music is good; “If it sounds good, its is good.”  To my Mom, Monk didn’t sound so good, but, my Dad and I would sit and sit and listen, tapping our feet and bobbing our heads in true jazz fan tradition.

My Dad was a bit of beatnik himself, and told me he was at a party once where Monk was in the kitchen sitting at a little table resting the side of his head on a block of ice.  For hours.  Never moved.  before going on to play a live gig, Monk was famous for standing in place and spinning.  The reason for this it was reported was to rid Monk of any musical orientation, so he could go out and truly improvise.  That was Monk.  The eccentric genius.

Monk was the ultimate king of improvisation.  He took a simple theme and could wail on it for hours.  He did this for three or four hours one time, a witness wrote.  I magine that.  Monk was as sensitive to criticism as any other artist, and Monk took his knocks for his outlandish stye that tested the ears of jazz fans and critics.  One thing everyone who has heard the music of Thelonious Monk can agree on — he was a completely unique original.  Is Monk an acquired taste?  Maybe.  But like any acquired taste, once you decide you like it, you might really come to love it.

Monk’s music brings me home.  The one piece I can still play is, “Blue Monk,” the title of the painting above, an homage to my hero and muse.  I listen to mostly classical music now, but every once in a while when I get a little homesick musically, I throw on a CD of my man, Monk.

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Good Riddance & Happy New Year
December 30, 2009 by Steve

 

West Young Man 30x60 Good Riddance & Happy New Year

"West Young Man" 30"x56" oil paintng by Steve Alpert

How I hate, “year ender” pieces.  Feels like just more disposable junk on TV.  Do I really need to go back to September 11 all over again?   It’s in my body forever.  I don’t ever need to see those smoking towers ever again.  It changed me, and all of us here in the US.  

              I used to work in the news business many moons ago, and this time of year the program execs would always crank up these tired retrospectives that tell us what we already know.  I guess people like to roam down memory lane this time of year.   What is valuable for me this time of year is to know that I am happy to kiss 2009 good-bye.  A bitter year for the most part, but ending up on a very sweet and optimistic note.  Looking to continue that through the dark & chilly January and February here in the Northeast.  

             2009 was certainly rough stuff, for me at least.  My art selling career took a dive off the cliff.  Felt like the floor fell out from under me.  It took me months and months to come to grips with the idea that I had to change my construct in how I viewed my painting business and career.  How would I sell art if the galleries are suffering so?  If you read the trade magazines, gallery owners are bearing up with stiff upper lips and giving good little bites of optimism — showing  courage in trying to figure out their place in the new economic world we are all dwelling in now.  I think they are masking their real feelings.  I hope I am wrong.

            A longtime gallery professional I know said to me recently, “I think the gallery business is over.  And it’s never going back.”  This person has ridden the crest of the gallery wave of success that ran for years and years.  Think about it.  What do you need to open an art gallery?   A lease on a space, hopefully a good location for foot traffic, a beautiful floor and walls, good lighting, a desk, a computer, some storage space.  The art on the walls comes from a constant stream of artists begging to show their work.  The gallery owner takes the work on consignment, opens the doors and start selling!  Of course, what you really need is an understanding and appreciation of what kind of art you are representing and why.  The rest takes care of itself, or at least used to.

         I have sold much work in many galleries all over the US.  Also, I’ve sold lots of work to buyers who don’t go to galleries for many reasons.  They feel, “less than knowledgeable” when they go to a gallery.  How many times have I heard the phrase, “Well, I don’t know art history, so I don’t know what’s good.”  To which my standard reply goes, “Duke Ellington said it best, ‘If it sounds good, it is good.”

            We are in times of sweeping change.  People want to buy things as always, but they want a different buying experience.  Case in point is the Kindle.  People who read a lot and buy a lot of books are taking to the Kindle.  My wife bought one for me for my birthday a month ago.  I love it.  Here’s the buzz from Kindle users; “I love it, I read faster, I read more.”  Is that exactly true?  I don’t know, but I do know that with that kind of perception the bookstore is doomed.  Only a matter of time.  Is same true about art galleries?  I don’t know, but I sat and watched my carefully and painstakingly built art career get swept out to sea in one ugly tsunami.  

            I was catatonic for a long time, but now am back in the game, selling to individuals the way I did before I found my way into the galleries.  People are having Tupperware parties again, jean parties, jewelry parties.  Anyone who has access to product is selling at wholesale prices.  People still want to buy things, but they want to buy them differently.  

            September 11, 2001 changed everything.  The Recession has changed everything, again.  We adapt or die.  If there is anything to learn by looking back is that we must change with the times.  I hate change for the most part.  But here’s the choice; change with the times or die.  Ok, now I’m saying, change is good.  I am totally optimistic about 1020.  Totally aspirational.  

            So, I will once again avoid those tedious, “year enders” in the media, and concentrate on what I have to do now, which is to adapt, be aware, and be flexible.  If you have enjoyed any of the 50+ pieces I’ve published in the last calendar year, I am glad.  Thank you for reading and sticking with me, I will work hard to try and bring you new posts that are provocative, stimulating and inspiring.  Happy New Year to you all.

Always from my heart,

Steve Alpert

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At The Watering Hole
December 23, 2009 by Steve
"Hello, Good-Bye" 30"x40" oil painting by Steve Alpert

"Hello, Good-bye" 30"x40" oil painting by Steve Alpert

THIS POST IS A GIFT that will give you pleasure and relaxation for years to come.  I find it infinitely fascinating, usually during daylight hours — in Botswana– but nighttime can be surprising as well.  Anything can happen.  Earlier this afternoon I watched a huge elephant bathing leisurely bathing himself, gazelles hanging out behind him and birds all over the pond area.  The sound is equally alluring and transporting.  Interested?

It’s a live webcam in Botswana at the Mashatu Game Preserve.  A friend turned me on to this site months ago and it has become a great way to calm down at the end of the day.  So, without further ado, I invite you to visit Pete’s Pond…

               video.nationalgeographic.com/video/wildcamafrica/

Seems like there’s a lot of African stuff going on in my orbit, suddenly.  Friends just came back from Africa and brought with them beautiful photos, vast landscapes that are breathtaking.  Some of those photos will become paintings in the coming months, I think.

 I am not one to take technology for granted, this is amazing to me and Pete’s Pond has captured my imagination.  Late last night was early morning in Botswana, and two warthogs were taking their visit to the watering hole, more gazelles peacefully hanging out behind them.  The warthogs and gazelles seemed completely oblivious to each other.  Today’s elephant was the first elephant I’ve experienced at the pond…

     Anyway, enjoy Pete’s Pond.  Happy Holidays!

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Fertile & Fallow
December 18, 2009 by Steve

 

"Fields of Gold" 24'X36" oil painting by Steve Alpert

"Fields of Gold" 24'X36" oil painting by Steve Alpert

Think of your favorite performer, or your favorite athlete performing at their very best.  When they’re at their peak, they are all one small step away from disaster.  Nobody can stay at their peak indefinitely.  Peak performance would not be peak performance without valleys.  Peaks and valleys.  High tide and low tide.  We’ve recently experienced the pain of this in our collective economy.  The peak was fun, but unsustainable.  We’re down in the valley and now beginning to slog up the mountain again.

         I love the statement of the great John Wooden, coach of many national championship basketball teams at UCLA in the 1960’s.  Dating myself?   Coach Wooden said, “We don’t get real high after big wins and we don’t get real low after losses.”  All respect due to Coach Wooden, in his peak years he so happened to have collections of players that were simply phenomenal, but he was the grand master maestro who guided them to title after title with an even-handedness that is indeed rare.  Wooden was steady at the tiller, for sure.  

         Take a look at the careers of various artist in their fields.  Very few of them have peak production on a regular basis.  For the most part, now you see ‘em and then you don’t.  The athletes you see performing at their peak are always on the brink of disaster.  The marathon runners who gear themselves to a particular race meticulously plan their training schedule six months in advance so they will peak on race day.  Awesome concept.  The real artists always come back.  The comeback trail is well traveled.

     As a working artist, now working in multiple mediums – oil paint, documentary production and now with a new stage play in development, I am experiencing a run up the mountain.  The economy devastated my art sales more than a year ago, and I was knocked back, really thrown for a loss with no notion of what to do.  In the coming posts I will detail a little more about the steps I have taken to resurrect myself, but clearly it has been a tough year and I am happy to kiss 2009 a big good-bye.  SEE YA!

      And of course, it’s all in nature.  Plow a field every year and eventually you deplete the nutrients.  Let it lie fallow, allow the elements have its’ way and, voilla, it is ready to support a robust new season.  Amazing!

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Making it Up
December 9, 2009 by Steve

 

"Mt Haleakala" 30"x40" oil painting by Steve Alpert

"Mt Haleakala" 30"x40" oil painting by Steve Alpert

Making it up as I go along.  This has been my theme song most of my life.  But, back in Summer of ‘72 in the hot bowels of the Grand Canyon, sun high, canteen contents low, pack heavy, legs tired…the first thing I did was realize how stupid I was to have just taken off without a map, a diagram, or someone else to go with who knew where to go.  Second, it was blazing hot in that canyon and the two mile jaunt to the beginning of the one mile ascent was okay, but it was the thought of trekking up that final vertical mile that was really weighing me down.  Third thing, my water supply was low and then the decision became easy.  Up and out was what had to happen and in that decision I knew I would rally have to physically pay.  And pay I did.

            One vertical mile of very steep switchbacks.  At about fifty feet per switchback, it amounted to about one hundred of ‘em.  In the heat, with the fifty-pound pack with very limited water.  All these years later I remember it vividly.  I began about 3pm.  The first five or six were not so bad, after that I had to stop and take off the pack after every switchback.  Chest heaving and gasping for oxygen I would have to rest for a few minutes every fifty feet.  Took three or fours hours to get to the top, and then, a four mile haul back to the campsite.  Dang.  

            It was a great lesson.  I’ve been often impulsive in my life and jumped into things figuring that my wits and intuition can take me through.  It has worked out well, sometimes, and sometimes not.  For me, this is precisely the spice of life.

            Much like staring at a blank canvas not knowing what it will be.  Most of the paintings on my website are unexpected works of improvisation.  What can I say?  This is who I am in this life. 

            This is my artist’s journey and when it’s time to go the Big Studio in the sky, I will look back with warm memories and not many regrets at all.  One of the best impulses was meeting a woman and realizing a half hour later that I wanted to marry her.  Dorothy.  I didn’t think it through, I just knew.  We didn’t run off and get married, it would be a year and three months after we met.  This is the person in my life who gave me the great gift of becoming an artist, offering to pay the bills while I make the transition.  It took longer than either of us thought and it has not always been easy.

            Another impulsive decision that worked out well in the best sense was meeting a man who became a great friend.  We were introduced at a lunch, and Arje Shaw had written a terrific play called, “The Gathering.”  Arje produced it as an Off-Broadway production where it did well and now was transitioning to Broadway.  I was very taken with this guy who was articulate, brilliant, and possessing a diabolical sense of humor.  After the lunch outside the restaurant I told Arje I wanted to invest in the show.  You might want to read the script, first, but I said that I was investing in him, and I would read the script, for sure.  I read the script, was knocked out by it,  and then called Arje and said I didn’t know what I was saying but that I wanted to raise money for the production.  I did and earned a producer credit.

            The show only lasted a heart-breaking four and half weeks, and then two years later I was one of the producers with another one of Arje’s plays, “Magic Hands Freddie.”  Freddie went for four and a half months.  Money lost, time invested, but a tremendous life experience.  And an enduring friendship that is special to both of us.  And as a result of the time energy and cash put into those two projects, a new project is beginning.  But this isn’t the trip down Hermit’s Trail this time.  This time I am assembling a seasoned team of talented professionals with track records.  Building this new project maturely so it has the best chance of living a long, healthy and profitable life.  And not oddly enough, the inspiration for this sweeping project begins with a painting I made a few years ago.  The project will begin as a play.  So much for now on that, it’s a hush-hush thing for now, but more in these pages as time goes on.  It all began with the creative impulse that told me to, “Go.”

     So, that trip down Hermit’s Trail would be a trip I would take many times in my life.  Many of those trails led to what we normally refer to as, success.  Who knows what can happen?  But I can tell you what will happen if you don’t take a chance.  Nothing.

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Decision Time
December 1, 2009 by Steve

 

"Destiny" 30"x40" oil painting by Steve Alpert

"Destiny" 30"x40" oil painting by Steve Alpert

 

 

Grand Canyon, June 1972.  It was a hippy happening at the South Rim campgrounds.  Along my hitchhiking trip I arrived with my two new buddies from U of Illinois I met at a campground in New Mexico, mentioned in the previous post on this blog.  Tom was a young party hardy dude and his buddy, whose name now eludes me were doing the cross country thing, joining the legions of long hairs who took to the road that summer.  We stayed in Las Vegas, New Mexico for a few days.  They had a pal just home from Vietnam and the party was on.  One night we went to a roadhouse honky-tonk out in the desert.  Tom offered a challenge to his army pal; bankroll the shots of tequila and Tom would down one a minute for fifteen minutes.  Seemed like a good idea at the time.  Tom got to number thirteen and then barely made it outside to purge himself of the poison.  A good time was had by all.  Funny, the more we drank, the better the band got.

            Couple of days later, the Grand Canyon.  About fifty fellow travelers of all shapes and sizes equipped with substances of all shapes and sizes gravitated to this one sprawling campsite.  The fire burned for days and nights, singing and reveling.  The smells of the Douglas Firs mixed with smoke from burning Pinion Pine and mesquite were intoxicating enough.  But of course, there were other intoxicants of the day.

            A few days in, a group headed out to a shangri-la spot somewhere in the depths of the canyon.  A big party deep in the recesses of a remote area of the Grand Canyon replete with crystal clear travertine pools, as turquoise as the Caribbean.  Sounded very good.  I was invited.  I said I would join them on the second day.  How do you get there, I asked.  Oh, go down Hermit’s trail and at the bottom there’s a fork in the path, go left and it will take you there.  Being nineteen I didn’t write anything down, just had a visual picture in my mind, such as it was.  I would find it.  Solo.

            The next day I managed a ride to the trailhead of Hermit’s Trail, a few miles west of the campground along the South Rim road.  I had my fifty-pound pack with me.  First but not last mistake.

            Down the steep and treacherous switchbacks for one mile to land on the first plateau.  A dome of deep smacking blue sky, cloudless.  Sun moving to the top, early summer heat radiating off the rocks.  Two hours in I reach a fresh water wellhead under an overhang of red rock, naturally hollowed out by eons of wind.  A well-worn fireplace next to it.  A good stopping place for a lunch of whatever I had.  It was quiet out there, God was it quiet.  Like you had the best headphones on kind of quiet.  All you could hear was quiet.  No wind.  The sun was really working now, heat waves blurring the narrow trail heading north toward the Colorado, still another few miles down. 

            Picked up the heavy pack and off I trudged looking for the fork in the trail.  Another hour or two passes and I am noticing how really alone I was, really deep in this canyon.  No fork, yet.  Arms and legs now covered in sweat and thin films of desert.  A fork!  Make a left.  They did say a left, didn’t they?

I took the left; only this left trail was going into a narrowing canyon.  Beautiful young Aspens all along shimmering in the sunshine, sending it’s light signals back to the sun.  Caves up on the cliffs.  I know this is not the correct way.  And then I heard it.  A sound I will remember forever.

            It was an animal, a big animal communicating to me that it was not pleased with my visit to its very own turf.  It was the roar of a big cat.  I’m not talking a Maine Coon kitty cat; I’m talking Mountain Lion, Puma, or some damn thing like that.  I never saw the beast and I chose not to investigate further but to take Leo up on his offer the get the hell out of Dodge.

            Decision time.  High noon.  Sun beating down.  Three choices. Continue on, try to find the trail that some stoned out hippie told me about?  Good luck. Backtrack and spend the night at the well, alone.  That seemed like a tough call.  There’s that big kitty cat out there, even though I knew the critter was probably more frightened of me than me of him.  Did I really want to be thinking about that through a night alone a mile away from Whiskers? Or, bag it — head up and out of the canyon, more than arduous at best, more like Herculean given the heat, fatigue and that freaking pack that seemed to weigh one hundred pounds and would have to haul it up one mile up those steep switchbacks in the late afternoon sun with the canyon heated enough to bake bread — oh Man!  And my depleted supply of water in my canteen.  There’s the real clincher.

            Interesting lesson.  To be so incredibly unprepared to just wander into a very wild place figuring I would just wing it.   To be young and stupid!

            Stay tuned…

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DIDN’T IT RAIN!
November 14, 2009 by Steve

 

"Rain" 11" x 14" oil painting by Steve Alpert

"Rain" 11" x 14" oil painting by Steve Alpert

When the world is quiet I can rest.  I can think.  Not try to do anything, just to be.  To be a human being, not a human doing.  It’s something that is hard to do with so much work to be done.  It’s hard to stop.  Especially with this laptop always within range.

The storm is passed.  It blew like Armageddon yesterday, the classic Nor’easter, swirling winds from the north and east bringing pelting rain and slapping winds.  Trees and tall bushes swaying like a ballroom dance competition.  Took Ray, my big yellow Lab for the morning walk, smells of decaying piles of leaves, the kind of tall piles we used jump into when we were kids.  The sun was working through layers of haze and almost made it before the sky darkened again and low clouds moved in quickly. We got back just before another round of torrential rain dumped it’s load.  It rained as if we were at the bottom of a waterfall for an hour or more. — the back end of the storm heading out to sea but giving us a good reminder who is the boss before leaving.

Spent the afternoon in the studio making new work.  Hadn’t opened some of those tubes of oil paint in weeks and weeks.  Took some small pieces that were not finished.  What I love about paintings is that any painting can be gone back into, if you want.  Of course there are real wrong choices to be made by choosing the wrong one to go back into.  Brought two pieces to life that weren’t really “there” just yet.  One is now completed; the other is well on the way.

Went out into the backyard with Ray.  Heavy mist and getting dark.  Very quiet out. It’s warm, about 63.  Can smell the salt.  The ocean is about three miles as the gull flies.  The roar of the surf is a very loud rumble, carried along the bay and creek waters.  The walkway to the dock is wet and slippery, and the reedy odors of the tall grasses mixed with salt fills my head with a quietness I can’t get anywhere else.  The tall coastal inland grasses are now a faded gold, they line the banks of the narrowing creek that disappear in the grey blue mist.  The bank of tall oak and pine are shrouded   standing above the creek water smooth and dark as granite.   A handful of crickets are still singing their cricket songs in the warm wet air.  A train rumbles by, whistling at the crossing a few hundred yards away, and soundtrack then segues back to the ocean. 

Four thousand miles of ocean ending less than three miles from here.  I always have to remind myself of that.  The seawater always licking at the shore, taking beach, giving it back and on and on and on.  It’s endless.

So, I can take a nap now that I’ve reminded myself of all of this.  It slows me down and lets me…rest…

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HIGH TIDE, LOW TIDE
October 20, 2009 by Steve

 

"The Adventure Begins" 40"x72" oil painting by Steve Alpert

"The Adventure Begins" 40"x72" oil painting by Steve Alpert

Two years ago my wife Dorothy met a woman, a lawyer who worked for the organization that administers the famous aircraft carrier Intrepid, now a museum at Pier in the Hudson River in Manhattan.  Next thing you know, I’m in Dorothy’s friend’s office offering to make a large painting of the Intrepid for their fundraising efforts, and also hoping to put a deal together to sell posters in the on-site museum store.  All sounds so good on paper, yes?

This was a year after I had completed the large painting, Legacy, I’ve written about in past posts.  Legacy still lives in my storage cubby after much talk from lots of folks who wanted to utilize Legacy.  Being the habitual dreamer/fool that I am, I had high hopes for a large painting of the Intrepid, and thought it would be lots of fun to make.  Fun, that’s the key that opens the door to commitment to make a painting no one is paying for, up front at least.  Artists are the ultimate entrepreneurs.

The Intrepid is a large subject, just physically sitting there at the pier, it’s beyond huge, a monster.  At that time, Intrepid had been moved to Staten Island for installation of new exhibits.  I was granted access.  All I needed was an idea of what the painting would be.

I began research in the library but found nothing particularly interesting.  I requested permission to board the great ship.  March of 2008, on a day as cold and gray as the Intrepid itself, I was shown around by Exhibit Director, Chris Malanson, a bright and creative professional who was going to make magic in this unique museum experience.  Chris told me much of the ship’s fascinating history.  I took lots of photos.  When I got back to the studio, my mind was as blank as that large canvas staring me in the face.  I went back to the ship a second time.  This time I wandered around on my own through narrow rabbit warren compartments in the bow section.  Imagining what it was like in the Pacific, Japanese fighter jets buzzing and bombing, the chaos, the loss of life, the months and years of war and peacetime,  thinking about the life of the ship and all the men who served and endured.

What would the painting be?  Still clueless.  I’m talking about nothing, nada.  I hit the bookstore looking for picture books of WWII aircraft carriers.  One book had an image of the USS Enterprise, another carrier of the era and the image was a dark and beautiful painting.  This was it – I would model my painting after this one.  I needed to latch onto something and I was taking it and running with it. 

Then I did something that was really weird and uncharacteristic.  I hired another artist to render the image of the big ship onto this big 40”x72” canvas.  It was an odd choice for me, and one that would prove to keep me away from working on the painting for one year.  For a while I felt I was cheating, that the image wasn’t mine, that I was, “producing” the painting.  But there it was, and Sarah did a fine job complete with figures of sailors I would later obliterate.  In Sarah’s rendering the Intrepid was tied up and being boarded by her voluminous crew.  It felt static to me, maybe the choice of image was wrong.  I didn’t know but the whole project became stuck in the mud.

Intrepid felt like inert, a gargantuan hunk of steel looming above a pier.  There was nothing exciting to me about it at all.  I hated it.  The canvas went into the storage cubby sitting next to Legacy.  Let them lean against each other and talk about nothing.  

Then, the economy tanked and my art selling business came to a grinding halt.  There was no reason to continue making paintings although my new dealer, Alan Blazar had spread my paintings around galleries all over the east coast.  Nothing was selling.  Not only was the Intrepid docked, so was my painting career.

For four months I didn’t go into the studio.  Never turned the lights on.  After eight years of continual development, putting in my ten thousand hours in front of hundreds of canvases, it was time to put the brushes down.  I was angry and disgusted at nobody in particular, just the world that pulled the rug out from under me.  I knew I was not alone, there were many others suffering a hell of a lot worse.  Time to hunker down, let it go, do other things, work in video or whatever I could.  The painting career would be put on ice until the thaw, whenever that would be.  Life is like the tides, they come in and they go out.  In time, things would change, but Americans were in for a long winter…so was I.

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IN SEARCH OF THE ART HEART
October 16, 2009 by Steve

 

"At the Watering Hole" 16"x20" watercolor by Steve Alpert

"At the Watering Hole" 16"x20" watercolor by Steve Alpert

A close friend, we’ll call him DC, was describing his dilemma.  A dilemma of his own creation– aren’t they mostly always?  DC is an accomplished executive producer and administrator of creative work at a major corporation.  A most talented professional, DC is in the business of  communicating ideas and concepts for clients, assigning the creative team, and sending them out to do it.  When the creatives come back with something for DC to see, he suggests, tweaks and cajoles, always making the product better, ultimately making the client happy.  Nothing better than a happy client and this is DC’s stock-in-trade.

DC is an undisputed master at what he does, more talented and intuitive than anyone I have ever worked with, and I’ve worked with scores of ‘em.   My dear DC suddenly is harboring an inner desire to know himself better  through his own individual artistic eye.  We’re talking photography.  DC wants to explore himself as an artist with a camera.

DC decided to take a Sunday jaunt, solo with his camera.  He climbs into the car, but then all the negative thoughts download into his consciousness.  “What am I doing here, I don’t know what I want to shoot, I don’t know…” and so forth.  All that thick mental junk us artists have to wade through, especially in the beginning.  He had an idea, a little spark telling him to drive down to the docks.  As a child his father would take him down to docks in a different city, just to be there, walk around smell the air, change it up.

DC began the short trip.  All the “stupid balloons” like cartoon character  dialogue appeared over his head, “What’s the purpose of this, this is stupid…”  DC got to the docks.  Walked around, squeezing off a series of shots.  Was there any great revelation or epiphany on that Sunday down at the docks?  No.  But, it was a beginning.

I suggested to DC that Sundays could be his time for his solo adventures, at least for now.  Take a few hours for yourself, just you, to be with your camera.  Let the clock tick.  Allow something to happen.  Keep at it and allow free will to guide you – by far the greatest benefit of being an artist.  Eventually, when you least expect it, you will find something, or really more to the point, something will find you.  Now we’re getting somewhere.

The tool and materials;  paint, film, lenses, pen and ink, shutter speeds, apertures, clay, whatever.  We all love the gear, the smell of oil paint, how a certain camera feels in the hands, the satisfying click of the shutter. But, materials are immaterial as this is the hunt for what’s inside the heart of the artist.  

It  all begins as play, doesn’t it?  Play, as in tinkering, being open, breathing, slowing it down, allowing your life experience to idle in neutral.  Allowing yourself to play as you did before the school system screwed everything up into rigid, linear work.   I remember playing with clay in art class back in second or third grade.  I had this handful of clay that suddenly appeared to me like a rhinoceros.  Once I saw it as a rhinoceros, I made a few more squeezes here and there, then glazed it.  When it came back from kiln and brought it home, it got my mother’s attention.  She was a classically trained fine artist, so her praise got my attention, but even more than that, I recognized that it was damn good.  I wasn’t trying to make a rhino, making a rhino never occurred to me but that rhino found itself in the clay.  All I did was identify it and then encourage it a little bit more.  Some fifty years later I never consciously planned to make all the military images in oil paint that continues as I write this, but all those images found me.  I didn’t even know what these military images meant for me, until very  recently, which I will deal with in a future post.

DC is very impatient to learn all the tools of photography.  That’s good, his fire is lit and knowing your tools is important.  But, the glowing jewels of the art heart lay beyond tech specs and gear — in the soul.  I think the way to get to the heart and soul is through regular exercise.  So, I wish DC well in his Sunday jaunts in discovering his big heart and kind soul I have known for a long time.  Sounds like DC is ready to exercise his considerable creative mind to seek the silent riches within and in doing so, make the world a better place.  I’m excited for him!  Bon Chance!

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