Art Pieces That Mirror Life

When it comes to life: say yes.

From the time I was a boy hoeing weeds in a Texas cornfield. I always wished I was an artist. My earliest questions about art were met with the answers: “You have to be born with the ability, or you have it or you don’t”. These are the kind of answers that made me think art may be an impossible dream. The distractions of the occasional airplane flying over. Made me think, “Bet it is a lot cooler up there.” Just the kind of thoughts that occupy a small boy with a hoe in his hands. My focus was to not be in that hot cornfield.

The Vietnam war was the “Alpha and Omega” of an 18-year-old’s life at that time. I ended up joining the Army because, after initial testing, the recruiter said I qualified for pilot training. My ticket out of the cornfields. I jumped at the chance. I discovered that they needed human clay pigeons much later. They gave me a twenty-year career as a helicopter pilot in civilian life. Lucky and grateful best describes my feelings for my chance to fly.

As it turns out, you have to be born with the desire to make art. Art is something that is learned by making a million mistakes. recognizing them, and then correcting same. Seeking instruction helps shortcut the many errors that come with being self-taught. Don’t reinvent the wheel. Thanks to flying I was able to pursue my dream to make art. I had saved enough money to move to France and study classical realism. A painting well done communicates with the id. The most basic way to stir human emotions. Plus, I must admit. Being a Texan and an art student walking the streets of Paris had an allure of performance art that I found intoxicating.

 Now as I enter the Winter of my life, I find myself also wanting to write about my upbringing and the people that populated my world. The circumstances that put that hoe in my hands. These were also the people that put a keel under my ass. No matter the storms, I was always self-righting.

I had an uncle that told me about hunting rabbits, Hoover Hogs, for food. He said they ate so many rabbits during the Depression, that his mother locked up the dogs before letting the kids go out to play. They were so poor that they couldn’t afford to miss a shot when hunting. He was forced to chase the rabbit for maybe a mile or so before he could get close enough to reach down and stick his finger up the rabbit’s butt. Then run another mile or so before he got enough slack to crook his finger and hold the rabbit. He told this story to a little boy with all the seriousness of his survival being at stake. I was enrapt until the end. Then his big grin and blue eyes belied his meaning. He has been dead for 50 years, but he is alive in my memories. These are the kind of folks I want to write about. It doesn’t have to be true, but the hearts and intentions are faithful representations.

I am working on a book, it is to be called That’s “Flyover Country”.  By clicking on the Working Book in the menu you will be able to see the chapters, vignettes, and acorns I have collected for this project, I am hungry for input from everyone. Grammar, content, or storyline. Knock yourself out. I’m trying to cover 120 years of rural living (the span of time I am familiar with through stories I have heard and lived,).

Welcome to my site. I am retired with little left to do but paint. I give that short shrift. To be able to paint and create on a daily basis is a joy that retirement has given me. I will offer paintings and oil sketches (les etudes) for sale on this site in hopes of sustaining my purchase of supplies. One can’t be an artist without the support of patrons. You can’t call yourself an artist. That is a title left for others to apply. The pursuit of that title will be my last dragon to slay. The dream that has called me since childhood.

I did try to prepare for this by attending art school at L’Albert DeFois L’Ecole Des Beaux-Arts in France for 5 years. After a career as a helicopter pilot, I moved to France to study art. That was a fabulous adventure.

This is the view out of my hotel window in Paris. I went to Paris often to take in the museums and everything Paris had to offer. Just like the novel, Moveable Feast, I was there to experience it all. 

This painting was a continued effort that spanned years. I got the setting but didn’t finish the story.  I would have added two prostitutes near the green storefront, and a little further away a pimp wearing a rugby shirt and a beret. Gargoyles on the rooftops with the street lights barely illuminating their grins. (I always loved the thought of Parisian gargoyles animating at night and roaming the rooftops to leer at the nightlife below.) The actors attention would be towards our right where we can’t see. A walk around the corner in Paris always offers more to see and experience. This what I left unfinished in Paris. Rounding a few million more corners.

Portraiture from a photo. These are done with drawing media, charcoal, pencil, or conte crayon. Drawings are done from a photograph. The subject must be lit from a single light source, i.e. next to a window. outside. or a lamp. $250.  Guaranteed, if you don’t like it you don’t have to accept. Multiple photos are good. Let me know the subject a little better.