Thoughts on Painting
Since my last post about art and painting I’ve been pondering art, again, or still, in this never-ending process I’m caught up in.
Since moving to Mexico in 2003 I’ve looked for ways to describe the culture here to my people back home. But culture is a 4 dimensional beast, it swirls around us constantly, changing over time. It’s like smoke, as soon as you describe its shape it has taken a new one and your words are inaccurate.
But there are elements that remain semi-constant. Things like how normal it is for strangers to say hello to each other here; there is an instinctive friendliness here. But also how people in Mexico expect corruption to surround them and don’t expect laws to be enforced. These things seem to flow all the way through the culture and color everything.
I’ve been looking at paintings by couple of my favorite Mexican artists and I wanted to share those with you (links will follow this post). Those artists are Mario Mizrahi, who is from Cozumel, and Julio Chico who was born in Mexico City. In both cases their work shows me something about the culture in Mexico which can’t be described in another way.
Mizrahi’s work talks to me about the playfulness that you find here, even in the face of life’s ugly underbelly. And Chico’s work comforts me, assures me somehow, that there is beauty and depth of feeling underneath the short-sightedness and ugliness I see in this culture.
Here are links so you can see some of their works. I couldn’t find a web site for Julio Chico, instead I found a gallery page about him.
Also I thought I would share one of my own paintings with you. I painted it right before moving to Mexico. I never titled it but I remember that I had been looking at some of René Magritte’s paintings, and I remember that I was scared and kind of depressed. I also remember that I painted it entirely with a palette knife, no brush at all. So enjoy it, or don’t, or whatever.
Untitled – Painted in 2003
