ESSAY: East Coast Traveling

Neil Welliver - I used to like this painter - yesterday he looked flat, posterized, lifeless to me, with a wonderful compositional sense.

Drive to Quonochontaug, “Quonny”, Rhode Island

I considered carefully, looking at Impressionists in particular.  I concluded that even they “failed”; I don’t think capturing light on canvas is possible.  Turner seemed to be the only one.  Monet’s two water lily paintings had a reflectivity that was very subtle and pleasing, as was a “Grainstacks, Snow”.  The “Rouen Cathedrals” and other Monets weren’t as great, somehow, as the presence the grainstack conveyed, resting with its substance so palpable, so rooted, so endlessly sentinal.  It glowed with orangey-Indian yellow tone against the cerulean-phalo blue sky beneath the snow.  

It still seems to me that it’s simply putting the Indian yellow glazes down and over against complementary tones that produce that quality of light so beloved by my teacher, by the Cape Cod School.  It’s so stereotyped and emulated now, overdone, overused, that it looks impossibly saturated and frothy, decorative, the “D” word, so dreaded among serious painters.

Better to work for more strucure, more subtlety.  I don’t need to get that unless I want it - it’s not something I need to master or achieve.  I think I’d like to be able to paint subtly luminous water more, or moonlight.  

I bought some iridescent paint and will just work with that.

Friday, September 7, 2012 – Page 2 

Manet’s drypoint etchings -

“Le Fleuve” illustrations.  Manet is my favorite right now.  He did botanical/biological work along with the figure, with the lightest, most elegant line.  

Drive to Quonny, Old Salt

It’s wonderful to be on the East Coast.

Such a different place, such a contrast to our western lifestyle and urban quality.

Saturday, September 8, 2012–  

At Old Salt, Date and Peggy’s beach home

It’s still, quiet, and a gentle wind moves casually across the back yard.   There are boulders, massed shrubs blooming and butterflies flutter between buddleia.   The house looks like something from Coastal Homes or Architectural Digest, it’s so welcoming, luxurious, and comfortable.  There’s a lovely screened porch that everyone sits on and evening dining happens.  

Date cooked buefish with breadcrumbs, lemon, and wasabi and it was truly delicious.  

Peggy has a very cute little dog that we played with and took for a walk down to the beach. 

We had a wonderful rainshower after dinner, tails of hurricanes which passed over Brooklyn and Queens last night.