Pure Creativity

"Homage to O"Keefe," mixed-media, 24x36 inches

For most businesses it is essential to build a “brand.” Artists are self-employed so have to think of being profitable. Thus, more often than not, they develop their own type of brand.

"Aspen Trail," o/l, 24x20 inches, SOLD

"Traveler," Mixed-media, 24x18 inches

I have always experimented and been uncomfortable being branded. Pure creativity is primal impulse and can be vitiated by commercial pressures to conform. Fortunately, for most of my life as an artist, I have had my own gallery, and could show a broad range of work. Over three decades, I have seen popular taste shift. In the last couple weeks, the majority of the work I have sold is “experimental.” That is gratifying and leads me to conclude I can be authentic and received.

"Afternoon Leisure," oil/canvas, 12x12 inches

"Afro Mask," oil/linen, 20x20 inches

Fun Intensity

Winter cold makes life contract—or so it seems. The sun shines for fewer hours of the day, plants go dormant and energy is spent in conservation rather than gleeful expenditure. And so it goes with my art business. The Steven Boone Gallery art sales lapse, as the Santa Fe art market declines to its nadir in January and February. 

It is a good time to take risks creatively. Why not let the modus operandi be that of surprise and exploration? 

I always come back to experimentation as a basis for my art. I am easily restless and never self-satisfied for long. This week, I pulled some large abstract monotypes out of storage and began painting on them. They were made years ago, during another period of exploration, and have been out of sight ever since. I allow my eyes to wander over the surface and like a Rorschach test, let imagination come forth to suggest a narrative. 

I love having archives to draw upon. This blog is an archive of my life for many years . . . and I have been drawing from it to write a memoir. Thirty thousand photos are in my files, and only last night I took delight reworking a photo from a session with two models in my studio that took place several years ago. The pair were young friends, a white woman and black man, roomates who had an easy ambience between them, and who were quite comfortable being naked and interacting joyfully for a few hours with me, as I took hundreds of pictures.

The studio was draped in black cloth, and at one point, the woman, who has marvelous milky-white skin, held a long black cloth that she used to duel with her friend, who had a good physique and cocoa complexion, and battled with a flowing white cloth. The action was wonderful and my camera captured the fun intensity.

Going With The Creative Flow

Art, like life, should be free, since they are both experimental. George Santayana

When you're experimenting you have to try so many things before you choose what you want, and you may go days getting nothing but exhaustion. Fred Astaire

It is often said to me, when visitors to my gallery have seen the work on the walls and discovered that I made it all, “It is surprising to see the diversity!” The Steven Boone Gallery shows the full range of my work, not just what sells. Usually, artists find a formula that works for them and if it is successful, then they repeat it—making a “brand” that it identifiable to the public and drives sales. I admit I have a style of my own—landscape painting using a palette knife and thick paint with bold color, which has driven sales for me. Yet, along the way, through thirty-five years of being a professional artist, I have frequently left the familiar path and gone into the unknown. This deviation is from inner necessity, not for financial gain. In fact, trying new approaches to art is scary, since it requires going into the mysterious and the public may not want to go there with you.

Art flourishes where there is a sense of nothing having been done before, of complete freedom to experiment; but when caution comes in you get repetition, and repetition is the death of art. Alfred North Whitehead

It is winter, and this is the perfect time to go into the unknown. Sales are down because tourists are gone, and I am not distracted by needing to replace inventory. The hours are plentiful to just experiment.

Twenty-five years ago I went through a period of producing abstract art, and now, I am returning to that realm. I am going with the creative flow . . . using the palette knife and thick paint, but experimenting with surprising combinations. Entirely new for me are mounting my figure drawings on board, coating them, and painting. I am pushing the color envelope into new territory.

I would say to any artist: 'Don't be repressed in your work, dare to experiment, consider any urge, if in a new direction all the better.' Edward Weston

A Unique Brand

"Road To Bliss"

In business, it is important to create a “brand” which identifies a product as desirable to the public. There are many examples of highly successful branding in commerce, where the name and image become so engrained as to gain legions of faithful followers. Even in the wide-open realm of art, it is often remarked that to be successful, a brand must be established. There are many artists that develop a style that is uniquely their own, and when they become successful, they continue within the brand that they have developed, afraid to go outside its boundaries.

"Target Hangup"

I never have been able to live within creative boundaries. I like to experiment, and even though I have been most successful as a landscape painter, and established a recognizable style that could be called a brand, I have nonetheless continued going beyond boundaries. It would be much easier, and I would be richer if I just stayed on a branded track. People like dependability and are uneasy being surprised. They want to know that what they like is current, and not a passing phase.

Artists need to be able to go through phases and explore. This worked for Picasso, DaVinci, and a handful of other art greats, but for the most part, once an artist has developed a unique brand and is identified with it, he is also slave to it—at the risk of being rejected and having to start again from scratch.  

                 

How did Pablo Picasso pull it off? The force of his personality became the brand. He was PICASSO—and everyone expected new surprises from his genius. This would not have worked for his American contemporary, Norman Rockwell, whose brand was his marvelous illustrations of homespun Americana. To change his formula even a little, would have elicited howls of complaint.  

"Migration"

I have written of this creative dilemma previously: The Tightrope Walker

See more Steven Boone artwork: Stevenboone.com

Strange Scenario

This past week I traveled a road that I have never been on before. I printed one of my photographs on top of an abstract monoprint. (A monoprint is a painting that is made on plexiglass and then sent through a printing press. The pressure transfers the ink from the hard glass to the absorbent paper.) I then experimented with coatings and sent the print through my wide format ink jet printer and came up with something interesting that I can continue to work with.
Meanwhile, the economy is in such a slump that I have no income these days. My paintings, which usually sell briskly, are not selling, and my items brought back to the United States from abroad are only selling on the very low end; not enough to cover my expenses. I am in THE DREAM, and now it is presenting me with a strange scenario where I produce work but it goes unsold.
Another strange scenario is the plight of seven Baha’ís in Iran. They were arrested a year ago just for being Baha’ís, and have been imprisoned ever since. In the past, similar arrests have led to execution. There is so much that is dreadfully unfair about this. The seven have not been allowed to see lawyers and not been charged with any crime. An international protest is gaining momentum that certainly will eventually lead to changes for the betterment of Iran and the safeguarding of human rights everywhere else as well.

Bloom Where You Are Planted

At times in my present nomadic existence, I wonder, who am I now that I do not have a home? The thought might come as I am standing in a shopping line, and people around me are speaking in a language I do not entirely understand, and I realize I have no one but myself to turn to, or while on a bus as it is taking me somewhere in a city half a world away from my native land. Always, the answer comes back to me; I am comfortable in my own skin, and at home wherever I am. During my crazy teen-aged years, during the hippie revolution, I remember reading a slogan that a flower child had painted on a wall, and it has stayed in my consciousness all these years: Bloom where you are planted.

The combination of Frederique’s artistic encouragement and Granada’s creative atmosphere and bravado has resulted in my reaching for a new space in my painting. I am painting closer to my heart, and not thinking of marketability. My self-portrait came out with an edge to it: blurred borders, three hands, and an intense gaze. I have made three other paintings as well, and they all are different from my normal approach when I am painting landscapes.

As usual, I am walking a great deal. Thank God for my Clark shoes, which are holding up under brutal exercise from walking the streets and exploring. I remain intrigued by the graffiti I see splashed everywhere on the walls in Granada. The textures too, are like abstract paintings. I am amassing quite a collection of photographic images. So much, that my hard drive is becoming crowded. I have to burn pictures onto DVD’s for backup and then destroy most of them from off of my computer as I go along.

Frederique is coming to visit. We have such wonderful dialogue and I welcome her presence and willingness to share moments with a nomad, living in THE DREAM.