music

Stormy Sky & Musical Muse

July 18, 2009 By Michelle Hendry

Update (07.20): I had to add for interest to the foreground. Between the caffeine and the sleeplessness, I hope it was worth it!

OK – This one nearly killed me…. I am not entirely sure I am finished with it. Sometimes it takes an overnight perspective to be certain – not that there is much left of the night. It is after 3am…

Music is a big part of my process. Many of my paintings have a soundtrack or a theme song. Music moves, pulls out the emotions I draw upon to paint some of my paintings.

A good example of a painting with theme music would be “Evanescence“. Allegri’s Miserere and Mozart’s Requiem made up the background. While I was painting “Evanescance”, I learned the historic church was being torn down. I had spent only a little time in this elegant pioneer structure, but the silence and peace of this place imprinted on me. The sadness and loss, the sublime beauty are all captured in Miserere. I played it over and over for the nearly two weeks during which I planned, drew and painted. Frankly, I was so emotionally drained from the work, it took me quite a while to really be able to go back to that ‘place’. It is also very unlikely I will ever part with the original painting.

Every so often, I find a song or piece of music that emotes in a manner that I cannot describe exactly. The word that comes to mind is haunting; the feeling slightly uncomfortable, but, at the same time irresistibly attractive. The music is often in a minor key.

A song that I can feel is going to affect my next painting is one I heard from a television show I have found quite a bit of great music from – The Cleaner. The song is called “Don’t Let me Down“, by Ampop. (I don’t have a good link but it is on iTunes) The song has that feeling – that essence of a deep dark place. In my imagination I can explore this darkness – a darkness with an underlying optimism and spark of light that permeates like an underground stream fills the cracks of a cave. The painting is of an old bathroom sink, the room coloured a warm rose by the curtain covering the window. The light is low. No one has used this room in years… I’ll post the WIP for you next week.

Occasionally it is the lyrics as much as the sound that grabs me. Sarah McLachlan wrote a song on her second album way back in the early 90’s called “Drawn to the Rhythm” (video link). There is a line in this song that I sing every time I hear it and it is seeping its way into my current work – and my life in general:

In the face of a blinding sun

Awake only to find

That Heaven is a stranger place

Than the one I’d left behind…

I would be very interested to know how music affects your life. We all have a soundtrack, for what we do, who we are… What’s yours?

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Newsletter

I finally got my newsletter out earlier this week. I find that after I finish a painting I am inclined to clean up the administrative stuff that piles up before launching into another piece. I spent some time figuring out the YLMP system and then customized it. I plan to make the newsletter monthly – so the next one will be in mid-August. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, fill in the field here and you will automatically receive it! The current newsletter, is here.

Musing on a Specific

February 18, 2009 By Michelle Hendry

I went for a drive this afternoon. It was the first one since the Autumn.

This winter has been a harsh one and the window of good weather seemed to be coming to a close, so I figured I had better get out. Driving is a great time to think, explore and get inspired. I always make sure that I have a purpose, something I set out to bring back that I cannot do on foot. For just thinking, a hike is better. I ended up at the south shore of Georgian Bay as a storm front began to slowly move into the area.

We admire uncompromising people; people that pursue a vision or a purpose with unwavering commitment. We call these people heroes and role models. In their very nature they attract some and offend others, but their belief in themselves, their vision, does not allow them to be concerned with that.

Many of us grow up attempting to be people pleasers. As artists we know that is necessary, however, how far does one take that? Seth Godin said that it is more important that you are best in your category and that it should be specific. People that share that vision will be gravitate to it. The artist’s job is to lead it. Pleasing everyone is impossible, if not undesirable.

Questions should be – what makes you unique? What are you passionate about? What are you trying to say – not necessarily just what you think, but what do you feel? Why is it important that you communicate it? Why does it matter?

In looking at these questions I have been attempting to distill exactly why I paint. I am often accused of being all in my head – a thinker. I suppose that kind of generality works for people that like labels. Thinking is important to me – but thoughts are empty and without context unless connected to something larger, something that reaches much deeper. Success is not in its description but in the attempt, the exploration – The journey is what others relate to. Emotion is not an end in itself, but merely a symptom of thought reaching that place deep within ourselves where we keep those things which make us human. Art is about sharing the human experience and imagination.

One might assume that because of the way I think, my work might be abstract or more expressive. I suppose it might be fun to try it, but it somehow is not me – at least not at the moment. I love form and colour. Landscape and the sense of place can often be a visual metaphor for an emotion, a feeling – one that many people can relate to. Like music in a minor key can evoke a memory of love or loss, sensuality or melancholy, a landscape painting speaks through Light. The angle of light, the saturation of colour and its intensity can evoke those same feelings. A certain amount of realism is required to create recognition and relationship – and specificity – for me.

I paint to raise awareness – not for some cause – but awareness of how much we are reflected in our landscapes. We till them, pave them, grow them, abandon them, observe them, and rarely pause to absorb what we are doing. Our inner landscapes are reflected in these outer landscapes. There is beauty and sadness in all of our geography. Is any of that important? It certainly is to me. It is why I get up in the morning and what stirs my passions. If it is ever to be relevant, it needs to touch others. You.

Perhaps my work is a mirror of places – an artscape. If I am moved, I am driven to share that landscape with another and in so doing, reflect who we are back to us – whether it be a wild place or an abandoned one. What makes each of us unique is the language we choose the speak in and the way we present what we are passionate about. I know I am still working out the presentation and I am hopeful that it will continue to evolve.

If you stayed with me and read all of this post, perhaps there is some meaning here after all. I want to connect with you.

I am a lifelong fan of Pink Floyd and this song came to mind. It is a song of alienation – but in this case, perhaps an example of how art can connect (links to sound and video below):

Hey you, out there in the cold
Getting lonely, getting old
Can you feel me?
Hey you, standing in the aisles
With itchy feet and fading smiles
Can you feel me?
Hey you, dont help them to bury the light
Don’t give in without a fight.

~ from “Hey You (music only)” – Pink Floyd (Waters) – Video

What is your Vision?

The Fate of the Arts

October 17, 2008 By Michelle Hendry

I just read a post on one of my favourite blogs about the state of the art buyer and the art world. (Visit Linda’s Blog) It got me to thinking about art how or why some of us become artists and why some appreciate – or do not appreciate – the arts.

It seems that every time thought and economy change, so does art. I do not mean the natural swings of economy, I mean the foundations. The paradigm shifts in power and philosophy from farmer to industry, from medieval to renaissance, from industry to? Art got mass marketed soon after our lives did. Art is always a reflection of culture and is inextricable from its times.

Gothic Cathedral Ceiling

However, people are people. I think that we, essentially, change less than our ideas. There are the workers, the thinkers, the creators, the innovators and the pioneers. As much as society can change, I am not sure we change who we are. We can learn to better manage ourselves and learn a skill, but, what makes us effective to act in line with our natures. In the case of an artist, a writer, an actor, designer, etc… we are creators. We may come to the act of creating from many different directions – some are inspired, others are obsessive; some are dark and create from the shadows and others are eternal optimists. Some are both depending on the day. We are essentially a communicative species and we have created many ways to share our knowledge, besides language itself.

The idea that we have an ancestral memory may not be as far fetched as many think and not quite as literal as a library or computer memory bank as some thinkers try to describe it. We are the sum of generations of people and their genetic memory is in us. Some things are by chance and others by calculation, but, ultimately, we are likely to behave in the way we are hardwired – giving reason for everyone seeing something a little differently. Relativity isn’t just physics. The very nature of the universe and the passage of time is relative to those who observe. No person will see it the same way.

Lascaux Caves

In the earliest times of human existence, art found a way into our lives. The significance of the art is direct to those to whom it belonged. To others it is a book of mysteries to be decoded. The shaman of ancient peoples saw things in a way different from others in their community and some painted their visions of the walls of caves. Others created great buildings with symbols and faces carved into their walls and pillar. Some painted the mysteries of God – some with representational images of animals and people, others with their strict absence. Looking up at the ceilings of a gothic cathedral is almost like looking into the canopy of an ancient forest.

Sistine Chapel

One can say the writing of language is an art form, to the Asians, particularly the Chinese it is an art form. The characters emerged from pictograms. Art to the Chinese is not a separate set of activities. Each art form relates to another and is a part of the practice. Writing is art, intellect and performance.

So with that in mind, is art is simply communication? It is not an entity in itself nor should it be simply the secrets of the unconscious mind of one person, although, I am not sure that can every really be the case.

There is art in communication even today, in the devices that deliver it and in the design of the words themselves. Painting has been with us since the beginning of human history, as has dance, music and storytelling. I am not sure we can ever lose them, just perhaps, in their current forms. The meaning and the drive to create has not essentially changed, just what might motivate the creator and the means by which they create. I don’t think that the Arts can ever die, because if they do, that is when we cease to be human.

'52 Gibson Guitar – Music and Art

February 1, 2008 By Michelle Hendry

Many writers and artists will be able to attest to the power of music in the creative process. Music has an incredible ability to emote.

’52 Gibson, 24×30, acrylic, Collection of Gerri Hynes and Paul Musgrove

Music has often inspired both my writing and my art. Images and words will come to mind when listening to any kind of music. I love classical, electronic and ambient music. Even the occasional pop song might spark something – love, sadness, longing…

Once in a while, though, I am inspired by the objects that make music.

My paternal grandfather used to play guitar and sing popular songs from the thirties that he might have learned while working on the railroad in the farthest parts of Northern Ontario. I remember him playing “You are My Sunshine” the most. He passed away in 1994.

When I moved in with my grandmother to attend college for graphic design a couple years later, I rediscovered his 1952 Gibson guitar. I was searching for things to photograph for a black and white darkroom class. I wanted a reflective surface so I could play with light effects. I scrunched up some foil and shot a spotlight on it. The result was an almost abstract image. I loved it. I am not sure that anyone else knew what it was. The image meant a lot to me for both the visual meaning and the memory of its sound.

Several years after that, I was going through my original college portfolio and I found the photograph. I felt like it could say even more as a painting. I embellished the metal parts as they are chromed on the original instrument, but I felt brass was better for the painting. I was very pleased with the results and I think my grandfather would have liked it very much.

I don’t play guitar, so it has been silent for many years now. To see the painting, instead, now reminds me of the music it once played and the love that inspired it….

Stormy Sky & Musical Muse

Musing on a Specific

The Fate of the Arts

'52 Gibson Guitar – Music and Art

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