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“Take the A Train”
The Colors of Jazz Collection
©2021, Molly Larson Cook
28″ x 22″ Acrylic on canvas
$600

 

“Water runs down hill concisely. There is no quibbling about it.
It does not have to run up hill in order to be entertaining….
The soul of a person may reveal its mysteries through direct expression,
simple speech, simple gesture, simple painting, just as
the soul of the brook is expressed in full simplicity and economy.”
—The Art Spirit, Robert Henri

I offer Henri’s words today because I learned quite recently, a few days ago really, why I was so stuck trying to get back to work.  His words are exactly what I needed.  Simplicity and economy.

Or in the advice of one of my instructors, Gary Ambrose, at Maine College of Art years ago to make the work “rich and complex not complicated and confusing.”

As I wrapped up the body of jazz pieces after my October show, I looked for something new, something different, a new direction, a new way to put the paint on the canvas.  Nothing took.

So I gave myself a break and looked at OPA, Other People’s Art, and read all the ads that come my way for one online gallery or another, read the news about big shows one place or another, new gimmicks and million dollar auctions.  None of this was helpful.

I looked through a lot of my early work to see if I could find a place of entry again…I hung out in the studio doing very little in the way of work, mostly sipping tea and eating whatever candy or crackers I’d taken on a particular day, reading my phone and rearranging paints.  Useful, eh?

I considered giving up my studio and spending the rest of my days doing other things – or nothing.  Spring is coming on and walks will be good.

The pandemic is not over and my little town is still locked down, although we are getting our vaccinations when we can.  Schools will open soon if all goes well, but I have no young children now so that’s not going to affect me much one way or another except to slow down when I drive through a school zone.

After thinking perhaps I should work on other subjects, use different materials, go back to collage, I realized even before I read the Henri that I was, in my own sweet way, trying to make the water run up hill.  I was not trying to be entertaining, but I was working against the nature of my own work.

It took a long time to figure out what I wanted to do in the first place, and if the pandemic had thrown me a curve, so be it.  The brook meets obstacles, too.  Stones, logs that fall into the stream, small dams, and yet the water stays true to itself and continues running concisely and simply down hill.

So I went back to the studio and back to my love of jazz, my love of color, and got to work.  This is my small prayer these days:  Let me be like the brook.  Let me find “direct expression, simple speech, simple gesture, simple painting, just as the soul of the brook is expressed in full simplicity and economy.”

Life does not have to be complicated.  We have choice.  We can make the best choices for our work. As my other guides, Bayles & Orland, put it in Art and Fear:  “Once you have found the work you are meant to do, the particulars of any single piece don’t matter all that much.”

I found jazz and color, the animal that wags its own tail.

Gratefully,

Molly