Two Questions

Ten Tubes of White

My response to two questions posed by Greg Card, Advancing Art Team Leader:

1. Who are you?

   I am a mystery… the son of a father, the father of a son, and, a friend of God. As a son, a father, and a friend, I am captivated by a love I do not understand- and yet it is a love I embrace. The One who calls me ‘friend’ directs my steps, and, I pray, my brush. It is from this place of mystery I answer the second question.

2. Why are you making art?

   Purpose has been in my thoughts for decades- the underlying issue of motivation. When I was a child, the act of drawing was elemental (as I suppose it is with all children) and without motivation. It was more an act of ‘release’, a letting go of something inside. I understand slightly more now what is being released.  And so, it is from a childlike place I make art… from the joy found in ‘seeing’ the work of my hands to the knowing I have been a participant in the process of creativity. When I make art from a place of authenticity, when I allow the Maker God to direct the ‘made me,’ purpose is made manifest.

Chesed
Oil on Corrugated

Faith like cardboard

     I grew up calling it cardboard.

     "Bring me that cardboard box!" someone would say.
     
     That was until one of my students corrected me. I suggested she screen print onto 'cardboard'. She looked at the paper in my hand and said, "Actually, Mr. Carter, that's corrugated paper. Cardboard is just one of the layers- like a cereal box."
     "Oh," I blinked.
     "That's O.K. Most people make that mistake." Her Dad sold corrugated paper so she knew more on the subject than most teenage girls.

     Greg Card paints on corrugated paper. I was surprised when he told me because Greg is big on 'permanence'... something corrugated is not known for. He stresses that an artist's work should outlive the artist- art should be archival. "The problem is air," he explained. "Corrugated breaks down when allowed to interact with air. Seal out the air and the temporal becomes permanent." Varnish is a good sealant. 

     Why paint on corrugated paper? Here are a few reasons Greg gave:

     - the paper is abundantly available, and free
     - the surface is interesting to work on, sometimes the printed side adds an element
     - corrugated paper is both rigid and light
     - painting on 'previously owned' corrugated paper is an artful way to recycle (I imagine a buyer's face as they look at the back of the newly purchased painting and discover they are holding a piece from a toilet box- which I am currently painting a series on)

     Corrugated is from the Latin- corrugare- to wrinkle up. As a verb, it means to draw or bend into folds or alternate furrows and ridges (dictionary.com). Corrugated paper is composed of a 'wrinkled' layer of cardboard sandwiched between smooth layers. It is this hidden layer of ridges and valleys that provides strength.

Creation

Day one

     My life is corrugated... a series of highs and lows, covered by a smooth veneer, but frayed, with worn spots in the corners. There is strength that comes from weathering a valley storm, and there is renewal that comes from a mountaintop. 

     Sometimes I think my faith is like cardboard- a thin, flat cereal box. What I want is corrugated faith: layered, dimensional, with places that go deep while reaching high. Corrugated faith is being wrinkled up with God.

 

Creation

Day Six

     Thanks to Greg, I have begun painting on corrugated paper. I rescued several pieces from a nearby dumpster. The surface is smooth, until I tear it... which I do. The strength should be revealed.

Shrewd

Concept Sketch

Shrewd

In Progress

Prayer For Joshua

Teresa Carter

So Joshua called together the twelve men he had chosen- one from each of the tribes of Israel. He told them, "Go into the middle of the Jordan, in front of the Ark of the LORD your God. Each of you must pick up one stone and carry it out on your shoulder- twelve stones in all, one for each of the twelve tribes of Israel. We will use these stones to build a memorial. In the future your children will ask you, 'What do these stones mean?' Then you can tell them, 'They remind us that the Jordan river stopped flowing when the Ark of the LORD's Covenant went across.'Joshua 4:4-7

\ab-ˈstrakt, ˈab-ˌ\ Medieval Latin abstractus, from Latin, past participle of abstrahere to drag away, from abs-, ab- + trahere to pull, draw. 1.not easy to understand because of being extremely complex, remote from concrete reality, etc.; abstruse

I once heard Tony Martin, an artist/pastor from Great Britain give a lecture on Abstract art. It was a small gathering in a Memphis coffee shop called the Ugly Mug. He used the Joshua 4 passage as a defense, or rather, permission for Christians to participate in the production of Abstraction- as a means of presenting the Gospel. It was beautiful. For years I struggled with abstraction. Sometimes a lack of understanding is accompanied by suspicion. I wondered if Abstract art was legitimate, valid, or, as I had been told- 'an inability to do better, a cop out'. In a paper entitled, Toward A Prophetic Aesthetic, Greg Card said, "The challenge is to present/implement something in the material realm that represents the dynamic of the revealed spiritual dimension."

I suppose the thing I struggled most with was the notion that 'art is serious play.'

When Calvin Seerveld stayed in our home, he had a private conversation with Terri about painting. She told him she wanted to be a better realist. He asked, "Why?" It is a simple question with profound implications. He suggested, "enjoy the process, have fun...play with the paint."

And so, the years have passed. My understanding and appreciation continues. My vocabulary of the language of art increases. Sometimes what isn't said speaks loudly. Sometimes it takes the abstract. Thank you Tony, and Greg, and Calvin.

"Certain experiences may be transmitted by language, others-more profound-by silence; and then there are those that cannot be transmitted, not even by silence." Elie Wiesel

Calvin Seerveld and Teresa Carter, seriously speaking on having fun

The Path

William Barclay said, “The only unanswerable argument for Christianity is a Christian life.” Terri and I spend Wednesday evenings with Greg and Susan Card, two brilliant artists who live Christian lives with graceful humility. And, as Matt Peterson says, “Humility is beautiful in every season.” We meet in their studio for dinner, conversation, music, prayer. Greg is working on a series of paintings on black with pearlescent polymers whose colors shift as light moves across them. The effect is stunning. The other night it occurred to me that it would be difficult, if not impossible, to photograph these paintings. They must be experienced, in-person. This, of course, would eliminate publication in journals or books, narrowing the audience and limiting the exposure. Why make art, if not to be seen? Why does God make flowers in remote mountain regions, or fantastical creatures who roam the sea-floor, never to be seen by man? Is exposure the ultimate goal? Or is the joy born out of the process sufficient? For Greg, the joy is evident whenever he shares a new work. He is on the path every true artist yearns for, the path of discovery. Perhaps art is merely the communication of a discovery, or, perhaps art awaits discovery. I don’t know. I am just grateful for the gift of Greg and Susan’s friendship.