The whole story doesn't show --

Farm History

The [artist/]writer is either a practicing recluse or a delinquent,
guilt-ridden one; or both. Usually both.
Susan Sontag

My respite is over. It's been too long, and I miss communicating with my fellow bloggers. But I just had to get through these last weeks. There is something about this time of year that just drags one down. Creative energies were at a low ebb, and all I could cope with initially was painting my living room.

But then I turned to the camera.

Why? I've given this great thought (or almost great) and conclude that, for me, it was something I could control. I could sit for hours doing the processing, fidgeting, starting over, creating my own textures for overlays -- so you see, the creative spark was still alive, just operating at a different level, a more controllable level unlike oil paints and watercolors that don't cooperate, that slide around and do what they want to do -- sort of like children or a herd of wild kittens!

I also like learning new things, new techniques and reading fairly boring how-to manuals. It takes my mind into that left side where I did not have to be creative, just thorough -- no, make that thorough and boring.

And I've learned so much, not only about the photography, but also about seeing, perceiving and composing. This was something I had always struggled with on canvas or paper, feeling clumsy and stumbling around in the dark.

Old Apple Farm

But with the camera and a viewfinder/grid I was suddenly composing vignettes and making images come alive. Now when I review my photographs, I can "see" them as paintings in my mind. The potential, the possibilities are there; I know now a bit more about how to tease the image out, to make it visible -- intellectually and emotionally -- how to translate and interpret.

Waiting Beneath

Also, I think the season allows for a different way of perceiving -- the excessiveness of colors and brightness we have in summer and fall are now gone. As Andrew Wyeth put it:

“I prefer winter and fall, when you feel the bone structure of the landscape - the loneliness of it, the dead feeling of winter. Something waits beneath it, the whole story doesn't show.”

. . . and so I hope that as time goes by my creative story will begin to emerge, a slow process of repousse, of pushing out from behind . . . or from beneath!

peace and joy

Winter Barn
photograph by K. Marszycki

Winter solstice is approaching . . .

A quiet time of year, one would think. But with the holidays we are forced into a breakneck pace to prepare, shop, cook, travel, visit, clean -- and then drop in exhaustion. Our bodies are still adjusting to the time change and the loss of sunlight. We have trouble sleeping, our minds crowded with lists and lists of lists of more things to do.

Winter solstice is approaching . . .

In centuries past, it was a time of darkness, lit only by candles and fires. Warm corners and rich foods were sought and the starkness of winter whiteness was softened by gatherings of natural greens and red berries, symbols of the natural world and of renewal.

Winter solstice is approaching . . .

Can we slow the pace down? Can we seek quiet corners and warm fires? Instead of gold and silver, can we festoon our homes with holly and juniper, perhaps play the music of earlier times when human voices soared high up into the rafters, across rooftops and deep into the night, as if to keep the darkness at bay.

Winter solstice is approaching . . . and I wish you peace, paix, paz, pax . . .