A few years ago, using my Stumble Upon toolbar, i came across the website for Carla Klein.
I was immediately struck by her imagery.
See, i have an ongoing obsession with horizons and skies. Horizons are an interesting thing. They are boundaries that exist within our perception and nowhere else. They provide a dramatic stage by which a day both enters and leaves our lives. They can turn a dismal gray day into an eternity where sunrise, daytime and sunsets have little meaning.
And they’re illusions. You can observe a horizon but you will never reach it. For every step that you take towards one, it changes and moves away with every step you take.
To give you an idea of my love for open, nearly endless spaces, consider that one of my dream vacations is to spend weeks driving around Alberta and Saskatchewan (no offense, Manitoba). I’ll put some links below to show why.
When i found Ms. Klein’s site, it… well, she’s managed to achieve what i always wanted to achieve in my work. Not to assign any sort of mysticism or try to parade any sort of artistic equivalence between her and i but it’s almost as though we’ve had a shared dream or perhaps an equal love and affection for the mystery of the marriage between skies and horizons.
I don’t know that i would have ever have been able to articulate with the skill and beauty she does in her work. I don’t work in acrylics because of: 1) money, 2) space, 3) time. I don’t work in oils because of: 1) money, 2) space, 3) time and 4) health risks. And frankly, my media of choice is watercolors. But no matter how much i love watercolors, they often lack the visual weight that oils and acrylics are able to achieve.
If nothing else, finding her site again is motivating me to start painting again. It’s spring and although it’s relatively chilly this morning, it’s supposed to get up to 70 by this afternoon and possibly near 80 tomorrow. Lately i’ve been painting more “commercial” type images of bees and/or coffee and honestly, i’m probably going to continue doing so for a while. I need money and i think i’ve found some imagery that is a healthy blend of commercial viability while still allowing me to keep some integrity.
But when i can, i hope to return to letting my brush reveal more horizons and the sheltering sky that holds it – and that in doing so, i take one step closer to those horizons in my mind and by doing so, reveal another something entirely new and yet comfortably familiar.