It's Always Something

I try to always have my little camera with me. 

When it's been left at home on the counter, 

I've always regretted it. There's usually something

that crosses my line of sight I wished

I'd had it in my pocket.

Yesterday was no different.

I was on my way to the store when I saw

these cherry-like berries against

the light gray background of the 

churchyard where they live.

They seemed like drawings to me,

scraggly thick and thin lines

defining the space in which they exist.

And triangles.

Lots of triangles. 

In a way, they reminded me of drawings 

and prints by John Dowell, one of my college professors.

I remember the time he showed his portfolio

to a batch of interested students.

It was a suite of lithographs he'd produced

for his MFA thesis. Based on the theme

of the gradual opening of a triangle, his words

and work has stuck with me for nearly

fifty years. I thought of him when 

I took these little snaps.

One of his drawings, Just A Sign of Soul,

is shown below. I love it. Of course.

Love/Water

I love to get to the Natatorium early 

to watch the swimmers.

Very often there are large groups 

either practicing or warming up for competition.

The sounds of the water and the rhythm of 

people moving up and down the lanes

is both mesmerizing and comforting.

None of the pictures I've taken so far of

the swimmers has captured the fascination

I feel by the almost balletic routine

of their movements.

While swimming myself, I sometimes 

think of the swimmers and try to emulate 

their long line, keeping my body straight 

and toes relaxed yet pointed.

"Relaxed." Yeh, that's the big thing for me;

I don't think about going fast, I think 

"Technique, technique, technique. 

Technique fast, technique fast, technique fast." 

My body comes up "on plane" and I feel 

as though the water is zooming by me.

It makes a difference.

I count my laps. I count my strokes.

I cast a glance at the clock

and then turn my eyes toward the bottom

of the pool to begin again,

another step in my odyssey to achieve a dream.

My love for you is like water.

Clear as crystal, its currents weave through,

creating inclusions, weaving, changing

yet always there, adding depth

and bands of color, rainbows of feeling 

from the darkest indigo

to the happiest of yellows.

Fight it and you flounder.

Rest quietly and it will support you,

carrying you to the other side

as quickly or as slowly as you may care

to go, but always there.

Maître Tom, le nageur du Nat

When I watch Tom and Victoria practice, 

I don't notice anything odd about their appearance 

in the water; I take the distortion for granted.

But when I tried to draw Tom, I found the distortions 

needed explanation: No, his arms aren't really 

all weenified, his legs and body aren't that thick; it's just 

the way the light is reflected by the moving water.

While working on the drawing, I was reminded 

of Picasso's Demoiselles d'Avignon, 

the painting that inspired the artist's development

of Cubism. The debut of this painting in 1907

marked the birth of modern art. From my art history

classes, I understood that Cubism was, in part,

an effort by the artists to flatten perspective and

to keep the viewer's eye moving continually

around the composition. I didn't try to "flatten"

the perpective at all, but the distortions made by 

the water certainly force one to keep looking

around the picture, making it move.

A Journey

I was asked by the newsletter editor for my swimming club 

to respond to a short questionnaire about myself 

and "why I swim." In response, I told her that, in addition 

to using the sport to help me combat obesity, 

I've found that swimming has given me more confidence 

in other aspects of my life. It is also helping me 

to become more disciplined in working towards 

achieving my goals away from the pool.

For the past year, I've been working to develop,

to revitalize, really, my drawing and painting skills.

Not surprisingly, these drawings have had swimmers

as my subject matter. The drawings aren't so much 

about the swimmers as they are about the water,

the colors and patterns that element takes on as the

athletes glide, kick, and move in the beautiful,

blue stuff. I'm working to make my marks on the canvas

and paper more personal, reflecting more how

I feel about what I see. I don't want them to be 

mere illustrations; that is too easy.

I love David Hockney's swimming pool paintings, 

but I don't care for his swimmers. While they are, 

purportedly, homoerotic, I find the male

figures all to have undefined bodies with flat butts,

completely unappetizing to this womanly eye.

But never mind that - the way Hockney renders water

is interesting, and his marks are unique to him.

And so, I work towards making my own marks to

describe how I feel about this activity and the people 

with whom I share the pool. 

The top picture is a detail of a small painting 

I am currently working on. The second is a ballpoint drawing 

I made to use as reference. The third is the underdrawing

for the little painting. It was done over another 

painting I'd started and set aside. 

Hell, I liked the brush strokes set against 

their predecessors grid marks and washy blue blotches. 

I painted over it anyway.

Colors on a Gray Day

Just over a year ago, I stood at the edge 

of the Natatorium pool, preparing for swim practice,

when I noticed the prisms of color spreading 

from the edges of the lane stripes.

They are a constant, changing with the flow of the water,

undulating and pulsing colored light.

I've taken pictures and made drawings as

I search for a way to bring their beauty to life

on canvas. This search adds movement

to the drawings of the swimmers,

although what interests me most is the

movement of the water over 

and around their bodies;

it's interesting to see the distortions

the moving water makes as an underwater 

swimmer pushes off the wall.

And so, on this gray day, as the breezes

gust through now barren trees,

I find color and comfort in the water

as I watch and swim in the "concrete box."

Art in Speedway: John Dowell

These leaves had fallen from a nearby bush.

Their arrangement in the snow, along with 

the bits of colored grasses and shadows, reminded me 

of drawings and paintings by John Dowell,

a contemporary artist from Philadelphia, whose

drawings deal as much with the effect of

negative space as they do with the actual marks.

Every line, shadow, and bit of texture

is considered in relation to the others, and how

they affect the overall space.

John was one of my college profs,

whose work enchanted me from the first

time I saw a suite of his lithographs.

He seemed so wise and "together"

to me even then, despite the fact he is

only four years older.

This is one of John Dowell's watercolor drawings,

Just a Sign of Soul, done in 1975. It is in the

collection of the Indiana University Art Museum. 

Going Forward ...

The day is so dreary it almost seems 

as if the sun forgot to rise.

The sky is thick with clouds,

a puffy quilt between us and the blue sky.

I am waiting, waiting for a phone call

to make an appointment for an interview, 

waiting for the workman who's supposed 

to fix a problem in my apartment.

The cat ran away when he came.

We couldn't find her, so now I'm waiting 

to have the work rescheduled and,
needless to say, I am waiting for 
my silly cat to reappear 
at some point in the next few hours
from a secret nook she's found.

Waiting.

What is the difference between waiting

and patience? So far this week,

I've missed two opportunities to swim

through waiting. It seems that patience is putting

in the work towards a desired result,

while waiting is putting oneself at the mercy

of others' whims and schedules.

My swimming is teaching me that I need to

be patient because it takes time to 

reach a goal. However, the act of waiting

takes away my control over a situation.
I am nervous and bored with waiting because
I want to be in the pool, swimming
towards a goal.

Delineations

After a thunderstorm, I went outside for a walk.

The rain had presented me with a drawing,

a subtle gray composition on the heaved sidewalk

where straight and scribbly intersected

to balance each other.

Tiny Bubbles

I'd rather be swimming ... or out taking pictures, 

but however clear and blue the sky, the temperatures 

have dropped into the 'teens, and the flag across the street is 

held out nearly straight by the wind.

So here are a couple SPD photos of sketches

I've been working on, impressions of what

I see when I am swimming. I've thought of borrowing

an underwater camera, but I think I would lose

the feeling of what I see when I'm in the pool.

One morning, a coach was working with me

on my stroke, asking me to turn to the side when I breathed,

making certain I kept my head down.

Well, I did just that and what I saw was beautiful!

There was the splash and flow of disrupted water

flowing past my goggles, with the man-made shapes

of the lane markers in the background.

And that was my left eye! In my right,

I saw calmer water, with people in adjacent

lanes swimming by, the water apparently disturbed 
only by the fan-like swarms of tiny bubbles made by their

feet as they kicked. Of course, the trick is to get

both into my drawing/painting efforts. Meh.