I'm endlessly influenced and inspired by any number of sources - other artists for sure (on a recent trip to the Guggenheim I was impressed by Julie Mehretu's recent paintings - walking through the gallery a friend and I were struck by how much we saw traditional Japanese landscape influences - yet in a totally modern and contemporary lens - as my friend said, "as if the Japanese landscapes were put into a blender with Carroll Dunham's work" - and that seemed accurate).  

Recently I've been struck by how much the landscape and atmosphere around us can also be an enormous influence. Since moving to Staten Island I am increasingly inspired by the New York harbor - by the sounds and smells of being on the waterfront - by the large expanse of sky that I see out my windows  - and from the ferryboat as I head into Manhattan each day. Photography seldom captures this well, at least in my opinion. A few artists have done  some  gorgeous work that captures these gorgeous views of the nature around us. I think of Vija Celmins, Uta Barth, Andy Goldsworthy - and of course there are many others - I like Eugene Atget's early morning photographs of the Paris parks - many others.

As you can see from the photographs I've posted - there is just so much for a visual artist to respond to. The colors in nature have such powerful emotional qualities.

I recently designed a painting lesson for high school students focused on the amazing variation of skies and the emotional resilience in each nuance of color and light.

Students first studied the sky at different times of day. Some sketched the sky in their sketchbooks.  Next students collected at least ten images of skies from magazines or other sources -- the sunny brilliant blue Caribbean skies - cloudy aggressive skies before a storm - night skies full of stars -- sunsets -  sunrises -- there are a million variations of skies. Next came the step that really interested me.

I asked students to choose the images that really resonated with them - at least three - and arrange them to tell a story. Here I wanted the students to think about the ways that the arrangement of the photographs could be a narrative. Any sort of narrative they could imagine. At first I had some trouble here -- "what kind of story?"  Then I made the analogy that they could all relate to: Imagine the sky on the day that you fall in love - that's your first sky - maybe it's a bright blue sky with a few fluffy white clouds. The, the second sky is the day that you have a disagreement - overcast sky photo goes second... Then, the relationship is falling apart - a dark stormy sky is third. "Ah Ha" the students get what I'm talking about.

Anyway, after all that analyzing of images, eventually they choose the one image of the sky that they truly relate to and begin a painting based on that sort of sky. It was a fun project for me and the students.

And now, 

Here is some of the artwork that has inspired me:

Vija Celmins:

Uta Barth:

Andy Goldsworthy:

I hope that these thoughts have given you something pleasant to ponder today. Thanks for reading and looking.