| "There's a long-distance loneliness rolling out over | | | | The otherworldly feelings of space exploration and |
| the desert floor." So croons Jackson Browne in | | | | interplanetary travel sparked the very core of |
| "The Fuse". With this painting of emotion, the pen | | | | my childhood as I gazed upon, no, as I gazed into |
| becomes the brush, the mind is the canvas. With | | | | the pictures spread before my young mind. |
| but one line, a picture is painted. More than a | | | | Anywhere I wanted to go, pictures took me light |
| picture, a feeling is painted. "A long-distance | | | | years away. Anyone I wanted to be, pictures |
| loneliness." It's beautiful, it's immense, and it's | | | | made it so. If it could be transferred to canvas, |
| depressing all at once. | | | | or paper, or board, or glass from the mind of an |
| It's a challenge when one attempts to resolve the | | | | artist, I was there! |
| dilemma of the greater of two artists: the one | | | | But where can the visual artist take me that the |
| whose canvas is transformed with the brush, and | | | | writer cannot? Is it enough to paint the cave in |
| the other, who uses words to stir the senses. | | | | the shadows? Does the visual artist take me into |
| When I was a child, I could examine picture books | | | | the cave, or does my own imagination? In the |
| for hours on end, imagining I was there on the | | | | scene of the cabin in the woods, surrounded by a |
| pages, in the story, one of the characters. I was | | | | winter wonderland, do I feel the warmth of the |
| three inches high as I scooted into the little mouse | | | | fire because of the light I see in the window and |
| hole in the wall. There I would take refuge with | | | | the smoke emanating from the chimney? Does |
| my friend, the mouse. There we were safe from | | | | my mind take me there and supply the warmth? |
| the cat, safe from the elements outside, on the | | | | Does the painting on the canvas move my |
| little couch, in the little home in the wall. | | | | psyche? Is it true that I need to have |
| I was the cowboy in the fort, the Indian in the | | | | experienced warmth to imagine it? Do I need to |
| canoe, the army man in the foxhole. I was a | | | | know snow to feel the cold? Is it the viewer who |
| giant, walking through the sea, able to touch the | | | | brings the canvas to life, or the artist? |
| ocean floor. Sloshing to the shore, I owned the | | | | So to the visual artist, and I am one myself, I say |
| city as I trekked through the streets, using cars | | | | paint the cold without showing me the snow. |
| for my own personal toys. | | | | Then paint the warmth of the cozy fire in the |
| As I grew, pictures brought on different feelings. I | | | | cabin without showing me the fire. Paint the wet |
| felt sadness, romance, and elation. That | | | | of the waterfall and the depth of the valley and |
| magnificent painting of the waterfall with the calm | | | | the height of the mountain. Yes, the visual artist |
| pool beneath, took me away. I put myself into | | | | can do these things and more! |
| the picture, drenching myself in the icy water, | | | | But the dilemma remains, canvas or pen. How |
| hiding behind the massive liquid sheet, falling asleep | | | | does the visual artist paint the "long-distance |
| in the sunlit afternoon on the bank of the sandy | | | | loneliness rolling out over the desert floor?" |
| shore by that waterfall. | | | | How indeed? |