August 2020

 by Viktoria Majestic 

 “Every artist dips his brush in his soul and paints his own nature into his pictures.”    Henry Ward Beecher 

 “I found I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn’t say any other way - things I had no words for.”                                               Georgia O'Keeffe

  Have you ever thought about the reason why do you paint?   Some people only discover art and painting later in life but, they become just as interested and   involved in it as those who start early. You could say they get “hooked”. Why is that, what does painting do for us? Probably painting means different things to different people.
However, there seem to be some common threads.   

 Some of us just do it instinctively from an early age. Those of us usually have an immense interest in everything related to art, colors, shapes, pictures etc. from the time we can remember.

I can recall back as far as pre-school, how much I liked creating art, and how fascinated  I was with other people's drawings and paintings. My all time favorite Christmas gift already at that very young age, was art supplies. I didn't know why, I was just simply drawn to everything art related.  That fascination and attraction has not changed over the years, if anything it became stronger. Art and painting is part of who I am, it helps me “breath”, helps to “turn off everything”, gives me a purpose and makes my life feel more complete.   

 Painting to most comes as a way to communicate emotions, or to capture a visual experience  that is hard to express with words. Moments and feelings that we feel deep within, can be expressed through a painting. A piece of art can also reveal the personality of the artist. Of course, all of the above usually requires learning the “language of art” first and requires lots of practicing. Similarly to someone wanting to write a book about something, first  he or she needs to learn the vocabulary, the rules and the grammar, before they can successfully convey their message.  

 If a painting is successful it can move profoundly not only the one who painted it, but those who view it, as well.
 
 Painting can heal, and  make us feel happy. This is especially true in these trying times. The  ritual of painting can be a  refuge from all the negativity in the world. . 

Painting is healing, relaxing and liberating both to the artist and to those who view it.   

 “ You won’t believe how liberating it is to do something that you don’t have to do. “  unknown 

 Excerpt from Harvard Women's Health Watch :     

The Healing Power of Art

 Creative activities can relieve stress, aid communication, and help arrest cognitive decline.
 The title of a recent documentary film, I Remember Better When I Paint, sums up the findings of a growing body of research into the cognitive effects of making art. The movie demonstrates how drawing and painting stimulated memories in people with dementia and enabled them to reconnect with the world. People with dementia aren't the only beneficiaries. Studies have shown that expressing themselves through art can help people with depression, anxiety, or cancer, too. And doing so has been linked to improved memory, reasoning, and resilience in healthy older people.
 The beneficial effects of creating aren't dependent on a person's skill or talents. "It's the process, not the product," says Megan Carleton, an art therapist at Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH).
 Why art is good medicine
 Decades of research have demonstrated that in people with dementia and other progressive neurological diseases, the ability to create art remains long after speech and language have diminished. Research has also shown that creating visual art can reduce stress and promote relaxation in people who are hospitalized or homebound due to illness.
 https://www.health.harvard.edu/mental-health/the-healing-power-of-art
 

 “The only time I feel alive is when I’m painting.”  Vincent Van Gogh

 Why do you paint? What painting means to you?

 I would love to hear from you about this. 

Viktoria 

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  SOREN EMIL CARLSEN   (1853-1932)
 was an American Impressionist painter who emigrated to the United States from Denmark. He became known for his still lifes. Later in his career Carlsen expanded his range of subjects to include landscapes and marines as well.

During his long career he won many of the most important honors in American art and was elected to membership in the National Academy of Design. For more than forty years he was also a respected teacher in Chicago, San Francisco and New York. Carlsen sought more training and embarked for Paris in 1875, where he came under the influence of the French still life painter Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin. He primarily painted tonalist still lifes that were somewhat reminiscent of those of Chardin. 

However, selling work was still a strugglefor a large part of his life. In 1885 Carlsen had two works accepted for the Paris Salon. Returning to New York he opened a studio on 57th Street. However, finding that it was still difficult to sell paintings he moved to San Francisco where between 1887 and 1889 he held a position as director of the California School of Design. He then moved on to teach privately at the San Francisco Art Students League until 1891.  In 1891,  Carlsen created a firestorm by openly declaring in one of San Francisco’s leading newspapers that art education was wasted on women who were inferior pupils without self-confidence and who were expected to become school teachers and marry. Arthur Mathews published a spirited rebuttal that provoked further debate.

 Carlsen moved back to the east from California in 1891 and began a long career of teaching in the East. He taught at the National Academy of Design, at the student-founded Art Student's League, and the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. Gradually, through his relationship with other New York-based painters and teachers such as John Twatchman and Julian Alden Weir, he became interested in painting landscapes and marines. 

 Emil Carlsen was a sought after teacher and financial necessity drove him to teach more than he wanted, taking time away from his painting. As he became more financially successful, he cut back on his teaching commitments.   Although he was considered to be one of the most respected American painters, Carlsen struggled financially for the first several decades of his career. 

The Macbeth Gallery in New York was the first gallery that specialized in the work of American artists. After Carlsen joined the gallery, which represented many of the American impressionists and for the first time he was able to live comfortably without constant financial stress. Carlson believed; “still life painting, is the very surest road to absolute mastery over all technical difficulties.”    

Critiques:  The art writer Arthur Edwin Bye featured Carlsen most prominently in his survey of American Still life painting in 1921 and wrote of him:  Emil Carlsen is unquestionably the most accomplished master of still-life painting in America today. ... It is evident that Carlsen has lifted his art to a height it has never reached before."  

In American Impressionism, William Gerdts wrote about Carlsen's transition from still life artist to landscape painter:  Carlsen was attracted to the beauties of the rolling hills and interpreted them in soft, pastel tones. 

Carlsen's landscape mode, however, is more more completely of this century, and it developed in the more decorative, somewhat naturalistic manner that characterized later Impressionism    

Credit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emil_Carlsen .