10,350. RUDIMENTS, pt. 180

RUDIMENTS, pt. 180

Making Cars

One time a guy walked into a

room full of my paintings (I'd

done up the walls with my

hangings), and he said, 'I like

this; these are all mineral colors.'

I hardly knew the guy except for

that afternoon, and that comment

threw me. They way he'd just

blurted it out. Like an art critic

adept. It surprised me, and then

later as I sat around I began to

realize what he meant. I don't

and didn't often approach a

painting or a work from the

angle of color. I use color, yes,

of course, and it plays a role,

but I was always more interested

in line and content. Those colorist

guys and all their abstract swirls

and blotches  - I got along with

all that, but it was never foremost.

I saw what he meant; the reds and

browns and ochres in what he'd

looked at were all earth-tones and

soil colors. So I got to work on

checking out some color theory and

history  -  we'd been taught some

of it, but I needed more. Two things

I always kept in my mind about

the early Impressionists were that

they were the first to use tube paints.

Before them artists had always mixed

their own pigments, etc, in the studio;

but for their outdoor painting habits

and 'plein aire' work, they had needed

'portable' paints. And I guess that was

a bit limiting, but I don't know. The

other cool thing was that Sisley, or

one of those guys, was the first to

have, in a painting or two, rendered

smoke stacks  -  the growth of new

industry and 'civilization,' was then

transforming the landscape in 

startling ways, smokestacks 

included.

-

The impulse of listing and cataloging

got started in earnest about then; I'd

guess from the packing and tubing

of colors for sale. The only colors

known were earth colors, minerals,

and the pigments of whites and 

blacks. In the Dutch Republic, 

1600's, began the collecting of 

shells, fossils, and insects, often 

displaying them in their home

'cabinets of curiosities.' That's 

kind of when and how 'color'

research began, as they found 

bug and insect secretions and 

such with peculiar colors and 

properties: 'Lead white' was 

causing the deaths of women

who used it to enhance their pale

complexions. 'Pitch Black' was 

created, just as it says, from pitch, 

black, and it caused a sensation by 

evoking 'the most fearsome shade 

of darkness,' a shade evoking our 

fear of dying. And in between was 

created an entire rainbow of 

colors. The first 'synthetic' color 

had, actually, been made 4,000 years 

ago and was found buried (statuette) 

in a tomb on the banks of the Nile. 

At a time when the only readily 

available pigments were the 

earth-tone colors made from soil

and clay, 'Egyptian blue' became 

the first 'synthetic/inorganic pigment.' 

(The process for 'Egyptian Blue' 

apparently involved a complicated 

process of heating chalk or limestone 

with sand and a copper-containing 

mineral such as malachite. The 

first of many blues were born. 

You know that old jazz song 

standard, 'The Birth Of the Blues.' 

Hmmm, I wonder).

-

There were lots stories like 

this, almost one for each 

color, worldwide; each

culture had its own cherished 

hues and meanings. When we 

look a something now, no one 

usually thinks much about the

explosion of colors we live 

with. All those rainbow hues 

of plastics and auto hues, tints 

and shadings, metallics and

washes. What a different world 

has been created. I often 

wondered about all that. Color 

is never much mentioned, except

the curious incident of Joseph's 

'technicolor coat,' of many colors,

as it was put. But also I wondered

what other message to us all 

was embedded in that episode?

Was there some sort of secret 

trying to be conveyed  -  maybe

about interpreting our world, 

or the vibrancy and frequency

of things. But I don't think any

of these artists got into that aspect.

-

In the 17th century, the English

philosopher Francis Bacon

recommended a gruesome remedy

for the 'stanching of blood' by

the use of 'ground mummy.' The

substance bitumen, found in 

mummies, had been used as 

a medicine starting in the first 

century. Expeditions were sent

to mummy pits to supply the

apothecaries  - who sold both

curative powders AND color

pigments. It was not then so

surprising that the rich, brown

powder also then found itself

on painters' palettes. The fine 

dust was mixed with drying oil

and amber varnish and used as

translucent glazing layers for

skin tones and shadows. Most

artists did not realize that

'Mummy brown' came from

actual mummies. And there

was something called 'Gamboge'

which was the 'color of old

ear wax, which was the solidified

sap from the Garcinia tree in

Cambodia (or Camboja, as it

was once known; thus the name

'Gamboge'). When the crushed

pigment was 'touched with a 

drop of water, these toffee-brown 

blocks yielded a yellow paint so 

bright and luminous that it almost 

seemed to be fluorescent.'

-

So, you can see how  -  by the

way I managed it  -  almost 

everything was totally interesting 

to me and I let very little get by.

What better place to be, for that,

back then, but New York City? It's

all somewhat different now, with 

the Internet and personal resources 

that everyone has at their disposal for

any sort of investigation or educating

on subject matter; but in these late 

1960's the entire world was still

different  -  paper and pencil 

different. You needed a singular,

task-oriented, mind, and you had to

stay with that. I found much of the

key to this being 'slowness' and

'deliberation.' Going about the task 

in an almost ponderous fashion,

seeking out one thing at a time.

They city was still like that then, 

and it allowed for such dark and

brooding eccentricity. Now it's all

transformed, nervous-breakdown

style, people all running about,

phones and chatter and communication

and junk; no one paying a mind

to anything, but 'having' everything too.

It's funny, how once the idle traveler

reaches the promised land, they don't

even realize they're there. Sure
all gives me the blues.