In the flesh refers to the fact that I’ve recently brought over several contemporary landscape paintings to the SFMOMA’s Artist’s Gallery at Fort Mason, Building A, in San Francisco, right next door to the the renowned “Greens” restaurant. So if you have a hankering to see my nature landscape paintings, maybe rent or purchase, you can go over Tuesdays through Saturdays, 11:30 AM to 5:00 PM. The work that is over at the SFMOMA’s Artist’s gallery is: “Slough along Corte Madera Creek,” “Inlet along the path,” “The return of the boat at Corte Madera Creek,” and “Another point of view.” All of these paintings can be viewed digitally on this website in the gallery called “Oil paintings, 2010.”

Renting my Contemporary Landscape paintings is a nice and fairly inexpensive way to figure out whether you are interested in purchasing the work. You can rent in three month increments and if you decide to purchase the work, the money that you’ve paid for rental is applied to the final purchase. For more information about the SFMOMA Artist’s gallery go to: To learn more call 415.441.4777 or email artistsgallery@sfmoma.org.

Over the 4th of July weekend I had two separate discussions with two different artists-that lead into each of them putting forth their idea of what constituted being an artist and consequently what then constituted good art. Both of these discussions were casual and each statement made in the moment.

The first artist, Jack Scott, told me that he felt that all good art was conceptual. I should say that Jack, whose work I greatly admire is a conceptual artist. He is also on the board of Bucklew House which sponsors a yearly landscape show (MarinScapes), which I participated in and which he does not, as he is not a landscape artist. In that our discussion took place in the middle of the MarinScapes event, I wasn’t able to pursue the discussion with Jack further, but what was in my mind, was wondering how that concept, the idea that all good art was conceptual, related to landscape or landscape oriented art. When I see Jack next, I’ll make sure to continue this line of thought.

Then on Monday I went for a hike with my friend, the artist, Thomasin Grim. One of the topics that came up during our hike was how each one of us felt that one of the essential aspects of our personalities was that we each had inquiring minds that lead us to question assumptions. We each acknowledged that not everyone enjoyed that aspect of our personality, but those having this aspect of who we were appreciated was essential in an in-depth friendship. I put forth that many artists had an inquiring mind and Thomasin rejoined by saying that she thought that having an inquiring mind was almost the definition of being an artist.

So this brings me to a link between these two conversations and what I consider a basic dilemma of any artist who makes an object that becomes part of the marketplace, or then part of the livlihood of any artist, and that is; one, how does an artist maintain an inquiring mind, make art that begins with a concept or lead into a concept, and not get mirred in reproducing a product over and over again because it has been deemed to have market value? And then the second question, which comes from my recent readings (The $7 million stuffed shark, Seven days in the Artworld) and my current reading, A Peoples History of the United States-how does an artist whose personal moral leanings are with egalitarianism reconcile the fact that the people who drive the marketplace, therefore ones potential clients and collectors are those who often pursue work that perpetuates the inequality of the system and lack of egalitarianism.

Since I use landscape as a jumping off place to reach into the unknown, I started thinking about how one (me) can start off thinking about going in one direction and wind up in another.
I’ve just completed five paintings that were derived from a photograph that I took down by the Corte Madera Creek-a favorite walk of mine-close by and always beautiful, even at low tide.
For the past few years my work has been influenced by water in many of it’s variables, but most recently I’ve focused on the water in the creek, it’s ripples, it’s stillness, the reflections and now some shadows. Sometimes when taking a photograph of the water, my shadow will cover a section of the composition. Although I haven’t previously used my shadow, I’ve been thinking about using it as it is similar to paying attention to the reflections in the water. So I’ve started a painting of the slough in full sunlight with my shadow in it-another version of the slough, another version of my attention to reflections. While I’ve just started this painting, I can tell already that although my intention was the continuation of working with the water and the creek and the slough, emotions that I hadn’t realized were there are taking form and begging to be seen and heard. The only way that allowed myself to be cognizant of this is by being with the work in progress, in my heart and soul, not just with my head and hand and so this takes me back to the question of intentionality. Where is intentionality generated? I suspect that most would think that it comes from the mind or the brain, a thought followed through. My own experience is both in life and in making art is that having a premise to start with, an intention so to speak, is like having a map, but allowing an openess to what happens is like getting lost and liking it.

Somehow I’d convinced myself that I’d gotten separated from myself, from my painting from the mere fact that I’d been living and that certain aspects of living had taken my attention away from a contemplative life. Can you separate your daily practical life, that such as buying food, paying bills, cleaning the kitchen floor, tidying your cabinets, calling on friends, reading a book, working a job, filling your gas tank from your life as an artist? After all, these activities always seem to take time from what I want to do, which is being in the studio painting, or going for a walk on the Corte Madera Creek watching the patterns of light and wind on the waterways. Not only is it the act of living that seems to interrupt with the contemplation of living but also the preparing for the future that takes away from living in the moment. Then again whatever kind of artist you are, and whatever your influences, Nature, Landscape, Death, Love, the Human Condition, your bathroom, they all kick back into your psyche as fodder for what you wind up putting down as the visual depiction of your experience.

Sometimes you can be dead for a long time but not know it. Despite working in an academic environment and despite consistently working in the studio, I’d say I’ve been brain-dead about art for about 20 years. There have been a few exceptions, such as when I got into a reading jag of art history books put out by the Oxford History of Art. So what’s the problem and how did this come about? Well work for one-work, meaning work that is like in a job, my day job, which I don’t knock, as it pays some of the bills, keeps me healthy and provides a structure, but intellectually challenging it is not.
Most of my time spent not at work or teaching is spent in constructing my days so I get to the studio and do as much work as I can and then at night trying to figure out which shows I should enter and how to market my art as a so called “Abstract Landscape Painter” which is one of the buzz words that I came up with Ken Klages, my web designer and web optimizer. Sounds like atomizer. In any case, this along with making sure that I do some kind of physical activity, pay my bills, keep my house somewhat tidy, maintain relationships has seemed to tax me so much that I wound up giving up reading almost all fiction, (unless you consider the NYTimes fiction) and have allowed my grey matter to be filled up with re-runs of Law and Order or Mystery or even Hoarders! The one positive thing about Hoarders is that I do always clean out my refrigerator or closet after a show. But I digress-

So I thought that I would as a Nature oriented painter (there are those buzz words again) be content to just paint away looking at, appreciating and reinterpreting the landscape, my landscape, here, right here in Marin County, CA, but I’m not completely content doing so-as I’m not sure that those dark and sometimes humorous things that I reflect on in a daily way make their way to the surface. The intellectual kick in the pants came from reading “The $7 million stuffed shark,” and now my current reading “Seven days in the Art World.” Now this is not to say that I haven’t been an avid reader of politics and world, national and local news-as I have been, but short of working directly for a particular organization that actually has a track record of making a dent in things, how to feel effectual has been daunting. And my job has always been that of an artist, which to my mind traverses the mixed waters of beauty, irony, observation, rumination, contemplation and commentary. In any case, I’m glad to have my brain back.

In the early part of May, I participated in two weekends of Open Studios. The following week I spent preparing for a large party that I gave in celebration of my daughter’s graduation from college. During this time I was reading “The $7 million stuffed shark: the curious economics of contemporary art.” My computer died and I had to buy a new computer. I went to the SF Art Fair. My brother visited me for four days. I picked up one painting at a show and delivered another to a different show. I watched trash TV. I went to work. I thought about digging a hole and burying myself with my paintings. I wondered now that I was informed about how the “artworld” really worked, what to do? I went to the studio and stared at my paintings. I brought some paintings over to get framed in preparation for an upcoming show, Marin/Scapes. I told my father that I would help him by staying with my mother and take care of her. I started thinking about time. I started thinking about hour glasses. I spent an hour and a half researching time, space and Bergson and reading about math and physics and various philosophers takes on time. I looked up the book “Time and the River.” I tried to imagine how my paintings of water reflected my preoccupation with time aging and death. I came up with no answers. I realized that since my paintings weren’t selling much that I may as well paint at the scale I wanted as opposed to painting with the hope that someone would buy my paintings. I wondered what the hell happened? So far, no answer.

I’ve been reading the book “The $7 million Shark: The curious economics of contemporary art,” by Don Thompson, and trying not to despair. It’s a well written and enlightening book about the high end world of the top tier artists, galleries, auction houses, collectors and the supreme gamesmanship of marketing and branding. The ideals of the artists that I know and revere are primarily focused on how they can best reveal how they perceive the world and how they can make their perceptions more transparent and communicated to their audience through their work rather than focusing on making themselves the next American Idol candidate. This does not mean that most artists that I know wouldn’t be delighted to have their work sought after fetching high fees in compensation, quite the contrary. But when in the studio, most artists just work, focused on what they are doing, responding to the object in front of them while staying connected to their inner core inside of them. The process of making a thing has nothing to do with the marketing after the fact. As a Landscape/Nature painter whose subject matter has been focused on the most fluid and elusive elements, water, considering “branding” is way down the river when entering the waters.

I will be teaching two classes through Community Education at College of Marin; “Drawing and Painting Workshop, June 16-July 21, Weds. nights, 7:10-10:00 PM on the Kentfield Campus, and “One with Nature,” a plein air class at the Indian Valley Campus, Saturdays, June 19-July 24, 8:10-11:00 AM. Sign up for classes as of Monday, May 17 at Marin.edu, then go to Community Ed.
Private instruction is also available: $50 per class (1.5 hours) or $35 per class (2 hours) for groups of 5 or more.
Email me at june@juneyokell.com or call 415-302-0291

For any of you who came to Open Studios this past weekend and were interested in purchasing an Abstract/Landscape, Nature painting but just couldn’t come up with the cash right now, remember that you can always buy a painting on time-contact me and we can figure out an arrangement.

So this morning I woke up dreaming about painting. The image that came up was a jump that I made off of a cliff into an awaiting pool of water in Maui.

I know that I am “supposed’ to use the buzz words “Nature, Landscape Painting, Abstraction, etc.,” to lure interest to my site, but I really haven’t decided that I am any of those words used to describe and as part of the search engine pattern. Instead, I would just say that I’m a poet/painter who most often uses a flat surface to make marks that reflect the juncture of internal and external perceptions.

So we are more than mid-way through Open Studios. Tomorrow will be the last day of the four days in the two weekend affair. So far there have been many visitors and much accolades, but few sales. Perhaps it has to do with the volatility of the stock market or the precarious nature of the job market, general fear during the recession or the fact that it was one of the first weekends where the sun was bright and the hills were calling. Whatever it was or is, it is not contributing to many visitors opening up their wallets and buying a painting or two.

It’s been a strange couple of weeks. While we have been busy preparing our work, making labels, ordering and mailing postcards, sending out emails, buying food and drink, putting out flowers, working other jobs, the only painting that I’ve done is a small gouache landscape of the marshlands over in Greenbrae. Meanwhile a man tries to blow up an SUV in Times Square, the stock market drops 1000 points, Greece is falling apart. Our lives are uncertain. Tonight, sure that I had a blood clot behind my right knee, I call Kaiser advice nurse. She tells I can do some stretching.

Somehow going on about my Abstract landscape painting seems folly. But what I can tell you is that upon seeing my most recent painting called “There’s always another point of view,” people are saying that it is mysterious, and for tonight, that’s enough for me.