Mostly I wake up early, sometimes more than once. And this isn't due to the results of the election, I've been doing this for years. A restless soul that somehow is still searching for ease. Maybe it's just my constitution, maybe it's part of being a human, maybe it's due to the illusion that somehow humanity will finally crawl out of the mud to be washed by a rain and somehow magically shed it's dark soul. I'm still waiting. I guess I'll be getting up early until I don't.

I am offering discounts on older work of mine. Here are some examples. If you find other work that you might be interested in, let me know and we can talk.

Cheers!

June

Sierra Lake, 30" x 40," originally $2500.00, now $1625.00

Change in Weather, 13" x 17," originally $650.00, now $425.00

Across the Shoreline Marsh, 13" x 17," originally $650.00, now $425.00

Restoration, 18" x 36," originally $1500.00, now $975.00

Framed.

"Why do I do art?"

It started with my grandmother who had a great reverence for culture, which included visual art, classical music, theatre, and dance, but primarily visual art and classical music. My grandparents had emigrated from Russia. My grandfather was a doctor and my grandmother a dentist. They settled in a small mountain town in the Adirondacks called Elizabethtown. Their house and property were to me a magical place. It was much larger than the small house I lived in during my early years, with large front and back yards, a barn, and a flowing river behind. Next door to their house was The Old Mill School, an art school started by the portrait painter Wayman Adams. My grandmother was enamored with the instructors, the students, the art, the ambience, and some unsavory gossip. She started taking painting lessons there and encouraged my older brother and me to explore making art, lending us her pastels.

I was primarily interested in the room I slept in, which had old-fashioned wallpaper with illustrations depicting people and modes of transportation during the 19^th century. I’d lie in bed staring at the wallpaper and visually moving people around. I was also interested in going into the barn that had very steep stairs and black widows, as well as wading in the swift, cold, river that swept by. But the main thing I was interested in was the Old Mill School. The primary building used for classes was in the former mill that overlooked the river. The other buildings consisted of small cabins and a large dining room and a fragrant garden. The buildings were made from old barn wood and cloved together by square nails. A large bell was rung to alert the students and faculty that lunch or dinner was being served.

Both of my grandparents had their portraits painted by Wayman Adams as did my mother, and her two siblings, my Aunt Ruth, and Uncle Dan. Dan was also called Sonny. I always found that funny that my grown-up uncle would be called Sonny, but he was.

One bright spring day I was standing around in the backyard over by the side of my grandparents’ property where it met up with the Old Mill property. I was staring at the remains of the rusted swing set that had been used by my mother and her siblings. It was right on the edge of the property. The scent of the wild roses that had twisted themselves around the swing set blended in with the scent of turpentine that traveled from the studio next door. At that moment, with bright morning light and smells of roses and turpentine, I knew that I would be an artist. It was as if God had spoken to me through the senses. And what He/She/They was saying to me was that making art was the highest religious experience. I never told anyone about this until much later in my life. But this is the reason I make art.

Sepia ink, green ink and gouache depiction of a Eucalyptus tree. Seen during my daily walks in 2020 during the lockdown. On a recent walk I noticed that this tree was cut down. Everything changes.

In the end of February 2022, I decided to re-read Faulkner, everything he has ever written. I still have not completed this journey. Jun Since then, other than reading news and technical articles, I've read one other book of fiction (American Pastoral, by Philip Roth), all the while continuing to read Faulkner.

What draws me to Faulkner, are the stories themselves, his ability to make the experience he's writing  felt on a visceral level whether it's a description of a wagon wheel getting stuck in mud, or a character's thoughts and feelings about what they are doing, capturing the vernacular of his characters, describing history as he saw it in the South and his use of language. Most nights before I go to sleep I read in bed, and inevitably I need to get up to go to my phone to look up at least one word that I am unfamiliar with. Last night I got up to look up these two words: cachinnation and dipsomaniac. While I might never use these words (cachinnation: noun: raucous laughter: psychiatry inappropriate laughter, sometimes found in schizophrenia or  the word(dipsomaniac)- (no longer in technical use) a person with alcoholism or alcohol use disorder, especially characterized by an irresistible typically periodic craving for alcoholic drinks, I love broadening my limited vocabulary with words that I have never heard in common discourse. 

Right now I'm reading and coming to the end of "Go Down Moses," which is comprised of seven interrelated stories. Ralph Ellison writes this on the back cover:

"For all of his concern with the South, Faulkner was actually seeing out the nature of man. Thus we must turn to him for that continuity of moral purpose."

Edmund Wilson "Faulkner....belongs to the full-dressed post Flaubert group of Conrad, Joyce and Proust,"

and Robert Penn Warren this:" For range of effect, philosophical weight, originality of style, variety of characterization, humor, and tragic intensity, Faulkner's works are without equal in our time and country.

If you missed our Open Studios on Dec. 3 & 4, not to worry, you can always reach out to me to set up an individual appointment to see my work and perhaps pick up a gift for someone hard to shop for or for yourself.  You can contact me at [email protected] so we can find a suitable time.

Available are drawings, prints and paintings of various sizes and prices.

Yesterday I brought over a painting of mine, "Golden State," 12" x 15," oil on panel to Artworks Downtown, which will be part of the members show in the Underground Gallery,  So if you happen to make it over to Artworks Downtown to see the juried "Small Works Show," make sure you toddle on downstairs. You'll find a great selection of work.

Art Works Downtown 

1337 Fourth St.
San Rafael, CA 94901 

(415) 451-8119 

I'm honored to have had my painting, "Across the Shoreline Marsh," 12" x 15," oil on canvas, c2013, to have been selected to be part of the Artworks Downtown Small Works Show, 1337 4th Street, #30, San Rafael, CA. Juror, Emebet Korn, director of Desta Gallery in Mill Valley Reception: December 9, 5-8pm, and 2nd Friday Art Walk. Nov. 25-27; open for Black Friday weekend and January 13, 5-8pm: reception and 2nd Friday Art Walk.

If this wasn't enough, Lawrence Tjernell, editor of Longship Press, has just announced this:

It's here! Just released... Issue 8 of the journal Nostos is now available to peruse, with poetry by Sharon Olds, Troy Jollimore, Lisa Rappoport, Karen Poppy, Joanne Esser and others. The artwork is presented by June Yokell and Kate Peper. This is the ODES issue. To order copies for holiday gifts and delightful reading, go to www.longshippress.org .