Ruth's Work

[Ruth]

I’ve been meaning to share some of my work for some time. I have an MFA in Painting from Claremont Graduate School. For years I showed with Orlando Gallery in Los Angeles, and taught Drawing and Art History at San Bernardino Valley College.

I started out in art wanting to be the last of the Abstract Expressionists. In grad school I was doing Minimalist-inspired abstraction. Gradually I moved through a series based on Chinese lattice designs which led me to still life. At the same time I moved through photography to figurative work.

Left all that about 15 years ago with an extended art dry spell when I began writing poetry. About 5 years ago I started on the work I’m doing now.


This is one of my older pieces.
Mixing Memory and Desire
24x36, oil on canvas
1989

There is more of my older work here: http://web.archive.org/web/2003022823...

My recent work is what’s called Visual Poetry, combining both words and images, carving poems out of the text in old books, the working on the page with watercolors, inks and metallics. Three of these were published in the special Visual Poetry issue of Rattle last year. You can see them here:

. http://www.rattle.com/blog/2008/12/th...
http://www.rattle.com/blog/2009/03/th...
http://www.rattle.com/blog/2009/01/i-...

And more

[Heather]

Thank you for sharing, Ruth. I especially like your first one, Mixing Memory and Desire. And I checked out your other older works, of...abstract expressionism?
Nice!

[Ruth]

You mean my realist work, don't you?

[Carol]

Your oil paintings are very impressive, and beautiful Ruth. I really like your "Visual Poetry" especially the last one - I have never been sensible . . .

[Ruth]

Thanks, Carol and Heather. Here's another of my older work, used on an earlier edition of Rattle.

[createjoy]

Thank you so much for sharing,

I really enjoyed viewing your professional work...
You are very blessed to have realized your creative desire and to have completed your education in this field.

Do you still teach?

Mixing Memory and Desire, is just wonderful! I hope you will continue to share with us.

Thank you Ruth.

[Heather]

Ruth wrote: "You mean my realist work, don't you?"

(oops!) Yes, thank you Ruth. It's wonderful!

[Ruth]

createjoy wrote: "Thank you so much for sharing,

I really enjoyed viewing your professional work...
You are very blessed to have realized your creative desire and to have completed your education in this field.

D..."

No, I'm almost 75 years old. Haven't taught for 14 years. Right now I'm writing poetry more than making art, but still working off and on with the Visual Poems.

[Jonathan]

Ruth, these are some really wonderful images. The one at the top, "Mixing Memory with Desire," seems quite impressive from a technical standpoint, and it would actually be very nice to see a larger reproduction. (How you would go about doing that, I have no idea...) The Visual Poetry pieces are truly fantastic--clever, personal, direct--and I can picture them looking incredibly handsome on the pristine white walls of a gallery somewhere. Well done!

[Ruth]

Thank you, Jonathan. I have slides of all my older paintings and could project them onto the screen quite large, but that technology seems to have almost faded away these days. Some of my abstract work was up to 6x8 feet, so I don't even think I could get them lifesize by projecting.

I'm having a ball with the Visual Poetry pieces. I like it that they're so small, it makes it very intimate when I work on them.

Due to my 12 year hiatus in producing artwork, I'm no longer affiliated with my Los Angeles gallery, and I haven't done the legwork to find a new one.

I did show the poetry pieces in 2007 when I had a retrospective show at the college where I used to teach. I had one whole section devoted to vispo and they did look nice, if I do say so myself.

I have always loved Medieval manuscripts, and I like the connections these have with those. I often use metallic paint. Hard to see in the reproductions.

I have an idea for a slight swerve in the vispo, but I can't get at it until our kitchen remodel is finished. My worktable at the moment is covered with mixers and bowls and boxes of spaghetti.

[Books Ring Mah Bell]

Great works, Ruth.

Jealous. I can't draw stick people!

[Ruth]

Thank you, BRMB. Shoot, you could learn to draw. Maybe not like Picasso, who could draw like an angel, but at a decent basic level. It's a skill like anything else.

[Books Ring Mah Bell]

Heh. You know how some people have talent? I have NEGATIVE talent. A few months ago, I bought some canvas and paint and brushes... and.... NOTHING.

blank like the canvas is my mind.

I enjoy looking at the work other people do!

have you heard of this event:
http://www.artprize.org/

you should register!
(today! No really, registration ends today!)

[Ruth]

Like I said, anyone can learn at a basic level. You learned to write didn't you? But not everyone has Picasso's talent.

That contest looks a little suspicious to me.

[Books Ring Mah Bell]

Heh. It was a very fun event, though the voting and such is a bit... strange.

Lots of great work, mixed in with lots of... weird stuff.
:)

One of these days I'll pick up that darn brush again.

[Ruth]

Here's are some old pieces of mine, which I just uploaded to photobucket.


Voices and Reflections



Summer Promises

[Heather]

Again, Ruth you sure have talent! I would think it is hard to paint the pictures of glass with the reflection and light, etc. But you seem to have perfected it!

[Lorie]

Ruth- how nice to see your work. I love the text/image pieces as well. I work with that theme as well.

[Ruth]

Thanks, Lorie and Heather.

Actually painting reflections and transparencies is easy once you learn that you're not painting the reflections and transparencies themselves, just duplicating all the funny little shapes you see.

What kind of work do you do, Lorie?

[Jonathan]

Great still lifes, Ruth!

[Ruth]

Thanks, Jonathan. I'm attracted to the combination of beauty and danger, hence the broken glass. And in another series, wildfires.

[Jonathan]

I'd love to see those sometime, Ruth. Fire must be pretty difficult to paint.

There was a 17th-century Dutch artist named Egbert van der Poel who made a specialty of paintings commemorating the explosion of the gunpowder magazine at Delft. (It was a big event in the history of the town, so there was a demand for mementos.) Anyway, his version of fire and danger:

[Ruth]

Thanks, Jonathan. Van der Poel is a new one for me.

As for my own fires, ask and ye shall receive.


Phoenix Nest
oil on canvas 46x30


Ladybird, Ladybird
pastel, 22x30

[Jonathan]

The flames playing off the rich colors of the sky in the first one make for a very interesting effect. The bottom one, also nice, has a more narrative feel to it. The house silhouetted against the clouds, the flames in the distance--what's going on and what happens next?

Both very nice pieces.

[Ruth]

Thank you, Jonathan.

[Lorie]

Ruth- I'm a painter and fiber art. If I could figure out how to post some photos, I'd put a few up..any tech-y types? :D Here's my website, in the mean time.
http://www.loriemccown.com/

[Heather]

Lorie, you are quite the artist, too! It will be great when you have your own thread to post your work. Looking at your website, I particularly like Strata's Dream.

[image error]

Of course, I think they are all good. Your resume sure is impressive! Thank you for sharing!

[Ruth]

Nice work Lorie. I particularly like the collages. Click on the top of the text box here where it says (some html is ok) and it'll give you the html to link to a photo.

[Lorie]

Hey thanks! Ok, I'll give it go. Ruth- I love collage work, and am glad it has risen as a true art, rather than just a weekend crafty thing.

[Heather]

All this talent! Kind of makes me envious...but just gives me more to appreciate, right?

[Ruth]

I have to admit here that every time I hear the word "talent," I cringe. Without hard work, without learning your craft, without practice and preparation, without years of formal or informal study, talent means zilcho.

[Rosana]

Lorie, I enjoyed your work very much.

[Lorie]

Have to agree with you about that, Ruth. As I've told my students, it's a creative habit (to plagerize Twyla Tharp, who's written a great book on this subject).

[Heather]

Ruth wrote: "I have to admit here that every time I hear the word "talent," I cringe. Without hard work, without learning your craft, without practice and preparation, without years of formal or informal study..."

In some weird way that comforts me, Ruth. I have always told myself that I can't do any form of artwork. But then again, I don't have any training, or practice, or study. Who knows? What if I could actually come up with something? But for now I am content to relish in the excellent efforts of others.

[Divvy]

Cool stuff ladies. Thanks for sharing.

[Geoffrey]

I am most enthusiastic about the visual poetry. The watercolors of the fish, glasses, table settings, etc. are extremely competent (similar to Alinda Fish`s work, correct?) but I have never been excited about setups. Too feminine for mucho macho me.

I would return to the visual poetry. There is much more to be mined there. I am not sure where you can take off from there, but perhaps simultaneously complicating the imagery and simplifying the words even more.

Give me time to think about it some more. I am intrigued by the possibilities and the direction.

[Ruth]

Thanks, Geoffrey. The visual poetry is my latest work. The still lifes are about 20 years old. (They're in oil, not watercolor, BTW.) It's great fun to paint transparencies and reflections, but I was also fascinated by light, and by the juxtaposition of beauty and danger.