.JPG)
I see some people are still subscribed to my blog after my three year hiatus. That is a long time and I apologize for not keeping in touch with many of you like I wish I had. But on a good note I have used those three years quite productively. I've grown as a person, an artist, and a gallery director. I still have a long way to go but, to quote a country song, "I can finally stand the man in the mirror I see."
Along with these experiences I found a renewed focus for my art. I have been studying for a new series that I've started on the great composers and in doing so I found an experience that has really moved me and is currently being recorded in a sculpture I'm working on.
Beethoven reached a very dark place in his life during the year 1803. He came close to committing suicide and went so far as to write a suicide note known as the heiligenstadt testament. However he was able to pick himself up and continue in the face of his pain and depression and seven years later, in 1810, he explained to a friend why. The quote was this, "Had I not read that a man should not quit this life so long as he could perform a good deed I would have died long ago and by my own hand at that... But I can't imagine leaving this world without taking the art God has placed in my soul and putting it to pen for others to hear."
I love this as a motto for making art. Its truly not what we do but why we do it that makes the biggest difference. My hope is that my art can take significant moments of both worldly and personal histories and give them new life and meaning. I will always be learning but I hope that the nuggets of truth and beauty that I stumble across in my life will mean something to you.
