I have always maintained that Art is not about making pretty pictures. The ideal that I have aspired to is best summed up by the artist Joaquin Torres Garcia, who said, "Art is not manufactured... it is the understanding of a profound harmony... and living in accordance with it."
This has been my guiding Light.
Youth
When I was a kid, I stuttered and because of this I did not hang out in groups except as a sort of outside observer, and usually had only one or two friends, at most, at one time. I didn't see my stuttering as too great a hardship except those times when I wanted to voice an opinion and couldn't out of fear of ridicule and not being able to say what I had on my mind not only clearly but concisely as well.
Other than that, I didn't mind being alone. I enjoyed long walks on Bushwick Avenue on Sunday afternoon, imaging how nice it would be to live in one of the one-family houses in the neighborhood. I also enjoyed sitting on the step in front of our small apartment house at 607 Central Avenue on hot summer days, the cracked terrazzo and teh layered and peeling front door held a kind of fascination for me, a fascination I think is readily noticeable in my work today. The heat and the pentimento of the brokenterrazzo and peeling door somehow mesmerized me in what today might be described as a zen moment --I seemed to have had trancended the ordinariness of the moment. Far from being a strange or eerie feeling, I remember feeling content, satisfied and happy, at peace with myself as though I understood something I could feel was important which I could not readily explain. I still feel that way! Just as I have frequently "felt", I understood other things intuitively, but am unable to clearly explain it. What I think is most important about my early life experience, as solitary as it was, is my solitude allowed me to think, to think of things one might not consider if one's days were filled only with play - not that I didn't play at games kids ordinarily play at - just not as frequently as most kids do. This, I believe, has stood me in good stead to the point that I now feel it a necessity to have periods of solitude.
During these early years, I had very little desire to draw or paint, save for the usual kid stuff like drawing airplains and some other comic book type thing but not a great need to do so.
When I went to high school, I had a variety of after-school jobs, none pertaining to art in any way. My brother began to take an interest in photography and I followed suit. In fact, we became very involved in it, devising a makeshift darkroom in our bathroom. It was then that my interest in art began and a couple of my photo prints won awards, one from the Eastman Kodak Company. I thought this is what I would like to do as a career.
Upon graduation from high school, after several attempts I got a job in a photo studio (Silver Studios), one of whose specialties was doing photography for the illustrators of the day. This was in the late 40's / early 50's when there were many magazines and soft-covered pocketbooks that used art for their covers and inside fiction. An artist/illustrator would come in with a sketch and, depending on what the scene was, he would hire models and we would devise set-ups to mimic what he had in his sketch. With the models and set-ups we would photograph the scene, make prints and the illustrator would then take a good deal less time and cost less, as well. Frequently, in order to save money, the illustrator, if he had a scene with several people in it, would luse whoever was at hand as models for background figures and such. I was often called upon to do so and so I found my likeness on pocketbook covers and in magazine illustrations. Once in awhile I even got to kiss the model.
It was here that I met someone who would be instrumental in changing my life. Jim Avati was the leading illustrator for pocketbook covers of his day. He single-handedly changed the way book jackets were done. I frequently did his photography and we became good friends. At this time, I began to see how illustration was done, working from photos, etc. and felt I could do this, that I could do it by myself without having to talk too much (I still stuttered and was shy about starting conversations). So I started taking home some of the prints I made for other illustrators and made an effort to paint them - an effort not too bad. Jim was a great help, first because he was so good and acted as an inspiration, and secondly and more importantly, as time went on he told me about a book called "The Natural Way to Draw" by Kimon Nicolaïdes (there are two dots over the second "i").
This book would eventually have a profound effect upon my work in terms of drawing and in how I approached my art.
But I'm gettig a bit ahead of myself. First, after working at Silver Studios for a few years, I did decide that what I wanted to do was become an illustrator. I did not seriously pursue this until I got out of the Army in 1953 (March 2) at which time I went back to work at Silver Studios in order to build up a small reserve of money. I then quit at the beginning of 1954 and made what I thought was a portfolio of work that would bowl over the commercial art world and went out to conquer that world. Well... of course that didn't happen, but I did eventually succeed in doing a fair body of work for magazines, newspapers, pocketbook covers, and managed to win a number of awards, including the Gold Medal at the Society of Illustrators. But I was never really a great success in the commercial field since I only did what was called editorial work which ment you didn't have to make all the men handsome or the girls pretty - a good thing since I could do niether, and you could only really make good money if you could. So at one point I said enough, since I wasn't making more than enough to exist, I might as well do exactly what I wanted to do.
Up until this time I hadn't gone to museums or galleries too much, but now I did and there found a world that I related to. In fact, I found a few artists who I had the temerity to say were doing what I was doing. Among them was Giorgio Morandi whose small still lifes seemed to have within them moments I had experienced. Jack Levine also answered my feelings about social justice as well as painting itself as a plastic medium. So I felt in harmony with what I called "fine art" and decided, albeit at a somewhat late stage in life (I was about 30 years old) to become an "Artist".
To get back to what I said earlier about the importance to me of the book, "The Natural Way to Draw". Nicolaïdes' method was to have you "feel" the subject matter, to actually "feel" it if it was an inanimate object or to "feel" it if it was a person. He had two methods to do this, contour drawing and gester drawing (for a detailed explanation of this, get your own copy of the book).
By exercising (doing countless drawings) his method, I did in time find I could draw and , if I might say so, pretty well. Not perhaps academically or even anatomically well, but well enough, judging from other people's reactions, to convey the "sense" of whatever my subject matter was. And this became the basis of my art. To get the "sense" of the subject, animate or inanimate, to convey the "sense" of my feelings towards the subject, to overlay the subject with a "sense" of all which my life experiences had brought me to. In other words, to express my feelings in a graphic manner which is probably what art is all about - not simply making pretty pictures, not trying to express some unattainable ideal of beauty, but rather to show the beauty of what is, rather than what might be.
Drawing is central to what I do, sketching more so.
My feelings are that sketching from life, especially quick sketching, is truly the closest we come to Pure Art than any other way, as long as we allow ourselves to let it happen. Also, what we see out of the corner of our eyes is most important. For this reason, when something, something we are not looking for, catches our eye, its significance lies in the fact that it has true meaning for us. What that meaning may be, one may not be able to say at the moment, but in timie it will reveal itself and perhaps reveal something of ourselves. If one has lived a good life that revelation may be a some import to others. To sketch this one needs only to sense (unconsciously) what it is and allow oneself to make a mark that conveys this. This mark is not a preconceived notion but something "felt" and automatically transferred to paper. It doesn't have to be a literal translation of what you see optically, it should be a mark made instinctively.
Another artist, besides Morandi, whom I admire, and hope I follow not in how he paints, but more in his beliefs, is Joaquim Torres-Garcia. My feelings for him, his work, and how I feel about art can be summed up in something he said, "... Art is not manufactured, it comes from an understanding of a profound harmony... and fromliving in accordance with it."
The Subway Works
In 1984, I felt the need to work from life and people rather than still lifes or works out of my head. It dawned on me that going and coming to work I was surrounded by a great many models - and they were free except for the cost of a copy of the New York Times in which I hid my sketch pad in order to look like I was either reading or doing the crossword puzzle. In this way, I did about 2,000 drawings, many of which I worked up later in color. It was an exhilerating experience, it boosted my confidence, gave me a wealth of drawing experience (obviously) and, more importantly, gave me an insight into the social upheaval New York was, and still is, experiencing - that of a new influx of immigrants. I must confess at first I was dismayed at the changes I was seeing in my neighborhood. When a new family moved in, one of a different racial background, the red flags were immediately run up the flagpole. Real estate agents began to fan the flames of "the neighborhood is changing, you'd better sell now" and people - neighbors - began their exits. It took me a bit of time to understand that the people I saw on the train - people of different color and ethnic background were doing exactly what I was doing - going to work! They were trying to make a go of it in a new land as my parents had - and that my parents must have faced the same hostile environment. So besides accumulateing a large body of work, I learned at first hand a very valuable lesson.
Satire & Etching
I must say that the above lesson was more easily absorbed because from an early age I had a feeling of right and wrong; of social justice and injustice. It was, among other reasons, why I was attracted to the work of Jack Levine, Daumier, and Goya. So, after experiencing a trial at first hand (I was juror), the courtroom, the lawyers, etc., I started to do works, satirical in nature, about that particular experience. Then I did more based on political observations and news articles, as well as other venues that impinged on the social order. I did this for several years until i came to the conclusion that the front page of the New York Times was more satirical than anything I could ever conceive. I concluded that I could achieve a greater good both for myself and the world by following my mother's philosophy way to teach is by good example, to try to show that which is good in the world rather than what is bad, to emulate the artists I most admire, like Giorgio Morandi and Joaquim Torres-Garcia who aspired to a higher plane of understanding and whose works contributed to a profound peace of mind.