FEBRUARY 2021
Chlorine Aqualung and other works produced during a pandemic | Graham Dane
It’s been a difficult year for us all but throughout the societal, political and viral concerns/fears I and my wife - the love of my life - Linda Infante Lyons have continued to paint. It helped us maintain sanity amidst the chaos and uncertainty, gave us order and continuity, our studios being safe havens.
The British painter Howard Hodgkin said it well – and I’s something I can certainly understand – when he said, “When I finish a painting, it usually looks as surprising to me as to anyone else." All of this work was completed since January 2019. Much of it might’ve started some time back but everything was finished under the damoclesian threat of corona virus.
In the past I’ve written or talked about the similarities between the way that jazz/blues musicians improvise and how I paint, of how music is the most abstract art of all; why I believe abstract painting is the visual equivalent. I can quote Kandinsky, Paul Klee and Mark Rothko, discuss chaos theory, alchemy, The Sublime and/or my visual sources, of how they’re used, inform and translated into what I need . . . but I won’t.
In recent months I found myself realizing that no one really expects a musician to talk about what they do nor justify it. So, if it’s good enough for them it’s good enough for me.
Like it . . . or not.
Engage or distance.
Your choice.
