Onward marked a return to my painting practice in 1980 after a year devoted to writing an unpublished novel.
The central figure’s advance is accompanied by repeated circular vignettes that imply different perspectives on — and approaches to — my creativity. In some sense, these various-sized motifs evoke my past, and my resumption forward as a growing painter. Therefore, the central figure represents the present moment.
Because Onward in some ways reflects the pause in my visual artmaking and then a return to it, it is correctly seen as a process work. The pause refers to the need to “remember” the perceptual process of making visual art. Its syntax (of line, color, form) is quite different from working with a linguistic syntax (of words and thoughts).
One noteworthy feature of this work is how the architectural framework and the stage-like environment aligns it with both earlier works and the kinds of dynamic geometric structures found in most periods of my career. For example,The Dance, 1977, is another “stage” work. By contrast, Alchemical Rendering #1, (1981) done shortly after Onward and with a comparable central framing, has a similarly structured architectural dynamic.
Ships (1983), a gouache and ink painting, came a few years later. It, too, mirrors the concept of a dynamic coupled with a rigorous geometric framework. Like Onward, Ships also relied on a medley of circles, arcs, and rectilinear grids.
By contrast, works like Space Study #1, (2002) created over twenty years later, and Mutation Study #1 (2016) created almost forty years later, show an evolution in my interest in dynamic architectural compositions. Like Onward, both of these works conceptually showed that my compositional approach continued (and continues) to underscore that artmaking is a process. More specifically, Space Study #1, was a color and perceptual study. Mutation Study #1 was a study of how shapes can mutate their form.
Now I tend to think of Onward as a painting that led me to stop smoking. While working on the novel I started smoking cigarettes. One positive outcome of Onward that is invisible to the viewer is how working on the the painting led to the realization that having to “track” or hold a cigarette interfered with my painting process. This annoyance made it easy to quit.
The work is now in a private collection.
Exhibitions
1981
Encirclement, Shambhala Booksellers, Berkeley, CA, Oct 1–Nov 30.
1980
Relativistic Perspectives, (with Bill Carpenter) ASUC Studio Gallery, University of California, Berkeley, September 5 – 28, 1980.
• • • • • •
Amy Ione
Title: Onward
Date: 1980
Medium: Watercolor and ink
Dimensions: 20 x 18 inches