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(And so, the pride was all mine. Lord knows, I was full of myself. I didn’t care. I needed to be back in the world. At this shining moment I couldn’t have felt better--such pride, was this!)
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Yes: The invitation broke the spell, and chased the impetus which had consumed me aside. I picked up the invitation, from where I’d dropped it, and placed it upon the bare shelves.
Obviously, both Rodgers and Cee-Cee were worried about me. (Was I “All right??.”) In Rodgers’ short note of invitation, I could read all the care he’d taken in broaching whatever apprehension he might’ve had about my welfare. In my detachment towards the world I’d given little thought to my friendship with Rodgers and Cee-Cee; their concern was now entering, finding a place. [There were, no matter what, people in this City, my adopted home, who truly did care about me.]
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Even though he didn’t mention it, Rodgers knew Beauty would be at the party. He wrote: I should come to the party. I wouldn’t regret it.
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Snow began to fall. All of New York State was bracing itself for a white Christmas. The cold could not stop the cheer, the holiday. Watching the snow falling upon the skylight overhead, I felt immense joy; I felt drained, and at the same time peaceful; prepped for anything; [ready for life, love, and celebration.]
I stood back now, very much free in my soul. In some strange way, I felt that the universe was looking out for me; that a conjunction of the stars were in my favor. Without any warning, my life had seemingly taken a turn for the better. Beginning again.
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I was ready to face the world. It was time to take a breather, relax, with all my brushes laid to rest.
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I remember:
The snowfall. Christmas. The end of a Decade.
I recall Rodgers’ words: You won’t regret it.
[At the time, he was right.]
He always was.
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That day:
The Twenty-Third day of December, Nineteen-Hundred and Eighty-Nine, returns to me in dreams. [Like everything else inescapable, that day and night returns in bits and pieces:
Shredded clothes are blown about the, unforgiving, Winter streets; night music, as clear and tonal as Handel's “Messiah”; a green flask, topped with red wine; snow-drifts, blown against brownstones, clinging to the brickwork, as a second skin; scurrying, last-minute Christmas shoppers, barreling along a sidewalk, clutching bundles beneath each arm. Gloved hands. Heavy coats. Scarfs. Every breath, meeting the air, a huffed patch of fog.]
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Impressed upon my memory are fleeting images; key elements, and objects, appear, as luminous, as if life itself could be summed up by an unknown skein of random events. Everything pertaining to this December day is affixed to time and space within the watery contours of my brain.
Imperishable, now:
As night returns, the clock lies, mute and knowing. My subconscious awakens, all color and sound; my brain, restful and active, is as pearl-grey as a stretch of concrete, peeking through the snow. Many shadows cling to this slit of night. Memory pulls me back towards an unpredictable beginning--that night, and every night since.
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[Many a night since has passed, and none of them in Beauty’s arms. So many times, again, and gone: A reinforced repetition, and rumination, becomes the catalyst for dredging up that long-ago December night.]
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Now, as I think myself back, I can see that day again as if it were only yesterday. All the feelings are still with me; every small particle of my Self returns to that moment of release, along with the grandiose conviction I held towards the completed Work.
I no longer felt doubtful about success. I stood back, away from the completed canvases, and knew exactly how everything would fall into place.
[(My backers and the people to talk with and the Gallery owners and the press people and my friends and supporters and Mentors, (Ian Rodgers, for one) would all give me the needed push.) All they would have to do is take one look at the canvases.]
The work I sweated over, during four, frantic, months, was right there, central:
Right there, stacked against the three walls; the dried paint, imbued in all its colours; every bit of cast-off glimmer, every still vision, I’d been too blind in recognizing in my previous creations.
My dry spell had come to an end. Whatever funk I’d put myself in, since 1980, was no longer consuming me in stasis. On that cold Winter day in 1989 I was on the move again; and, the only place to go was up. A turning point had been reached, and transcended. I’d used up every bit of colour, shadow, and light, going beyond the set surface of the canvas, in order to redefine the entire working process of creation. I’d taken something “old,” [those sketches] and transformed them into something “new,” [those forty paintings, stacked against the walls].
I thought I was redefining a process of painting; however, on reflection, the truth is I had redefined myself.
Seeing the paintings now, [in my mind’s eye] what strikes me is the secret Self: A dark side the paintings represented.
All is too clear in the aftermath:
The Self I’d painted,--something an Artist should never do--was a Self as dangerous, and violent as any carnivorous beast. In four months time, every piece and part of my better nature was tossed away; and, what had entered to take its place was something I would’ve never imagined as a part of myself. The Self revealed upon these canvases was a self which gratified itself, without respect or love. The images were stark, and stripped bare of anything hidden. [Of course, the wildness of these canvases would bring me riches, beyond measure; although, (as, final analysis) what the paintings revealed of the man who painted them would leave a far more lasting, and greater, impression.]
In retrospect, looking upon my hibination, the Outer and Inner Man were given a home. With the completion of this Work I had assumed a greater visibility, which in turn only hastened my undoing.
Everything is struck clear now:
My inhibitions were transcended as well. Each canvas (particularly, the ones which depicted themes of power, domination, or pain) did nothing but hold a mirror up to my own deeper, darker, nature. Refusing to inhibit myself, I’d managed to strip myself bare of all pretense in these paintings; going beyond solitude, beyond individuality. Now, I was, in effect, finally seeing the Soul for what it was; breaking free, of all internal chastisement, or external pain. Everything was dragged into the light and illuminated [tenderly] on canvas.
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All of the soul-searching in paint, eventually, brought me fame; however, it would not be without a corresponding price to be paid.
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[Distancing himself from this Self, he sees so clearly:
He stands in the middle of the loft. The “I” falls away, and he sees and feels and thinks as if he were someone else entirely; not the man who sees himself in mirrors, or the self-possessive “I” of his account. He shifts his naked body, further into the room, walking away from the mirrors; although, never, ever fully away.
What he sees in the mirror is a monster: ego-driven, callous, and cruel; devoid of all morality. His life goes crashing into another frame of reference. Like some strange admixture of sane and insane, he grasps the totality of his living, breathing, presence in the lives of Others; the living, and the no longer alive and all those who’ve come to know him through the years.]
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Those Others:
They never really knew me; never knew the violence in me, or my own silence, or the pain I endured to get to where I’ve gotten in life. I wonder, even today, how it was I ever lived to see the Winter skies of New York, or the beginning of a new Decade.
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[He doesn’t understand why, and can only step outside of himself in order to begin understanding himself. The man in the mirror is forgetful and uncertain (a weakness, of immorality). These words seem to be the sum of everything he sees before him. He shrinks from the pictures he’d painted of the Self, trying to deny the deep truth of each and every one of them. He confronts his mother, his father, in a collage of twisted desires. He wants to crawl away, fall into a fetal position, and shut out the light of day; and, oh God, why did he ever paint such things as these? He sees each painting (at least, now, in 1994) as some sort of premonition of what his life with Beauty would be like. It was there all along, (he thinks, to himself) right there in the paintings, he can trace, not only his early life, (his childhood and youth) but also his all-consuming relationship with the Muse. What he’d put on canvas was only a prelude.
Everything followed, as if he’d known all along: What moved him and spurred him on and drew him toward that one Ideal, one woman. She (Beauty) was a woman to make all his desires something spoken; all of his fantasies a reality.
Now, all he felt, when he thought of those paintings was a deep shame; a convulsive neutering of all desire. Right before his eyes, what made him famous, turned shameful, twisted, and muted. He had gone too far into himself; like an opening of Pandora’s Box, the paintings were self-revealing entities, which couldn’t be closed, or hidden, or even, shut-away within his own mind. The impulses: The possessiveness, the domination, the obsessions, the breaking of boundaries,--all of these things--were pieces of him, long before he’d ever set a brush upon the canvas; and, the violence and pain and hurt, comingeled (as they’ve been) were all a part of his Character.
A naked, shame-filled man weeps in his loft. Even now, after everything is gone:
He still misses that one Ideal, that one woman who’d helped him release what had been there all along. Now, with knowledge of his own guilt, he weeps for himself; and, in turn, weeps for her.]
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In each mirror, he’d hung with care, upon his walls, he sees himself. His mind becomes clearer as he distances himself from the “I.” He can picture that day as if it’s happening again, and he himself has doubled, tripled, although, standing outside of it.
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[Now, like a burst dam, he overflows with everything inside him. He crouches to the floor and rents the hair from his head and beats himself upon his back and doesn’t stop until he has raised welts. With one, final, shudder, he falls completely to the floor, and folds himself up into a fetal position.]
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Now, I understand:
Having stood outside myself, I’d eaten the shadows and ghosts in my head; reveling in the past which sickens me. I know what I’ve done--know, really know--for the first time, what I did...and, why.
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Going back: It was only days until Beauty entered my life. At this time, I wasn’t seeing the paintings as anything representative of my character, or moral standing. All the mistakes I was blind to in those Works only enhanced their value. The shadows, the lines, and colors, brought a deepness of expression, which in my haste of brushstrokes, only enhanced, and accentuated the overall impression. Judgment was stifled. Praise was loosened.
There were moments, during these four months of painting, when I couldn’t recall the exact moment I’d colored, or filled-in, a particular area of the canvas; each image came to me unbidden, unconsciously, so. (All, of course, would have been better had I left everything in the dark. I was in denial of these pieces of myself; completely blind to the shattering of my character.)
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It’s too late now for regrets.
It may even be too late for forgiveness.
Whatever I’d managed to suppress, up to a point, as I began painting, came spilling out onto the canvas. I painted as if my very own life were on the line. The only person I had to live with, in those months of confinement, was myself. Therefore, I think it would be fair to say, this complete isolation brought every unexpressed, dormant, desire, out of hiding; projected, and immortalized, in paint.
With the addition of Beauty in my life the fostering of further, uninhibited, leaps of creativity would arrive also. A muse, [so I’ve heard] can be fluid and dominant. The changes to come in my life would be staggering; something huge, and without boundaries. There was no compromise, no brook, in my feelings. We were open to anything; and, her eyes pieced me, completely.
My desire to write of these things can only begin to redeem me. For now, I must return to those heady days of December [1989.] This, as I look back upon it now, was the true beginning of the end.
I couldn’t see it then.
By God, how I see it now.
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Every sound outside my studio/loft had faded into a half-recognizable hum. I’d dropped out of the world, and in turn, had fallen mute in its absence. It was time to re-enter the world.
With this self-imposed confinement I’d shed any doubt from my perspective. I burned with a new-found confidence, knocking down walls of self-criticism. The only occupation which held any meaning for me was the clear recognition I experienced, each day, before the easel. As in life, each day was a new creation:
Each preliminary sketch became a focal point, a jumping off spot. Each day became a new round of things I’d never dared to see before. There never was enough light, in a twenty-four hour period, for all the work I did. Each painting, finally, became a sort of rapture, never stifield by fading sunlight.
All those sketches I’d thrown onto a shelf were only a germination of things to be realized; ones having dates scribbled upon them, revealed themselves to be ten, twelve, and thirteen years old.
[Was I at the end of my creative rope? I certainly was, when I’d picked up those forgotten sketches. It did not matter. Here, finally, was something I could work with. My mind was on fire.]
In shutting out the world, I’d reclaimed all the lost pieces of my Self, which for better or worse, had been relegated to a silent place, dormant and muted.
Nothing seemed more important, as I began the Work, as the possibility of what could be expressed in paint upon a canvas. I was completely within my chosen element; only, this time, the focus became narrowed down to a point of invisibility, only to be re-born with a fullness I’d never visualized before:
The approach was frontal; undiminished by the thematic underpinnings of Bondage and Submission. Later, however, the spell would be broken by Rodgers’ invitation. Now, the time had come for me to open my studio door, and exit into the street I’d abandoned, in my envy and pride.
All I could contemplate, as I lifted my head from Rodgers scrawled message, was the very real envy I’d fallen into:
Envy was the spur, the kick in the backside, I needed in order to get back to the Work I was meant to accomplish. Each one of those stacked canvases, one-by-one, were the fruits of whatever envy I carried for Rodgers’ success. I felt nothing but pride in [what I felt was] this eclipse of Rodgers’, “Beauty.” The results were there, propped against the bare walls of my make-shift studio.
My legs felt weak. Feeling drained, yet comforted, the accomplishment was coursing through my veins like a hypodermic of something illegal.
[You took your pride, Steven, and shut out the world.]
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I began to see it clearly now:
I’d come out of a sustained, and dazed, indifference; I’d willed myself into production, into Work. What had begun as envy of Rodgers’ “Beauty,” was nothing more than an over-all movement toward impetus; an imperative, ultimately, drawing me into myself...
...Then, outward, toward some other side. Those paintings, putting all modesty aside, were the end results of an inner transformation.
Onward:
The last word, as I lifted the canvas from the easel, and placed it against the others, was:
Rodgers must be dumbfounded by my behavior.
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I didn’t know whether I wanted to see Rodgers and Cee-Cee yet. I didn’t even know if I could speak again to others. Everything, after all my silent, solitary, work seemed too much to think about. (Would I remember the Art of Conversation? How could I go out into the world, and speak, without whispering, mumbling.) I wasn’t myself, at all. I was deaf to my own sense of Self. Come here, go away...Come here, go away.
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[Well. It’s done. You’ve sung yourself some fine work songs, Steven; a virtual Devil’s Chorus, as you’ve sketched, painted, and sweated your way to completion.]
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So, there went Rodgers’ invitation to the floor:
The release and pleasure I felt was unequaled to anything I’d ever felt before. My Ego was just about ready to burst. There was a distinct impression, lying somewhat left of consciousness, I’d managed to scale a borderland of madness, and lived to tell the tale.
I brought myself back, gazing at the completed paintings, one-by-one, taking my time with each nuance, before moving on to the next.
Then, I recalled, all the injunctions I’d punished myself with in the past; the faceless, vocal critic, I’d listened to, but had never seen. [Well. It’s just the past, again, staring me in the face; a ghost, hovering like a knowing companion, just out of reach.]
I knew I had to see the paintings as others would see them. I had to be free of self-censoring, and move forward.
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The Critic was gone.
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“Yes, Steven”, I found myself speaking into the empty loft, “These paintings were done by you. You’ve done well, Steven. Nothing’s going to hold you back any longer. Nothing. The new Decade will see you in the Gallery; will see your paintings hung. You’ve done well, boy. Very well, by God.”
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Within those four months I’d spent painting, the inner-critic--the “voices,” which always seemed to dog each one of my steps--began to fade into low mumbles, until one day they disappeared completely In the face of these forty paintings, I felt as if a giant weight had been pulled, lifted, from my shoulders. Those “other voices” were no longer with me.
[I had painted: The most brilliantly colored flower; the dying sunlight of dusk, as it caresses a skyscraper; two men, seated upon a park bench, in Central Park (each one, gazing into their own private “bubble” of a young woman, nude, and kneeling at their feet); a discarded whiskey bottle, given beauty, as it rests before the open door of a tavern; a pale, yet still, beating heart, dominating the center of the canvas (along its edges, the half-forms of long-ago lovers and the entwined limbs of a leaf-abundant cypress tree); a phantasmagorical mixture of Liverpool docks, and the intrusion of a Hudson River seascape (these two vantage points, are off-set by the a man and a woman, seated in a small rowboat, kissing); a mine worker, trudging up a hill, with a lunch-pail; two nude women, lounging poolside (one is reading a magazine and the other is listening intently to the strumming of a lone guitar player--this figure is hastily sketched upon the right-hand corner of the canvas); one tree, standing alone, in a garbage-strewn lot; sunset and nightfall, represented by a woman bending over a tub of bubbling water, lighting a candle; a framed sunset, within a forest of multiple varieties of trees (the entire colour composition is bursting with reds and greens); an old woman, seated in a wheelchair, gazing at herself in a hand-held mirror; a ballerina, wearing an uplifted tutu, revolving, in dance, upon a bare stage; a baby monkey, leaping through a bathroom mirror; a nude, and nubile, young woman, emerging from a mud-filled pool; splashes of reds, greens, and blues, spraying outward from the top of an open cardboard box; four people, (two men, and two women) seated at a table, gazing upon an empty chair; an umbrella, hanging from a front-door knob; two lovers, (Chagall-like) embracing, as they fly above the clouds; a woman, hanging, Shibari-style, upside-down, over a candlelit dining-room table (her wrists and ankles are bound and she’s suspended, completely naked); two apples, set upon the seat of a wooden chair (a snake is wrapped around each arm of the chair); bamboo shoots, along a river’s edge, and 18th Century ships sailing into port; a nude woman, arranging a vase of flowers; a nude black man, and a nude white woman, lying together, asleep, in front of two huge salt and pepper shakers; a lone woman, (painted as a portrait) with a tear-drop falling from each eye (there is the crouched-form of a nude man, reflected within each of the woman’s eyes); a star rising, and a star falling, over Manhattan; a Spring leaf, brushed by a breeze; a young woman in a swimming pool, with sparks shooting from her body; five apples, two oranges, and three ripe pears, placed upon a windowsill; stout beer, and a pack of Export cigarettes, upon a water-stained tabletop; a bare light-bulb, illuminating a multi-colored stage setting; very small, fuchsia flowers, arranged within an empty wineglass; light, falling upon a woman, asleep upon a long couch (she is covered by a thin, satin, sheet, which accentuates each contour and crease of her nude form, beneath); a Still Life, consisting of fruit and a half-full bottle of wine; a young woman, winding a Grandfather’s clock (the glass cabinet door is part-way open, and the woman’s breasts and lower-body can be glimpsed, in reflecting brushstrokes. The woman is wearing an old, lace nightgown. The clock is poised at twelve o’clock); shackles, whips, paddles, and two masks, suspended by hooks, on a bare wall; a group of women, playing softball in Central Park; a Self-Portrait: brushes, and a palette, placed upon a table-top (at the edge of the canvas, one part of an easel can be discerned, and my face is partially seen there, sketched); a young woman, bending over the two arms of a living-room chair (both of her bare buttocks are uplifted, and out-thrust, from the center of the chair); and, finally, the interior of a bedroom, viewed through an open window (a man and a woman can be seen, naked and asleep, in each others arms).
Forty paintings, done.
[to be continued...]
