Anticipation: The Force of Art

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© 2016 Robert L. Smith; Fran W. Smith. All rights reserved.

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Published by AuthorHouse 04/08/2016

ISBN: 978-1-5049-7885-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5246-0225-3 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-5049-7884-2 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016902219

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Contents

Preface

Anticipation: the force of art

The Surprise Intrusion of Art

Art Periods Identified by Scholars

Stimulation, Interaction, and Imagination

New Influences

Changed Lives

A European Influence

A New Life Style and Assignment

A Neighborhood Art Gallery

Rocks and Whittles

The Asian Connection

Collecting Art

Twenty Illustrations from a Diverse Collection

About the Authors

Preface

W e confess! We began and end this book with the conviction that we are all born with a need to discover art in any and all of its wonderful forms. Try as we may, it is impossible for us to ignore the creative forces in ourselves and others. It makes little difference whether our interest is in making a useful pot or vase pretty, a piece of driftwood, attractive or interesting, or even fishing hooks and equipment decorative. The urge or impulse exhibits itself in decorative impulses on everything from food to seagoing vessels, barns, museum walls, and even the human body. On a larger scale, there are architects, who when they are good, build places of great beauty for the many. Add to that brief list glass blowers, sculptures, and musicians, even the humble writer who sometimes creates literary value while taking you to places and feelings you never dreamed were possible. Some chefs are artists and many are good cooks, and creative in their daily labor. It is virtually impossible to identify any human endeavor that is not improved by artistic impulses that often go unnoticed and unacknowledged. I admit that when I took the time to look at the work of others I discovered both artistry and beauty, two things the world needs for human survival. Out initial search for understanding the beginning of art was historical speculation. It was metaphysical in character, simple in design, but useful in our journey into the origins of art in ourselves, and the rest of the world.

In short, we believe that the human mind is innately committed to an exploration of future possibilities, anticipation: our forward looking imagination of what we might or could be seeing in some new form not that familiar or clear. It is our mind sorting out some substantive mystery our senses let us experience. In short, it is the way art comes to all of us; it is the magic and force of art, that in some way stimulate us, and by undefined image, something yet to happen.

The Eskimo understanding of this feeling expresses itself as the spirit he/she senses in the material used for carving, be it bone, stone, or wood. It is an act of art prompted by need to liberate the spirit the rest of us have not yet seen. In painters it the outrageous and spontaneous explosion of colors that find their way on to canvas and the dreams of the mad architect who creates beauty in his head or computer and finds the mechanics to bring them into monumental reality. It is the fragment of a melody that only one person hears before he shares it with the multitude. It is the dancer who moves across the floor defying gravity, impossibly floating on the air that goes unseen.

It is an unrecognized energy of those who sense a future experience of uncontrolled force that drives all art—anticipation, the unexpected ability to see what can happen, to see beyond the moment not yet arrived. That time is the time of art, the creative time that drives us all to seek it out and make our world even more beautiful than it might otherwise be.

We plead guilty to wanting to surround our lives with such beauty. We collect to ensure the survival of the art and the impulse to create whatever future possibilities the creative mind can discover that makes our world beautiful. It is this impulse that is the force of art.

Anticipation: the force of art

T he technician from Staples was in my office to correct problems with my computer. It wasn’t his first visit. We were becoming family. Based on what I had learned in earlier conversations, my computer was a substantial source of the income supporting his wife’s graduate work at U.C. Berkeley.

As he came in, he said, OH, you are the guy who collects rocks and stuff. It was first time I had been identified as a collector of anything. I was surprised at his form of recognition, and would have preferred something more in line with, you have a nice Eskimo collection of sculpture. He should have said something more important since I was supporting his wife’s year of graduate work. But, as I thought about it, he was right, even the room I reserve for my writing has many carved rocks, including an infinitely small jade Chinese carving of a lion, one inch tall, which anchors my computer screen to the desk where I like to think that we both work. He is also my resident scold to remind me when I am wasting time asking the computer to help me avoid work.

The sculptures are many and varied. They are carved from rocks, a few precious stones of one form or another, roots of old trees, cement, and even iron in many shapes and colors. He failed to mention paintings, oil, watercolor, or charcoal, and he ignored the porcelain Danish bear lounging on top of the computer and a large sandstone owl by a California sculpture, by Jack Richardson, sitting on my desk. His remark got me to thinking, something that at my age does not come easily, and when it does, requires all the help I can get.

As he tinkered with my computer doing all sorts of things that I did not understand, he revealed sides of the machine I did not know it possessed. He finally concluded his work and said, Any questions? Since he had not given me the opportunity to explore the problems that I had called him to fix, and I understood nothing of the conversation he had been having with himself, I said, No, but I might later on. It seemed like an obvious response since he was already half way to the front door pausing only long enough to give me an invoice for his work. Later, I discovered that I had lots of questions since his fix, had created a whole series of new problems like destroying my contact file, and wiping out one or two other files that I depended upon. Like my small art collection, I looked forward to seeing what the technician had done with anticipation.

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The computer tale is not the story, however. The technician got me to thinking about our rock collection. My wife was as much culprit as me. Where did the sculpture, paintings, oil, watercolor, and charcoal begin? Where had the seed of an interest in art, and collecting been planted? I was startled at first because I could remember nothing in my child hood, school, or even junior college that might have infected me with a desire to collect rocks and other objects of art. Hell, I did not even collect marbles like every other boy. My best guess was World War II.

As a child and youth, I had no recollection of art, any form of art except books and music at school. We never had pictures or art objects in my home as a child. The closest thing was a cathedral table radio that sat in the living room on a side table and invited the rest of the world into our home. We also had a calendar picture titled End of the Trail. It was depressing, and appropriate to the depression of the time. Even so, it was difficult to think that this picture of a bronze sculpture by James Earl Fraser, not Frederic Remington as many believed, would trigger a hidden impulse to collect art. The iconic bronze was meant to be viewed as a reverent memorial to a valiant people. It depicted the raw emotion of a single Indian figure with his horse, both exhausted after years of losing battles with the Army and white settlers. Both had reached the end of their trail. Both horse and rider appeared to droop with the Indian’s lance pointing to earth near the horse’s head. Horse and rider seemed to be stumbling to earth. They had reached their end.

The bronze sculpture was first shown at the Pan-Pacific Exposition in 1915, but later became symbolic to millions of unemployed during the great depression beginning in 1929. Interestingly enough the picture, without the calendar remained the one object of art in our home until 1938. Why it was abandoned I cannot remember because our financial circumstances had not changed that much. I was still permitted to steal fruit and vegetables from the market in the early morning on my paper route, but not acknowledge my deed.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized that the images and shapes having no utilitarian value had little to do with my life, except, maybe one faded calendar photo of a dying Indian and his horse reaching the end of their trail. It took WWII and my introduction to Europe, and a civilization, rich or poor that paid tribute to a variety of things called art. Foremost there was architecture, destroyed, but still magnificent in the ruins it represented.

No matter how poor the home we invaded in Europe, there were colorful vases, pottery, and dishes displayed with pride on side boards. Oil painting, poor perhaps, but colorful were readily found in homes, restaurants, cafes, and other places where people gathered. You found individuals, and small groups gathered to catch on paper and or canvas a patch of flowers, children playing, or some beautiful piece of architecture, whole, or in pieces. Painting was something people did, and, for the most part, for self-satisfaction and pleasure.

As I thought about it, the images I saw in and after war were familiar, I had seen them as a child in a very used set of Encyclopedia my parents had found money to buy for me in the first or second grade. Somewhere in those dog eared pages I found pictures of things similar to what I was seeing. Ancient images were stirring up memories long forgotten. It reminded me of my first real interest in classical music. It lasted for only a few weeks before my tone deafness, lack of interest, and even greater lack of discipline let me give up my feeble effort to learn to play the violin. It was a decision that pleased virtually everyone, including my teacher.

During my early teens the depression and family problems resulted in my being placed at the Long Beach YMCA where I would have a room, limited cash for dinner, and supervised, more or less by a nearby aunt. My middle brother, considerably older than I was moved me into the YMCA and gave me his portable table radio as company. It was his pride and joy, and a significant gift for him to make. As La Von saw it, he was leaving me with the company of his radio, the only real gift he had ever given me.

Between school, and other things, I was rarely in the room during the week, but on weekend the Texaco Oil Company presented Saturday at the Opera. The program lasted for hours, and I could stretch out on my bed and listen to music I did not understand, but the music comforted me; it was my friend, and helped me avoid being lonely. No matter what the program, I listened every Saturday. Then, more appropriately for a thirteen year old, had lunch at Amos and Andy’s across the street (hamburger, bowl of chili, and pie) for fifteen cents before riding my bicycle to the Long Beach Pike and the Rialto Movie Theater. For ten cents I got three cowboy movies and three cartoons which filled my afternoon before going home to the Y and Amos and Andy’s for my evening meal, hamburger, bowl of chili, and piece of pie.

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I have no question where my interest in classical music came from, it was Saturday at the Opera. Other interests are not as easy to explain. I thought it might make an interesting adventure to explore the source of interest I had in various forms of art, and our need to collect. I could even try to describe something about the artists who we discovered that shared our home. The story would be a loose and wide-ranging journey of discovery, history, and artistry. I could try to introduce my reader of the value of people who I thought enriched life through art. They were after all, probably the culprits who encouraged collecting, not only rocks but objects of beauty. In our case it meant oil and water color paintings, some modern, some classic, and other forms of carving and painting we came to discover in Japan and China. While the journey may be of rediscovery for author, it is my hope that it will encourage the reader to recall his or her own journey to art and all that is beautiful, in your mind, and reality—to reassess, if necessary its value to your life.

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Every story has a beginning, this one begins in 1943, and later with a decision, pressed by both of my parents, and two good friends to finish Junior College, get an Associate Degree in 1947, after getting out of the Army, and