Artist Blog - Richard Long and a little on Mark Rothko

Today I am writing about Richard Long and Mark Rothko. Richard Long is best known for his land art but he is also a sculptor, photographer, and painter. He has studied at the West of England College of Art and St. Martins School of Art and is currently represented by the James Cohan Gallery in New York. A lot of his work is based on or created by taking walks. For example Long creates lines on the ground from walking back and forth in A line Made by Walking (1967).Richard Long, A Line Made By Walking, 1967

I also does sculptural installations using rocks, usually arranged in either a line or circular manner.

Richard Long, Wooden Line, date unknown

Some of his work is in the walk itself, in one he walks an outstanding distance until he sees a cloud


and another he writes down something for every minute of an hour of walking in a circle.

Richard Long, One Hour, A sixty minute circle walk on Dartmoor 1984

He and Andy Goldsworthy have really gotten me excited about using nature as an element of my work. I really love their style and I've been thinking about how I can incorporate it in my work. So I started thinking about their technique of drawing attention to nature through the use of nature as art. I also think their process of creating is important too and want to participate in the sort of meditative quality of collecting and creating the work. I was reminded of some paintings I did in 2004 using mud and found materials.

Justin Lewis, Texture Field,
wood, steel, canvas on canvas, 2005, 18"x24"

These were inspired by one of my favorite artists of all time, Mark Rothko. I've always enjoyed his color fields and I felt this piece as an extension to what i call texture field. I want to use similar techniques to my texture field mixed media work but instead use nature as my canvas and materials. I want to enlarge them to make large scale color/texture fields using natural colors and textures of leaves, berries, or rocks in natural settings. I also am interested in the ephemeral, which is seen a lot in Goldsworthy's work and I will include in my documentation. I'm thinking of video documenting the process of making the piece and then natures process that destroying it and of course including a photograph of the finished piece before it's destroyed.

I wanted to mention Rothko as well because I am interested in his his ideas about using these color fields to create a mood or feeling. I also enjoy the mechanisms he uses in most of his work. I'm hoping I can use his color field theory to create senses of urgency or longing in my work.

Untitled1947
Artist: Mark Rothko (Russian-American 1903-1970)
Medium: Oil on Canvas
Dimensions: 121.0 x 90.1 cm

No. 14, 1960, by Mark Rothko, oil on canvas, dimensions unknown

I don't know if this is the right posting for some of this, but I have been struggling with finding a focus and method for my work this year, I realize that my original idea of photoshopping lacked my real involvement and my video performances aesthetically didn't speak to me(I've never really enjoyed performance art and I found the final piece to be boring) I feel like I have finally aligned my interests in aesthetics, subject, and purpose and I needed to write it down. Hopefully it will be successful when put to action.