Besides Fun and Joyful --- 14/100, 101 & 102

Walks: Hood 

Distance: average 3.5 miles

So the late Sacramento artist and teacher, Wayne Thiebaud (1920-2021), is one of Ciwt's favorite artists.  Also one of the most tricky for her to write about.  Because, like most people, she find his work immensely pleasurable, joyful, even silly.  But unlike many, a part of Ciwt is also moved to tears by it. 

Wayne Thiebaud, Clown Cones, 2000

To Ciwt, at the core of all Thiebaud's art are the tears of a clown, even his more adorable, 'happy' clown  paintings like the one above.  These cones are somehow animate, like pets or dolls, you want to snuggle with them, 'eat them up.'  And, if they haven't melted first, that is what they are calling for someone to do, consume them. And then they will be gone.  From most beguiling to gone.  This, life's trajectory embedded in Thiebaud's painting, is both endearingly desirable and sad. 

And each of these 'dressed up' cones is alone; they aren't relating to each other. So too the people in Thiebaud's portraits.  

Wayne Thiebaud, Five Seated Figures, 1965, o/c

Whether in group or individual portraits, the inner life of all his subjects are hidden from the people around them and from us.  Even in Thiebaud's portrait of his wife and love of his life, Betty Jean, we see she is gorgeous and has pictures of historically recognized art in the book before her. But we have no indication what she's thinking her or how she relates to that art.  She is essentially a stranger to the world - including her most intimate partner.

Wayne Thiebaud, Betty Jean Thiebaud and Book,  1965-69, o/c

In person the glowing lushness of Thiebaud's paint is as thick and gooy looking as frosting.  His brushwork caresses the canvas with the same sensual, loving way a baker might lavish frosting on her cake. His confections are both beckoning and stark. Too perfect. His people are precisely presented but unknowable. His toys, like gumball and pinball machines have unreliable chanciness. His San Francisco is glowing, gorgeous and extremely precarious.  

Wayne Thiebaud, Morning Freeway, 2012, 0/c

 

There is a complex, deeply personal sensibility underlying Thiebaud's art.  It's shining simplicity isn't all it appears to be.  And to Ciwt there's a lot of tragedy there.  But, like the people in his portraits, Thiebaud's thoughts are private and inaccessible.  Happy, sad, overt, unknowable at once.

What do You Think? --- Days 14/98,99,100

 Walks:  Hood

Distances: 3.5, 5.5, 2.5 miles

So Ciwt was really excited that the new rug she ordered for her living room was arriving early!  When it got here, it was quite lovely but it seemed lighter than she expected.  Just to check, she took out her photos of the rug in the store and slid them under the rug that had been delivered.  If you look above, the one she ordered, Alabaster, is in the middle of the photos.  And the lightest one, Ecru is on the left and right ends respectively.  To her eye, the one that is in her living room is Ecru  the wrong color.

What do you think, dear readers?  Here's a close up: 

Left: rug in living room, Right: bottom Ecru, top Alabaster