Artist's Statement

Carol Taylor- SEARCHING FOR QUIET

It’s October and I’ve taken a break from painting.  I walk through the young fir trees, the smell of sun-warmed earth and forest bring back memories of other times when the woods was a companion and a shoulder to cry on. The silence here at my brother’s camp is almost perfect, broken only by bird song and the sound of wind stirring the branches.

I sit to look out over the pond, cattails nod, a red-winged blackbird soars away. I gather earth in my hand, rich dark humus under a warm layer of needles.  It is wondrous to be here in the quiet.

A place to think, to question myself, to ask why am I painting with oils when clay has commanded my interest for the past 12 years? I shake my head at not receiving an answer. Across from me a small fish jumps and returns to it’s underwater world with lunch.

This day by myself makes me more conscious of the whirl of activity that usually surrounds me. Activity that seems beyond my control . . . meetings, classes and paper work for exhibitions, volunteer time, friends . . . my husband’s busy life, my family and the usual house keeping. An exciting whirl, one that contrasts sharply to this place and to the usual images that I have used over the years in my art-making.

The first of the female images I created changed the way I felt about art and the way I worked.  It was a breakthrough for me at the time. It was a way of working that excited me, it made me feel the images were unique.  The first image in that series titled New Beginning was simply that, a turning point that came about in this way.

Avis Lang Rosenberg* was curating an Atlantic Canada show in 1981 for Mount Saint Vincent’s Art Gallery of Nova Scotia. The information came by mail, slides and bio material were sent out in response.  The short list was chosen from Maritime artists and those selected were to take actual pieces to the UNB Art Center in Fredericton. 

Although I managed to make the short list I felt the work I had been doing would not satisfy this west coast woman and tried for weeks to do something that would be considered original.  One night about three in the morning teary eyed and tired, I leaned against the wall and said to myself . . .”if nothing is working damn it, just make marks on the paper until something happens”.   Which I did, and what appeared was a female image coming out of a tangle of scribbly marks. In the morning I was elated with the image and worked on it adding shiny graphite to the mix of pastels until I felt it was finished.

We were to show the work the following day.  I was very new to this  “dance” of art, curators and exhibitions, and took only this piece and a couple of unrelated previous attempts. It was truly my first work of self-expression . . . and it was not enough. I had only one image with no personal history and no “reasons why” as an explanation of the work.  But, Avis Rosenberg’s exclamation of interest, her enthusiasm for this image when we discussed it, was enough encouragement to keep me working for months.  It helped put me on this path of using the female body to represent humanity . . . as the male figure had done for centuries.

I think back over many of those images and I feel there has always been a sense of withdrawal, of introspectioncaught in them.  From that first series:The Nurturing Circle, which grew out of this new way of working; to Ageratos in 1990; the 10 Dadaelus’ Daughters; some of the Windows; and especially the Reflection: reflection of the 1997 Delta series, each has at it’s essence a quality of stillness, of holding one’s inner self quiet.

I made a lot of pastel drawings during the early 1980's; most were torn into strips and used to make another series of images.  However, Bev Betts, a friend whose basement I was using for a studio saved two, of which this is one.

It is in these works that the search for quiet is evident. Then, when I find it, I can develop the rest of the series.It comes, I think, from growing up in the country on a dirt road not far from the small village of Apohaqui, surrounded by woods, making escape easy. I fled there often during my growing up years . . . the times I came home from living in Saint John in particular.  I hated the city . . . though I loved art school and my teachers, Fred Ross and Ted Campbell, but the city was sooty, smelled of grime, traffic and industry.  Home and the woods were a refuge.  

 That search, running away from reality to a quiet place, figuratively and literally, was left behind by maturity and responsibility.  It then became part of my creative expression.

Now my search for Quiet involves going to the studio and immersing myself in throwing pots . . . repetitive, therefore soothing.  Other times when a problem needs solving I turn to realism as an escape in whatever medium is handy.  These solutions help for a time until a new series presents itself and I look again for that  quiet place in my work.

The change in temperature disturbs my thoughts.  I move, patting the handfuls of earth and dried needles back in place. The sun has gone behind the tall spruce and I know I have been here too long.  My real world intrudes and I pack up the paints, clean the brushes, store the turps and the wet oil for another day.             Another day, when I can look forward to . . . Searching for Quiet.

Carol Taylor
10 McLaughlin Dr

*Rosenberg, Avis Lang. Mirrorings: Women Artists of the Atlantic Provinces. Exh. cat. Halifax, NS: Art Gallery, Mount Saint Vincent University, 1982.
http://collections.ic.gc.ca/waic/catayl/catayl_e.htm
in progress: http://www.geocities.com/womens_clay_art/
http://new‑brunswick.net/new‑brunswick/nblinks/arts.html

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From the Women in Universities site:
http://www.geocities.com/katherineside/sarah.html

In October, 1981 women artists in the Atlantic Provinces were invited by the Mount to take part in an exhibit titled, "Mirrorings." The exhibit was described as "an exhibition of women seeing, knowing, narrating and describing themselves," and was "concerned with the multiple, personal, physical and social selves that women project, inhabit and experience"(6). The work of approximately 15 artists were exhibited

or

Rosenberg, Avis Lang. Mirrorings: Women Artists of the Atlantic Provinces. Exh. cat. Halifax, NS: Art Gallery, Mount Saint Vincent University, 1982.
http://collections.ic.gc.ca/waic/bibliography_f.htm