Consistent, Persistent 

Listen to the essay here

Persistence and consistency have been coloring my days. Persistence is probably a cool, deep blue, consistency maybe like the way the sky changes colors from light to dark to back again, no clear start and stop in our lifetime, simply the words and frames we’ve agreed upon to mark our passage of time. I have been showing up to canvases and painting as if my life depends on it; with persistence and consistency at a pace dictated by a show opening date. Though I’d like to believe without the deadline, I’d still be painting, just at a different pace. I consistently force myself away from my paintings every six days or so, not because I necessarily feel good stepping away, but because I know persistently that it helps my productivity levels. In fact, I typically panic each time I have a scheduled or unanticipated break from the safety of the studio, “I’m not going to get to paint today?!” I bemoan to Vaimo on the unplanned breaks. Every day for the last six weeks as I’ve worked to finalize four large paintings, I show up and move the paint on the surfaces, even if I don’t feel like it, which is probably more usual of an experience than not. The painting has been feeling like writing lately, in that I have persistently trained similarly for writing. The goal is to show up, do something even if it becomes nothing that stays in the final version. I appreciate the difference with paintings however, in that there is evidence of the efforts before, below the surface. And there is something about the movement of my body to make it so that I remember what is underneath. Very different from the lack of memory of changed drafts - words cut and pasted into a different document, sometimes (rarely) only if they are deemed lucky enough to escape the wrath of the delete key’s repeating click, click, click. Even if what was once there is not necessarily visible in the current iteration of the painting, the surface gains depth with each layer applied. So I paint, trying to embody some of my best skill - my ability to keep going, to drive toward a goal, my persistence pushing anything else aside so that I can live into my best and worst quality, my inability to give up.

Over the last year as I’ve worked on this new body of work, I’ve found delight in the repetition of railroad ties. Some of you know that I’ve been working on a series of paintings that will soon hit the world for a broader audience. My pleasures in railroad imagery represents persistence and consistency in physical and historical manifestations. Generations ago, when my family members on both side of my lineage worked for various railroads, there would have been many hands that touched the ties, spikes, and rails. They are embedded in the dirt with a machine these days, but the tracks laid by hand needed to be as precise as they remain today. Gloria Anzaldúa describes the U.S./Mexico border as a wound, and I wonder what she would say about railroad tracks. So many ties, spikes and rails across landscapes, through small towns and urban centers, a visible monument of manifest destiny. The markers of history decaying, shut down, or repurposed train depots as the small towns, once stops for trains, now vie for highway traffic attention instead. Like Anazldúa’s description of the border as a thin edge of barbed wire serves as metaphor for the painful bifurcation of cultures, the arbitrary man-made separations of geographies, railroad tracks also slice through topographies forcing it into compliance with a particular grade for the smooth operation of machines. I am in awe of railroad tracks for their tidy repetitions, the feat of persistence, and disturbed by the lack of attention to the infrastructure and the privileging of cars moving oil and freight versus trains full of people. I feel the tensions of wonder of human feats, and disgust at the exploitation of so many people’s bodies, their lives, in achieving it.

Clearly painting railroad ties is nothing like laying rails into the ground. Though, I can say painting so many railroad ties and rails has fueled a year long obsession I’ve given myself the room to explore in new mediums. There is no doubt a legacy of trains in US culture fills some with pride, with others amongst us becoming obsessed with the glory days of train transport. There is something to be said about the size, scale, and magnitude of steel vehicles hurling through space. A majesty, if you will. Retired steam powered engines are encased in museum spaces now, artifacts of a time pre-dating plastic. Caboose and other train cars sit on the edge of some towns or in some cases, serve as a cornerstone element of the city park visitors can climb aboard. A train as portal to the past. And certainly riding a train these days in the US is a portal to the past, sadly not the glamorous one. Though, of course the glamour was only afforded for a few to enjoy. I know I’m obsessed with the rails because I’m nearly “done with” the series I’m calling Roots and I’ve been dreaming of the new projects ahead for the rest of 2022 and one of them involves continuing to explore railroad ties and other railroad related imagery. I thought spending a year painting, over ten years researching, several years writing about it would have meant I got this subject matter out of my system. Curiously, persistently still obsessed.

And yet, consistently I find myself thinking about how many different ways can I paint railroad tracks and still have it be interesting for me? I’ve wondered about how to make it interesting for the viewer; and the railroad elicits a range of feelings from almost all who see the paintings. I’ve persistently been obsessed with figuring out how I can make these repeating forms move a viewer’s eyes across a pictorial surface? How can I imbue the recognition of the laborers who made those tracks possible? How can I repaint women into the equation? How can I remind of us all of new associations with the railroad that connect our present to past? Why do I feel so compelled to shout about the railroad companies as vital facilitators of land grant theft through breaking treaties with Indigenous Tribes? That public ideas about labor forces, efficiency, productivity, that emerged from railroad glory days, and continue to reverberate into current realities for laborers in production and manufacturing? That trains connect people across various geographies and also that tracks continue to demarcate the right and the wrong sides of town? That the railroad companies of yore crafted public policy realities that impact our lives today even if we don’t explicitly know it? Railroads facilitated our shared notions of time through scheduled stops on their routes, they were actual time benders! What else have they had a part in that we don’t even stop to notice or realize? Am I the only one interested in this?

The rhythmic moving of a steel wheel on a steel rail compels me forward. I’m writing these rails of inquiry to a place I hope reminds us of previous railroad associations while also making new ones rise to the fore. And so, like my ancestors who were in charge of ten miles worth of track, walking the ballast path over and over to ensure the train safe passage at the risk of their lives and limbs, I too lay these tracks in paint searching for my own safe passage. Through the subject matter that enthralls me so, finding more comfort in this label as painter, consistently and persistently trying to learn something about how to be in this world, in this time.

What I’m Reading

Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals by Alexis Pauline Gumbs

Offerings in the form of meditations, Gumbs provides fascinating strategies for thriving through interweaving practices from the lineage of Black feminism and the sharing of wisdoms from marine mammals. Each offering is grounded by a practice such as "Listen" or "Breath" in which she poetically and beautifully connects the concept to human and underwater mammals alike. Though Gumbs' offerings we gain models for engaging with the natural world that reminds us of our inherent connections, not separations. An absolutely genre defying book that feels like it could be as at home in a yoga class as it could be in a college classroom. I'm throughly enjoying and savoring the read.

Artist Offerings

• Some food for thought on writing from Kiese Layman We’re Not Good Enough to Not Practice which has me thinking about the risks and joys of putting out writing into the world (even if it’s not so polished/perfect hello this missive!) and also a more words on persistence and consistency
• I've been working my way through the Smithsonian's podcast ARTiculated which brings historical interviews with artists in conversation with people today

Creative Ritual

It is looking more and more likely that I will hit my (revised) goal of 15 paintings fo my series Roots. Drop off at the gallery is on Friday of this week! Show officially opens on August 11th. Wow, it's happening folks, keep an eye on Kaddatz Galleries for more information as we get closer. In addition to finishing up some paintings I've been doing a ton of exhibition prep. It is a lot of work to get paintings into the world in all the ways! I've been working on an application for broader audiences beyond my region for my paintings, it feels like a long shot but, my philosophy is you won't know if you even had a chance if you never gave yourself the chance by putting yourself out there... also known as gotta meet that rejection goal for the year or at least try! I had a meeting with a friend who is commissioning a painting from me, which I will begin painting later this month. My shop remains open for business, your purchases of my work help support the thousands of unpaid hours of painting I log in my studio. Current listings include the remainders of my Kitchen Saints series as well as several Tiny Tequila studies that are all framed and matted and ready to hang. All in all, I am looking forward to a rest and reset after this painting push.

Questions to ponder

What has persistence taught you?
What areas of your life include consistency? Where might you need to let up a bit or push a little harder?
What makes up your currently obsessions? 
In what ways are you seeing the past collide with the present?

Thanks for journeying with me. I hope, as always, that you take what you need and leave the rest for someone else, or for another time.

-KCF