I sat in my favorite chair for my afternoon quiet hour – a time of silence, meditation, and contemplation. I heard the text beep on my phone: “He Jon, hope you are well. I’m painting out in the back of VARAK Park if you want to stop  by; thanks, Matt.”

Ever since I wrote about Matt earlier this year on the blog, I’ve been trying to catch up with him as he makes his solitary treks around our county to take his peaceful and beautiful landscapes. We’ve been going back and forth. We finally connected at the right time for both of us. I want to follow Matt and his work from time to time.

I was drawn to Matt the first time I saw his work; he describes himself as a Prosaic Realist, but I don’t know what that means. I see him as closer to Edward Hopper because he is drawn to the beauty of the ordinary and sees beauty in what most people don’t see at all.

Photography is very different from landscape painting, but we share an eye for similar things, the small things, the ordinary things that are a part of life but not a glamorous part. The part that never gets painted or photographed.

Matt always works alone – an introvert, but I don’t get the feeling that he’s lonely. He is not interested in anybody else’s opinion of him; he marches to the beat of his drummer. He loves what he does; it’s a part of him.

He lives comfortably within himself, content to paint what he wants to p ain’t, not what anybody tells him he should paint. I feel the same way about writing on my blog.

People always tell me what to write, which never turns out well.

 

His subjects are impulsive and chosen at random.

I was happy to get the text and answered, “I’m coming.” I scrambled around, grabbed the Tripod (I knew I needed a tripod for these photos), and stuffed both of my Leica cameras into a camera bag, and went racing over to meet him.

Matt was standing in the street behind Varak Park, a beautiful old factory-turned-office building in the center of our town.

 then

 

He was talking to a friend,  a fellow painter who introduced himself to me and then left me to take my photos before the afternoon sun sank below the horizon.

I set up my cameras, opened up the tripod,  and started shooting.

Matt was, as always, polite and at ease. He’s painted hundreds of landscapes and is eager to sell them, but I never get the feeling selling them is nearly as important as painting them. He has an inner calm I think is rare among creative people.

 

 

Matt drives around in an old van, the back stuffed with paint, canvas, and the artist’s debris. He says it takes about an hour to paint a landscape; he has a whole building crammed with his paintings, and outsiders never see many of the.

He has a studio, and it’s usually open on weekends.

He generously devoted four paintings to the Mansion Activity Room; they are hanging on the walls and are much loved by the residents.

Matt has sold many of his pictures, but it doesn’t bother him that so many are left in storage. He trusts and follows his instincts; he doesn’t want to listen to anyone else’s.

 

I admit to loving his paintings. I don’t know Matt well, but I think he mostly lives in his world and the world of his wife and daughters and his art. We are very comfortable with one another.

I was careful to be quiet as I fumbled with Tripod and tried to get my Leica Monochrome to deal with the very bright light. I didn’t wish to disturb a prolific and gifted landscape artist with small talk.

But Matt was happy to talk.

He is rare in that he is a passionate artist and creative without any drama at all. He is always himself, and he is always quiet and calm.

It was just another day at the office for him, another landscape of the ordinary, and even as he dealt with the sun’s reflection on the white in his painting and a big photographer circling all around,  he was at ease.

If he has another gear, I’ve not seen it.

He shows no sign of either in a culture filled with big egos and self-absorbed people. He is always pretty much the same, quiet, patient, and gentle.

He doesn’t seem to doubt or second-guess himself,  fuss or agonize; he just brushed and paused and brushed and waited until he suddenly stopped. He was done.

It was a gift for me to be right in the middle of a talented artist’s work life, I was sneaking behind him, in front of him, clicking away,  and he never once even blinked at my intrusions.

We have no art writers or critics up here; the artists work alone and out of sight, and it is always a struggle to sell their work and let people know about it.

I like to write about it when I can. I admire anyone who takes the leap and risks being creative in this culture of distraction, greed, and obsession with security.

Matt would be surprised to hear me say I see him as iconic, someone I am drawn to know and write about. But that feeling was reinforced today.

I love the idea of the lone artist doing his work, day after day, year after year, in all kinds of weather,  without complaint or sturm and drang.

Matt seems to exist very much inside of himself. He is a quiet, thoughtful man and a committed artist. He is always pulling over somewhere in the country to photograph a building, a landscape, or an old car.

Most of his paintings are landscapes, but a lot of them are not. He often takes pictures too.

I like the idea of him popping up here and there, painting a lovely picture for an hour, and then heading home.

He also works maintaining some buildings he owns.

 

Something is stirring about his commitment, the solitary nature of his work, and his absolute confidence in his artistry.

I appreciated the hour we spent; we talked a little and mumbled a bit to each other.

The next time I hear from him, he will be somewhere in the town with the rear trunk of his van open, his battered easel out on the street, very quietly and skillfully dabbling away to the puzzlement of passersby.

People gawked at our little scene when they came by to walk their dogs or head for the grocery store.

This was a quiet commercial back street with a factory across the road; I imagine the few people who live here don’t see many tripods, artists, and photographers around.

One whispered to me, “what is he painting?”

When I said it was the red truck and the water tower base, she just shook her head and walked on. As she left, I told her that lots of beautiful landscapes were stored in his backyard.

But that is the point; that’s Matt’s territory, the things we see but don’t see. Landscapes can be green and pretty or covered in snow; they can also be gas stations at night or old trucks rotting in a backyard.

I assumed that Matt would be painting the Varak Building itself, which seemed quite photogenic, but he wasn’t.

He painted the base of a water tank and a red truck across the street.

As a photographer, I would have gone for the building’s unique structure, but Matt saw something I didn’t see – the call of the ordinary; he saw the beauty I would probably not have seen.

 

I took many photos but only posted eight or nine of them. It was a gift for me to watch him paint and see the work come to life on his canvas.

I urged him to call me again anytime.

My schedule is crazy, so that it might take a while, and so is his, but I feel we are not done with each other. His call got me running. I’m glad we got together.

It felt good,  like peering into the window of a creative soul.