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Forgery, plagiarism, and transformative use: the money machine of art

Early light on Moon Lake, 9X12, oil on archival canvasboard, $696 includes shipping and handling in continental US.

Last month I wrote that I was too idiosyncratic to be a forger. It requires sublimating your own creativity to another’s vision. What’s the fun in that? You might as well be an engineer; it pays better.

US copyright law says you can’t copy someone else’s work, except under limited circumstances. One of these is ‘transformative use,’ which has a bit of an “I’ll know it when I see it” definition.

Eastern Manitoba River, 6X8, oil on archival canvasboard, $348 includes shipping and handling in continental US.

Transformative use could mean:

  • Parody: Creating a work that imitates or mocks the style or content of the original copyrighted material for humorous or satirical effect.
  • Commentary or criticism: Using copyrighted material as a basis for commentary, critique, or analysis, where the new work adds new insights or perspectives.
  • Educational or informational purposes: Incorporating copyrighted material into educational or informational content to illustrate a point or convey information.
  • Remixes or mashups: Combining multiple copyrighted works to create a new, original work with a different meaning or expression.

That last one is where the visual artist has some latitude. For example, I might want to put an 18′ Grumman aluminum canoe in a painting and am too lazy to walk out to the back yard and photograph my own. If it’s a detail in an otherwise completely different work, I can reference someone else’s photograph. I cannot, however, copy Dorothea Lange’s dustbowl photographs verbatim and expect to get away with it. Of course, there’s a lot of grey area in between these two examples.

Brooding Skies, 8X10, oil on archival canvasboard, $522

Transformative use is judged on a case-by-case basis, which is why famous artists like Jeff Koons keep stealing from less-well-known ones. They can better afford protracted legal cases.

British artist Damien Hirst also has a long rap sheet when it comes to plagiarism, but he may be the first artist in history to be accused of forging his own work.

Among several examples reported by the Guardian is an $8 million, 13-foot tiger shark split into three sections and suspended in formaldehyde at the Palm Hotel and Resort in Las Vegas. It was dated 1999, but was made in 2017.

The works were first shown at a 2017 Hirst solo show called Visual Candy and Natural History, and dated “from the early to mid-1990s.”

“Formaldehyde works are conceptual artworks and the date Damien Hirst assigns to them is the date of the conception of the work,” Hirst’s company said.

The artist’s lawyers added that “the dating of artworks, and particularly conceptual artworks, is not controlled by any industry standard. Artists are perfectly entitled to be (and often are) inconsistent in their dating of works.”

Cold Spring Day, 11X14, $869 includes shipping and handling in continental US.

A more prosaic explanation is that Hirst’s reputation is in decline. More recent works do not sell at the prices he commanded when he was one of the fresh new Bad Boys of British Art. By backdating his catalog, he could hope to make more money.

Formaldehyde slows down but doesn’t stop decay. Some of Hirst’s earlier pieces are rotting, or the original specimens have been replaced. What a revolting job for the conservators, not to mention the gallery assistants who did the work in the first place. Formaldehyde is a highly toxic systemic poison that is a severe respiratory and skin irritant and can cause burns, dizziness or suffocation. If you’re inclined to deface artwork for political or environmental reasons, Hirst’s suspended animals seem a far better target than an irreplaceable oil painting.

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Monday Morning Art School: Painter’s Block

Early Spring on Beech Hill, oil on canvasboard, Carol L. Douglas, 12X16, $1449 framed includes shipping in continental US.

“What do you suggest for the dreaded easel terrors, as in frozen or painter’s block on how to continue?” a reader asked me. As often happens, the painting she’s stuck on is going very well. I can’t tell if she is afraid to ‘ruin’ it, or if she’s blind to its qualities.

Take a Break: Stepping away from your work gives you a fresh perspective. Go for a brisk walk, since exercise boosts creativity. Or do something completely unrelated to give your subconscious mind time to figure out the answer.

Experiment: Start another painting that is completely outside your wheelhouse. Try a different medium, or a different style. Pushing yourself out of your comfort zone can help push through your painter’s block.

Main Street, Owl’s Head, oil on archival canvasboard, $1623 includes shipping and handling in continental US.

Draw: Your brain knows that deep down you think drawing is harmless and insignificant. It won’t invest the energy trying to trip you up on a little thing. That helps you regain your looseness for your real project.

Preset your palette: If the problem is one of color, find a painting you love and mix six or eight colors from it. Then observe in what proportion the artist uses these colors, and consider how you could use these colors in your own painting.

Apple Tree with Swing, 16X20, oil on archival canvasboard, $2029 framed includes shipping and handling in continental US.

Seek background inspiration: Visit art galleries or museums, read art books, browse art websites, watch a movie or play a computer game-all seeing some kind of ideas on which you can build.

Change Your Environment: It’s almost spring. Go outside and paint. A change is as good as a rest.

Don’t worry that you’ll ‘ruin’ it. If you could paint it once, you can paint it a thousand times. Having said that, if you’re considering a big revision, try it in photo-editing software or on a scrap of canvas first.

Work at the same time every day, when possible. Inspiration follows effort, more than the other way around. Sometimes the only way to overcome painter’s block is to keep painting, even if you’re not in the mood.

Lobster pound, 14X18, oil on canvas, $1594 framed includes shipping and handling within the continental US.

Analyze what’s wrong: Are there underlying fears or doubts holding you back? Sometimes naming those fears is enough to banish them; if not, talk them over with a trusted friend.

Join a community: A problem shared is a problem halved. Artists are generally very supportive and they either will or have gone through the same temporary drought as you.

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Coping with bad press

The Raising of Lazarus, ~20X24. Available on request.

There’s a common misconception that knowing the juror improves your odds for a show. I’ve found the reverse to be true. Knowing the juror usually ends up being a liability, since your friends bend over backwards to avoid the appearance of impropriety. This is a story where knowing someone slightly resulted in bad press.

For those of you who don’t know the story, Lazarus died, and four days later, Jesus went into Lazarus’ tomb and resurrected his friend. This was Jesus’ last miracle before the events of Good Friday and Easter, and prefigured Jesus’ own death and resurrection. I was still contemplating what ‘remission’ meant in my life, so the dark subject appealed.

In my painting, Lazarus is beginning to putrify. Death is gnawing on his arm. Jesus is being dragged down from the cross by demons into hell, and at the same time he is the power of resurrection himself, our Great High Priest. To the far right are Adam and Eve being cast naked into the world, because Christian theology calls Jesus ‘the second Adam’ (it’s complicated). At the top left is a figure representing suffering mankind.

Harlequin, 12X16. Suffering humanity was on my mind at the turn of the millennium; I’m so glad I’m over it, and also over layered figures and slashing canvases. In my defense, I was just recovering from cancer.

This was before I knew not to apply to shows that were beyond my pay grade, and naivete (as so often happens) paid off. The painting was accepted into a prestigious national show.

Then I received a newspaper review in the mail. My painting was singled out for excoriation. The two comments that rankled most were, “immature use of color,” and “I don’t know what [the curator] was thinking to include this painting.”

What the critic didn’t disclose is that he had a nodding relationship with me (the art world is small, with much overlap). To speculate about his reason for spitefulness is pointless, but he did tremendously jar my confidence. I’ve only shown this painting twice in the 21 intervening years.

The Raising of Lazarus, 1929, Walter Sickert, oil on wallpaper, detached then laid on canvas, courtesy National Gallery of Victoria.

At the time, I I did what any mature person would do: I burst into tears and called my spiritual mentor, who let me cry all over her shoulder and made all the right noises about what a jerk he was. Today, I have far more self-confidence, but bad press is always a downer, whether it comes in the form of rejection, withering comments, or even self-doubt. A friend is an invaluable resource at those times.

As for my use of color, it was an intentional nod to the Renaissance palette, since they were the last great gasp of religious iconography.

Have a thoughtful Good Friday and a blessed Easter, my friends.

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Paint your dreams

Ravenous Wolves, oil on canvas, 24X30, $3,478.00 framed includes shipping and handling in continental US.

I was fishing around on my desk and found an old Zoom class outline with a scrawled note that read, “paint your dreams.” Alas, I can’t remember the context or who said it, but it struck me as wise advice.

What does “paint your dreams” even mean?

“Paint your dreams” is used metaphorically to convey the idea of visualizing our aspirations and goals.

When someone says “paint your dreams,” they’re encouraging you to articulate your dreams as a first step towards making them a reality. But here I’m talking about literal painting: a visual exploration of your hopes and dreams.

I don’t think it would work for our nighttime dreams, which often have a menacing overtone. “I dream of painting and then I paint my dream,” Vincent van Gogh wrote. That was good for art, but possibly bad for his mental health. Anyways, most dreams are senseless to everyone but the dreamer. I can’t imagine they’d be more entertaining visually than they are when recounted over breakfast.

That doesn’t mean we can’t paint with a dreamlike quality; Van Gogh and Marc Chagall were both masters at this. But I suspect my student meant we are supposed to paint our aspirations.

Lonely Cabin, 8X10, oil on archival canvasboard, $652 includes shipping and handling in continental US.

Do I even allow myself to dream?

Most of us gussy up our dreams in practical terms: our bucket list. Worse, our dreams can be guilt-driven, like “spend more time with my elderly Mom.” Neither of these are gut dreams.

It’s very hard for me to drill past that. I have a very satisfying life. I love my work, my family, and my church. Still, I have some things I’ve never made time for, including:

  • Recover my singing voice, which I’ve neglected for the past 35 years;
  • Learn to preach simply, logically, and convincingly;
  • Do more traveling just for fun.
  • Get strong enough to climb high peaks in a single bound.

It’s easy to articulate our dreams when we’re young; it’s harder when we’ve lived some of them, disposed of some, and realized that others are unattainable. (My career as a ballerina was over before it started.) If this exercise goes no farther, it’s gotten me to articulate what my dreams are.

Midnight at the Wood Lot, oil on archival canvasboard, $1449.00 framed includes shipping and handling within continental US.

How would I paint those things?

My friend and student Cassie Sano painted a pair of songbirds for my Advanced Painting class this week. (That class is full of bird people. This week we also had a raven discussion and some watercolor ducks.)

Would painting birds help me regain my singing voice? Possibly, because when I first came to the Maine coast I painted boats, and now I get to teach on one annually. I’m painting a scene from my last long ramble in Britain right now. It’s making me excited for my next one, which will be in late May.

Overall, though, I’m much more likely to draw my dreams, since I have notebooks filled with stream-of-consciousness visual ramblings.

Winter lambing, oil on linen, 30X40, $5072 framed, includes shipping and handling in continental US.

What about you?

Can you clearly define what you want to achieve in this life? If so, do you think you can paint that? Do you have the visual language to communicate and reinforce your goals?

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Monday Morning Art School: watercolor paper

Clary Hill Blueberry Barrens, watercolor on Yupo, ~24X36, $3985 framed includes shipping and handling in continental US.

“I was wondering if you can address the different types, weights and rag content of watercolor paper and what they’re best for,” a student asked. Sure, although I obviously can’t talk about every paper on the market.

There are three general types of watercolor paper. (There’s also a plastic product called Yupo, which is non-absorbent so acts entirely differently than paper. It’s a gas to use.)

Cold press has become a favorite because it gives you decent washes, scumbling, and moderately good detail.

Cold Press has a moderately-textured surface. This is the most popular paper used today because it’s highly absorbent, allows for some detail, but also allows for broken washes and scumbling.

Rough is a deeply-textured surface. It is the most absorbent paper. It’s great for broken washes and scumbling, but you can’t get much detail on it.

Hot Press or Bristol has a smooth surface. It comes in several surfaces, ranging from plate (highly polished) to vellum. It’s exceptional for detail work, making it a favorite of illustrators. The least absorbent of the papers, it’s also the easiest to lift color from. (I carry this Strathmore Bristol notebook with me at all times because it’s good for pencil, ink and watercolor.)

Rough will give you great broken washes but don’t plan on painting detail.

What is sizing?

All watercolor papers have sizing added to keep the paint on the surface. Sizing may be gelatin (traditional) or a synthetic product. Sizing stops paint from sinking and spreading into the paper. Without it, paper is just a big, uncontrollable sponge.

How important is 100% rag or cotton?

Rag means papers made with cotton textile remnants, which have a longer fiber than cotton linters. However, with so many synthetic fibers in modern textiles, the cotton rag supply is dwindling. Cotton linters (byproducts of cotton processing) are now either the chief or only fiber in 100% cotton paper.

Cotton paper is superior in strength and durability to wood pulp-based paper. It won’t yellow as quickly (although the sizing can also cause yellowing), as it doesn’t contain the high concentrations of acids that are in wood pulp. However, many non-rag watercolor papers are now acid-free as well.

Cotton fiber is more absorbent than wood pulp. Because the fibers are longer, it tolerates more lifting and scrubbing than wood pulp.

There are places where fiber content doesn’t matter. For quick color studies, grisailles, and other transient works I use Strathmore 400, which is a moderate paper. To get 100% cotton, I’d need to step up to Strathmore 500.

One of my many sketches in a Bristol Visual Journal.

How can I tell if a paper is 100% cotton?

If it’s not labeled 100% cotton, you can assume it isn’t. Some common cotton papers are Fabriano Artistico, Arches, Stonehenge, Winsor & Newton, and Hahnemühle, although of course there are many others, including the aforementioned Strathmore 500.

Weight

Watercolor papers come in three weight classes:

· Light – 90 lb.
· Medium – 140 lb.
· Heavy – 300 lb.

For comparison, copy paper is 24 lb.

90 lb. watercolor paper requires stretching and/or careful taping or clipping. In general, most painters use 140 lb., which doesn’t buckle except if totally saturated. 300 lb. paper is for working very wet/very large.

A thumbnail sketch on Bristol. My current preference is for smoother, harder surfaces. (Please excuse the paucity of examples in this post; I’m away from my studio and looking for dribs and drabs on my computer.)

Format

Watercolor paper comes in several formats:

Blocks are glued on all four sides. The finished painting is removed by slitting the glue with a knife when dry. Because they’re stabilized, they can take quite a bit of water without buckling. They also obviate the need for a separate support board.

Pads: Although not as stable as blocks, most pads work well enough with a single binder clip and a support board. They’re generally less expensive.

Loose sheets: These need to be taped or clipped down with binder clips, but give size flexibility and cost less than blocks.

Rolls: The most cost-effective way to buy watercolor paper, this is also the only way to make very large watercolor paintings.

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Dreaming of spring green

I can’t speak for people who live in the rest of the country, but in the northeast, March is ill-tempered. “Comes in like a lion and out like a lamb?” Hah. March comes in like a psychopath and goes out like a moody teenager, and only dreaming of spring green helps us endure it.

Spring Greens, 8X10, oil on archival canvasboard, $652 framed includes shipping and handling in continental US.

This week, we’ve been getting four seasons per day-snow, blustery winds, just enough warm sun to fool us into shedding our winter coats, then whipping rain and more wind.

It blew so hard yesterday morning that our windows creaked with the stress. And starting tonight, we’ll get more snow. In fact, if you look at the map below, you’ll see that the whole northern tier of the country is having tempestuous weather.

We all need a dollop of spring green, and fast.

Painters are naturally attracted to towering spruces, mountains, rivers, and other iconic structures; for one thing, they make composition easy. However, most days in most places aren’t like that. The abstraction of the everyday makes for fascinating paintings, because the artist has to let go of the crutch of those classic symbols. That forces us to focus on colors, shapes and brushwork.

When the world looks like this, you’ll be glad of a painting that looks like that.

I hope this painting evokes the smell of warming earth, green shoots sticking up through old grass, and black willows opening along a tree line.  To me, that’s a perfect day. The simplicity of this painting is misleading; you’ll be looking at it a lot longer than a painting with a more obvious subject.

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Art or vandalism?

Ice Cream, oil on archival canvasboard, $869 framed includes shipping and handling in continental US.

Street art

Street artist Banksy is believed to be behind a ‘mural’ painted in Finsbury Park in London. It is a spatter of green paint that implies the leaves on a nearby pollarded tree. Banksy is, of course, a favorite of the high-end art market. He’s the guy who once got $1.4 million for shredding a painting.

Meanwhile, Chris Kanizi, 65, who owns the Golden Chippy, also in London, has been told to paint over a mural that he paid to have painted on the side of his shop. It’s a fish, and it reads, “Fish and Chips: A Great British Meal.”

“Why are planning laws, not to mention property laws, continually bent in order to favour the pseudonymous artist [Banksy] when they continue to come down so heavily against anyone else who has a go?” asked columnist Ross Clark  “Banksy is not just tolerated: some of his works have been listed, so the owners of the buildings on which they have been sprayed couldn’t even remove them if they wanted to.”

The same conversations happen here in the Land of the Free as well–here in Arlington, VA, and here, in Conway, NH, to cite just two examples.

Is it art or vandalism or just plain advertising?

Grain elevators, Buffalo, NY, 18X24 in a handmade cherry frame. $2318 includes shipping in continental US.

America has a long relationship with roadside art, which even lent itself to a style of architecture called Googie. Drive down Route 1 through Saugus, MA and you’ll pass signs from the heyday of Googie. Some of the businesses are gone, but the signs remain. After 70 years, they’re protected landmarks.

So why do we stop people from building roadside commercial art today? Ross has a simple answer: advertising art is for oiks, not the well-bred fans of Banksy’s art.

Princess Street, Dawson City, Yukon Territory, 8X10, oil on archival canvasboard. Includes shipping and handling in continental US.

Art or vandalism, redux

Those of us who love art have been troubled by the recent trend of protesters damaging works of art. In Britain, where this is beginning to look like a national sport, prosecution has been hindered by the Criminal Damage Act 1971. If the perpetrator believes the owner would have consented if he or she understood the circumstances, then the damage is excused. This codifies the common-sense idea that if you see a baby in a hot car, you’d be right in smashing a window to rescue it.

If that was your Velázquez that was just destroyed, well, you just didn’t properly understand the threat of climate change, and now that you do, it’s fine.

Yesterday Lady Chief Justice Lady Carr delivered a judgment on protest law that should close that loophole. Perhaps it will help hurry this fad into obscurity before more Constables, Van Goghs and other priceless pieces of our patrimony are damaged.

Larky Morning at Rockport Harbor, 11X14, on linen, $869 unframed includes shipping in continental US.

Those dark nationalist feelings

Landscape painting has always been about pride of place. We love the Hudson River School in part because they’re so optimistic about America’s heritage and destiny, on which rested their themes of discovery, exploration, and settlement. The Canadian Group of Seven painted the energy of the Great White North, and helped establish the Canadian art ethos. Joaquín Sorolla was a proud Spaniard; Anders Zorn was a proud Swede.

The Fitzwilliam Museum at Cambridge has decided that British landscape painting has a dark, nationalist underbelly. A new label in its landscape collection reads:

The countryside was seen as a direct link to the past, and therefore a true reflection of the essence of a nation.

Paintings showing rolling English hills or lush French fields reinforced loyalty and pride towards a homeland.

The darker side of evoking this nationalist feeling is the implication that only those with a historical tie to the land have a right to belong.

Think of that next time you go outside to paint.

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Monday Morning Art School: nobody can copy you

Tilt-A-Whirl, oil on archival canvasboard, $869 framed includes shipping and handling in continental US.

Bobbi Heath sent me a post yesterday called How to Deal With Copycats, which I promised I’d read before I blogged this morning. “I’m never that worried about what other people are doing,” I added. She told me not to bother reading it but to just write about the subject, so that’s what I’m doing.

A few decades ago, a woman came up to my booth at a show and took a photo of one of my paintings. “I want to copy it,” she told me, apparently unaware of the etiquette of stealing others’ ideas. (First rule: don’t broadcast your intentions.)

“Good luck with that,” I told her.

There are some brilliant copyists out there. They’re called forgers, and I admire their ability to channel their creativity into chemistry rather than the business of brushstrokes. I’m too idiosyncratic myself, and I suspect most of us are. We have an inner vision that’s too strong to be overridden.

I am insufficiently dead to attract the attention of forgers. Those other copyists are called ‘amateurs’ and if their copying doesn’t affect the value of my work or my reputation, I don’t care what they do.

In Control (Grace and her Unicorn), 24X30, $3,478 framed, oil on canvas, includes shipping in continental United States.

Sometimes copying is about learning

I look at the work of Tom Root for his brushwork, Tara Will for her audacity, Cynthia Rosen for her palette knife virtuosity, Eric Jacobsen for his scumbling, and Colin Page for his color. I have no hesitation about copying passages to be sure I understand how they achieved the effect that interested me.

Is that being a copycat? No; it’s being a lifelong learner.

Best Buds, 11X14, oil on canvasboard, $1087 framed includes shipping and handling in continental US.

Paintings are mostly about what isn’t stated

It’s your inner vision that makes you unique, both as a painter and a person. I’ve taught painting for many years and one of my go-to lessons is to ask students to copy a masterwork. Can they make a perfect JMW Turner or Rockwell Kent or Emily Carr? Absolutely not; their own personality always seeps out through every brushstroke. That’s even true when I ask them to concentrate on brushwork.

A person who wants to copy your work or style is devoid of that strong inner vision. That means he or she won’t understand your viewpoint in the first place, which would make real mimicry impossible.

Beauchamp Point, Autumn Leaves, 12X16, oil on archival canvasboard, $1449 framed includes shipping and handling in continental US.

What is style, anyway?

Years ago, a painting teacher told me that heavy outlines were my style. He was wrong; they were just an inability to marry edges (which I hadn’t been taught yet). That’s an argument for not even thinking about style until you’ve developed serious painting chops. Style is different from being stylish, to which we should all aspire.

Style is the gap between your inner vision and your ability to render it. That disconnect may be caused by bad painting chops. It can equally be caused by something subconscious that elevates, rather than diminishes, your vision.

Vincent van Gogh is an eloquent example of this. His obsessive need to put his inner vision on canvas tells us he never quite succeeded in matching up his brush with his mind. We’ve all benefited immeasurably from that disconnect, since his style has profoundly influenced modern art.

But what about AI?

I feel about AI the same way I do amateur copyists. At this point in its development, it’s easy to pick out AI-generated art online. Maybe someday AI will be good enough to look like it has a heart, but we’re not there yet.

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Deadwood

Deadwood, oil on linen, 30X40, $5072.00 framed, includes shipping and handling in continental US.

I painted Deadwood, above, for a solo show at Roberts Wesleyan College’s Davison Art Gallery. The work was an exploration of the relationship between God and man as seen in nature.

At the time, I was thinking about how our mistakes impede the flow of life. “But fallen branches can actually change the course of a waterway,” my hydrologist friend Ken Avery told me at the opening. It’s the butterfly effect made apparent.

I’d never thought about it like that.

Branches that fall into streams tend to collect other sticks into logjams. This debris can alter the flow of the river itself. There is great force holding such river jams in place; in fact, breaking a logjam is something best left to experts as it can be very dangerous.

Deadwood is a metaphor for decisions we’ve made that seemed to permanently hobble us. Sin and failure drop into our lives and mesh with other sins and failures. By the time we’re adults, we have a logjam of troubles pushing one against another. These start to define what we understand to be our character or personality. “She’s temperamental.”  “He is afraid of his own shadow.” “Of course he has a drinking problem; so did his father and grandfather.” None of these are true definitions of our characters, but the distortion caused by the sad accretion of troubles upon troubles.

Deadwood in situ. Photo courtesy of Ivan Ramos.

The great lie of Satan is that each of us is uniquely and fatally flawed. Neither is true, of course. Our sins are generally common, and we can correct our course as long as we’re still breathing.

At the time I painted it, Deadwood seemed very unfinished, but this is a painting that predicted where I was going as a painter. These works make us uncomfortable at the point of creation, but they ring true over time. That’s the big reason why I’m not quick to wash out rough starts.

(By the way, an altered life is not a ruined one; if this resonates with you, you may want to read this book.)

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Exercise and creativity

Early Morning at Moon Lake, 6X8, oil on archival canvasboard, $348 includes shipping and handling in continental US.

I have never once gotten up in the morning and said, “gee, I can’t wait to get outside and climb Beech Hill.” That goes double for winter, but I still do it every day.

I’ve been doing serious daily exercise (and, yes, I mean seven days a week) as long as I can remember. Even during chemo, I’d push my drip bag along on a pole and keep walking. In fact, I turned down a port because it would mess with my running schedule.

On the Hard, 8X10, oil on archival canvasboard, $522 includes shipping and handling in continental US.

I’m not telling you this to be a twit; I believe exercise is an important daily habit, no different from brushing my teeth or making my bed. Although I’ve had two serious cancers, I’m still here. I’ve also avoided the typical diseases of aging like diabetes and heart disease.

The physical benefits of exercise are well-documented. Exercise improves brain health, including memory and learning, executive function, processing speed and attention span. It helps us manage weight, reduces the risk of disease, and strengthens bones and muscles.

Equally documented are exercise’s mental health benefits. Exercise reduces anxiety, depression, social withdrawal and negative mood. And exercise slows down the physical and mental decline of old age. I’m not going down without a fight.

Coal Seam, 6X8, oil on archival canvasboard, $348 includes shipping and handling in continental US.

Exercise and creativity go hand in hand

There’s a demonstrated link between exercise and creativity. “Even a single, brief bout of aerobic exercise can ignite creative thinking,” wrote Dr. Chong Chen, author of a narrative review on the topic. He looked at 21 studies exploring the link between exercise and creativity.

Both the type of exercise and its duration affect its impact on creativity. For example, strength training doesn’t seem to do much for brain plasticity. Too much exercise and we stop benefiting (and may even decline).

What is creative thinking, anyway?

Mid-century psychologist Dr. J. P. Guilford identified two types of creative thinking: divergent and convergent. Convergent thinking is arriving at the single best answer to a question. Divergent thinking is the process of exploring many possible solutions. Divergent thinking is associative and flexible, while convergent thinking relies on working memory and fluid intelligence.

You might think that divergent thinking is all we need as artists, but in fact we need both. First, we come up with our ideas; then we winnow and execute them.

Peace, 8X16, $903 framed includes shipping and handling in continental US.

How does this work, physiologically?

Regular aerobic activity can trigger structural changes in the brain, including increased brain volume, particularly in the hippocampus, according to Amir-Homayoun Javadi, author of Joggin’ the Noggin. But these adaptations occur over time. What happens in the short run?

Javadi suggests that acute exercise temporarily improves our blood flow, bringing fresh oxygen to the brain. Furthermore, exercise that doesn’t demand much thought (like my daily walk) actually dampens activity within the prefrontal cortex, allowing the mind to roam free, without constraints. That may be why walking shows better promise for creativity than yoga, which requires mindfulness.

The biggest bang for your buck

Activities like treadmill running and dance help with convergent thinking. Meanwhile, walking helps with divergent thinking and is the only form of exercise associated with heightened originality. However, it’s apparently useless at enhancing convergent thinking. On the other hand, if you have a hill or mountain nearby, the uphill slog can benefit your convergent thinking and the downhill amble will help your divergent thinking. Presto! Beautiful, balanced brain!

One more thing

If you know a school administrator, policy-setter, school board member, or parent, wave this post in front of him or her and suggest-strongly-that school policy allow kids lots more time untethered from their desks. Immobilizing our children, whether in school or in front of the television, is surely one of the great injustices of our current age.

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