Chris Domig dreams big dreams. I’ve never worked with a better actor. And, more importantly, he is among the best people, truly – truly – a great person.
Chris is the artistic director and founder of Sea Dog Theater in NYC – one of his dreams, come true. He works harder than anyone I’ve ever known to make his dreams a reality.
In the next week he has a mountain to climb: for this new off-broadway production, Tuesdays With Morrie, he must raise $100,000 before this time next week. Seriously.
I have little money but a rich network. You can help Chris in two ways: 1) Pass this on, or 2) Follow this link and give-what-you-can to a worthy artist making very worthy art. Or, if you wish, do both.
Thank you for passing this through your network. Thank you for helping Chris climb this mountain.
[a note: Thirteen years ago I made a rule never to promote anything through my blog – except my own mad-mad-artistry. This post – for the first time – busts my rule and I’m delighted to do it – a statement of how much I value Chris and his work.]
Pre-Covid we regularly had dinner parties or hosted gatherings of Kerri’s choirs and ukulele band. Each week the big dining room table was piled high with food and drink. People crowded into the kitchen and living room. People spilled out onto the deck.
Now, we use the dining room table when we have large projects that require space for organization. We use it as a staging ground when we’re preparing for a trip. Covid ushered in an era of reclusion and the necessity for space and quiet.
Last weekend we had a surprise large project to assemble. Tons of paper to sort. As Kerri prepared the plan I headed to the dining room to clear the table. I stopped in my tracks with what I found there. The table was covered with rocks. There were several gallon size ziplock bags with painted rocks and rocks ready to be painted. Mostly, there were paper towels spread like islands across the table surface, each populated by dozens of hagstones. Odin Stones. Adder stones. Magical stones of many names, all sizes, from tiny bead-size to fist-size rocks, each with a naturally eroded hole. The power of water working on earth.
I hadn’t realized that we’d collected so many. We’d inadvertently converted our dining room into a hagstone sanctuary, an epicenter of ancient folk magic: nature’s talisman of healing, protection and wisdom. I laughed. Apparently we could use a bit of ancient protection. I certainly could use a healthy dose of wisdom. I considered laying on the table, body across the bumpy stones and saying, “I’m ready! Do your stuff!”
We bumbled onto the secluded beach a few months ago. The power of the lake is palpable. The beach is a festival of wave-polished rocks and treasured hagstones. The gulls circle and chase. The portal to the beach requires crawling through trees recently burned. Fire. Air. Water. Earth. People have created whimsical structures, crude altars and twisted sculpture from the driftwood.
We’ve returned a few times to comb the beach for the miracle stones with holes made from years and years of their dance with water. A feather on the stone. Time disappears as we slowly walk the beach, heads down, sensing as much as looking for the rare hagstones.
According to tradition, only good things can pass through the hole in the stone, made magic by the watercarver. Our growing collection, a prayer-pile or incantation cairn. Good things.
I will, someday soon, lay on the beach after dipping into the cold Lake Michigan water, warm myself in the sun, and feel the large hole that life has worn through me, myself now a magic hagstone. Grateful, I will think, “Only good things. I’m ready. Let’s do it.”
There are deep, meaningful layers to this story-image. The first is an answer to the all-important-question, “How do we entertain ourselves at a bar?” We make fun contemporary art, of course! Or, we make fun of contemporary art. I’m not sure since the line of distinction is blurred in real life so it is more blurred at the bar, where life isn’t really real and escapism is to be expected.
Have I confused you? It’s simple really. Limit your palette to two bar napkins, two sipping straws, and the fruit remnants from a brandy old-fashioned. Arrange a composition. Snap a photo for posterity. Ask yourself and others, “What does it mean?” And, when you find yourself concocting answers to the great amusement of your friends, you might recognize that the actual art-of-the-moment is the performance of the improvisational play entitled What Does It Mean?
You’ll conclude – if you are honest – that it – your art work – has no inherent meaning – and all supposéd meaning is projected onto the image. It can mean many things or nothing at all. Just like life outside of the bar [that sneaky escapism always loops back to the real stuff!] The composition might simply be appreciated for its clever arrangement and varied texture. It might conjure up fond memories of old-fashioned’s past.
Here’s what it means to me: I could not be considered a local Wisconsinite until I had a palette of experiences, like eating cheese curds or attending a fish boil. On the tippy top of the list was to enjoy a brandy old-fashioned. More, to know whether I preferred my drink sweet or sour. This composition, the scattered remains of the drink-of-the-state, reminded me of the day I ascended to the top of the list and sipped my first ritual old-fashioned. I would anoint this piece with the worthy title BELONGING AT LAST.
A Haiku: Sun bathes the hilltop/Green grass, stones etched, dates with names/Here, we meet again.
Carvings in stone. I’ve read that among the first evidence of human-made-art is associated with funerary rituals. Send the soul on their journey with the proper talismans. There are petroglyphs, too. Scratches in stone. A message? A journal? A reach to the “beyond”? A handprint on the wall of a cave.
The earliest Greek theatre was a religious ceremony. A portal for the gods to come through and speak. Can you imagine the role and responsibility of the playwright?
I watched a Rangda ritual in Bali that shook my world. Priests with knives ran at the Rangda, stabbing and stabbing. The knives bent, the Rangda taunted. One of the priests fell into a trance and began channeling a voice from beyond. The entire community leapt to surround the priest and hear the ancestor’s message. As introduction to the ritual, the only English speaker in the village told us something akin to: “What we have of value to share is our art.”
Can you imagine? An entire community that held their art and artists as sacred. Valuable. As the means to connect to their ancestors. It was so profoundly moving that I couldn’t sleep that night. What I had known and experienced personally was, in this place, alive in the public heart. I mourned the art-poverty of my nation and community. We tape bananas to the wall and lose ourselves in a made-up-maze of the conceptual.
I was taken aback in the pioneer cemetery. Most of the headstones were homemade, a red-brown sandy-cement with shells or rocks pressed in; a name scratched in the surface with a stick. Families doing their best not to lose their kin. Moving forward in time, we found a few stones made of marble and decorated by a stone carver. More substantial, perhaps, but the purpose remained the same. Keeping connected to what has come and gone. Attending to the ancestors. The story of us etched in stone.
After several weeks with its face to the wall, I turned the painting around to see it with fresh eyes. “OMG!” I thought. “This needs some serious work!” It’s too tight in some places, not finished in others, and it’s missing an all important element. The florals are rock hard and the dog – part of the original composition – is nowhere to be found. What was I thinking!
I’m a bit too famous for painting over paintings. It’s a habit that evokes finger-wagging from friends. Kerri has been known to fling herself between me and a painting that I put on the easel-chopping-block. “I hate it!” I cry.
“Touch it and I’ll break your fingers,” she quietly threatens. I like my fingers so I relent.
Actually, she’s provided me with the perfect response to gallery-goers when they ask the ubiquitous question, “How do you know when a painting is done?”
In the past I’d say something amorphous like, “It’s not something you know; it’s something you feel.” Intuition. Gut feeling. Artistic argle-bargle.
Now, my perfect reply is definitive and goes like this: “Oh, it’s easy! I know it’s complete when my wife threatens to break my fingers.” She might look like a delicate columbine-flower but watch out.
It’s a conversation stopper but the real fun comes when I add, “She’ll break the fingers of anyone who doesn’t appreciate my work.”
I turn and walk away as they debate asking the obvious next question: Is she here?
I am a big believer in happy accidents. Kerri didn’t intend to take this photo. A vibrant shock of red thrust into a field of green. I’m tempted to slap a title on it and enter it into a contemporary photography exhibition.
I’ve read that serendipity, an “unplanned fortunate discovery,…is a common occurrence throughout the history of product invention and scientific discovery.” It’s also a common occurrence throughout the history of art. It’s also a common occurrence throughout the history of…history. We have experiences and then we make meaning of them. Not the other way around.
I suppose we pride ourselves on our capacity “to know” so we forget that all knowledge is the result of a stumble, a discovery found at the far end of curiosity, exploration or an outright mistake. The point of a hypothesis (to borrow a term from Quinn) is to cultivate serendipity. Try it and see what happens.
I’ve been following the conversation in the tech-o-sphere about the sudden blossom of the very lucrative job “phrase engineer.” Human beings attempting through trial and error to learn how best to converse with the technology we’ve created. AI. ChatGpt. The unspoken goals are (not surprisingly) efficient and effective communication. There are now several sites with useful phrases, conversational hints, Youtubes abound with guidance for best ways to ask better questions, quickly eliciting the best result: an answer. It’s glorious and reminds me of old 3rd grade language primers or my high school foreign language class – only more enthusiastic.
I am among the millions who hope beyond hope that someone-out-there bumbles into the secret of effective communication. Perhaps if we discover how to communicate with artificial intelligence there will be a profound blowback and we will, serendipitously, discover the secret of easy communication with each other. Generosity. Empathy. Kindness. How-you-say-what-you-say matters.
“AI, tell me what you see and I will listen with an open mind and heart.” I know, I know. More pie-in-the-sky. But as a dedicated believer in happy accidents, I’m given to think that anything is possible.
“I believe that the very process of looking can make a thing beautiful.” ~ David Hockney
Sometimes I look at a blank canvas and see a composition. My job is to follow the image. To make it visible.
Sometimes I have an idea and I bring it to the canvas. My job is to explore the idea. To make it visible.
It’s a chicken-and-the-egg conundrum. What comes first? When I look at the peony do I see beauty or do I bring beauty to what I see? Is beauty a decision?
“Good-God!” I hear Kerri’s inner monologue-commentary on my too-ponderous questions. “Get out of your head! Smell the peonies!”
I wish I could. What happens when it’s not a peony that I see but my neighbor? Or someone whose worship is strange to me? Or someone with a different opinion?
Sometimes I look at a blank canvas. Sometimes I have an idea that I bring to it. Sometimes my job is to follow the image. Sometimes my job is to explore the idea.
The tricky part of language is that the biases are unseen. For instance, in English, the emphasis falls on the noun: me. Canvas. It implies the two are separate. Distinct. It obscures the relationship between. Connectivity is relegated to the basement, a lower status or obscured to the point of nonexistence. It fosters a philosophical orientation of…”it happens to me.”
Connectivity, once seen, once understood, requires us to recognize our responsibility for what we see. Our participation in the dance of creating what we see. In what we bring to “it”. What, exactly, do we wish to make visible?
In addition to the bunny nest in our yard, I discovered some abandoned nests behind the tall grasses that line the fence. Elegant and intricate constructions meant to protect new life.
The distinction is in the words “meant to”. The critters creating the nests are not necessarily concerned with the aesthetics. Their concern is function. We two-legged critters can’t stroll down a beach without stacking stones, organizing driftwood, or picking the most interesting rock to nestle into the curious pocket found in the wood. Our action is purely to communicate. To leave a trace. To make a mark. To convey something beautiful.
I suppose it’s the same reason that critters make nests. They can’t help it. Nature demands their construction. New life is coming.
We can’t help it, either. Our nature demands playing with possibility. Function need not be a part or party to our frolic. Our creative impulse needs expression. Our active imagination, our spontaneous recognition of opportunity, an intrinsic curiosity and hands-with-thumbs make even the most mundane stroll a canvas-for-the-painting.
We have friends who tell me that they lack creativity. I know better. I’ve walked with them through the woods, across frozen lakes, and strolled down beaches. Rocks are stacked. Flowers gathered. Wood is spontaneously arranged. Not because a nest is necessary. No. Their gathering of texture and color and curiosity is meant to foster appreciation. Inside and out. The function is enjoyment.
No other reason is necessary. No other reason is more essential to us two-legged critters. Nothing better defines us than our innate desire-to-play with the great “What if…”
Kerri’s albums are available on iTunes and streaming on Pandora
Our meeting seemed destined. I’d just moved into my apartment in Seattle on Queen Anne hill. It was a beautiful sunny morning and I decided to explore the neighborhood so I walked down the hill to The Seattle Center. I laughed when I saw a sign for a theatre conference so I went in the Intiman Theatre to check it out. There was an open seat. I sat down next to David. He was the first person I met in my new town. We’ve been fast friends ever since.
Although we’ve had few shared projects, he is among my most prized artistic wise-eyes. If I want an honest opinion about one of my pieces, he’s among the top of my go-to list. If I need some fresh air blown into my muddled brain, some playfulness infused in my too-serious-process, there is no one better to call.
One night, early in our friendship, we did a painting together. We tossed three pieces of masonite onto the floor; we started painting on opposite sides and worked to meet in the center. It was a riot of fun. It was an exercise in juxtaposition. My-action-inspires-your-action. Artistic call-and-response.
I’ve kept those three pieces of masonite these many years. Occasionally over the years, I remove the protective wrap and reassemble the pieces on the floor. I snap a photo and send it to David. “Do you remember this?”
Juxtaposition. Proximity of color-to-color, image-to-image. Comparison and contrast. It is how color works. Ask Seurat. It is the essence of painting. How purple illuminates green. It is the essence of artist community. Artists elevate the work of their peers. Inspiration is a blossom of proximity. Collaboration. How does my work inflect upon the story of yours?
Diversity of color. Diversity of approach. Diversity of perspective. It is how healthy community works – artistic or otherwise. Uniformity spells the death of progress, the end of invention and creativity.
The cold rainy weather broke and the sun emerged. Finally. We walked our trail. We soaked up the sun. She gasped, let go of my hand and raced away. I know that means a photo op has been spied. “Don’t you love this!” she exclaimed, pointing to the budding crimson flower against the coarse wood. “They are so beautiful together!”
The theme of the mural is “humanity represented through different stages of life through song.” Past, present, future. The song of Sorrow. The song of Joy. The song of Hope. It’s painted above the proscenium arch of Chicago’s Auditorium Theatre, designed by artist Charles Holloway, the words at the apex are “The utterance of life is a song, the symphony of nature.” The symbols of his time.
Even as I write this, the birds this morning are in full-song. The utterance of life. The symphony of nature. Dogga barks to round out the bass section. Yesterday, standing on the bridge over the Des Plaines river, as we watched two deer amble across the trail, the ancient sound of Sandhill cranes croaked from above and two gawky-yet-glorious birds careened in for a landing on the sandbar just to our right. “We’re smack-dab in the middle of a National Geographic special,” Kerri whispered.
Sitting in the auditorium I wondered why the song of the past is Sorrow. Hope, Joy…Sorrow? It seemed a mismatch or, perhaps, a wrong assignment. Most of the people I know are suffering in the present moment. They sand off the rough edges of their memories so they remember their life-walk fondly. The song of warmth.
Honestly, the mural reminded me of another painting, a piece by a master-painter that lived during the same period as Charles Holloway. Gassed by John Singer Sargent. It was not something that sprung from his imagination. He witnessed this moment. A man who’d spent his entire life painting portraits of the elite. A genius artist. He painted his composition from what he sketched that day and it has become a symbol. The suffering of his present moment. The sorrows of the past in a world that had lost its mind. As testaments of the horrors of war, it lives up there with Picasso’s Guernica.
I just took a peek out of the window at the bird feeder. In addition to birds eating the seed, at the base are chipmunks, a squirrel, and the adolescent bunny. The song of Joy is also available in the present moment. I wonder, if I was commissioned to paint a mural over the proscenium arch of an enormous theatre, what would I paint to represent the human condition? The songs of past, present, and future?
It was a National Geographic Live event that brought us to the Auditorium Theatre: Coral Kingdom and Empires of Ice. The brilliant underwater photography and the lifetime exploration of a husband and wife team: David Doubilet and Jennifer Hayes. Among other things they’ve documented the impacts of climate change in the oceans. Even amidst the loss of reefs and disappearing ice that sustains life, theirs was a message of Hope. They infused us with their rich hope, drawn directly from their duet with nature. The utterance of life. Interconnected. The song of the future.
