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May 11, 2010

"We must let go of the life we have planned, so as to accept the one that is waiting for us." --Joseph Campbell

An Artist's Life

"I walked into this little painting gallery and nobody was there, just a room full of paintings- not paintings that I found very interesting, but I was killing time." So begins an unlikely adventure in which Richard Whittaker learns about a 97-year-old painter still at work and giving watercolor workshops even though he was blind. Literally a few hours after setting foot in Claremont Fine Arts, Whittaker finds himself ringing the doorbell of painter Milford Zornes in order to conduct an interview. Here's one quote from that interview: "In my case, I don't have any religion. I don't trust politics. I don't trust anything, except my painting. It seems like my whole life - the whole outside world is confusion - and the only way I have of bringing order into my life and my thinking is by organizing a picture. I'm well enough acquainted with human nature to realize that even honest people can't always afford to tell the truth. The truth in your painting is the only thing you have."