Archive 2006-2

Robert Flinkman
The Passage Within Time - Self-Portrait at the Age of 50
oil on canvas
3.5' X 6.5'
2006
copyright 2006 Robert Flinkman

December 4, 2005 Sunday

Have been working this morning on the large painting - Within the Passage of Time [initial title of the work] - started on the left hand side, working with my birth and ideas about Rita, and distantly my biological father. Looks good, a lot of movement and color. Gradually will be moving on next to my father, Leonard. Got some ideas to work with. Sgrafitto shows tension. I need to wait for some areas to dry before working with them again. Anyway, off to a good start! Much promise here!

February 18, 2006 Saturday

Worked on the large painting this morning, painting in the long stem red rose on the hand and arm to the right of the painting, both hand and rose extending themselves to me as I enter my fifth decade......Tomorrow morning I'll work on the hand and arm and refine other areas. When it's done, I'll then explain what the figures represent. I think it's pretty self explanatory, regardless the finer points are there. I do believe it's a very powerful work, alot of movement here, no doubt.
This evening I'll be attending the NMSO's performance of Verdi's Requiem, and looking forward to that.

Note : The following is a description of the figures in the painting, The Passage Within Time - Self-Portrait at the Age of 50
In the left side of the painting, I envisioned at the time the circumstances involving my birth. The hand to the right attempts to reach out for the truth. The next figure is that of my father, who passed away three years earlier. Over his right shoulder is a Caduceus, the symbol of his medical profession. Next one sees a member of the family, a woman who also helped raise me with such warmth, love and care I still feel to this day. The heart to the left symbolises this. Below the woman is Crouse, the building on the Syracuse University campus, where I took my studio art classes. To the right are images of my experiences in New York, a period of exploration, desire and the experience of the AIDS epidemic, during which I lost so many of my social circle. I look back on all of this with my hand on my heart, feeling it so deeply, and the hand rising from my heart wanting to express the pain and passion of it all. I then reach out past my fifth decade, reaching out to the future. Above are the Twin Towers in New York CIty, the scales symbolise the need to seek justice for those victims of the terrorist attacks. The map of the United States shows even then the divisions in our country. Below to the right a hand from the future reaches out to me with a rose, a symbol of beauty but also with a thorn, that also with love and beauty does come some pain. Above all of this one sees the Wheel of Fortune, which contains love, health and the creative arts. Above all of this are the symbols of Love and Death, which really are the basic elements of so much of Life.