Robyn Sand Anderson Art
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  • Bach's Mass In B Minor: Et Crucifixus
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Interpreting Music with Color: April 29, 2019

4/29/2019

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Picture

"Morning Mood" (play music below)
An interpretation of Edvard Grieg's
composition from Peer Gynt
Acrylic on Gessobord with 2" Birch Sides
Ready to Hang: 24" x 18"

Today I put the finishing touches on this painting interpreting Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg's "Morning Mood" from Peer Gynt. I received an arts grant from the Southwest Minnesota Arts Council to travel to Bergen, Norway last summer where Grieg lived and created his many interpretations of the beauty of Norway. I've found a great kinship with Grieg. He was a Romantic, as am I. He suffered physical pain from an illness, as have I. The beauty of his music speaks to me and he was prolific. This painting came to me as I was driving to my hometown of Decorah, Iowa, listening to Grieg's music, one of my favorite ways to visualize. (I know, look out!) Decorah is a very Nordic community and I grew up hearing Grieg's music every summer at Nordic Fest. Maybe it's in my bones. I find his music expresses such great beauty and I hope to express abstracted versions of his tribute to the natural beauty of Norway. I experienced that in Norway a hundredfold and I am very thankful for the experience of exploring the life, work and environment that inspired Grieg and visiting the land of my ancestors. I will be painting 8-10 paintings interpreting Grieg's work with my opening exhibit at the Southwest MN Arts Council gallery in Marshall, MN September-October 2019. More to come!
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Hear My Voice: April 26, 2019

4/26/2019

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Picture

Dark Night of the Soul
Acrylic on 12x12" Gessobord with 3/4" Birch Sides

This morning I've been listening to Bach's Credo - Et Incarnatus Est and Crucifixus for the project I mentioned in my last post of April 24 from Bach's Mass in B Minor. As I look over the paintings I did for Augsburg Fortress's Hear My Voice: A Prison Prayer Book (see April 19 blogpost), I was caught by this painting called "Dark Night of the Soul". When asked to interpret the prayers written by the many prayer writers of this book, I had in mind that I didn't want every painting to be pie-in-the-sky, cheery and unreal to the experiences of those who will use this book. Yet, that was a challenge for me, for even in my own interpretations of the endless pain and weakness I experienced with the onset of rheumatoid arthritis. I tended to paint in vibrant and yes, hopeful colors. Maybe it was my defiance toward the illness, thumbing my nose at it trying to take over my life. A battle I didn't always win on a daily basis, but with rest and medication, I did get better, at least enough to function and paint again. I handed in these paintings for the Hear My Voice project and was asked a few days after to paint something to express the darkness, those times where we feel defeated, sorrowful and hopeless. And so, I came up with this painting, Dark Night of the Soul.

Today as I am absorbing this music for the second of four Bach paintings, I am struck by its mournful tones. It begs a darker hue. When I was in the hardest days of RA, I remember sitting in church, trying to hold my head up with my hand. It was the hymns in minor keys with words of God's presence in my suffering that spoke to me most deeply. Not the happy, happy, joy, joy songs. They have their place, but we cannot forget the hard parts of what we experience in this human journey. It is sometimes in those darkest moments that we truly experience God's Spirit speaking as a thread of light, a tether, a thread we can grasp and hold onto.

I will be posting one of these paintings every Friday (hopefully) leading up to the launch of  "Hear My Voice: A Prison Prayerbook" in August at the ELCA's Churchwide Gathering. Here's a link: ://go.augsburgfortress.org/hear-my-voice-a-prison-prayer-book.

* This painting has sold. I will be posting more every Friday and more will be available for purchase.

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Interpreting Music with Color: April 24, 2019

4/24/2019

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An Interpretation
J.S. Bach's Mass in B Minor - "Kyrie"
(A Cropping)

Picture
My high school choir was an experience most of us won't forget. Our director was a bear. Not literally, because that would be something, but let's just say he had a "challenging" personality. We tiptoed around him. But, I find myself looking up to the sky and thanking Mr. Sexter these days. He pushed us to sing college level choral pieces. I remember singing some of Bach's difficult masterpieces in chamber choir. I think about him now, wondering what troubled him, but knowing that he found solace in some of the same music I am now interpreting as an artist. I want to say, thanks Mr. Sexter, for exposing us to such beauty and pushing us to master it and share it with an audience.

I started a new project a few weeks ago collaborating with Matthew Olson and his Oratory Bach Ensemble to interpret Bach's Mass in B Minor. I will be painting four interpretations which will accompany Matt's first annual Bach Roots Music Festival taking place in Minneapolis June 16-24 with concerts on June 21 at Summit Center for the Arts in St. Paul and June 22 at Lutheran Church of the Good Shepherd in So. Mpls.

This is a cropping from the first painting interpreting the beginning Kyries. Kyrie Eleison  "Lord, have mercy" and Kyrie Christe Eleison "Christ Have Mercy". I will be featuring a few croppings along the way as I work on these paintings and will show you the completed work when I get them scanned in early June. Listen to the opening of Bach's masterful work below.
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Interpreting Music With Color - April 19, 2019

4/12/2019

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Picture

"The Human Spirit"
Original art 24" x 18"

Last year I was selected to paint interpretations of 15-18 prayers written primarily for those who are incarcerated. "Hear My Voice" a compilation of prayer and art is coming out in August 2019 from Augsburg Fortress Press and the ELCA.

When I was invited to submit my artwork for consideration for this project, I was especially touched by why they wanted to include artwork in this book of prayer. They wanted to include beauty and color for people who are so deprived of these gifts when in prison. Color. We take it for granted don't we? What would it feel like to be deprived of this most basic thing. What does that do to the soul?

I have been very interested of late, in the power of combining the arts, music and art, dance and music, written word and art, and any and more combinations of these. When you combine the arts, it is like looking at something that is 2-D and flat and then seeing the same thing in 3-D. Our perceptions and experience are enhanced. And so, for people imprisoned, this book is offered as a window and reminder of God's presence. Beauty in word and art is offered. To be able to offer my paintings to ease some suffering touched me deeply and I was honored to be part of this project.

I will be posting one of these paintings every Friday (hopefully) leading up to the launch of  "Hear My Voice: A Prison Prayerbook" in August at the ELCA's Churchwide Gathering. Here's a link: ://go.augsburgfortress.org/hear-my-voice-a-prison-prayer-book. These paintings are now available for purchase.*

* This painting measures 24" x 18", acrylic on gessobord with 2" birch sides, ready-to-hang. $630. To see the full painting, here's the link: http://www.robynsandanderson.com/purchase-originals.html
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