Page 24 - the NOISE January 2015

in ToWn & coUnTrY:
finding the plain truth in plein air
BY saraH Gianelli
on the floor of his honey-warm Jerome High School studio is an assortment of items painter Mark Hemleben has laid out in preparation for an upcoming trip. In addition to the expected accoutrements of a plein air artist — a pigment- mottled painter’s box, brushes, a portable easel, squares of canvas — are other clues to his destination: gloves (with and without fingers); a bound blue book with the drawing of a small European hamlet on the cover; a photo of a brazen redhead rocking out on stage with her guitar, and rows of index cards with rudimentary sketches of art and architecture.
Much like a traditional plein air painting gives the impres- sion of detail that just as easily dissolves into abstraction, the array alludes to the specific nature of Mr. Hemleben’s travels without spelling it out for you. Deeper inquiry into his inventory reveals that Mr. Hemleben is off to Germany for five weeks to paint on the streets of wintry Berlin, where the redheaded guitarist in the photo (a musician/writer of some notoriety with whom Mr. Hemleben is unabashedly smitten) resides when not in Jerome. Together they will take a side trip to the tiny town of Hemleben (the subject of the blue book) from where all of his paternal ancestors hail.
As further proof of Mr. Hemleben’s highly visual nature, rather than make a list of sights he wants to see and possibly paint, he has scribbled off small sketches.
“These are places I want to see,” he says, picking up a no- tecard with the dome of the Berlin Cathedral crowning crowded rooftops; and another of old European buildings huddled along the Spree River. “I typed in walking tours of Berlin — they have these guides that make these wonderful little videos — and when I find an angle or perspective I like, I hit pause and make a sketch so I can remember how I liked a particular look or vantage point. It’s like a mental note.”
Mr. Hemleben has also made visual notes of iconic Berlin Wall art, such as the graffiti portrait of Soviet and German politicians Leonid Brezhnev and Erich Honecker locked in a passionate kiss and Frank Thiel’s larger-than-life light box im- ages of an American and Soviet soldier gazing into each oth- er’s territory at the infamous former border crossing known as Checkpoint Charlie. A sillier sketch depicts Michael Jackson dangling his infant out a window at the historic Hotel adlon.
Mr. Hemleben may be best known for his landscapes and florals, but his true passion is painting cityscapes and quaint street scenes — likely a byproduct of growing up in New Or- leans — that has led him to paint on the streets of Paris and London; and to Jerome, where its crooked charm is reminis- cent of a European hill town.
“I really enjoy getting into a city real fast with a little kit in my backpack, doing a quick hour and a half sketch and then going home,” he says. “That’s the traditional path of plein air
— you always start with a little one and work it up into a big
one. For me, I’m always thinking of Edward Hopper, and all the French impressionists that painted around Paris. I even have dreams when I’m walking around a city looking for com- positions and thinking to myself, ‘This would make a great painting.’”
A few of his most prized paintings — small originals of a reclining nude, a darling Paris street scene and the old “Tama- le Lady’s” house in Jerome — are affixed to the roof and sides of a blue and white paint-chipped birdhouse pushed into the corner of his studio.
“This is my version of Heaven,” he says, beginning to talk about the concept of the akashic Record, a tenet of Theoso- phy that the past and future of human thought and action is recorded, and immortalized, on the astral plane. “Let’s say you’re 80 years old and you die. That’s not the end of you. There’s a record of everything you’ve done. I believe there’s a house in Heaven where all art is recorded, and when I go to sleep at night, I pray that I have a dream that takes me there.”
Someone wanted to buy Mr. Hemleben’s heavenly bird- house of art and he came up with the sum of $5,000 for the whole thing. “But I shouldn’t even consider selling it,” he adds.
“For me, it is a reminder that there is a whole backlog of artists behind me... we didn’t just pop into existence, we are riding a huge momentum of artistic thinking.”
Mr. Hemleben’s work has evolved and developed since he was the subject of my very first article for The noise, exactly four years ago this month. At the time of that interview, he was beginning to try his hand at portraiture, and the differ- ence between his first attempts and the portraits and nudes he has done since, is astonishing. Having regularly attended life drawing sessions, he has tapped into his confidence and succeeded in transferring his impressionistic plein air style and skills to the representation of the human form.
Some of his newer landscapes have taken on an abstracted, fractured quality reminiscent of Gustav Klimt’s work — espe- cially a series of three large, predominantly green works that one immediately registers as floral-scapes, but upon closer inspection is composed entirely of circles.
“In this series I was trying to narrow it down to the abstract of how pleasant variants of green are together in nature,” he explains. “The reason it’s Klimt-like is because he was always trying to use green as a harmonizing color. A painting is in a key, just like a song is in a key. You don’t want to hear a cacophony — that’s what a photograph is, but that’s not the way humans see. Humans see through a very poetic process of cones and rods, and highly developed peripheral vision.”
Overall, his florals are more vibrant, incorporating more hot pinks and colors that pop than many of his earlier subdued still lifes and distant landscapes.
“Falling in love has made me much more optimistic,” he
says. “So I look for more optimistic things to paint. I think my work is becoming more and more joyful and that’s what I’m striving for now. I think that with time your work becomes more precise and less clumsy, and therefore it comes across as more effortless.”
At this point in our interview, fellow Jeromie Tom bauer walks in with a guitar and a six pack. The two men have been friends for 15 years, ever since Mr. Bauer saw Mr. Hemleben painting on the streets of Jerome.
I ask Mr. Bauer what changes he has seen in Mr. Hemleben’s work over the years.
“I own several pieces of Mark’s, so I’m a bit biased,” he says. “But there are paintings in here that I could be entertained
with for hours. I bought this small iris painting for my neph- ew’s wedding... up close it was nothing, but from afar it just came to life. As far as changes, I see some of his old stuff that I think is just fantastic, and I see some of his new stuff that is still just as fantastic. There are certain paintings that are just magic, and magic doesn’t come across all the time.”
Mr. Hemleben tells Mr. Bauer that someone stole one of the paintings he was working on during a live painting event at the Spirit Room the night prior.
“I guess someone desired it so much they had to take it!” Mr. Hemleben laughs, unfazed by the incident. “That’s what I’m going for in Berlin — to reach that magical level. If it’s painted in the snow, you’ve got to have the feeling of the cold; if it’s painted in the beautiful bright sunlight, you should feel that warmth. If I come back with just one that has that magical quality, I’ll be satisfied.”
More of Mr. Hemleben’s paintings have that magical qual- ity than the artist might realize. As was true for many of the great painters throughout history, his paintings have a time- less, soul-touching beauty whose value may not be fully rec- ognized until posterity.
When it’s just the two of us again, Mr. Hemleben says, fi- nally, “I’m just trying to put as much truth into my work as possible, but it’s my truth; it’s my version of Jerome; it’s my version of a poem; it’s my song in a visual way. When I go to Berlin, I’m sure there will be plenty of dark and weird stuff, and while that’s a totally valid statement, I would much pre- fer to create something a little bit more spiritually uplifting... because, really, why would you ever want to communicate anything other than beauty and joy in a painting?”
Sarah Gianelli lives, plays and writes in Jerome when she’s not stomping grapes down south. happygianelli@hotmail.com
24 • january 2015 • the NOISE arts & news • thenoise.us