Beyond Earth: A Park West Gallery Artist Exclusive

Written by PETER NIXON*

We often read Collectors’ comments on the Park West Gallery blog describing their pleasure at meeting artists at Park West Gallery events; this experience is reciprocated by artists. I have met many remarkable art collectors during the course of my association with Park West Gallery – all high achievers in their fields and all leading fascinating lives – but it is not every day that you meet an Astronaut.

“Beyond Earth” by Peter Nixon | Park West Gallery Collection

Astronauts are so rare and legendary, like Rock Stars, it is hard to believe that they are actually real. So it was my great pleasure to meet Sherwood ‘Woody’ Spring, a decorated Colonel, test pilot, and an astronaut on the 1985 Shuttle Mission. Considering his career reads like “The Right Stuff” – he’s flown in space and performed two spacewalks hundreds of miles above the Earth whilst traveling at 17,500 miles per hour – he was very unassuming and modest about his achievements.

I met Woody and his wife, Debbie, at two Park West Gallery events; one a Baltic cruise in 2010 and again on a Mediterranean trip in 2011. On the second occasion we had several discussions about astronomy and space in general, with Woody indulging my enthusiasm but meager knowledge of astrophysics.

Even though he has military training and takes an incredibly detailed, pragmatic approach to his profession, I was struck by the degree of emotion Woody expressed when describing the wonder of gazing down on the Earth. Here was a life-changing event, that only a handful of human beings have experienced, and the thought of this fired my imagination.

The painting I created, illustrated above, was a collaboration between Woody and me, with many emails transmitted between the two of us; Woody providing reference material and technical advice.

The main subject of the picture is the beauty of the Earth itself. I wanted to capture an impression of what Woody might have seen from the dizzying heights of space and also present this in painterly terms. I have always enjoyed the rich textures and colors of satellite photographs and incorporated some of their abstract qualities into the painting. I had great fun finding the appropriate brush marks to represent clouds and creating the Earth’s deep “blueness” by building up layer upon layer of color.

One of the facts Woody told me that caught my imagination is that the Earth’s atmosphere has multiple distinct layers of blue when viewed from outer space. On his mission, he counted thirteen different bands. Whilst I didn’t feature this around the Earth, preferring a soft halo, the background blue is made up of thirteen layers producing the vibrant near-black of space. Another amazing fact is that the astronauts experienced a sunrise (and a sunset) every forty-five minutes as they orbited the planet every ninety-three minutes; this is represented in the painting by a succession of stylized suns.

There is always a figurative element in my paintings; in this case, the female figure represents intuition and the horse, the power of the imagination. Here, I placed the mythical figure on a horse, representing the spirit of endeavor, curiosity and the incredible vision of one day venturing into the larger universe that galvanizes the space mission. She rides the Milky Way across the top of the picture on a contrasting crescent to the Earth. This was done with a little artistic license, the scientist in Woody informing me that the Milky Way is actually all around us, but I persuaded him this format would make a more dynamic composition.

The small pictures or insets around the painting are iconic insignia and memorabilia provided by Woody. From top left, they are: an observatory he visited as a boy, Astronaut’s Wings, Woody in his spacesuit, and also his Space walk. Along the base of the painting are a Crew Patch from his mission and the five continents as seen from space. From top right are an EVA Patch and the “Earth rise” seen from the dark side of the Moon during an Apollo mission. There is a small visual joke at the base of the painting – I usually include in my paintings a silhouetted self-portrait in a Rembrandt hat, but on this occasion it is a self-portrait in an astronaut’s helmet.

I had fun designing and making this painting. Woody has also expressed his enthusiasm for it.

*The art of Peter Nixon is available for purchase through Park West Gallery and its cruise art auctions at sea. Visit the Park West Gallery Peter Nixon Fine Art Collection →

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Related Links:

• Artist Peter Nixon on the Park West Experience
• Venetian Cruise Excursion Inspires Park West Artist
• The Alchemic Nature of Painting
• Artist Peter Nixon’s Goddesses of the Moon

Artist Peter Nixon on the Park West Experience

Detail from “Allure” (2005), Peter Nixon | The Park West Gallery Collection

“Working with Park West is a unique opportunity and a dream job for an artist…,” says Peter Nixon, who has been part of the Park West Gallery family of artists for over 5 years. “I’ve been an artist for a long time and I’ve never come across an organization before that has such love and enthusiasm for its subject. They’ve been around for a long time, so it demands this level of commitment. The mission—started by Albert Scaglione in 1969—was, and still is, to make art accessible to everyone. They do this by reasonable and competitive pricing, and exhibiting a variety of artworks to suit all artistic tastes… [Park West] is an organization with complete commitment, honesty and integrity towards their work. I certainly don’t think you stay in the business for 40 years if you’re not.”

Hear what else the artist has to say about the Park West Experience:

Learn more about Peter Nixon at the Park West Gallery Artist Biographies or view selections of his work from the Park West Gallery Collection.

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Related Links:

• The Alchemic Nature of Painting
• Peter Nixon’s Goddesses of the Moon
• Venetian Cruise Excursion Inspires Park West Artist

Venetian Cruise Excursion Inspires Park West Artist

The Park West Gallery Collection features unique paintings and limited-edition artwork by artist Peter Nixon. With artwork ranging from figurative to still life, combining both representational and abstract elements, the artist is extremely well received by collectors the world over.

AN ESSAY BY PETER NIXON • Written exclusively for Park West Gallery

“What a difference a day makes,” as the song says, and a day can have a wonderfully transformative effect. I have had many memorable days on Park West excursions: nocturnal jeep rides stargazing in the Mojave Desert, zip-wiring through the jungle in Tortuga and wandering in luxuriant gardens in Madeira. I recently experienced another of these significant occasions in one of my favourite cities – Venice.

Venice has always been a special place for me and a kind of muse for my work, the starting point for many ideas. It is a truly magical place, a historical monument seemingly preserved in aspic like a miraculous stage set. Like opera, it is simultaneously beautiful and ridiculous; a testament to an impractical dream. It was also a centre for the High Renaissance and home to some of the finest art ever created. A busy work schedule meant that I had not visited for some time. I was excited to return at last to ‘La Serenissima’.

Our entry into Venice aboard the Celebrity Summit cruise ship was a spectacular introduction, the top deck providing unique views of rooftops and monuments rarely seen. I took many panoramic photographs.

When we docked I hit the ground running; there was little time and so much art to see. The sun was baking hot that day but that did not deter me as I set off with resolve and a simple map. There were many false trails and I lost my way several times in the labyrinthine streets but each corner revealed another stunning vista and photo opportunity.

I eventually arrived at my first destination: the Academia, in what could best be described as an overheated state. There I gazed in wonder at several Bellini Altarpieces, Bassano’s Adoration of the Shepherds, Veronese’s Feast in the House of Levi and the crowning glory; Giorgione’s The Tempest, one of the most beautiful and mysterious pictures ever painted.

From there I went to the Scuola di San Giorgio and the Frari where my viewing extravaganza reached its climax with the magnificent Tintoretto Crucifixion, Bellini’s Frari Triptych and Titian’s Pesaro Altarpiece and Assumption of the Virgin. It is an incredible thrill to see these works “in the flesh” after only studying them in books.

By twilight I was back in St. Marc’s Square looking dreamily at the jewelled lagoon, assimilating the things I’d seen during the day. Later I met up with the Park West team; we found a superb back street restaurant and had a wonderful al fresco meal of fine Italian food and wine. The evening ended with a moonlit vaporetto ride back to the ship – it felt as though I’d been in a Fellini film.

My love of Venice is characterised by a triptych of paintings, Venetian Colour – Vermilion, Ultramarine and Gold (shown below). In each painting a female figure is juxtaposed against an architectural backdrop – The Doge’s Palace, Santa Maria Della Salute and the Rialto Bridge. The figure’s dresses symbolize the qualities I admire in Venetian painting: its sumptuousness, sensuality, richness of colour and intricate patterning. Each painting contains a ‘detail’ from paintings by some of my favourite Venetian artists, which serve as vivid examples of the colours in the titles: Giorgione for Gold, Titian for Vermilion, and Veronese for Ultramarine Blue.

This special day in Venice will resonate in my mind for a long time to come and will continue to inspire many new images.

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Related Links:

• The Alchemic Nature of Painting
• Peter Nixon’s Goddesses of the Moon
• Park West Gallery Artist Biographies: Peter Nixon
• Browse the Park West Gallery / Peter Nixon Artwork Collection

The Alchemic Nature of Painting

The Park West Gallery collection features unique paintings and limited-edition artwork by artist Peter Nixon. With artwork ranging from figurative to still life, combining both representational and abstract elements, the artist is extremely well received by collectors the world over.

AN ESSAY BY PETER NIXON • Written exclusively for Park West Gallery

I OCCASIONALLY WONDER whether I am in danger of becoming an artistic relic.

In these post modern times, when all of art history is available to artists as an influence and inspiration, my inclination is to look backwards to the Old Masters for insight. Not that I have any desire to imitate the Old Masters, I am a creature of the 21st Century and the themes in my work reflect that, but I am drawn to them in the same way I am drawn to good food and wine. My senses strike a chord with something in their work that my appetite craves. To stretch the food analogy further I am compelled to add these spicy elements to the mental soup in my head ready to be stirred and ladled onto a fresh canvas.

Eugène Delacroix, the 17th century French artist said, “what inspires artists’ work is not new ideas but their obsession with the idea that what has already been said is not enough!” So when I look at an Old Master painting it may suggest an avenue to pursue that is at a tangent to its subject.

The composer Arnold Schoenberg said that an artist should not cut himself from the art of the past but should take it and assimilate it with his own work. I believe it is important for an artist to continue the timeline stretching from the past and maintain and develop the traditional skills of drawing and painting as there is still much in them to explore.

What I love about the Old Masters and what makes me continue to make reference to them in my work is primarily their richness of colour, chiaroscuro and particularly their theatricality – paintings such as Rembrandts and Titians which make my heart soar when I see them in the National Gallery in London.

Paintings should be an event – something visually splendid whose colour ranges from the brightest whites through sumptuous tones to the darkest black. The world presented as vividly as the imagination can conjure.

Modern art can seem cold and forbidding and too concerned with psychological introspection and answering its own rhetorical questions. The beauty of Classical art is that it celebrates the human condition and touches us at a level we can easily recognize. It is as equally well thought out as modern art, some would say more so, but presents beauty as mysterious without being obscure.

Art makes great demands on its devotees. It is extraordinary to think of the amount of human effort that has been put to the service of art just over the last 800 years; surprising for a practice that Oscar Wilde said was entirely useless. An amazing record of toil and tears, divine madness, aspiration and disappointment, but even so, something compelled all those artists to return again and again to their canvases.

Personally, I answered a spark that was ignited by a Leonardo drawing I saw when I was nine and I responded to some mysterious spell in that picture that has driven me to paint ever since.

The alchemic nature of painting is reflected in its mystifying language: sfumato, chiaroscuro, verdaccio, tryptich, alla prima, impasto and also the opulence of its materials: Ultramarine blue extracted from lapis lazuli, Vermilion red from sulphur and mercury, and Indian yellow from the urine of cows fed on mangos. It is pure sensuality and it is the tactility of these materials and the wonder of manipulating them that distinguish painting from video or Conceptual art.

In the recent past there was a belief that academic study – drawing from the model – was hostile to creativity. What a crock, and what a feeble excuse for navel-gazing and butt-scratching. Painting is not dead, as some would have us believe. The younger generation is just too lazy or scared to wake it up.

Modern masters such as Matisse, Picasso, Dali, De Kooning, Rauschenberg, Bacon, were all formed by the same academic skills that benefited Leonardo and Michelangelo. Art is Darwinian by nature and develops in increments; one person’s achievements building a further storey in the edifice. It is naïve and arrogant to believe that all of this collective experience gained over such a long period can be ripped up and discarded in the incessant contemporary pursuit of novelty.

Inspiration does not come without application and hard work. An artist needs to be continually alert to the world around him and should be like a magpie, acquiring images that catch his attention and adapting and absorbing them into his work. As Louis Pasteur said, “fortune favours the prepared mind.”

Curiosity did not kill the cat; it sharpened his claws and got him the cream. There is no finer example of this rabid acquisitiveness than Picasso, about whom Roland Penrose said, “he could take your energy during dinner and use it to paint all night.” Picasso said, “I do not seek, I find,” and was an artist whose insatiable curiosity inspired fear in other artists. In fact those artisans who shared the Bateau Lavoir studios in Paris with him at the turn of the 20th Century locked their doors in fear that he would adopt elements from their work and tellingly go away and do them better.

The artist also has to have the ability to transform all these accumulated ideas into a cohesive form; a good idea can be spoilt if the finished artwork is not well crafted. It takes a lot of looking and contemplating and painting practice to formulate a style that is not rigid and can be built upon. If an artist can transfer these feelings to the viewer by some visual osmosis; to beguile the eye and induce contemplation then he has succeeded in slowing time and casting a spell, thereby bringing a spiritual element into art and the impression of a vivid moment captured and delivered with what Francis Bacon called, “the sensation without the boredom of its conveyance.”

Someone once said that art is like the lotus flower; its roots stand in the mud and its head in the colourful and rarefied atmosphere of ideas. It is this mixture of the earthy and the ethereal that gives painting its charge, its physical impact. The artist; both an alchemist and a shaman takes base materials; minerals and petroleum products, the very dust of the earth, and transforms them by a strange magic into visual gold.

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Related Links:

• Peter Nixon’s Goddesses of the Moon
• Park West Gallery Artist Biographies: Peter Nixon
• Browse artwork from the Park West Gallery – Peter Nixon collection
• Park West Gallery Master Sites: Rembrandt van Rijn
• Park West Gallery Master Sites: Pablo Picasso
• Park West Gallery Master Sites: Salvador Dali

Artist Peter Nixon’s Goddesses of the Moon

Written for Park West Gallery by Artist PETER NIXON

MY RECENT PAINTINGS, The Moon Triptych, were originally inspired by a book I read some time ago; Moondust by Andrew Smith - a poignant account of the NASA mission, containing moving interviews with all the astronauts. I was reminded of the book recently - on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the moon landing in 2009 -  and decided to produce a triptych to celebrate the magical and momentous memory from my childhood.

Many of the subjects of my paintings are taken from Greek and Roman myths so I decided to paint the goddesses representing three phases of the moon. Their Greek/Roman names are Selene/Luna, Artemis/Diana and Hecate/Trivia – and they correspond to the crescent, harvest and full moons respectively. As a connecting element in the paintings, I dramatically silhouetted the three goddess figures against a full moon.

In Selene/Luna (shown below), the picture has insets with depictions of the goddess from ancient illustrations - a horse’s head symbolizing her chariot, the torch she traditionally carried and an astronaut’s footprint from the surface of the moon. There is also a quote from a painting by the German artist Caspar David Friedrich showing two figures gazing at the moon.

In Diana/Artemis (shown below), the goddess stands dramatically flexing her bow as this lunar phase was also known as the “Hunter’s Moon.” In addition to the depiction of an astronaut, there are also insets with representations of her from Greek vases and Roman statues, and a painting by the romantic English artist Samuel Palmer, who was famous for his moonlit landscapes.

In Hecate/Trivia (shown below) there are insets showing the Lunar Module and ancient portrayals of the three-faced goddess, who was also associated with crossroads and another dreamy Samuel Palmer landscape. This picture presented a problem in that I had used the full moon as a backdrop in the other two paintings whereas Hecate/Trivia characterizes the phase of the moon when it is below the horizon. I resolved this by placing the horizon high up in the picture as a line of buildings.

Across the top of each painting are the four phases of the moon. However, as there only three goddesses, as a visual joke I placed a silhouetted self-portrait against the fourth moon.

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Park West Gallery would like to thank Peter Nixon for sharing this wonderful glimpse into his creative process and for describing so prolifically the inspiration for his recent artworks. We certainly look forward to reading more from the artist in the future!

Related Links:

• Learn more about the artist Peter Nixon bio.parkwestgallery.com
• View selections of Peter Nixon’s artwork available at Park West Gallery sales.parkwestgallery.com

My First Park West VIP Art Cruise

Dear Park West Gallery:

“I just wanted to take a minute to thank the entire Park West team for making the VIP Art Cruise so enjoyable.

Simon was fantastic in keeping me posted on all the pre-cruise logistics, and I really appreciated his help and guidance in all the auction previews. He also went the extra mile every day by asking if there was anything we needed, etc!!

Samantha was great – and she was particularly effective at clearing NCL staff out of chairs in the lobby on the evening of the “paint off”!! I also appreciated the fact that she took time to point out other original Picot works that were available when she found out that I bought the original Picot watercolor.

EJ was friendly and helpful! He went to the other auction and pulled the Nixon and Marko pieces for me which I really appreciated (and can’t wait to get them). And he helped me through all the framing decisions despite that fact that he was feeling poorly!

And Rebecca was a star – she rounds out your team well with her bright personality and incredible administrative abilities!!!

As this was my first VIP Art Cruise I really didn’t know what to expect and even when I knew there were going to be artists on board, I still really didn’t understand the opportunity that was being afforded to me!! Upon reflection, how incredible it was to meet and socialize with Noah, Tim Yanke, Nano and Jerry.

Park West has certainly increased my appreciation for all art! I’m still incredulous when I think I bought some abstract pieces (Mouly and Yanke)!!!

Thank you Park West for such an enjoyable experience.”

Nancy W.
Apopka, Florida

There is Nothing More Artistic Than to Love Others

“Art is not the application of a canon of beauty but what the instinct and the brain can conceive beyond any canon. When we love a woman we don’t start measuring her limbs.”
~ Pablo Picasso

“Love is probably the strongest and most fulfilling emotion we will experience and it underlies and informs all our enthusiasms…we, as ordinary beings become transformed for the better by love. We are literally filled with emotion, which engenders a positive outlook and truly engages us with others and the world…”
~ Peter Nixon

“Poetry and painting are done in the same way you make love; it’s an exchange of blood, a total embrace – without caution, without any thought of protecting yourself.”
~ Joan Miro

“Creativity begins with an affinity for something. It’s like falling in love.”
~ Csaba Markus

“In our life there is a single color, as on an artist’s palette, which provides the meaning of life and art. It is the color of love.”
~ Marc Chagall

“Through art, I want to share a part of myself. I want people to see the love that I put into it.”
~ Marcus Glenn

“Love wants to rise, not to be held down by anything base… He who loves flies, runs, and rejoices; he is free and nothing holds him back.”
~ Henri Matisse

“(My work) comes from the love to paint. That’s the love that runs in my blood and is the center of my life.”
~ Itzchak Tarkay

“Love is when the desire to be desired takes you so badly that you feel you could die of it.”
~ Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

“The more I think about it, the more I realize there is nothing more artistic than to love others.”
~ Vincent van Gogh

The Leisurely Contemplations of Artist Peter Nixon

Excerpt from a Park West Gallery interview with artist Peter Nixon

“When formulating an idea for a painting, my memory plays a vital role as I bounce the idea around looking for connections and echoes. Often an Old master painting will emerge in the equation as an indicator of the direction to be taken.

I was reminded of this intrinsic quality of memory and contemplation in painting when completing a series of pictures called Odalisque I & II. These paintings were inspired by specific paintings by Matisse and Picasso who were themselves returning to a classic theme immortalised by old masters such as Ingres and Delacroix; namely pictures of idealised women in eastern dress couched in lavish surroundings.

But what was of interest to Matisse, and also myself, was not the exoticism of the subject matter, but the expression of a feeling of leisurely contemplation, of allowing the mind to expand, of time compelled to stand still. The extravagance illustrated in these paintings; the marble, the gilded drapery, the lush silks, represent the richness of the imagination when explored at a measured pace.” – Peter Nixon

Odalisque I (left) and Odalisque II (right), by Peter Nixon

ABOUT THE ARTIST
Born in Lytham St. Annes Lancashire in 1956, Peter Nixon’s direction in a career of art was first realized as early as the age of four. At nine years old Peter visited his first museum, the Royal Academy of Art, London England. Here he would see Da Vinci’s Virgin and Child which would have a profound effect on young Peters Artistic development.

At seventeen, Peter was accepted into Blackpool’s fine art academy, where he was schooled in the study of the human form and the discipline of drawing that is the foundation of many of his creations today. Peter finished out his artistic education at Bath Academy of Art where he extended his skill in graphical art.

The main themes of Nixon’s paintings are primarily idealized and stylized figures in states of joy, exhilaration and ecstasy. They share moments of tranquil elation, feeling lighter than air, reveling in being just pure spirits – in love, dancing, listening to music in celebration of their most vivid collective memories. That time that we are truly alive, ecstatic, positive and living in the moment.