Speed of Life

  Gregg Chadwick Either/Or 36"x29" oil on linen 2004 Private Collection, San Francisco I find I need to look deeply into this painting to provide an antidote to the images flooding my way as I walk down the avenue. rack after newsrack, each with a front page heralding destruction. Years ago I was in Perth, Australia reading an art review concerning an exhibition about peace. Most of the images in in the show were anti-war but few if any were really about the idea of peace. The title of the review was "how do you paint peace". I have been trying to do that ever since. I think this painting is close. I ask you: how would you paint peace? How would you create the idea of peace in your music? In your writing? In your life? Please send thoughts. ideas and images my way- greggchadwick@icloud.com I will post your dreams...

by Gregg Chadwick Turn the nightly news on today, or scan the latest headlines on your iPhone, and it would seem that the world grows uglier each day. Eleven years ago,  I wrote  about my search for images of peace. I  hearken  back to those thoughts prompted by a memory  of a time in Perth, Australia  reading  an art review concerning an exhibition about non-violence. The title of the review was "How do you paint peace?" Prompted by these ongoing concerns, I have been creating a new series of paintings using ideas of New Urbanism - Los Angeles in particular with peace as a subtext. What the amazing writer, actor, and teacher Claudette Sutherland, in my studio yesterday evening, called "Love Songs to the City."  Gregg Chadwick Third L.A. (for Christopher Hawthorne) 30"x24" oil on linen 2015 Three books published in the last few years should be on every peacemaker's bookshelf: Steven Pinker's  The Better Angels of Our N...

Kent Chadwick's poem "(Peace) 320˚ NW" is the first in a series of responses to my question, "How do you paint, write, sing peace?" Kent Chadwick is a Seattle based poet. His work is rich in language and moment. "(Peace) 320˚ NW" is from a new, ongoing series of poems modeled on the Japanese ukiyo-e artists Hokusai and Hiroshige's views of Mount Fuji. Mount Rainer is the touchstone in this series. Each poem contains a fleeting view of Rainier that acts as a silent witness to the life unveiling below. I urge you to read the lengthy and important series of comments found below the intial post. Thank you for your thoughts and I encourage you to think seriously about this question. I welcome your responses. Feel free to e-mail images, poems, stories and links to your songs my way.

" I saw Obama's speech tonight at the Democratic Convention in Denver as a political masterpiece. As I had a chance to say on CNN a few moments ago, it was in many ways less a speech than a symphony. I also sensed that we saw tonight an Obama who is growing into a new, more mature leader — stronger, tougher, harder-hitting." -David Gergen Full Video: Barack Obama's Acceptance Speech at Democratic Convention August 28, 2008 Full Text: Barack Obama's Acceptance Speech at Democratic Convention August 28, 2008 To Chairman Dean and my great friend Dick Durbin; and to all my fellow citizens of this great nation; With profound gratitude and great humility, I accept your nomination for the presidency of the United States. Let me express my thanks to the historic slate of candidates who accompanied me on this journey, and especially the one who traveled the farthest – a champion for working Americans and an inspiration to my daughters and to yours -- Hillary Rodham Clinton...

by Gregg Chadwick I first heard U2's 1987 album The Joshua Tree in Western Australia. The album's Cinemascope sound provided the soundtrack for my next few months traveling the breadth of that expansive country from Perth, to Uluru (Ayers Rock), to Darwin, to Melbourne, to Sydney. Having spent a number of summers as a kid traveling across the grand deserts of the United States, I could hear the arid landscape in U2's songs. And while riding through the red deserts of Australia's outback I felt right at home. I gazed at Anton Corbijn's evocative black and white photography each time I pulled  The Joshua Tree out of the cassette case and popped it into my Walkman. My brother Kent is a poet, and I thought of him often as I listened to the poetic, atmospheric wash opening the album. In those Australian months, I often peered out of a bus window as we careened through the desert dust with Bono's plaintive wail in my ear. From Bullet the Blue Sky, to Red H...