About the Artist

The Arts are my calling.

There is no other way life I could imagine other than a life of imagination. From my earliest memories, all I have ever dreamed of doing or being are the Arts, virtually to the exclusion of all else. The Ideal of: “Art for Arts’ sake “is the guiding principal of my creative life. I have endeavored to maintain the purity of this ideal, as I am an artist less of personal choice than driving necessity to fulfill the purpose for which I was born. The Arts are my birthright, entitlement, love, passion, slavery and freedom.

I loved to draw ever since I was old enough to hold a pencil.

Making a successful drawing is one of the most honest,

It is amusing that while the humble pencil is one of the simplest devices invented by

man, it is also among the most difficult to master.

Music and literature have always held equally important places in my life.

Great music moves the soul to exultation and lofty spaces of the spirit,

while Great literature connects us with ourselves by providing deep intellectual, emotional

and spiritual understanding of the teachers who write from the depths of their knowledge and wisdom. The arts are essential aspects of the human experience and all are equally important.

As a child, I poured over books with prints of drawings by Leonardo DaVinci, Michelangelo’s epic works and the copperplate engravings and wood block prints of Albrecht Durer that captivated my imagination with their charismatic warmth and intimacy, beginning my love affair with the High Italian and Northern Renaissance that continues to this day. I was also enchanted by the highly stylized forms of ancient Egyptian art that conveys a sense of order, presence and immortality of the eternal man, beyond transient contemporary concerns.

Visits to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan, that magnificent palace of culture introduced me to masterpieces of European High Renaissance Art that stole my breath and filled me with awe, veneration and inspiration, reaching to the depths of my soul with a profound sense of purpose and destiny. I was compelled toward knowing the unfathomable mysteries of how these magical images that transported me out of my skin were created, filling my mind with dreams and aspirations of one day, achieving artistic immortality.

When I was about 16, I was introduced the work of Salvador Dali which was one of a profound series of mind altering experiences that left indelible impressions in my life and Art. From the moment I first encountered Dali, who’s work convey profound enigmas of existence, I realized that his originality, combined with supreme mastery of technique, placed him among the greatest artists who ever lived. Dali was also a consummate showman in the theater of the absurd. Whether he was a genius or madman is irrelevant, he lived life on his own terms and not those that were dictated or imposed upon him. Several years ago, an exhibition of surrealist art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art reminded me that Dali was in a class by himself. There were a few works by Dali, the most notable, “The Metamorphosis of Narcissus”, was a demonstration of virtually unrivaled mastery in painting. None of the other artist’s works in the exhibit approached the dazzling heights of the Dalian masterpiece and in fact were amateurishly inept in unwarranted comparison. When he was excommunicated from the Surrealist movement, Dali stated: “I am not a surrealist, I am the surrealist.” I laughed to myself that this grandiose proclamation of monumental egotism would be pure hubris had anyone else made that claim, but spoken by Dali, was a simple statement of fact.

I have always had a deep fascination of the point in time the European mind experienced the transformation from sleepwalking through the labyrinthine darkness of the Middle Ages to the awakening of the Renaissance. These early influences nurtured interest in arcane mysteries revealed through the ancient mystery religions of the Middle East and Asia that were later adopted by European monastic and alchemical traditions permeating Western Art. In the process of studying Eastern religion and philosophy, I was naturally drawn toward Eastern art, where I absorbed influences from India, China, Japan and Tibet.

My work continues to emulate the mythopoetic sensibility of my childhood influences and the ideal of the Renaissance Man, embodied by Leonardo Da Vinci, the consummate theorist and Michelangelo, the consummate practitioner; transposed to the context of our time. One of my greatest artistic concerns is to consciously avoid transient contemporary references, delving into the unchanging eternal verities of the human condition’s ongoing evolution, struggling through ignorance toward enlightenment, not the “enlightenment” of 18^th century rationalist philosophers but the Enlightenment of self transcendent wisdom.

I have never seen any point in aspiring to anything less than reaching toward the pinnacle of one’s full potential. The ultimate purpose of ART is to elevate oneself spiritually and in the process, help others by making a contribution toward uplifting humanity personally toward Enlightenment and collectively, evolution.

The essential drive and purpose of the Arts is the same as conscious life, which is enlightenment.

Speaking from personal experience, I know of no other activity or vocation that demands such deep introspective thought and concentration for the cultivation of beauty, imagination and wisdom, inspiring moments of bliss and epiphany.

Throughout my life, I have been crafting the laurels of a modern day Renaissance Man, achieving excellence in a diversity of the Arts in a wide range of media, including drawing, painting, sculpture, literature (poetry, lyrics, prose, short stories, essays, a novel, and philosophy), Music and computer arts. Never satisfied, I have always endeavored to take on difficult, over reaching challenges without the benefit (or perhaps debility) of an extensive formal education.

I am primarily self-taught and educated, intellectually resourceful and rigorously self disciplined which may explain, like an idiot savant, my accomplishments developed by studiously ignoring all naysayers who would place limits on my capabilities and the native potentials with which we were all born.

Through intensive work and study, I have pioneered a few innovations that may prove to be significant contributions to the language of the visual arts. Much more importantly, I have worked on practical ways and means to uplift the human condition, which I have always considered far more important than my Art and which I hope to leave as my legacy before I die.

The preceding essay is composed of excerpts from: “Artist’s Studio of the New Renaissance”, “Draw!!!, “Illuminations” & “Self Mastery” © 2007 Eric M. Gendell/ Ars Magna Fine Arts & Phantasia Arts Studio.

These books are slated for publication in 2008 as both hard copy and e-book editions.

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