John Steines, Fine Artist

Current Practice:
My expressionist art form evolves through gestural lines onto the blank canvas. I then allow these options to interact within the canvas directly, suggesting images that appear to me. I have worked this way since my mid-twenties in an increasingly complex manner.  Recently, I have learned that this practice is described as a 'Jungian' format aimed to bring the unconscious into a visible state (Spontaneous Form). This process is an evolving spontaneous conversation between self and canvas. Thoughts, interests, and training surface in a variety of ways through this process.

Process:
I envision waves of 'happenings' - influences, occurrences, memories - past, present and potential, as moving across the canvas from off-scene. Typically I represent three related yet distinct feelings/perceptions in these wave-forms, then allow them to interact without extensive thought interpretation, so as to initiate the first markings.  These lines form the start of the painting's storytelling. From that point, images from  past, present and imagined grow together, to interact within the canvas, as process evolves that detail toward completion of an intended unified concept.  I have since learned that this technique was described by Carl Jung as a method for achieving waking dream-state, and representation into the unconsciousness.  The 'spontaneous' technique allowed Jungian clients to enter unconscious vision while awake,and is specifically used there to evolve mandalas as representative of thought activity.

Particular tools and approaches: I enjoy making use of a perspective reversal - a representing of a small item or distant figure in significant detail, while a larger figure upfront may recede into a suggestive mode without extensive detail.  These variations become an image story driver for me of what can be left behind and overlooked. As in experience, an apparently insignificant incident or encounter may grow into profound effect, such as how an uninvolved passerby can become a focus of an impact or expression. I do blend observational detail into evolving images as they appear, so the result have a blending of interpretation and often, compounding intent.

Youthful Initiation: My exploration in art began very early, by age 4-5.  My mother quickly figured out that this hyperactive child, fifth of eleven children, required additional attention to assist his adaptation and growth, and diminish the inherent conflict risks with those who surround. She quickly identified that getting me involved in an art project resulted in deep attention and concentration which could rarely be disturbed by surrounding activity. My dedication (study) began then.

Study: I have studied classical drawing techniques over the years to develop my descriptive skills, including basic form, perspective, figurative and portrait work. These learning's inform my visions as they evolve within the canvas. As the iterative process evolves, disparate images begin to orient into relationships that carry deeper meaning. An abstracted quality persists within and among these detailed elements moving into and out of the canvas surface, to suggest a moment in time and an incomplete process or an unfinished evolution.

Related Background:

1. BS Nursing. My professional background beyond artwork consists of 42 years as a Registered Nurse in Critical Care, including State of Wisconsin Health Advisory Planning Group, personal advocacy and informal counseling, and public/university speaking on Trauma and Resiliency. I speak out to elevate awareness and minimize the risk and amount of trauma-affect others may experience, and to encourage effective adaptive strategies.  Health care workers are in a particular critical position to assist in comprehension of the trauma-response process, and thereby, intervene positively. Trauma is universal and each of us cope with it.  That ability shifts over time. Healing can first be encouraged through active non-judgemental listening to the story of the abused. The ability to speak out about one's trauma is inherently a healing process in itself.

2. Nature & Environment. From childhood on, deep encounters with nature continue to be a strong spiritual connection for me, and function as rescue, and teacher. My origin family farm is at the southern tip of the Canadian Shield in north-central Wisconsin, Marathon County (Ginseng Country), just north of Leopold's 'Sand Counties'. John Muir's Wisconsin youth with his study origins have been strongly influential to me. I followed Fran Hamerstrom's work on the Prairie Chicken (continued after her husband's passing: The Buena Vista Grassland and interconnecting Leola Marsh, located in Portage and Adams counties, consist of the best and most extensive prairie chicken habitat left in Wisconsin (Wisconsin's Central Sands).

- Nature links: Rocky creeks with numerous rapids and waterfalls, and their surrounding wooded habitat, link from the family farm all the way into Wisconsin's northern acreage and around Lake Superior's northern shore. That landscape became my psychic home territory as I grew into mature adulthood. A typical excursion was 1- 3 weeks  exploring deep into isolated realms off season (Spring ice-out and late Autumn into early snow). Winter brought XC Skiing, and Summer - swimming and berry harvest. Each outing has time significantly dedicated to sketching, aka, Tom Thomson inspired (primarily pastel on black paper, with some oil on canvas work). My small urban home-site is transformed into a lawn-less North-woods habitat, mixed with savanna species in open spaces. Wildlife follows, even in the urban setting.

Environmental Stewardship:
- I worked with the Yahara Parkway (Tenney Park and south, Lake Mendota to Lake Monona) after returning to Madison in 1997-78.
- I co-founded Friends of Starkweather Creek in 2002 after purchasing my home property halfway between the two branches of the East Madison Creek's watersheds. With that effort began the semiannual Starkweather Solstice Festival, under an intent to celebrate local watersheds, elevate attention back toward agrarian/seasonal calendars, and address some of the complexity of Winter Holiday depression and suicide (Wellness).
- In 2014 I became involved with the new and evolving SE corner of Dane County's 300 acre new park space, dedicated to Ag Education as a farm-park. Silverwood County Park is original Ho-Chunk land, and that connection was constant in assessment. In 2015 I initiated 'Ten Variations on a Theme':  10 artists installations in 10 giant circular corn cribs, celebrating and envisioning the possibility of this new 'farm-park' as a working regenerative farm. By 2016, I was mapping and drafting a Master Plan for the park, based on Leopold's principles of 'The Land Informs'. With the assistance of a number of specialists in etymology, mapping techniques (lidar, drone footage, walks in assessment). Professional soils expertise assessing a recessional glacial moraine, a significant glacial-lake washout gully, numerous deep kettles, and about 25 acres of remnant Oak Savanna(0.0006% survived from pre-settlement, 50,000,000 acres originally - down to 30,000 now, and most of those plots are small and isolated).  Regenerative practice is an essential tool for such degraded soils and damaged habitats as we found onsite. With persistence, the value of Oak Savanna restoration evolved within decision-making as a better option than growing a new Oak Savanna from scratch (evolution time ~ 300 years - letting the 25 acre remnant die out). Most significantly, an element of the proposed, and then adapted/adopted Dane County Plan is linkage of Savanna habitat across the property to agroforestry fields,  and including linkages to a northern and southeastern  extensive wetland waterway immediately off site. All this results in the principle that 'field' becomes the island  element, rather than pollinator/savanna habitats as isolated communities. This is without a doubt, my proudest advocacy achievement.