Author: Scott Von Holzen

I am currently renewing an artistic adventure that first started in 1974, and ended in the early 1980's. A casual comment restarted the quest in art in 2004. Now, at night I am surrounded by artworks done and in progress, shelves full of art books, my music collection playing through a classic NAD amp and a pair of solid, classic free standing speakers, my piano, violin, blues guitar, and saxophone. So all is musical no matter what I am up to in the studio. Since I was a kid I have had the urge to be creative Now, in my later sixties, I am determine to know. I want to follow this to the end to see what these paintings, and all this music amounts to. This is probably the last great adventure I will have, so I am all in. So, watch out for nonstop music, canvases with multiple panels, with paint spread thick or dribbled on, words with meaning, and results that will challenge, push the meaning of music, and may even splash back. This blog's real purpose is to document my story in the making, and you are welcomed to follow along. Thank you for your support. Scotty Von Holzen

S_V_H Christmas Painting image1

Published on by Scott Von Holzen

What Child is This is this years Christmas Painting, close up. This is a dinky painting 20inches by 5feet.  The size is rather boring and surprisingly it’s size pales in comparison to the Chopin piece along with the sense of challenge.  Strange,  it was thought that a smaller canvas offered the chance to experiment with more freedom.  Yet, hum, that feeling still stands, yet, hum, maybe it is like betting with quarters instead of hundred dollar bills.   It is this way with each painting: there is an idea and a path to take and  for some reason the artist attention span is short, and the path quickly turns into a trail, into trampled grasses, into finally an open field filled with a breeze and a reassuring sun.  And what does he do? He puts on his sun glasses and searches for the way out.

Scott Von Holzen

S_V_H Chopin’s Etude Op.10 No.3 Tristesse final image11

Published on by Scott Von Holzen


This is a 400 pixel image of a painting fourteen feet in length.  Hopefully, tomorrow this image will be uploaded to the website in much larger and greater detail.   To understand this painting you need to listen to the music.  Here is a quick link to Chopin’s Etude Opus.10 Number 3  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dz_BlYlBi40 The painting is based on the last nine measures of the music.

Tristesse  was started on August 16th and it has been a long road. There was a lot of frustration at first, for a 14 foot by 36 inches of canvas was needed to have the space to put in notes of some decent size. The canvas was almost pushed aside because of a concern that such a large canvas would take considerable time to complete, which it did six weeks.  Doing two or three smaller canvases in that same time period, would have offered  more chances to experiment at a lesser cost of failure.   The result today was worth the time, although the next few works are going to be much smaller and  easier to handle.

Tristesse was also hard to photograph, but the space was found for it, the Canon 7D camera and two  bounced flash.   The image was edited in Photoshop, mostly to correct perspective.

Is it possible that nothing quite like this has been done in art?  It is easy to see this because the style is so  distinctive that from across the gallery it would be clear who painted that work.   Yet, none of these canvases are in a gallery or much less anywhere else but piled carefully against the walls.  That is the way it is.  It has all to be earned, and who is it to say that any of this effort is truly worth the effort.  Still, no matter, as long as there are white canvases and  paints to complete another wonderful musical piece,  it will be started and finish by this artist,  a driven and well aware realist.  At this stage in life there is no other choice  to be made.

Scott Von Holzen

S_V_H Chopin’s Etude Op.10 No.3 Tristesse image10

Published on by Scott Von Holzen

This painting is full of musical ties and slurs and they are fun to let the brush to wander about the canvas to see what works.  These lines are the widest that have been used but they seemed to not effect the strength of the notes.   The lines give life to this work and because they are spinning across the canvas a sense of movement exists.  No real movement, not like the LED light show that is on YouTube of the artist, Leo Villareal.  His work must be impressive and appears to be very modern. Can canvas art exist in this age of digital brightness?  It is wondered if this art should be built on more recent examples, instead of relying on that old dead artist Van Gogh.  Today’s art appears to offer much more opportunity of diverseness.  If you think about it Van Gogh pushed  art forward  be using brighter colors with obvious brush strokes all with an emotional edge, which today is just plain common.  Maybe this work is built on a past art that has been left behind 60 years ago.  Maybe, there is a better way yet left to be discovered. Maybe, none of this conversation matters:  real art stands the test of time, and only years gone by will be the  true judge of what is fine art and what is only the art of a moment.

Scott Von Holzen