terrance

Beth Ross asked….
“I was wondering what you planned to do next?

Terrance - I’m going to oil paint this winter, and work on just one or two new etchings. I really have no idea at this time what the work is going to be, only that it will be. I have book art ideas that involve creating raku boxes to hold the books. I have this idea going already with two boxes raku’d and now I have to make books to fit into them. I’m getting a little more involved in pottery, as I have a piece that is ready for pit firing and another piece I plan to paint.

I want to develop my drumming and my rhythm and my sense of where it all comes from. I feel that if I can open up that sense of mine where the rhythm lives it will flow like water from a tap.

I continue to keep working on levitation and becoming invisible. I think I’m having better luck with the invisibility.

Elizabeth Jennerjahn asks………….
What is art?

Terrance - From the time I was a teenager I always felt that art came from a great beyond. That there was a reservoir of ideas out there. I can distinctly remember sitting by my bedroom window writing poetry and watching the process unfold before me like I was a spectator.

Thoughts that I had flirted with days before came back answered in a poem as if there were a part of me in the great beyond that was doing the work for me. I was just the conduit between the two worlds.

So I think Art is basically an ability to interpret and to have the great beyond flow through the human mind. Art is not just for the ‘artist’, but for anyone who can open up to the great beyond.

As for being a conduit, it's like the work is already there, somewhere in the great beyond and I just have to put the time and energy into bringing it into this world and it holds true for every aspect of life.

If I have a question, need or want I can just put it up there and know that there will be an answer, direction or action or even an act of synchronicity that I can take or will happen to me, either consciously or unconsciously.

So I took notice and still do of the creative process that occurs to me. I'm fortunate that I have the time to be able to do so, it's always been a fascination for me.

Elizabeth also asks……Why Art?

Terrance - Why not?

A Question from Seth Rosenblum……
“Mr. Young, could you tell our audience how your innate artistic abilities have influenced your drumming? and do you think your drumming would be in the same place if you were not an artist?”

Terrance - I’ve approached my drumming very much like I approach my art, with the spirit of fun. If I take anything too seriously or too well planned it just doesn’t work for me. A little planning is ok but I really look for those times when I’m confronted with the unknown when it comes to the art work that I do.

It’s in the unknown where I feel the power of my spirit coming through, where I feel the link up to spirits who were here before me.

I can’t imagine life as not being who I am so therefore I can’t answer the second part of that question.

Another question from Mr. Rosenblum…..”Also Mr. Young, could you tell us if you think of drumming as another one of the art forms you express or do you experience drumming in a different way?”

Terrance - Why yes Doctor Rosenblum. Drumming has it’s moments for me, they are quick giga moments right now that only I am aware of, because I pay attention to that side of me. But I can see that as a tool for expression that yes, it is growing inside of me.

Ellee asks…….
I am always curious to know about artists and what their feelings are once they release works. Do they feel they even emotionally own the piece/s anymore? Do they feel any greater expectations will befall them as to future work meeting the standards of current products?
Muses are also interesting to me. I love reading about the ways people become inspired, what places suit them best, if they are fairly linear or abstract as they create, and how they feel immediately following a creation binge.

Terrance - When I put something out in my gallery it is certainly a part of me. My attention gives energy to whatever it is I am working on. We are so much more that what we hold within the confines of our bodies, and our influence can be unleashed by our actions. Art is an action and it sustains the energy of the artist, even though it can be interpreted differently by whoever experiences it.

I recently had a show in Brooklyn NY and I didn’t go down to the opening reception and I was very curious that evening as to how the opening was going. I like to talk about my work and I like to feel the energy of the opening to get a take on the influence of my work. So I laid back in a chair put on some drumming music and worked myself into one particular work called, “Transcendence” that was in that show. I was really hoping for visualization but I received very good energy readings, but only about that one particular piece. I think the attachment to any work is great if the work was made with one’s spirit.

I use to worry about equaling past performance, but I’m over that now, because for me I now know that change brings new eternities.

As for inspiration for me it comes in many ways. My family, my surroundings, the forest, the world. I can and usually do have very abstract thoughts about what it is I feel like bringing to this world. It’s quite often abstract to begin with for me. Sometimes it’s a word or phrase and I’ll jot it down and post it on my studio wall. I might act right away on it, or it may linger on the wall for years.

It’s really best for me to act upon fresh ideas because if I don’t I tend to work them out inside and then I finish them inside and never take them into the world.

It is in my artistic nature to consider where my ideas come from and I am totally blown away at times by the things that I come up with. They are not Earth shattering to anybody but me.

Being able to follow ones own creative thought processes is an art in and of itself though.

It is a very slow and tedious process and the results don't really manifest themselves all the time.

When I know that I am totally into something that is very creative for me, I am also aware after this binge there is going to be some down time for me. I prepare for that while I’m being creative and know that I will have a melancholy experience right after. I usually plan what I call mindless work, like preparing for the next project or doing some production work of some kind. It's relaxing work and it's part of my creative cycle. While being in that state of creativity it is a very nice high, so naturally I would like to be able to stay there.

Roger Korey asks two questions………
Why do you do what you do?

Terramce - Mostly because it’s who I am and I didn’t know any better when I got started. I know better now, but it’s too late because I like who I am.

and then Roger asks.....Why do it in Jay, NY, rather than New York, NY, where you are from if my memory is correct.

Terrance - Circumstances mostly. My folks built a retirement home up here and on vacations I came to love Jay. One of my first vacations up here was for a week by myself without a car, I took a bus up here and I just walked everywhere. I remember sitting on the rocks and drawing the covered bridge and a group gathered around and we had a real good time.

The Adirondacks just suit me, I’m comfortable in the woods. When I first vacationed up here I would sleep with an ax by my side. Now I can go into the most remote parts of the park all by myself, I look for that solitude now.

Beverly Quenville asks………
Nature has obviously been a large influence in the creation of many of your art pieces. What part of your surroundings do you find particularly inspiring?

Terrance - Everything has become stimulating and I’ve just come to this realization very recently too. An example: I was sitting on a rock, very still on top a mountain, viewing the world, feeling the breezes and the heat of the sun. The rock inspired me to be like it, to be laid bare to the elements and to know on the surface only the elements that it is exposed to. I concentrated my attention to those elements of weather and in the process I was able to feel the great essence of the rock. That experience inspired a poem and a drawing and I think that in time it will stimulate more out of me.

Jeff Fink asks….
In your interview of yourself you might consider asking yourself how you developed an interest in drumming, what started you drumming.

Terrance - Drumming was never meant to be for me, I believe. I fell into it by being curious of the remark a friend made to me. Karen said she loved her drum and it was the way it which it was said that made me very curious. So I asked if I could sit in on a lesson and I was drumming from that day on, two years ago.

I’m only beginning to feel the rhythm in me, and only seeing the possibilities of interpreting that feeling into my hands and into the drum.

Jim Slamon asks….
I'd like to know more about the ancient place you discovered- not the technical stuff, but how did you recognize the place as man-made, how did you feel as you 'uncovered' the site? Did you argue with yourself that it was only your imagination?

Terrance - Well…first of all my imagination and ego argue all the time. My imagination sees the possibility of a magical world where even gravity perhaps is taking a day off. If I can bring my consciousness up to a point where I have complete and total confidence, like in a lucid dream then I can accomplish discoveries, like the Ancient Adirondack Observatory. As I uncover ancient ruins and civilizations, I am also discovering the ancient parts of my being, like getting in touch with the ancient atoms that make me who I am.

Sue Ann asks….
What is the most important thing that you would like your friends and family to know and understand about you?

Terrance - I think family and friends already know that I cherish my time with them. I think that when you boil it all down, like breaking down a mathematical equation, that in the end the answer is family and friends.

Thanks to everyone who posed a question, I couldn't have completed this interview without you.