July 14, 2004 interview with artist, Christy Henspetter, questioned by Steven Pressfield. Steven is the author of "The Legend of Bagger Vance" and "Gates of Fire" and a personal friend.

SP:	Who is your favorite oil painter?
CH:	I like so many painters: some for their vision and contribution to Art, and others for their technical abilities. My favorites, I suppose, reach me deeply because of their brave and exposed hearts. Examples that come to mind are: Vermeer, Matisse, Monet, Van Gogh, Bonnard, Kahn and Schiele. Right now I am mesmerized by Bonnard’s sense of light and composition.
SP:	I have heard you use the phrase “God-energy" when talking about wild animals, as a quality that they possess. Could you expound on that a little, specifically in its connection to painting? Can an inanimate landscape have God-energy?
CH:	Hmm. I consider some places to be magical, like the South of France, my grandparent’s farm in Oregon, the Pacific Ocean and the barrancas above Santa Fe, but having God-energy, I’m sure they must, but the concept for me relates to sentience. The eye of a hawk in flight when it meets your own is connection. You are in its memory, as it is in yours.
SP:	Most of your work is in watercolor, isn’t it? What’s the difference for a painter, between that and other mediums? Do you prefer it and why?
CH:	I began to speak the language of watercolor with just a brush, a piece of paper and some pigment over 40 years ago, using color and brushstroke without word-based thought. So it is a very comfortable place for me to go. On 9/11 I grabbed my watercolors. There are very different qualities to each medium. Oil is so luscious and textural. It is considered the master medium, and I love it, as well.
SP:	You went to college in France and you speak French almost as well as I do. I know you’ve spent quite a lot of time in the South of France, particularly around Arles, where Van Gogh used to live and paint. What draws you to that region? Is it fun, painting there? Can you talk about that experience a little?
CH:	France is the most beautiful country per square mile that I know. And when you study the French language and its literature for a dozen years+ it can take hold. I find the French lifestyle more geared to the senses, and that suits me. I vacate my American-self there. And the light in Provence is as exquisite as it is in Santa Fe. One day I hope to live there.
SP:	How do you feel about this quote: Art will never come, except from disregarded corner, where an isolated man is studying the mysteries of Nature?
CH:	True art does come from the depths of the artist, and you don’t get there without a lot of quiet and soul searching.
SP:	Another comment for your reaction: We can rely on nature to provide the solutions to most of the problems we face, grounding the world and ourselves in the present.
CH:	That sounds Native American. But it’s complex isn’t it? We are so technically and left-brainoriented, so removed from Nature. The landscape as a metaphor, is remote from our understanding. We miss the overall perspective of what life is and can be .We have lost our sense of landscape. I stay grounded by an incessant observation of nature. Natural rhythms inform me and therefore my work .
SP:	How does careful observation and study of nature unlock the secrets of painting?
CH:	Nature is the best of the planet. Perfection comes to mind, but not as one normally thinks of it in terms of symmetry and such. I am amazed at how environment participates with the individual organism to mottle it or bend it. The strangeness of creatures and plants, adapting to external forces is Life itself. Whether they’ve unlocked painting secrets for me I don’t know. They have enriched my experience.
SP:	What are your favorite themes or subject matter?
CH:	I have been painting fish for most of my life. I adore water and it is so unfathomable how fish breathe and exist in liquid. Water environments bring up the womb and the primordial soup.The origins of life. I continue to paint plants and animals, of course. Especially exotic species. I paint landscapes and architecture that speaks of its place. You know, adobes in Santa Fe, stone facades in France. I enjoy a portrait from time to time. And nothing beats sunlight.
SP:	Do you think that by working carefully and meticulously you are able to better capture what is essential?
CH:	Sometimes yes. It would be a pre-painting consideration. How do I best achieve the essential, as you say. Sometimes it is valid to give the viewer all the information, other times it is better to suggest; to play loose and get the viewer more involved.
SP:	Have you ever expressed maximum content with minimum brushstrokes?
CH:	Sure. This approach is the basis of most modern and post-modern painting, but it harkens back to painting as a meditation, as in Sumi brush painting.
SP:	When painting a subject have you ever tried to look at your subject without any point of focus?
CH:	Sometimes if you just go, the painting just shows up for you. There is a leap of faith in creativity. •••