BASEBALL

The game of baseball has been aptly termed "The Great National Pastime" of the USA. It's a marvelous, colorful athletic event. Ideally, it's played outdoors in the splendid sunshine on a verdant manicured grass field, sculpted with symmetrical diamond shaped base paths. Most Americans know and enjoy the game, either as baseball players or spectators. It's played professionally and on many amateur levels from pre-school through retirement age. Yet, baseball encompasses so much more than the great game itself. It conjures up warm memories of childhood and youth, beloved friends and family, idyllic days, beautiful ballparks, diamond legends and heroic feats experienced as a player or spectator which are timeless and embedded in the mind and heart. According to many sages, to understand the game of baseball is to understand the people of the USA, their way of life and mode of thinking. Although it's a team sport, it often focuses upon the skills of one particular player during each play. It has no time limitations. The game doesn't end until the final batter, usually the 27th, is declared "out". Its object is for one team to outscore the opponent in a non-violent contest, by skill, savvy and at times luck. It is a statistician's heaven and has a folkloric history. It is pure Americana. It allows the young among us to revel in their youth and us older folks to rekindle our youth with memories of past games and those dear to us. It's a majestic bridge from our present back in time to our past. LONG LIVE THE GAME OF BASEBALL....

The above copy is courtesy of "Baseball Album", 48" x 68" oil on canvas painting by GARY ERBE, Collection of the Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio.

To review this great contemporary American artist's work, please go to http://www.garyerbe.com/