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Archive for December, 2010

Ramshackle Review

Posted in Neat Stuff, tagged , on December 10, 2010| 1 Comment »

Mark Reep, who I’ve featured here before,  is a truly gifted artist, one who toils in the world of black and white art producing stunning imagined landscapes from graphite and ink.  His work, always moody and thought-provoking, is filled with thousands of marks upon the surface  and takes a lot of time to produce. I repeat- a lot of time.

Yet, despite this drain on his time and energy, Mark  somehow finds time to edit an online literary and arts journal, Ramshackle Review, which premiered this past September.  It was started as a showcase for literary and artistic work to run alongside comments from the creators about the process used.  There is an interesting interview with Mark in the Start Up section of Zine-Scene where he describes the evolution of the journal and his goals for it.

In the first two editions there is a wealth of poetry and prose from accomplished writers from all points as well as intriguing artwork from extremely talented artists.  Interspersed are short interviews that Mark has with the creators.  I’ve spent some time going through and plan to head back in later to spend a bit more.  Interesting stuff.

Kudos to you, Mark.  Well done. 

Good luck!

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I Hope He’s a Doctor

Posted in Early Paintings, Neat Stuff, tagged , , on December 9, 2010| 2 Comments »

I saw this the other day on one of my favorite blogs,  American Folk Art @ Cooperstown, which serves up great American folk art and the stories behind it on a regular basis.   Paul D’Ambrosio, who writes this blog and is an authority on folk art, featured this wonderful protrait from the early 1800’s, probably from eastern New York state where the painter  Ammi Phillips plied his trade. 

Having your portrait painted at that time was the only way that one’s image might ever be recorded and therefore took on a great importance, the sitter wanting to give a full accounting of who they were.  It was not unusual to display evidence of your trade, to show the tools that enabled the sitter to afford the luxury of such a painting.  But I doubt that many went quite as far as this man.

He is obviously a doctor.  Well, at least I hope he’s a doctor because I really wouldn’t be comfortable if I were the man whose eye is being held open if he were, say, a carpenter.  This appears to be a doctor about to perform cataract surgery.  You wouldn’t think so but this surgery, in different forms, has been around since well before the time of Christ, as early as the  6th century BC.  It’s one of those things thqat makes me very thankful for the time in which I live, for all its flaws.

It’s a  portrait that makes you wonder about the lives of the people in it, which I think  makes it a great portrait.  It has an oddball quality as well that transcends mere portraiture.  Just a wonderful and strange piece of Americana.  If you wish to know more about the world of American folk art, check in at the American Folk Art blog.  It is a treasure chest of information and stories,

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Hard to Believe

Posted in Favorite Things, Video, tagged on December 8, 2010| 4 Comments »

It’s hard to believe it’s been thirty years since John Lennon was shot outside his home at the Dakota in Manhattan.  Amazing how time has fled and we remember Lennon as a still vibrant artist at age 40 rather than as a 70 year old, as he would be today.   It still seems shocking even after all these years.  I remember hearing of his shooting first from the lips of Howard Cosell as I watched Monday Night Football.  It was before the time of instant information, before the days of the internet and 24/7 news coverage, so you couldn’t simply flip to CNN and catch on the spot information.  All you had was Howard Cosell, who fortunately , being a very astute newsman, understood the gravity of the news he delivered.

Strange days, indeed.

I always carry the memory of John Lennon in his earlier incarnation as a Beatle, when he shared the mic with Paul as frontmen and was the wiseass with a quick comeback in  A Hard Day’s Night, which stands as a very fine film today.  It’s hard to get across to a younger generation  how vast the influence and reach of the Beatles was in the 60’s.  Early on, my sister was a big Beatles fan and had a copy of his book of scrawlings and verse, In His Own Write.  I loved to flip through the pages of this book, taking in his rough drawings and witty little ditties.  I wonder what became of that book?

So thirty years have come and gone since Lennon came and went and we’re left with a treasure trove of music that lives on.  I wanted to show a video and had a lot to choose from.  I first thought of Power to the People, a song which I can still hear in my memory coming from a tinny transistor radio speaker.  Or one of the songs from his final LP, such as Nobody Told Me.  But I settled on Instant Karma.  Maybe it was its chorus of “we all shine on… ”  that attracted me.  Seemed fitting.  Shine on, John.

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Trio

Posted in Early Paintings, Favorite Things on December 7, 2010| 4 Comments »

This piece hangs in a back bedroom in my studio that acts as a storage space of sorts.  It was done back in 2002 and has long been one my favorites.  A tryptych consisting of three 5″ squares in individual windows, it’s been shown a number of times in galleries but has never found a home, which is fine by me.  This is one of those examples where I find something more in a piece than the outside viewer.

I don’t know what it is in this piece that does whatever it does for me.  Perhaps it’s the harmony in the way the colors play together, creating a palpable vibration, which is what I immediately think of when I look at this work.  A vibration– something else I can’t fully explain.

I guess that’s what I like about this piece- the sense of satisfaction that it gives me with  no need for explanation.  It induces a primal reaction in me that goes beyond the need for words and explanation.

That being said, I will now shut up.

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Some Things Just Keep Coming Back

Posted in Current Events, Opinion, tagged on December 6, 2010| 5 Comments »

Saw an article yesterday that stated that incidents of book burning are on the rise here and abroad, in part due to the effective networking online by the moral storm troopers whose sworn duty is to protect us from our own wayward thoughts.   I felt very queasy after reading this, a deflated sort of feeling. Like, here we go again.

Book burnings  and thought supression have never been a sign of good things to come, have always been the tools of dictators and fascists.  One of the most famous was the burning of books in Berlin in 1933 at the Bebelplatz, a public square where Nazi brownshirts destroyed over 25000 volumes that they felt were antithetical to the German and Nazi causes.  That was a dark omen of things to comes.  On that site there is now a memorial to that event with the words of German poet Heinrich Heine inscribed on a marker.  The books of Heine were among those destroyed and he ominously foretold of the results of the event with his words written over a hundred years before:

“the burning was just a prologue: where they burn books, they ultimately burn people.”

So understand my unease at the news that book burners are back and ready to go into action. 

 It seems so ridiculous and so counterproductive to the movements who stage these events.  Book burning is a trait of the weak and fearful.   Burning a book says that you are afraid of the whatever is in that book and don’t feel confident enough in your own beliefs and morals, or those of your children,  to simply counter the claims with tolerance and logic.  Demonstrate your moral superiority and the strength of your own character by publicly pointing out the flaws and mistruths of the literature in an open forum rather than simply yelling that it is obscene and setting it ablaze.  If you can’t counter the books with logic and truth then perhaps you must look at your own thoughts and motives with a bit more care.

Just put down the goddamn gasoline and matches.

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At Least Their Sundays Are Free

Posted in Neat Stuff, Video, tagged , on December 5, 2010| 1 Comment »

I really don’t have much to say about atheists or anyone’s religious beliefs or non-beliefs.  I see it as a strictly personal choice and whatever works for them to get through their days, so long as it doesn’t impinge on my own beliefs or freedoms, is fine with me.  Actually, if you really think about it, there haven’t been that many wars fought or peoples repressed purely in the name of atheism.  That being said,  I’m only using them as a device for showing a clip of a very clever and funny song that I saw on  another well done and interesting  blogsite, Touch2Touch.  The clip is from Steve Martin, the one time stand-up comic who wears many hats as an actor, writer, playwright, banjo player and world class art collector, possessing one of the finest and most celebrated collections of modern art anywhere.  He’s obviously very talented and smart, to boot.

Martin noticed that all the religions of the world have a rich treasure trove of music and art that celebrate their faiths but also noticed that atheism is sadly lacking.  Therefore, he came up with the first atheist hymn.  Here he is, backed by the Steep Canyon Rangers, singing Atheists Don’t Have No Songs.  The cartoon above is from the always smart and  syndicated Speedbump.

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Night Sleeper

Posted in Favorite Things, Influences, tagged , on December 4, 2010| 2 Comments »

I recently picked up a book, Andrew Wyeth: Autobiography, which is not really an autobiography but features over 130 of his pieces throughout his career along with short descriptions about them by the artist.  It’s quite a striking collection of images especially if you’re attracted to the Wyeth palette of  earthy browns and greys, as I am.

I have many favorites here  but perhaps the one I like best is this piece, Night Sleeper.  There’s a lot here to look at yet it maintains a quiet and  contemplative stillness that one associates with Wyeth’s work.  The two windows provide two separate examples of landscapes, the moonlit mill in one and the dam and millstream in the other,  that could be great paintings on their own.

  It’s all held together and anchored by the tee of the interior windows and the sleeping dog, an image I’m really drawn to.  There’s something about the posture and comfort that dogs adopt when sleeping that I find interesting, something that plays on a sense of reciprocity that I have with dogs, one where they watch out for me when they are  awake and I watch out for them when they are asleep.  Their sleep indicates a deep trust and a sense of security.

But the bit of this painting that makes the whole thing sing for me is the pale blue striping on the pillow or bag or whatever it is that the dog rests against.  That bit of color adds a whole layer of depth that would not be there otherwise and creates a beautiful harmony, echoing the moonlight that plays on the window frame on the right.  For me, it immediately brings to mind Henri Rousseau’s Sleeping Gypsy and its whole feeling.  They are very different paintings in many obvious ways but there is a ribbon of feeling that runs between them, in my mind at least.  I think this immediate visceral association adds a layer of appreciation of this painting for myself.  That little blue striping adds all the warmth of the Rousseau painting to my sense of this Wyeth painting.

In short, I think this painting is a peach.

Have a great Saturday.

Well,

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Getting Ready For the New

Posted in Early Paintings, Recent Paintings, Technique/History, tagged on December 3, 2010| 3 Comments »

Now that we’re in December, I’m beginning to tie up the year’s work.  I’m tryiong to finish up a few obligations such as a couple of smaller commissioned pieces befor ebeginning to gear up for the coming new year.  I ‘ve been mulling over going ahead with some concepts that I’ve been pushing aside for years now and I’m getting pretty anxious to get at them. 

I have plans to doing a few larger paintings, including a couple that are very large.  I am also working on a series that relates to the Exiles series that I did back in the mid-1990’s, such as the piece shown here.  The newer pieces will not emulate this work as they were surely emotional products of that time in my life and, as such, cannot be simply replicated.  At least, I can’t do that.  So they will emerge with a different look and probably a different feel, which is exciting in itself.  One idea involves a large assemblage of small paintings in this theme.  I will reveal more as the work comes about.

This period of getting ready for the upcoming year is always exciting, for the most part.  I have had years where I struggled early on to find something to move me ahead, something that lit the fires under me.  Inevitably, the ignition came but it feels much better to start the year with a fire already ablaze.

There are also a couple of other things in the works that I will announce in the new few months that I am pretty excited about.  Hopefully, they will turn out as well as I hope.

And if not, we’ll make it work…

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In a Perfect World…

Posted in Recent Paintings, Technique/History, tagged on December 2, 2010| 1 Comment »

I recently finished a commissioned piece for a couple in NYC.  It was a little different and offered more challenges than many of my requested pieces. 

First,  it was a larger version of a smaller existing painting, Destination, which was a 12″ by 36″ canvas.  The requested piece is a 24″ by 54″ canvas.  So, while it is larger, it also has has a different ratio of height to width than the smaller painting, meaning it is less panoramic and changes the relationships of  all the elements in the painting to one another.

The second problem was that the original piece was painted in what I have referred to here as my reductive style.  It is a process that I use that places a lot of wet, liquid paint on a horizontal canvas (or paper) and takes away paint with brushes or rags until I have achieved the color and intensity I’m seeking.  I use transparent paints which allows the gessoed surface underneath to glow through.  

The other way I paint is an additive process.  By that I mean that paint is simply built up from the surface by adding stroke after stroke of paint, usually going from darker tones on the surface to lighter tones.  It is a more traditional method of painting.  My work tends to have a bit less refined appearance when I paint in this way as a result of generally using larger brushes and allowing the skies in my landscapes to be unblended color comprised of individual brushstrokes.  I also usually start these paintings with a layer of black paint over my normal gessoed surface.  This was the method that was requested for this new piece.

So, the request was for this smaller, more panoramic painting to be translated into a larger, somewhat boxier piece painted in a different method.  At first, I was skeptical that it could be achieved to either my satisfaction or their’s.  After a short bit of consternation, I decided to simply jump in and keep some of the elements the same and try to carry the tone of the colors through but let the painting take its own course.   I changed other elements and colors as I felt were needed in the context of the new painting.  For instance, the trees in the foreground are thinner and more expressive, as well as lighter in color.   I ended up with a piece that carries the influence of the original yet has become something of its own, complete with a different feel and attitude.  Just what I had hoped for when I started.  I was very pleased and, fortunately,  the folks who requested the painting were very happy as well. 

Here are how the two compare, when placed together in relative size.

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Don’t Forget Me

Posted in Favorite Things, Video, tagged , , , on December 1, 2010| Leave a Comment »

I’m on the road today, taking a group of work to the Principle Gallery in Alexandria.  So, I thought I’d play a song that ties together several different elements.  It’s a song that I referenced in yesterday’s post on Harry Nilsson, Don’t Forget Me.  It’s performed by one of my favorites, Neko Case, who has been featured here a number of times.  She covers this song on her most recent album but this is from Elvis Costello’s Spectacle television series.  She also hails from Alexandria.

So, give a listen and, like the songs says in such a wistful way, come on, get happy…

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