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Archive for September, 2020

I Am a Patriot

Posted in Current Events, Music, Quote, tagged , , , , on September 9, 2020| 5 Comments »

The notion that a radical is one who hates his country is naïve and usually idiotic. He is, more likely, one who likes his country more than the rest of us, and is thus more disturbed than the rest of us when he sees it debauched. He is not a bad citizen turning to crime; he is a good citizen driven to despair.

― H.L. Mencken

I have been trying to stay away from current events but seeing this morning that the Department of Justice is looking to take over the defense of the president in a defamation lawsuit brought against the president*** by a private citizen over an alleged rape that took place twenty years ago just raises my blood. The fact that we, the people, are now paying for his legal defense and any subsequent settlement for is beyond the pale.

It is just another mile marker on the road to authoritarianism.

Factor in what is happening under the rulers this thing in our white house so much admires and refuses to criticize, often even as they imperil our citizen soldiers. You have the kidnappings of opposition leaders in Belarus. The poisoning of opposition leader and Putin critic Alexei Navalny in Russia, which was, by the way, not the first such occasion under the Putin regime. And then there is the crazy number of Putin critics and journalists who “accidentally” fall from high rise windows or mysteriously get shot with sight of the Kremlin.

Not to mention the brutal killing and dismemberment of a US based journalist by the Saudi regime that he often coos about, an atrocity that is now barely a blip in a radar screen filled with atrocities.

That’s the world to which our creature in charge aspires. And 40% or so of our population thinks, or in the absence of thought, believes that this is just fine and dandy.

I can’t accept that.

I will not succumb to the dark world being forced upon us. Will not keep my mouth shut. Will not close my eyes to the wrongs being perpetrated. Will not turn my head away from the rampant corruption or the many injustices of this regime.

I won’t do it.

And the 40% of us that are his true believers view this as being unpatriotic.

Well, we obviously have different views on patriotism.

I am going to defer to Aristotle on this: “It is not always the same thing to be a good man and a good citizen.

If being a good citizen requires me to be less than a good man, then I will cease being a good citizen.

Sorry for the spew this morning. Here’s a song that says this much better than my angry words. It’s from way back in 1984 from Little Steven and the Disciples of Soul and his album Voice of America. You might know him better as Miami Steve Van Zandt from Springsteen’s E Street Band or as Silvio, Tony’s lieutenant and the owner of the Bada Bing Club on The Sopranos. Or from his Sirius radio channel Little Steven’s Underground Garage or from his Netflix series, Lilyhammer. He’s a busy, multifaceted guy.

And a patriot by my and Mencken’s definitions. Here’s his I Am a Patriot.

The painting at the top, The Way of the Brave,  is from quite a few years back. It’s a longtime favorite of mine and one that I used when I last played this song here back in 2009. It still fits the song.

Have a good day.

 

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Choose Well

Posted in Advice, Biographical, Current Events, Poetry, Quote, Video, tagged , , , , , , on September 8, 2020| 2 Comments »

“At times the whole world seems to be in conspiracy to importune you with emphatic trifles. Friend, client, child, sickness, fear, want, charity, all knock at once at thy closet door and say,—’Come out unto us.’ But keep thy state; come not into their confusion. The power men possess to annoy me I give them by a weak curiosity. No man can come near me but through my act.”

― Ralph Waldo Emerson, Essays of Ralph Waldo Emerson

In my Gallery Talk I spoke about the struggle to go inside myself to create in these crazy days. The outer world and its many problems seems to be keeping me from the inner. It’s a frustration that more or less paralyzes me, requiring me to go put in a lot of extra effort just to get down to work.

I am trying to reconcile this, to somehow get past this feeling.

I came across this snippet above from Emerson and it reminded me that I am the one letting the outer world in. Oh, I know you can’t keep it completely out but I was the one opening the door and inviting it in. I was the one who listened to it as it went on about its problems and thought I could somehow help it out, foolish as that idea seems when I write it out. I went, as Emerson writes, into their confusion.

It also reminds me that I get to choose how I respond to the outer world. And being paralyzed is not a choice. It’s a refusal to choose.

So, I choose to shed the paralysis, to get back to work, to explore those inner paths once more. It’s my choice and what I do.

We all have that power to choose how we react to our own forms of paralysis, fear, anger, frustration and so many other negative aspects of our world. Most likely you don’t need to hear this. You probably know this as well as I. But I know I sometimes fall out of rhythm and have to be reminded once in a while.

The painting at the top is from a few years back and lives now with me in the studio. It’s one of those pieces that really hit high notes personally for me right from the moment it took form on the easel. It’s one of those pieces that surprises me in that it hasn’t yet found a home but also please me because I get to live with it for a bit longer. I thought it echoed with the words of Emerson today. It originally echoed with the words from the Rudyard Kipling poem after which it is named, If.

I was going to include the poem here in print but here’s a fine reading of it by actor John Hurt complete with the words shown. And some powerful black and white images.

Have a good day and choose well.

 

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For Labor Day

Posted in Music, tagged , , , , on September 7, 2020| Leave a Comment »

I usually go on and on about the real meaning of Labor Day but I am tired today. Here’s a post from a couple of years ago about a favorite song concerning work, fittingly titled Work Song, of all things. Great tune. Have a good Labor Day and just try to at least give a little thought to what the holiday represents.

I call this painting Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, a title I used for a few paintings from my early Exiles series, in which this piece is included. I seldom show this piece and am not sure if it has ever appeared here. While I like this piece for a variety of reasons– for instance, I love the sky and hill colors– I never felt it was up to the same level as the other work in the Exiles series. I felt that it was more flawed than the others and too forced, not as organically formed as much of the other Exiles.

But every time I pull this piece out I feel a small sense of satisfaction in it and maybe that it needed to be aired out. I want to play a song today and thought this would be a good opportunity to let this little guy get out a bit. We’ll see.

The song is Work Song. It was written by the brother of jazz great Cannonball Adderley, who originally performed the song as an upbeat  jazz piece. But it has been interpreted by a number of artists over the years, some to great effect. Others, not so much to my taste. But one of my favorites is from one of my  guilty pleasures, Tennessee Ernie Ford.

He certainly doesn’t seem like a “cool” choice if you remember his public persona in the 50’s and 60’s as the goofily naive but affable hick from Bristol, Tennessee. I enjoyed that caricature as kid but it was his music that hooked me. He had a deep and mellow voice and a knack for choosing songs and arrangements that fit him perfectly. His series of country boogies were great and his 16 Tons is a classic. His version of this song is a great interpretation, spare and deep felt.

I couldn’t find a decent video of this song so here is the track alone:

Here’s another version that is a different interpretation from a band called The Big Beats with vocalist Arlin Harmon. I don’t have a lot of info on either though from what I can glean Harmon was a highly esteemed singer out in the Northwest. It’s a solid rocking performance with a different flavor than Tennessee Ernie’s. Give a listen.

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There Will Be a Reckoning

Posted in Current Events, Favorite Things, Music, tagged , , , , , , , , on September 6, 2020| Leave a Comment »

I don’t need to be forgiven
For something I haven’t done
Nor for wanting my family
To find their place in the sun
If you keep this pressure on
Just don’t be surprised
If I can’t summon up my dignity
While you’re roughing up my pride

There will be a reckoning
For the peddlers of hate
Who spread their poison all across this estate
And a reckoning, too, for the politicians who
Left us to this fate
There will be a reckoning

—Billy Bragg, There Will Be a Reckoning

Since we’re in the midst of another Labor Day weekend, albeit one certainly not in normal times, I was listening to some Billy Bragg, the British singer who has picked up the mantle of Woody Guthrie to become the voice for workers and the downtrodden. In fact, his Guthrie connection includes the fact that he provided most of the vocals for one of my favorites albums, Mermaid Avenue. It was a collaboration between Bragg and the group Wilco to set to music and record a group of unreleased Woody Guthrie songs that were just lyrics on paper.

The result was what I consider a brilliant album. But that’s one guy’s opinion.

I came across this song from Bragg that has been bouncing around for a while but seems to have relevance for these times. It’s called There Will Be a Reckoning. In different performances Bragg has talked about how since WWII and the defeat of the fascist forces that were threatening to overtake the planet, generations of politicians have neglected to honestly address the big issues that affect the majority of the population on this planet– financial inequality, social injustice and racism, food insecurity and adequate healthcare.

They usually just kick these concerns down the road in acts of expediency.

Expediency is often just another name for cowardice.

As a result, it has created a vacuum in which those with fascist tendencies and objectives can once again begin the rise to power through the division of the population through campaigns of fear and hatred. They see the neglected problems and, though they have no plan on ever correcting the deficits, use it as a prybar to separate the masses and set one group against the other.

And quite often they succeed. And fascism gains a strong toehold and takes power. And this leaves another generation to have someday fight to stop its spread.

Yeah, if it’s not stopped, there will definitely be a reckoning.

Here’s a live version of the song from several years ago. I am playing it to let you hear Bragg’s cockney accent and a few words on the song as he introduces it. The painting at the top is my A Time For Reckoning which is still at the West End Gallery and was part of my recent show there. I think it pairs well with this song and these times.

Have a good day.

 

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Ingersoll

Posted in Neat Stuff, Quote, tagged , , , on September 5, 2020| 9 Comments »

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Justice is the only worship.
Love is the only priest.
Ignorance is the only slavery.
Happiness is the only good.
The time to be happy is now,
The place to be happy is here,
The way to be happy is to make others so.
Wisdom is the science of happiness.

–Robert Green Ingersoll

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After writing yesterday about a person* with no honor whatsoever I thought I would write just a few words about a man with honor in abundance.

Most likely you don’t know his name, Robert G. Ingersoll. I know he was unknown to me. But while looking up a quote I kept coming across quotes from well known men who spoke of this man in what can only be described as glowing terms. Thomas Edison described him as being perhaps the closest thing to a perfect man on this earth. And Clarence Darrow eulogized him with these words: 

“Robert G. Ingersoll was a great man. a wonderful intellect, a great soul of matchless courage, one of the great men of the earth — and yet we have no right to bow down to his memory simply because he was great. Great orators, great soldiers, great lawyers, often use their gifts for a most unholy cause. We meet to pay a tribute of love and respect to Robert G. Ingersoll because he used his matchless power for the good of man.

And Walt Whitman said this of the living Ingersoll:

“It should not be surprising that I am drawn to Ingersoll, for he is ‘Leaves of Grass’ … He lives, embodies, the individuality, I preach. I see in Bob [Ingersoll] the noblest specimen—- American-flavored—- pure out of the soil, spreading, giving, demanding light.”

I found myself asking who the heck was this guy?

Robert Green Ingersoll (1833-1899) was perhaps the most famous American of his day. He was a lawyer who was recognized as the preeminent orator of his time. As an enlightened freethinker and pioneer of humane, rational, and agnostic views, Ingersoll was a tireless advocate of rational thought, battling superstition and hypocrisy wherever he found it. Ingersoll would regularly address huge audiences, opening their minds to ideas that often provoked guarded whispers in private. He was a man far ahead of his time, advocating such progressive causes as agnosticism, birth control, voting rights for women, the advancement of science, civil rights, and freedom of speech. He had a wide influence in his day but somehow has been overlooked in the century or so that has passed since his death in 1899.

Ingersoll was born in 1833 not too far from here, up in Dresden, near the west shore of Seneca Lake. I just discovered that there is actually a small museum there dedicated to his life and work. I look forward to visiting it at some point. He only lived there as an infant because his father, an abolitionist preacher, was often on the move. However, a collection of his works published just after his death is called the Dresden Editions, published by the Dresden Publishing Company which was formed to publish this 12 volume set and was named specifically  after his birthplace.

I am still discovering more on this interesting fellow so I am going to urge you to do so as well on your own. I would think that someone who garnered so much openly warm praise from the great men of his time deserves a few moments and has something to offer us now.

Note:

I thought his words at the top were an appropriate response to the ignorance and abhorrent behavior we have been exposed to on a daily basis for the past four years. Also, Ingersoll was a Colonel in the Union army during the Civil War and is buried at Arlington National Cememtery, not far from the Tomb of the Unknowns.

He was captured during the war which I guess, by current standards, makes him a sucker for enlisting and a loser for being captured.

However, even though Ingersoll might be considered a sucker and a loser, I sincerely doubt that the current occupant of our white house will have any of the greats of this age, save Kid Rock and Scott Baio, trumpeting his good works, his love for humanity or his good heart once he is stone cold and forever dead.

 

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Saps, Suckers and Losers

Posted in Current Events, Opinion, tagged , on September 4, 2020| 3 Comments »

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“On Memorial Day 2017, Trump visited Arlington National Cemetery, a short drive from the White House. He was accompanied on this visit by John Kelly, who was then the secretary of homeland security, and who would, a short time later, be named the White House chief of staff. The two men were set to visit Section 60, the 14-acre area of the cemetery that is the burial ground for those killed in America’s most recent wars. Kelly’s son Robert is buried in Section 60. A first lieutenant in the Marine Corps, Robert Kelly was killed in 2010 in Afghanistan. He was 29. Trump was meant, on this visit, to join John Kelly in paying respects at his son’s grave, and to comfort the families of other fallen service members. But according to sources with knowledge of this visit, Trump, while standing by Robert Kelly’s grave, turned directly to his father and said, “I don’t get it. What was in it for them?”

— Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic, 3 September 2020

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There is a new article in The Atlantic from Jeffrey Goldberg that carries the heading Trump: Americans Who Died in War Are ‘Losers’ and ‘Suckers’ that I urge you to read. It details a host of incidents over the last several years under our current president*** where this creature displayed a total lack of respect for the service and sacrifice of those who have seen duty in our military forces. The reports in this article have been subsequently corroborated and verified by multiple news agencies and their sources.

Without going into all of the details of the article here– again, please read it for yourself– he calls those American troops who were killed overseas and are buried in the military cemeteries in those places ‘losers‘ and ‘suckers.’

It aligns pretty much with his words for the late John McCain who he claimed wasn’t a war hero because he was captured.

There was another incident during talks concerning a potential military parade, one of his fixations, where he asked that the parade not include wounded veterans, particularly amputees, saying, “ Nobody wants to see that.”

This man sees everything as being transactional. You only do something for something in return. The idea of doing anything out of a sense of duty or honor is a foreign concept to this creature. After meeting one high ranking general, he is said to have remarked to aides that this general was a very smart guy and wondered why a guy with that kind of smarts went into the military. To him, if you have the ability to enrich yourself, sacrificing that ability in order to act in service to others is a sucker move.

I was watching The Godfather 2 not too long ago, having not seen it for a number of years. There a scene near the end, a  flashback to most of the members of the Corleone family along with the family attorney (Robert Duvall as Tom Hagen here but think of Michael Cohen, okay?) sitting around the dinner table before a birthday party for patriarch Don Corleone. Future boss Michael ( Al Pacino) reveals that he has enlisted in the Marines in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor.

The responses from his brother, Sonny, and Hagen were illuminating. People who do something for strangers were ‘saps.’

You only do for yourself and family.

Sound familiar? It has been said that this president*** operates in much this same way as a mob family, right down to the attitude that you only help those who can help you in some way. The others are all saps and suckers and losers.

You might ask why this matters. It is important because it shows that he sees everything around him in terms of how it serves him. The military and its veterans are seen as props and pawns to be used. I believe that if he had to sacrifice dozens or hundreds or even thousands of troops in an action that would help him stay in power.

And this extends to law enforcement, as well. He sees cops as a tool to be employed on his behalf. And even then, he only sees cops who are willing to compromise their oath or break the very laws they are charged to enforce as being capable of helping him. A good cop, someone who entered a dangerous field with relatively little financial return, would fall under the category of sap or sucker. Or even loser if they were to call out the bad cops among them.

You may not care.

You may not give a shit ( excuse me for my plain language here) about his constant lies and deceptions. Or maybe you don’t give a crow’s fart for his total refusal to accept any responsibility whatsoever for the citizens that he is supposed to represent during a worldwide pandemic. You may not give a tinker’s damn for the 190,000 dead from covid19 and find these numbers, no matter how high they climb, somehow ‘acceptable.’ You may not care about the damage being done to our future economies by his fiscal policies. You may not care about weakened position in the world, one that makes the world much more dangerous for all.

You just might not care. You got your stupid red hats and your confederate flags and Fox News. And your own beliefs, however misguided and misinformed they might be.

But make no mistake about it, this creature is the ultimate looter and he’ll burn down this whole shitshow to stay in power and to keep from ever being held accountable. If you or me or a million other saps, suckers, and losers have to die, it won’t bother him one damn bit.

And unless enough of us stand up now and vote him out in numbers too large to be disputed, I believe that is exactly what he will do.

So check your voter registration. Vote early.

And vote like your life depends on it because this might be the one time in our lives when that is actually true.

In the meantime, read the article in The Atlantic. And, here’s that scene from The Godfather 2. See if it sounds familiar to you, as well.

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Wow!!

Posted in Event, Music, tagged , , , , on September 3, 2020| 5 Comments »

I was sent an email by a friend after last weekend’s gallery talk in which he gave some advice on improving future virtual talks. Most were very helpful and are under serious consideration if the need arises to do another such event in the future. However, it was a suggestion at the end of his email that came with an attached video that made my day and made me laugh very hard.

You see, in the run-up to the gallery talk, I had jokingly stated that I was practicing an acrobatic entrance complete with backflips and two twists with a stuck landing at the end. He said that he was disappointed that this part of the talk had not came about and suggested that if I had any song & dance skills or any other variety show talents, that I put them on display at the next talk.

He was, of course, kidding.

Gosh, I hope he was kidding.

The idea of me doing anything like that in front of a crowd of people made me laugh. It takes everything I have to simply stand stiffly up in front of people and move my lips so that words form.

But I laughed even harder when I watched the video he had enclosed.

It’s a performance of a song called Wow!! from a 1950’s group called The Goofers. It’s from a 1957 movie titled Bop Girl Goes Calypso, also known simply as Bop Girl, which I understand has become a sort of cult classic. I am not going to describe their act here. You can witness it for yourself.

But, sadly, I doubt that you will see any of their act migrate into my talks. Though it might be worth one try.

I didn’t know anything about The Goofers and there’s not a ton of info out there about them. Before setting out on their own, they were part of the band of tone of the greatest live performers, Louis Prima, in his prime years when he was performing with Keely Smith. If you have ever seen clips of Louis Prima, showman extraordinaire, you will understand where they got their ability to produce that wow!! factor.

Take a look for yourself. And next year, the whole gallery talk will be done on a trapeze.

Or a pogo stick. The Goofers also performed on pogo sticks but I can’t locate video of that.

Anyway, here’s Wow!! Now, have a good day.

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Oh, The Places You’ll Go: GC 마이어스 Video Edition

Posted in Advice, Music, Video, tagged , , , , , on September 2, 2020| Leave a Comment »

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I was checking YouTube yesterday to see if the videos from last week’s Virtual Gallery Talk from the West End Gallery were being viewed. As I came to my page I saw a strange looking entry among my suggested videos. It was my name as a title appearing to overlay what I could see was my work underneath.

There was lettering above my name that appeared to me to be Korean. Clicking on it, I saw that it was a compilation of my work set to three pieces of music with photos of me along with what appeared to be biographical info, all gleaned from the internet.

It’s a strange sensation to see your work in this way, compiled and used by someone else. I am sure there are those of you out there who feel I should be upset over the unauthorized use of my imagery in this way and maybe you’re right. But I knew that once I began putting my work online as I do, it would possibly be subject to this sort of thing. I felt it was worth the risk in order to get my work out there.

I sometimes at gallery talks tell the story of the great photographer Brassai asking his best known subject and friend Pablo Picasso for advice on selling some drawings he had created. For how much should he sell them, for example. Picasso, who liked the Brassai drawings, told him to put a very low price on them because he needed them to get out into the world where they could be known and be seen. Where they could establish a name and achieve a noteworthiness that might one day make all his work valuable. Picasso claimed that had been his route.

It’s advice I still give young artists.

And that’s how I view this– a result of putting my work out into the world.

Actually, I am happy and flattered that my work has reached across the world and translates well into other cultures. You go into this hoping your work speaks to all people and to get a small bit of proof that it might doing that is gratifying.

There are worst things in this world.

Take a look, if you so desire. I could do without the photos of myself but I like the musical accompaniment’s different moods. Have a good day.

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A Year of Augusts

Posted in Biographical, Opinion, Quote, tagged , , on September 1, 2020| 4 Comments »

pablopicassoskeleton******************

Your willingness to wrestle with your demons

will cause your angels to sing.

—August Wilson

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Aah, September 1, 2020.

In most years, this would be a day where I begin to feel some sort of relief from the grim cruelty of August, my least favorite month. That is putting it mildly because, truth be known, I hate August. It’s something I’ve written about before here on the blog, as seen in the enclosed posts below. It seems to seep out every five years and since its last appearance there have been several more other awful Augusts to further make my case against it.

The funny thing is that this year I wasn’t even cognizant of my deep hatred for August. Oh, it was as difficult and stressful as all Augusts are for me. Instead, I realized that my recognition of it was hampered by the fact that this entire year has been comprised of Augusts. Every month has been filled with the same sort of tension and uncertainty that normally mark Augusts for me.

March was an August, April was an August and so on.

So, though we have passed the threshold into September, I don’t feel the same sort of relief it might bring in a normal year. This is obviously no normal year. It might say September on the calendar, but this year it’s just another goddamn August.

Man, what I would give for a year with one August. Or better yet, none.

From August 12, 2015:

As the post below from back in August of 2010 points out, most years I struggle with the month of August and this particular one is no different.  The doldrums set in and I am filled with an anxiety and a stifling restlessness that combine to create a sense of desperation within me. If I hadn’t experienced this before, this feeling would seem unbearable.

But it’s not something new so I realize that it’s just a matter of hanging on and letting it pass, all the while trying to pull something from it that will show itself in my work. I have found that such keen desperation is often the source of great work, much as playwright August Wilson —a fitting first name!— points out so eloquently in the quote above. So, while I find myself fighting through the cruel days and demons of August, I do so as I listen for the song of angels to begin.

And from experience, I know they will begin soon enough. Sing, angels, sing!

From August 18, 2010:

This print from Picasso [ Above] very much sums up my feelings for the month of August. 

I have never been a fan of August. Memories of the so-called dog days of summer spent as a child. Hot from a relentless sun. Bored. Burnt grass crunching underfoot. The coming school year hanging overhead like the sword of Damocles.

August has always had a faint aura of death around it for me. I remember the death of my grandfather in ’68. My beloved dog Maggie years later. Several friends over the years, from a variety of causes. Elvis. The bright glare of the August sun seeming to taunt the grief of the moment.

August.

We were watching something on television the other night, perhaps Mad Men– I can’t really remember. Anyway, the character in the scene that was on said, “I hate August.” 

It made my ears prick up and I couldn’t help but mutter, “I’m with you there, brother.”

August.

Well, I’ve got a lot to do this August  morning. It takes a lot of work to keep busy to ward off the cruelty of  August…

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