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Archive for the ‘Video’ Category

Hot Licks

Posted in Neat Stuff, Video, tagged , , on March 5, 2010| Leave a Comment »

I was thinking of Dan Hicks and His Hot Licks the other day.  I’ve got a couple of  his albums from the early 70’s and periodically some of his songs pop into my mind.  It’s hard to categorize his music but their was always an eccentricity factor with it.  He’s been around for something like 40 years or more but probably achieved his greatest success with his early work and his appearances on popular TV variety shows of the time. 

 One such appearance was on The Flip Wilson Show in 1972 which I’m showing here.  I was going to show only this clip, given that it’s such a great snapshot of that time in popular culture,  but I thought it would be interesting to also show him a few years later to show the evolution.  Somewhat.

Anyway, here are a couple of Dan Hicks’ songs for your consideration.  The first is from 1972

The second is from around 1990 from the short-lived late night show Night Music with David Sanborn…

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Van Gogh Self-Portraits

Posted in Neat Stuff, Video, tagged , on March 1, 2010| 4 Comments »

Last year I featured a video called Women In Art that featured portraits of women from over the past 500 years morphing one into another.  It was a really well done piece of work from Phillip Scott Johnson and was a YouTube sensation, having more than 10 million hits.  He has also given the self-portraits of Vincent Van Gogh the same treatment.

It’s a short piece and it’s interesting to see how the familiar views of Van Gogh relate to one another and how his appearance or, at least,  his perception of it, changed through the years.   His state of mind is evident in each piece, with some showing a vibrant, seemingly healthy man and others showing the more tortured Van Gogh that we have come to know.

It’s an interesting little piece, coming in at under a minute.  Give a look…

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Mohammed’s Radio

Posted in Favorite Things, Technique/History, Video, tagged on February 24, 2010| Leave a Comment »

I’m in the middle of a piece at this moment so I’m going to be brief this morning.  Actually, I’m at two different points in two different paintings and am pretty eager to get to them.  Sometimes it’s difficult for me to go back and forth between pieces.  My focus sometimes gets broken in the transition from one to the other and both pieces suffer.  But this time there seems to be a seamless shift between the works and I’m actually taking energy from one piece and plugging it into the next. 

Wish I had four arms.  And eyes that worked independent of one another like some tropical fish looking for moray eels…

My selection for this winter Wednesday is from the late Warren Zevon, a wonderfully talented songwriter/performer best known for his Werewolves of London.  Actually, it sort of yoked him and overshadowed his abilities as a composer of unique and often beautiful songs.  Here’s one of my favorites, Mohammed’s Radio,  from way back in the day.  1976, I think.  Give a listen…

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Thunder on the Mountain

Posted in Technique/History, Video, tagged on February 20, 2010| Leave a Comment »

It’s a Saturday morning and I feel like I’m starting slowly to reach a rhythm with my recent painting where it’s just coming easily, not feeling forced.  This rhythm, this feeling lets me know I’m going in a direction that is desirable to me.  It’s a feeling that, like many things, that is hard to put in definable or measurable terms. 

It’s just a feeling.

For me, when the everpresent knot in my stomach fades away as I’m working I know I’m in the vicinity.  It used to bother me when the knot would return and I seemed a bit out of rhythm in my work, as though it might never return.  But through the years I have come to know that by simply pushing forward, working hard to the point that all the extraneous distractions melt away, this rhythm will return.  In fact, it never leaves.  It just gets pushed aside at times.

Anyway, let’s have a little music on this fine Saturday.  Here’s Bob Dylan’s Thunder on the Mountain.  Enjoy…

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Perfect Day

Posted in Favorite Things, Video, tagged , on February 15, 2010| 2 Comments »

I don’t normally like to put posts with music in them too close to one another but while watching the Winer Olympics I keep seeing an ad with Lou Reed‘s Perfect Day carrying the message.  I can’t even remember what the ad is for but I always stop when it comes on to hear Lou.

It’s a funny thing how the world has come around.  When I was listening to Lou Reed many ages ago, the idea that his songs would be used as the motor for commerce seemed totally inconceivable.  His songs were not pretty.  His songs were not sentimental in the way we normally see sentiment.  They were about seamy people on the grubby side of town.

And Lou was not a pretty voice.  His plaintive flat tones lent a matter-of-fact feel to his lyrics of drug use, sexual ambiguity and street-smart losers.  Not the stuff of your normal pitchman.

I remember a Christmas when my brother gave me the album Rock N Roll Animal and all Christmas Eve and most of the next Christmas day my stereo was blasting Sweet Jane and Heroin through the house.  Not exactly holiday cheer but when you’re young and pretty much stupid, you don’t fully appreciate the occasion.

But time passes and the mainstream shifts, and what was once verboten now is the stuff of TV ads and supermarket background music.

I don’t know if there’s a point here.  I just wanted to play Perfect Day for you.  Have one yourself…

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Pullin’ Back the Reins

Posted in Current Events, Favorite Things, Video, tagged , , , on February 13, 2010| 2 Comments »

They held the opening ceremonies for the 2010 Winter Olympics last night in Vancouver.  As usual, it was a great bit of spectacle.  There was only one visible glitch although it occured at the most critically symbolic moment.  As the torchbearers, including Wayne Gretzky, waited nervously for the Olympic cauldron to rise from the arena floor one of the four large supports that were supposed to rise balked.  Nothing happened.  Finally, after an awkward pause, the ceremony went ahead with just the three remaining supports.

Hopefully, this small hiccup in an otherwise wonderful ceremony and the horrible death of a young Georgian luger yesterday will not taint the games.  The world could use a few moments of relative unity right now.

I’m showing a poster from the 1912 Stockholm Olympics just as an example of how beautiful some of the Olympic posters once were.  Over the years, the artwork for the games have become more and more logo-like, more commercial and less artful.  It’s more about creating a brand than expressing the spirit of the games.  But that is but a reflection of our times.

Also, last night saw Canadian chanteuse KD Lang perform Hallelujah.  Her’s is always a  great version of the song and the presentation last night was striking with all in the crowd holding lights and swaying to the rhytm of the song.  I first saw KD Lang in the early 80’s when she was still perfroming with the Reclines.  I think I saw her first on a Smother Brothers Show that ran for a short time in the summer one year.  She was wearing a big cowgirl outfit and flying around the stage, manically out of control.  She was like a dervish.  Like a force of nature.  With that huge voice.  It cought my attention.

Here’s a song from her from that time, one of my favorites, Pullin Back the Reins.  Enjoy your Saturday…

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Finding Home– A Short Film

Posted in Biographical, Painting, Recent Paintings, Technique/History, Video, tagged , , , on February 8, 2010| 6 Comments »

This is a short film that I put together one day last week.  It was a little project that I took on at the request of my friends at Lovetts Gallery in Tulsa, OK.  They, like many galleries around the country, have taken a hard look at how they interact with their clients and are making a real effort to provide more information about the artists they represent in their gallery.  To this end they are putting together a multimedia website that will give their clients a better look at the work and thoughts of their artists.

They asked that I provide them with some film of me working in the studio with some dialogue.  It was pretty difficult deciding what I wanted to say in the film.  I wanted to give an idea of what I see in my work and to tell a little of how I came to painting but I didn’t want to say too much.  Wanted the paintings to be the focus.

As I was putting it together and I was inserting narration a theme came around.  About the idea of finding one’s home.  It’s a concept that I’ve been seeing a lot in my work as of late and one that I think can be applied to most of the work through the years.  I think it fits.

The music is from the great acoustic guitarist Martin Simpson, a longtime favorite.  I had the chance to take lessons from him many years ago when he resided in Ithaca for a while, after coming to the States from England.  Carried the little classified ad from the Ithaca Times around in my wallet for the longest time but, like so many things in life, never got around to doing it.  I’m not big on regrets but I do wish I’d taken that opportunity.

Anyway, this is the film that I came up with.  I hope it works in some way…

To see the film in higher quality please click here to go the YouTube page.

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While My Guitar Gently Weeps

Posted in Favorite Things, Neat Stuff, Video, tagged , , on February 5, 2010| 1 Comment »

It’s Friday.  Time for a little respite from the week.

Here’s a great version of George Harrison’s While My Guitar Gently Weeps performed by ukelele virtuoso Jake Shimabukuro, a performer who has stretched the perception of what a uke can be.  Beautiful playing…

Enjoy your Friday and if you’re in the Corning area tonight, stop in at the opening for the Little Gems exhibit at the West End Gallery.  It’s always a lively crowd and there’s something for everyone in this show.

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Monday/ Rave On

Posted in Opinion, Video, tagged , on February 1, 2010| Leave a Comment »

Monday morning.

I guess I’m lucky in that Monday morning has no special significance for me.   It’s not the start of my work week since my work week never really ends- or starts, for that matter.  It doesn’t harken the reminder of having to be somewhere that I’d rather not be.

It just is.

Just another day.  Another chance, another opportunity to rise and do what I do.

An endless continuum of being and doing.

That’s one of the charms and curses of doing what I do, this lack of a defined barrier between what is and isn’t work.  For some, it could be an awful thing to be constantly trapped in your own world of work.  I understand that and there are days when the last thing I want to think about is my work.  But, fortunately,  those days are few and far between.

For the most part, I am happy to live an endless work week, rising early to rub paint on canvas and board.  To solitarily try to capture something I can’t quite see or describe.  To go to sleep with the rhythm of an image in my head and to wake, eager to try to find it once more in the new light.

So, it’s Monday, somewhere in my work week.

In the spirit of today, here’s a neat version of Buddy Holly‘s Rave On from M. Ward.  Enjoy your day…

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The Contrast of Influence

Posted in Influences, Video, tagged , , , on January 26, 2010| 2 Comments »

I was listening to music this morning as I read email and puttered around.  My iPod was docked and in random mode so anything could come on.  At first one of my favorite pieces, Tabula Rasa from composer Arvo Part, played.  It’s a modern classical piece that I have always identified with.  Tabula Rasa translates as empty slate and was actually very influential in a lot of my early painting, helping me visualize the feeling of wide space as I painted.

Next up was Highway Patrol from Junior Brown, which is worlds away from Tabula Rasa.  It’s clunky and chunky and throttles along on Brown’s deep twangy voice and his unique guit-steel guitar licks.  I began to think about how the mood shifts so quickly between the two selections, how the mind is suddenly thrown from silence to chaos.

Something very interesting in this contrast.  I began to wonder if this has an effect on my painting, on strokes and color selection.  Am I looking for different things in my work when different types of stimuli are present?  It’s something I’ll have to examine further.

The picture shown is of a visual/psychological phenomenon called the contrast triangle.  Just above the reflected light on the water is a dark triangle in the sky.  Supposedly, it’s not really there.  If you cover the water, the darkness fades away.  It is only in our eyes and minds that it exists.  Don’t know why I put this in today except that maybe this little area of created vision is similar to the influence of other stimuli on someone’s creative work.

I don’t really know.  I am working off the cuff here, you know.

Here was the next song that came up this morning.  Another favorite, Gillian Welch with Miss Ohio.  I think that fits somewhere in my contrast triangle.  We’ll see…

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