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Archive for the ‘Video’ Category

The Name Game

Posted in Early Paintings, Video on February 17, 2009| Leave a Comment »

The IncantationWhat’s your name? Who’s your daddy?

Is he rich, is he rich like me?

A couple of memorable line from the old Zombies song, The Time of the Season.  

Knowing the true name of something has often been the sign of power over that person or thing. Think of a shaman performing an incantation, perhaps like the one depicted in this older piece I painted  many years ago.  I suppose that means that if one can know the truth, the real essence, of something, they can control or dominate it.

There is obviously something to the concept and  causes me to worry a bit for the open nature of our lives today  as expressed on blogs and social networks.

Maybe it’s a little paranoid, but I would rather be the incantor than the incantee.

Anyway, that’s only the premise to get to a little music.  I bet you thought it would be The Time of the Season ( which is a great song, one where the original is far superior to any subsequent covers) but actually I wanted to play a song that was sung many times over the years and remains a lot of fun to hear.  Plus it’s another great snapshot of the time with go-go dancers and everybody in jackets and ties.  Here’s Shirley Ellis and  The Name Game.




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Waitin’ Around to Die

Posted in Favorite Things, Video, tagged , , , on February 12, 2009| 2 Comments »

OmegaI was listening to some music yesterday and, coming across some stuff from the late  Townes Van Zandt  that I hadn’t heard in a bit was reminded of a documentary that my nephew, Jeremy, passed on to me a few years back.  It’s called Heartworn Highways and is from around 1975, chronicling some of the singer-songwriters who came to be known as alt-country.  

It’s pretty gritty.  These guys are shown completely unvarnished and it is the antidote to the packaged, slickly produced  music that pervades the airwaves today.  There is the first recorded version of Mercenary Song from a very young and greasy looking Steve Earle and good versions of  L.A. Freeway  and Desperados Waiting For a Train from Guy Clark but the parts that stand out for me are those with Townes Van Zandt.

This is Waitin’ Around to Die and has an interesting intro that really sets up the tune well.  It’s a pretty powerful song.  Enjoy…

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Mermaid Avenue

Posted in At the Movies, Favorite Things, Video, tagged , , , , , on February 8, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Mermaid AvenueIt’s yet another Sunday morning and I’m a bit tired.  Time for a little music.

Casablanca was on TCM last night and, of course, we had to watch.  It’s one of those films that I could watch on an endless loop.   It has so much going for it- great performances, great story, memorable writing with lines that became part of our language, incredible characters (Conrad Veidt’s  Strasser is the prototype for  Nazi film  villains), romance, action and surprisingly great humor.  

It also has the glow of Ingrid Bergman.

That brings us to my selection for the day from the CD, Mermaid Avenue, from the collaboration of Billy Bragg and Wilco with their versions of song  lyrics from Woody Guthrie.  For more info, click on the album cover above.

This is the song, Ingrid Bergman, from that CD.  I wish I had a better video to accompany it but enjoy the song anyway…

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Here I Dreamt I Was an Architect

Posted in Video, tagged on February 4, 2009| 4 Comments »

SerenadedI just don’t know…

They seem to be my go-to words when all else fails.  I don’t know if it’s a matter of not knowing about what I happen to be pondering at the moment or if it’s a matter of certainty.

I just don’t know if there are any absolutes in this world, outside of my uncertainty.

I envy those people, so many who seem to blog, who see the world with such certainty.  Certain in their beliefs and convictions.  Certain that their perspective is true.  Certain that they are right in all things.  Certain that anyone is listening or caring.  Certain that their opinion matters.

The one thing I do know is that I have never had that certainty.  Even as I write this I am unsure that anyone will read this or even think more than  a moment about it if they do.  I think that is why I have always believed that when someone sees something in my work and decides to make it part of their life, that it is a small miracle, something beyond the reach of my uncertainty.

How does this happen?  Well, I just don’t know.  Maybe this not knowing keeps me going forward, plugging onward, searching for something that gives me that evasive sense of certainty.

Until that time, here’s a video from the Decemberists with kind of the feeling that I have at the moment.  Hope you enjoy…

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Route 66

Posted in Favorite Things, Video, tagged , on February 1, 2009| 2 Comments »

fausts-guitarAnother Sunday morning and I think we all deserve a little break, maybe a little song.

Today, I’ve chosen Nat King Cole and his uber-cool Route 66.  

The voice of Nat King Cole has always been magic for me.  Silky smooth and seemingly effortless.  Full of nuance.

His choice of song was nearly perfect.  He seemed to always perform songs that fit his voice and his combo’s cool playing, so much that the song became his and his alone.

Mona Lisa, Route 66, L-O-V-E, and on and on.  Nature Boy is still one of the most haunting songs I’ve ever heard.

Anyway, on this Super Sunday, sit back, relax and take a little trip down Route 66…

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Get Off My Cloud

Posted in Favorite Things, Influences, Video, tagged , on January 24, 2009| 2 Comments »

harlequin3Saturday morning and I’m in the studio early, anxious to get to work.  There are things I’d like to post on my blog but I feel like there’s a painting waiting to be released.

I think that for this Saturday morning I’ll instead show a little early Rolling Stones.  At Christmas, I was talking with my nephew, who is around 30 years old, who commented on how many people he knew who were totally ignorant of the music of the Beatles and the Stones, particularly before the mid-70’s,  and the great influence that both had on current pop music and culture.

For anyone from that time that is a remarkable thought because of the incredible changes that were taking place at the time and, for many,  how their music was very much the soundtrack for the era.  Perhaps this is hyperbole and the world would pretty much be the same without either band and their songs but I doubt it.  Great change is only affected by great influence.  The greater the influence, the more we are inspired to go beyond, to take what they have shown us and to synthesize and integrate it with our own voices and visions.  

Growing up, listening to this song, Get Off My Cloud, was empowering.  There was a sense of defiance and a sense of standing up for yourself that pulsed out of the grooves.  I don’t know if it completely comes through but at the time, it played loud and strong.

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Sunday Morning Rumination

Posted in Influences, Video, tagged , on January 18, 2009| 2 Comments »

reserves-cover-blank-jpegSunday morning is usually an even quieter time for me.  It seems that memories from the past usually flood in on Sunday mornings, all triggered by a mere word or sound.  It seems most of these sense-related bits are from childhood when everything is soaked in and forged into memory.

For instance, there are Beatles’ songs that come on and I’m six years old again, living at the old house on Wilawanna Road.  The music is coming from our hi-fi console with sliding panels on top that expose the record player on one side and the other, the radio and controls.  The light wafting through the curtains over the large, old windows is from the spring and brightens the living room and its weathered floral wallpaper.  It’s a very secure feeling, the kind you hold onto from childhood.

On this Sunday morning, it’s about 8 degrees outside  (much warmer than yesterday’s -18 )  but it’s a little warmer when I hear this…

 

The painting from the top is a piece that was used as the cover for a CD by a northern Virginia based band, The Reserves, titled Where Have All The Dreamers Gone.

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A Hard Past

Posted in Biographical, Favorite Things, Video, tagged , on January 16, 2009| 5 Comments »

A Hard PastThis is a painting from a couple of years ago, titled  A Hard Past, part of the Outlaws series.  I have been hesitant to write about this piece even though it remains a personal favorite.  I use it as the wallpaper on my office computer and am always transfixed by this face.

It actually reminds me very much of my mother.  I know that may not seem a very flattering thing to say but there is something in the hardened distant gaze that reminds me of Mom, sitting silently at the kitchen table with a cup of tea and her ever present Camel.  She would just sit there in silence for long periods of time and I often wonder what thoughts and memories ran through her mind. 

The title came from this memory of her.  She had a pretty hard life- her mother died when she was three,  no school beyond ninth grade, years of toiling in a factory and a long, turbulent and angry marriage to my father.  I could go into detail but I don’t think she would like it, if she were still around.  She liked privacy and preferred to be away from other people, a trait that I carry as well.

I could go on but I just wanted to show this piece again.  I do think Mom would be okay with that…

Speaking of the Outlaws series, here’s a short video I put together with the paintings from that series along with some from many years earlier.  The music is from Bill Frisell…

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Gutterballs

Posted in Video, tagged , , on January 15, 2009| 2 Comments »

] Faust's GuitarI’ve mentioned before that I often have movies playing in the studio while I’m working, listening to the dialogue as I paint and occasionally looking up to take in the really visual aspects.  Some movies I have seen many times and know when to look up to catch something that really excites my eye. This is especially true of movies from the Coen Brothers.

The Big Lebowski is a favorite in the studio and I always have to stop and watch when the Dude enters the realm of fantasy.  I particularly enjoy Gutterballs with Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In) from Kenny Rogers and the First Edition as a backdrop.

It’s a great, lavish production and always makes me grin like an idiot.  

The Dude abides..

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Dedicated Follower of Fashion

Posted in Early Paintings, Painting, Video, tagged , , on January 13, 2009| 3 Comments »

Dedicated Follower of FashionThis is called Dedicated Follower of Fashion, based on the song of the same name from the mind of Ray Davies  and the Kinks.  

I call this one of the Exiles pieces but I’m not really sure if it truly fits.  It was done at the same time back in 1995 or ’96 and performed in the same manner but lacks the emotional depth of the others.  In fact, it’s defining feature is its lack of emotional content.  

I think that this blankness may have been the factor that led me to shape this piece into its final form.  The elements of the face were the first part completed and basically dictate, in the way I work, where the painting goes.  For instance, he could have been place on a vast and deep plain that sweeps to the distance behind him but that didn’t fit for me.

There was something in his oddly colored features that reminded me of the vanity and obsequiousness of many fashionistas. And that’s where the Kinks come in.

So, maybe he doesn’t quite fit in with the other Exiles but maybe that in itself makes him an exile of sorts.

Anyway, here are the Kinks doing the song…

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