A few more digits /  by mirena

Painter Scotto Mycklebust, is putting together Revolt magazine, an art-talk large format, limited edition paper. I am heading down to Occupy Wall street to take some photographs for the first issue.  Also saw De Kooning show at Moma for the second time.. barefoot because my shoes were too tight and I couldn't think properly. I took the shoes off, and this being New York, no one seemed to care except that I gained a different perspective.. could be the height but this time I loved De Kooning's last paintings.

The power to feel /  by mirena

Painting is an active language. Pollock once told De Kooning "You know more, but I feel more". To feel and to observe are the two most powerful weapons an artist uses.. on himself. When you are out in the world you really see, you dissect the world down to the particles and reverse back through to the whole to construct a mental image, however distorted. You later bring these images to the canvas. In front of the canvas, you feel. To observe and to feel are somehow in a quantum entanglement, the better you observe, the better your ability to feel. You see a brick for what it is and then you really see it, for what it isn't, a sort of stereo vision which overcomes the senses. That's why if someone feels one, an artist feels ten. You need that feeling powers ten in order to get the feeling flick through to the brush ( or whatever tool is there ) and via the paint - onto to canvas and from there to the viewer. The feeling needs to have that power in order to travel.

The confusion is that art is about learning how to draw or paint, that ability to render some ( or even strange ) reality. I think art is about learning how to feel. To feel is a powerful narcotic and immensely seductive. It is the blue pill, and the red pill simultaneously.

Happy birthday, Picasso /  by mirena

One of the best rooms with art I have seen is the room right next to Guernica in Museo Reina Sofía in Madrid. It's full of Picasso's studies for the great painting, a room full of discarded work. There are never perfect circumstances, there's only process where you allow things to happen sometimes to great discomfort.

Thank you for your support during Open Studios /  by mirena

Picasso once said "It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child". I'd say it will take a few lifetimes to earn the ability to see like a child. As a child you always see things as they are, rarely blinded by purpose or meaning.  Once you grow up you stop being fascinated by the obvious thingness of all things, the simple facts of movement and color which are astonishing by themselves but too obvious.

Life existed for 3.5 million years without the ability to see. So the thinking among
scientists is that life didn't need the ability to see in order to exist. Seeing is the
longing of life to understand and to reflect on itself.

Life existed for 3.5 million years without the ability to see. So the thinking among  scientists is that life didn't need the ability to see in order to exist. I am hoping it will take me a bit less than that to learn how to see.

High Line Open studios - Chelsea 2011 /  by mirena

Hand Painted Ocean - Tsunami ( Japan series ) - 40 x 30 inches, dip pen, ink and brown wash on paper, 2011 I would like to invite you to my Pen and Ink Drawings Open studio as part of High Line Open Studios Chelsea 2011 – Oct 14-16, 526 West 26th street, suite 723, Fri, Sat and Sun 12-6 pm. I will be participating with new pen and ink drawings.

Preview exhibition and opening reception party will be held at 551 West 21st Street, ground floor, the corner of West 21st Street and 11the Ave. The Preview Exhibition will be open to the public for the weekend event, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, October 14 – 16, 2011, from 12:00 to 6:00 p.m.

My biggest thanks to Painter and true Londoner Ian Mack with whom I will be sharing the Open Studio space this year. Please, support his work: http://www.ianmackstudios.com/

There are many other participating artists, all within a few blocks around West 26th street in Chelsea. If you can’t make my studio perhaps you can visit theirs: http://www.highlineopenstudios.org/artists.html

Careful! Some bugs still in this one. /  by mirena

Pace Gallery in Chelsea mounted an amazing Social Media show but their Iphone App Fakes literally took my breath away... laughing. "The exhibition  features the first presentation of works from the David Byrne’s new Apps series from 2011. The works are advertisements for witty applications authored by Byrne that speak to the rapid proliferation of apps for the iPhone and other smart phones.."

Chelsea opens with color and glamour /  by mirena

It happens that every round of gallery openings in Chelsea has a different flavour. Last night the art world descended on Chelsea district in New York for the opening of almost 50 new art shows and new galleries as well. Perhaps we differ in our opinions on art but what we all agreed on is that it was spectacular, dense with art lovers and illuminated with color. Art world spectacular openings in Chelsea, New York

Chief Seattle's letter to the US Government /  by mirena

What is it to have, to own something, do you really "have".. your body, your heart, abilities, things, dreams, desires, your family, the ground under your feet? The following is the best poetic prose on having that I have ever come to read: "The President in Washington sends word that he wishes to buy our land. But how can you buy or sell the sky? The land? The idea is strange to us. If we do not own the freshness of the air and the sparkle of the water, how can you buy them? "Every part of this earth is sacred to my people. Every shining pine needle, every sandy shore, every mist in the dark woods, every meadow, every humming insect. All are holy in the memory and experience of my people. "We know the sap which courses through the trees as we know the blood that courses through our veins. We are part of the earth and it is part of us. The perfumed flowers are our sisters. The bear, the deer, the great eagle, these are our brothers. The rocky crests, the juices in the meadow, the body heat of the pony, and man, all belong to the same family. "The shining water that moves in the streams and rivers is not just water, but the blood of our ancestors. If we sell you our land, you must remember that it is sacred. Each ghostly reflection in the clear waters of the lakes tells of events and memories in the life of my people. The water's murmur is the voice of my father's father. "The rivers are our brothers. They quench our thirst. They carry our canoes and feed our children. So you must give to the rivers the kindness you would give any brother. "If we sell you our land, remember that the air is precious to us, that the air shares its spirit with all the life it supports. The wind that gave our grandfather his first breath also receives his last sigh. The wind also gives our children the spirit of life. So if we sell you our land, you must keep it apart and sacred, as a place where man can go to taste the wind that is sweetened by the meadow flowers. "Will you teach your children what we have taught our children? That the earth is our mother? What befalls the earth befalls all the sons of the earth. "This we know: the earth does not belong to man, man belongs to the earth. All things are connected like the blood that unites us all. Man did not weave the web of life, he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself. "One thing we know: our god is also your god. The earth is precious to him and to harm the earth is to heap contempt on its creator. "Your destiny is a mystery to us. What will happen when the buffalo are all slaughtered? The wild horses tamed? What will happen when the secret corners of the forest are heavy with the scent of many men and the view of the ripe hills is blotted by talking wires? Where will the thicket be? Gone! Where will the eagle be? Gone! And what is it to say goodbyevto the swift pony and the hunt? The end of living and the beginning of survival. "When the last Red Man has vanished with his wilderness and his memory is only the shadow of a cloud moving across the prairie, will these shores and forests still be here? Will there be any of the spirit of my people left? "We love this earth as a newborn loves its mother's heartbeat. So, if we sell you our land, love it as we have loved it. Care for it as we have cared for it. Hold in your mind the memory of the land as it is when you receive it. Preserve the land for all children and love it, as God loves us all. "As we are part of the land, you too are part of the land. This earth is precious to us. It is also precious to you. One thing we know: there is only one God. No man, be he Red Man or White Man, can be apart. We are brothers after all."

Open States - Earthquake /  by mirena

Open States - Earthquake ( Japan series ) - work in progress fragment, 30 x 40 inches, pen, ink and brown wash on paper, 2011 Unfinished business - a fragment of my latest yet-to-be-finished painting dealing with the disaster in Japan: Open States - Earthquake, 30 x 40 inches, pen and ink on paper. It will be days before the painting is completed, it is still quite raw. And it will change by the time it is finished. But just like its subject matter - I was anxious to preserve this current crumbling state. The painting is the first in a series prompted by my dream about the Japan earthquake, which I had about 48 hours before it struck.

May is a month of growth in the art business and a number of great artists have shows all over Chelsea. Richard Tuttle's vigorous presence at Pace Gallery with pretty large follies that oozed spirit. Jasper Johns who was in attendance of his show opening at Matthew Marks Gallery in Chelsea and seemed to very much enjoy himself amidst his many works and the crowds, who seemed to enjoy it too.

Today also marks my one year anniversary of living and painting in New York. I don't have much to say but have a lot to paint about it.