My recently acquired Isabey brush is going bald, and is one of my favorite brushes... I am writing to Isabey in France to see if they would mail me a replacement.
the rest of my Isabey arsenal is quietly drying - getting ready for tomorrow's date with Vermilion.
There are very few things that really stop me in my tracks and I can watch and listen to for hours on end without ever getting tired - one of these things is anything Space and Cosmos. I could live on Nasa.tv and steamed broccoli. Neil deGrasse Tyson, an astrophysicist and Director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History, talks about Newton and the importance of keeping the lines of thought and conversation open. He says when open conversation ratchets up - you make discoveries and you make discoveries rapidly..
There is a wonderful story in the Upanishads about the god Indra. Now it happened at this time that a great monster had enclosed all the waters of the earth, so there was a terrible drought, and the world was in a very bad condition. It took Indra quite a while to realize that he had a box of thunderbolts and that all he had to do was drop a thunderbolt on the monster and blow him up. When he did that, the waters flowed, and the world was refreshed, and Indra said. "What a great boy am I".
So, thinking, "What a great boy am I", Indra goes up to the cosmic mountain, which is the central mountain in the world, and decides to build a palace worthy of such as he. The main carpenter of the gods goes to work on it, and in very quick order he gets the palace into pretty good condition. But every time Indra comes to inspect it, he had bigger ideas about how splendid and grandiose the palace should be. Finally, the carpenter says, "My god, we are both immortal, and there is no end to his desires. I am caught for eternity. So he decides to go Brahma, the creator god, and complain.
Brahma sits on a lotus, the symbol of divine energy and divine grace. The lotus grows from the navel of Vishnu, who is the sleeping god, whose dream is the universe. So the carpenter comes to the edge of the great lotus pond of the universe and tells his story to Brahma. Brahma says, " You go home. I will fix this up." Brahma gets off his lotus and kneels down to address sleeping Vishnu. Vishnu just makes a gesture and says something like, "Listen, fly, something is going to happen."
Next morning, at the gate of the palace that is being built, there appears a beautiful blue-black boy with a lot of children around him, just admiring his beauty. The porter at the gate of the new palace goes running to Indra, and Indra says, "Well, bring in the boy." The boy is brought in, and Indra, the kind god, sitting on his throne, says, "Young man, welcome. And what brings you to my palace?"
"Well, says the boy with a voice like thunder rolling on the horizon, "I have been told that you are building such a palace as no Indra before you ever built."
And Indra says, "Indras before me, youn man - what are you talking about?"
The boy says, "Indras before you. I have seen them come and go, come and go. Just think, Vishnu sleeps in the cosmic ocean, and the lotus of the Universe grows from his navel. On the lotus sits Brahma, the creator. Brahma opens his eyes, and a world comes into being, governed by an Indra. Brahma closes his eye, and a world goes out of being. The life of a Brahma is four hundred and thirty-two thousand years. When he dies, the lotus goes back, and another lotus is formed, and another Brahma. Then think of the galaxies beyond galaxies in infinite space, each a lotus, with a Brahma sitting on it, opening his eyes, closing his eyes. And Indras? There may be wise men in your court who would volunteer to count the drops of water in the oceans of the world or the grains of sand on the beaches, but no one would count those Bramin, let alone those Indras."
While the boy is talking, an army of ants parades across the floor. The boy laughs when he sees them, and Indra's hair stands on end, and he says to the boy, "Why do you laugh?"
The boy answers, "Dont ask unless you are willing to be hurt."
Indra says, "I ask. Teach."( That, by the way, is a good Oriental idea: you don't teach until you are asked. You don't force your mission down people's throats.)
And so the boy points to the ants and says, "Former Indras all. Through many lifetimes they rise from the lowest conditions to the highest illumination. And then they drop their thunderbolt on a monster, and they think, 'What a good boy am I.' And down they go again."
It was great to see you at my Bushwick Show - Invented Mythologies ! And Thank you for braving the heat in Bushwick, some of you coming from upstate or Manhattan, which is just as far:) I got a fresh point of view and heard your comments about the work and your honest opinions. I was amazed at the insights some of you had about what you thought was a successful piece and what you thought was the best part of a successful piece. And what you thought didn't work. Artists sometimes like to say they do the work for themselves. The truth is we are part of a soup, physiologically and cognitively, we constantly shed cells and replenish with new ones, we are constantly engaged in the world mentally.. so unless we a are a Robinson Crusoe - we are an amalgamation, and so is our work.. to some degree.
Invented Mythologies
an installation of drawings,
animations
and xquisite corpses,
as part of
Fri, Sat and Sun
May 31 - June 2
12 pm - 7 pm
Brooklyn
As a commercial artist I was involved in the creation of the Star Wars myth and it flows into my own work.
I worked as an artist for George Lucas and I am very familiar with "The Ranch" in Northern California, where Lucas held 4th of July parties every year. The following conversations between Bill Moyers and Joseph Campbell took place at George Lucas' Skywalker Ranch, right before Campbell's death in 1987.
If there is a single text that has influenced my view of the world - The Power of Myth is that text. In it Campbell says:
"Everyone is a hero in his birth. He's undergone a tremendous transformation, from a little water creature living in the realm of the amniotic fluid and so forth, then coming out and becoming an air breathing mammal that ultimately will be self-standing. This is an enormous transformation and a heroic act."
On Art and Artists Campbell wrote:
" Myth must be kept alive. The
people who can keep it alive are artists of one kind or another. The function of the artist is the
mythologization of the environment and the world."
Joseph Campbell also wrote "The Hero with a Thousand Faces", a seminal work of comparative mythology.
"What beauty is, I know not, though it adheres to many things... We must gather it together from far and wide" Albrecht Durer. This quote was inscribed in one of my favorite galleries in New York - The Morgan Library and Museum.
The exhibit at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC runs until June 9th, 2013 - http://www.nga.gov/
...all at Postcards From The Edge - A Benefit for Visual AIDS. January 25-27, 2013 @ Sikkema Jenkins & Co - 530 West 22nd Street, NYC.
The 15th Annual POSTCARDS FROM THE EDGE Featuring artworks by Mirena Rhee, Ann Hamilton, Donald Baechler, Kara Walker, Dana Schutz, Bjarne Melgaard, Marilyn Minter, Burt Barr, Kiki Smith, Ed Rusha, John Baldessari, Louise Fishman, Arturo Herrera, Ida Applebroog, Ross Bleckner, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Katherine Bernhardt, Nayland Blake, L.J. Roberts, Marcel Dzama, Catherine Opie, Tony Feher, Mary Heilmann, Jim Hodges, Julie Mehretu, Jeff Koons, Robert Longo, Moyra Davey, Bill Viola, Jane Hammond, Lawrence Weiner, Kay Rosen, Jack Pierson, Louise Lawler, John Waters.
Extinguished a bit of a thirst for art at Art Basel Miami this past weekend. Visited the very same galleries I have seen dozens of shows of in New York, but felt as if meeting someone from church ... at a Maskenball.
Also overwhelming was the amount of small dogs and high heels.
Magritte inspired drawing.
Join me for the unexpected! – I am doing a DAF Dress piece at The DUMBO Arts Festival! Saturday, Sep 29th, 12pm-9pm. Somewhere near 45 Main Street, Brooklyn, in DUMBO!
Join me for the unexpected - I am doing a DAF Dress piece at The DUMBO Arts Festival!
When: Saturday, Sep 29th, 12pm-9pm.
Where: Somewhere near 45 Main Street, Brooklyn, in DUMBO!
BE CAREFUL, PAINTING WILL BE INVOLVED! NO PETS OR WEAPONS, PLEASE!
DUMBO ARTS FESTIVAL is a three day event - it happens September 28-30, 2012. Join me for Brooklyn's biggest arts event of the year.
I have been a vegetarian all my life - I destroy great amounts of fruits and vegetables and spend time around New York's green markets choosing produce. I like to smell it, touch it and feel it. Bees and I think the same things. Seeking quality things take time to grow and be found.
The intent of Figment Dress was to create a visual response to Mark di Suvero sculptures, the wearable aspect of my projects actually stems from my many-years involvement with computer generated artwork. Working commercially for blockbuster franchises like Star Wars made me want to create painting and sculpture experiences where the whole body operates simultaneously as a surface, as a creative vehicle and a final product. Where the body is literally in touch with the process, with the materials and the product creators; where the final piece is spontaneously created on the spot with very low likelihood that the same object (in this case "dress") will ever be produced again. When I first conceived the piece I had no idea how it was going to come out formally. I wanted it to be relevant to the vision of Figment, grounded in "forms follows function" principle and also reflective of the location - Governors Island right across Manhattan in New York. Mark di Suvero sculptures dominated the landscape and provided me with the relevant geometric fulcrum.
