Mark Grotjahn

Clarinette, Picasso

Bibemus, Cezanne

The more I look at Grotjahn's work, the more I think about Cezanne, Cubism, and the use of perspectival space. Cubism's premise is that the viewer sees various views of an object, all at once, in a flattened space (think of a map of the world). Forget objects, or flattening, now we get to see the construct of space itself from multiple angles as it recedes. Pretty cool.

Saltz mentioned in the article posted below, the notion of death anxiety or fear of the unknown. I had a prof that stated that all artists' work is about death or sex and sex is about death. A little morbid and yes, perhaps just a touch pessimistic but I agree in this instance. The monochromatic paintings I've seen (sadly not in person) deliver the somber elegy-like tone that makes me certainly think of infinitude, the unknown, a skewed sense of space that is off kilter (fear).

Back to Cezanne, the father of modernism. There is so much information out there on him and I wouldn't be able to do him justice, so I won't try to explain other than to say that his precarious, space that is somehow flat and spatial at once, is constructed in such a way, that there is a glimmer of the multiple views later taken and run with by Picasso and Braques. I see the "lineage" in Grotjahn's work and find it interesting to trace even if he is essentially flipping it upside down or out, or in, or opposing it in some way.

What makes this work relevant though? It seems (thankfully) there is no trace of irony or cynicism. But I certainly feel as if he is drawing deep from his modernist roots. Well, I don't have the answer to that and I don't condemn it for that either, it just makes me wonder.

Mark Grotjahn

I am going to post a bit of commentary on these paintings by The Village Voice art critic Jerry Saltz here. Saltz is a great read. Try it, you just might like it.

Terry Winters

Love this artists' work.  I won't proclaim to know much about him but there is definitely the element of ordering and systems.  Also one word to describe his mark-making is "gauche" - but not (profound, I know!).  Anyways, I think sometimes his paintings seem heavy-handed, seem to feel labored over, but not to the point of being self-conscious.  The prints don't do that though (the element of removal in the printmaking process?)

What I thoroughly enjoy are all the layers that can be sifted through, the sense of the microscopic, as if we get to see the invisible threads that hold our world in place.  But I think his work is thoroughly grounded in what Is, rather than idealized or romanticized.  And though I know he draws from nature and the world around us, I like the impression that his objects are familiar because of their resemblance rather than through their explicit representation of something.  I am reminded of fractals, of light through trees, of cellular organisms, and of the net of interaction that they are involved with- players in a drama, perhaps.  Repetition is obviously part and parcel of his work, again another element found in nature (that is what a fractal is after all).   Anyway, this is an artist that I regularly look at and always come away feeling good about painting.  The tactility, the imperfection and labor (as in the growth of the painting) becomes something I can get involved with and I always get a rush from.  Seems like a somewhat selfish reason to look at his work, but hey, it's my drug of choice.  At some point I want to post work that I hate and let it rip, but that's for another day! Hope you enjoy, please feel free to post a comment.

Rewind...

I do so hate that this piece was destroyed.  I keep thinking about rebuilding it if I ever get the space to do it again.  The light on the strings was mesmerizing and so beautiful.  One of my favorite pieces so far (I'm  a tough critic, too).

Rewind...

I've been looking at some of my older work lately and thinking about incorporating those older ideas into the new work, juxtaposing the chaotic with the ordered quality of my dotted, stippled, and detailed drawings.  I like their ephemeral quality and think that daintiness alongside some of the more aggressive marks could be really interesting visually, as well as  metaphorically.

Alaska cont'd

Alaska

RT@vvoi, work by Myra Mimlitsch-Gray

Love the piece found on this blog here:  http://new-art.blogspot.com/2009/05/abstraction-game-myra-mimlitsch-gray.html

Good commentary on subjectivism and abstraction too...

RT@DarrellDavisson

Check out this awesome lecture on Modern art and trauma.  A different world view of the phases of "recovery" after what Dr. Davisson calls post-bomb art. Heavy but worth it.

http://www.dddavisson.com/trauma-in-late-modern-art.pdf

writing/painting/reading

Train in the distance

lonely night call

the earth ripples and moves

under your weight

Time in motion

and endless miles

could not make me wish more

for what

I don't know.

                                                      

Cloud ceiling running past

Indigo skies and thunder

Detect in me a portion of your anger

This tumultuous thing that 

turns me round and round

despite my hope.

More in progress....

       ...although I think these are for the most part finished.  May rough them up in spots with some sanding.  My response to the red one at this point is "Eww, I made that?"  but it is what it is, and there's something about that attraction/repulsion thang.... besides, I tend to overwork so this is a good stopping point until I really HAVE to change something.  

   "Travelers Among Mountains and Streams"  

Fan Kuan, 

11th century

          Weightless and effortless

Of moonwalking and slowed time

To roam without bounds

And little collisions

My will and yours in a 

Peculiar dance of

Attraction and repulsion

Of direct hits and near misses

  It's the in-between, 

the not, the seam, 

the line, the edge, 

that is.  

And in those cracks and crevices,

a million worlds collide.

R&R Part Deux

R&R

 This week I took a few days to head to South Alabama not to so much unwind as to get some ideas for new work, do a little visual collecting, if you will.   Had a great time and got some ideas to catapult me (hopefully) into some new drawings/paintings.  This is a place that has been in the family a long time and has managed to survive all the hurricanes.  Part of its charm is that it hasn't changed a whole lot despite flooding and storms and (changing tastes in interior decor!)   Had a great time, ready to get to work.

Thomas Ovlisen

Came across this guy on the ArtCat site and thought his work was pretty interesting.  He uses car paints over polystyrene and then sands the gloss down, gives it a history.  I start thinking about perfection and the human hand or at least touch and how those ideas sort of meet at yearning.  There's always something about artwork that has that subtractive quality, of being sanded down then worked over again that creates the desire in the viewer to touch, even with just the eyes.  Anyways, here are some examples of his work.  Couldn't find a lot of large images to bring over but he does have some photos on Flickr.  Also a website at http://thomas.ovilsen.com/

Turbulence

  One of my intentions for this blog is to use it to journal, post research and pull the threads of what interest me from journaling into my paintings and drawings.  I've been thinking about the way in which nature is constant in that it is always moving, it repeats itself, it is unstoppable. It is always in process. To that end, in some ways I am more engrossed by the process than the product.  Work begets work, etc. The more we are in the studio, the more we find new directions in which to explore.  But Processes also become part of my work  and shape the forms that appear.  I have been experimenting with them and have stumbled upon some interesting techniques for making paintings. Although this is new and is by no means perfected, it is exciting to be in the "lab" with no preconceptions about what will happen.  I do not wish to turn this site into a slick representation of what I do, which is all fine and good -  but I want to share the ups and downs too (perhaps I'm a masochist!).  I may regret it but I feel compelled to show some of the steps that it took to get where I got.  

There are some aspects of this painting that I really like, and parts I find to be clumsy.  But I have been layering and layering for months and think I'm going to say it's finished.  Not the most elegant piece ever but I learned a lot from it as it kicked my ass.

Next....

Just finished this guy, another 48x48 oil on panel. 

I've been peeking in on Tyler Green's Modern Art Notes at http://www.artsjournal.com/man/     - if you're so inclined take a look, there are some good interviews and thoughts on painting. 

I finished this one a few weeks ago and have been letting it sit - just looking at it to see if I'm really done.  I think so (but I've said that before!).  This one is a 48"x 48" oil on panel. Haven't given it a varnish yet, will have to wait a few months to let it thoroughly dry.  

I'm still struggling with the whole "field painting" thing and whether I need other elements to move this from work that has been seen before.  Although interested in order/chaos, I'm wondering if an element that "says" structure is necessary or if the viewer completes the idea by looking for the patterns that are inherently there.  By structure I mean some form of ordering, or grid or some such element.  I'm back and forth on that one so I guess I'll do them both, depending on the piece.  Also the color is truer in the detail, I am not a photoshop guru.

Here are a few new ones I've been working on, all oil on panel.   I'm trying to come up with ways of seeing the familiar in an unexpected way, by way of context or by juxtaposition - through comparison.  Also thinking about opposites and using that in all aspects - cool/warm, active/passive, depth (glazes)/opacity, movement etc. all moving towards the idea of union through opposites, or harmonious balances of differing elements.  Also more present in these is the notion of decay. Haven't quite figured that out yet except to say that I am (as always) interested in cause and effect.  Nature as a force that ravishes is not something new but it's interesting to me as a metaphor.

The more I look at this one, the more I dislike the bottom strip. May have to do something about that, or do another one! Always in progress...