Today is “ART TUESDAY”…I’ve capitalized the words…because I’m shouting them rather….. than just saying them…today I was slow on getting the post up as I have been under the weather…and opted to rest rather than write…until this afternoon….today I thought it would be nice to explore some of the work of my 3 favorite sculptors….there is something about all of their works that seems to draw off of each other…Alenander Calder, died in 1972…I feel he was the beginning of the modern sculptural movement…by creating what we’re called “Stables”…large steel structures that were anchored outside as an asthetic…he is known for his mobiles…which are incredible to look at…as well…but there is something about the scale and construction of his Stables that are overwhelming….
Mark Di Suvero
I have always liked Di Suvero’s work…to me there is something very weapon/tactical like about every piece of his sculpture I’ve seen….like there is more than meets the eye…I expect this piece to begin turning as is the case with most of his work for me….
Alexander Calder
Alexander Calder’s work is breath taking…I saw a show of his Mobiles at SFMOMA…and was amazed at the level of complexity from something that seemed so simple…Calder’s the Grand Pupa of sculpture…as I see it…..
Fletcher Benton
Saw Fletcher Benton’s work in Scottsdale at Riva Yares Gallery a few years ago….I am very drawn to his balance and out of balance…he creates…there is something about the ability to catch a fraction of a second in time…that I feel Fletcher Benton does with his work….every piece I have seen of his….I expect has just started to fall apart and I am watching it take place….
I hope you enjoy these pieces….let me know what you think….
Arthur Ganson’s Work is incredible…below is a video of his work set to music….
“Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything” – George Bernard Shaw
I was thinking this morning….what it takes to get “There”…all of us have a “There”…we can kind of describe…explain how it feels…what parts of it may look like….and we may be living some of the steps leading to it…but “There”…is probably more elusive than we may think…the pursuit in itself…always keeps it…just out of reach…a few fingertips aways…so then maybe getting close to “There” might be good enough?…or does it have to be the “X” that marks the spot?
I think “There” is the ideal…”Here” becomes the real….and it is what we do with “Here”…. that makes “There”…as close to possible and attainable as possible…our futures are altered by what we do now…with a few unknown exception right now…planning for something yet expecting a different result in the future just doesn’t make sense…wanting to be something …yet being unwilling…to work at the essence of that something is unrealistic….some call them goals…but I think becoming something….arriving at someplace cannot be a goal….it can only be part of a larger goal….that which is in constant flux….a series of negotiation and renegotiation for the “Ideal”, (There) from the “Real”, (Here)…
because the arrival to “There”… never happens…..it never will…”There” becomes the reason to travel….to change…to elevate…descend…. reshape….rebuild…redesign….take everything back to the basics for a different look at what “There” now really means…and start the process over again…we are constantly redoing the pursuit…..changing the method of approach…assault….attack….to get something that is not getable…..yet we still try….
“Here”…the “Real”….is the hive….all the bees come to this hive…because this is where the hive is ….figuratively…literally…grographically….until it changes….and the hive moves a few steps closer to….”There”…..without “There” being the destination….
I recall when I was younger…I’d get an idea that “There” was the answer…the solution…the cure-all…the best of the best….everyrthing that was…was “There”…and I’d load everything I owned into my truck and move….to “There”….knowing I’d find every bit of what I was searching for…. after a few dozen of these sort of moves…I realized…I was the answer….my problem though…was that I was not the question as well as the answer at that time in my life….and just having answers can’t make you the winner on Jeopardy…
it has taken many years to know that I am the questions and answers…most of the time…I discovered…that my pursuit of….”There”still comes from “Here”…which is where I am and have always been….and I don’t have any great desire to get “There”…because then what….is it a cliff edge…or a vast desert in front of me…or maybe a sea of ice…..and what I thought “There” was may not be remotely close to what it is….
so talking to myself seems a normal function of the day…because I’m really just asking and answering questions….not just the easy ones…..
“I have a simple philosophy. Fill what’s empty. Empty what’s full. And scratch where it itches.” – Alice Roosevelt Longworth
I thought…is it cream first then sugar…or the other way around…I’m certain the method…delivery changes the taste…maybe even something on the smaller level that I can’t detect…but may affect me for the rest of my life…I mean just think by adding cream first…if the heat from the coffee … destroyed the Bovine growth hormone in the cream…but by adding sugar first…it encapsulated the hormone…added a simple sugar to it and made it considerably more potent and dangerous…unable to be destroyed by the heat….and made it deadly over the long term….it’s these things we have to think about…it’s not easy…not predictable nor remotely obvious….just kind of have to think how it all works…what gears move faster and what ones move hardly at all…
we wanted the same result…we just used different maps to plan the trip…so it was sort of right…and sort of wrong…..all wrapped up in the same package…so when you opened it….it was a surprise either way…like getting something you already have…but a better version of it….so now you had to think about what you were going to do with the one you already had…unless of course you were one of those people who used it until it died…while the stand-in…sat wrapped in plastic on the shelf in the utility room ….waiting for some action…
all I ever wanted was a small place…in the hills…behind the house I lived in….maybe raise some vegetables…and a few white rabbits….name them all “Buddy”…so it would be easy to call them and remember who was who….no name confusion…no stammering on the porch by the bug light…calling a few hundred names to get the rabbits to come home at night….it would be simple….kind of like a recipe where you just add salt and pepper…how easy is that….I mean if you’re a counter….1,2,3,4,5,6,…..bing all the salt you need….7,8,9,10,11,12…..pepper’s done….and there you have a gastronomic delight…who’d have ever thought….simple…good for you…and good looking….like the picture in the magazine…
it was a 12 hour sleep fest….my throat was raspy….I had a fever…and was talking to somebody about giant Christmas ornaments…and the ideal placement to make the aesthetic more pronounced…in between that…I was going to the bath room every hour…talking to my endocrine system…coaching it right along….in hopes we just might win the endocrine challenge…we signed up for at the beginning of the year…I say “We”…because it is a team effort…there is no “I” in team…but there is an “I”…in Ice cream and…..Igloo….and just knowing that has made this so much easier…rewarding and overall a great experience…I could see myself there..in the middle of the three winners…standing highests…on the stair step looking thing….my country’s flag draped around my neck…and singing the “Star Spangled Banner”…except…I’m not clear what “Spangled” means…and I’m a little troubled about that….but I’d hum over those parts and sing when I needed to….
if it’s automobile repairs you need…I can not do them…that’s my motto…sort of playing all of my cards face up….nothing to hide…want everything right there for everyone to see…that has a real old western flair to it….like I could have once been a bad guy…but…some event changed me into a good guy…or maybe I was a good guy and events changed me into a bad guy with a good guy…streak…I’m still a little questionable…but not always….and I wear black and white all of the time….to keep them guessing….takes and destroys that whole stereotypical attitude of the old west…now…doesn’t it…
I wish you a wonderful Sunday…rest well…enjoy yourself and by all means take a little time in the sun…vitamin D is essential…and I know most of us do not eat enough leafy greens or drink enough milk to get all of the Vit D we need……
“If you take big paces you leave big spaces” – Burmese Proverb
the dryer was spinning its usual sound…somewhere between a high pitched dog wihistle…and saying “Harry” in a muffled sort of catacomb sound repeatedly at each large turn…..I was boiling water…for the bubbles…and the heat…but they…they had the door locked…making plans…or maybe they were playing with the bag of shiny green army men they took from the Gunning Castelle…store…sometime around 1963…either way there was something brewing…I just couldn’t figure out the smell at that second….
I asked for the left-handed scissors…repeatedly….cutting with the right-handed ones in my left hand was driving on the wrong side of the road….kind of fishing without the tools…the hooks you know…the long pole sort of thing…it was vicious…there at the gates…they just stood there looking…wondering what was taking so long to produce so little….like “Tic Tacs” for dinner…hard to get excited about a few little white things…and call it tasty…or flavorful…worse though she handed us all a stack of papers…ones she’d signed…with a blue pen….thinking we’d be swayed be her attempt at perfecting her autograph….she was practicing for her “Big Day”…that one in front of the hotel there in Odessa…where they were married…I slept with the Bridesmaid that night…it was a vodka drinking time for me…sort of a movie with out the sound or picture…so I had to figure how it all was by how it wasn’t….
so the numbers kept ticking….by….I was nervous thinking they meant the last few seconds on the planet….were close at hand…when she reminded me I’d won…my card matched the ticking numbers….the choices were obvious….she motioned to the section where winners like me could choose the brightly colored animals…with their striped scarves….I’d wished they real…though….a living breathing pet…or maybe a room full of platypus’…little water lilies in the garden by the tub….I’d call it “Eden or Not”…..just in case God really existed….that way I could show him…at least I tried when I wasn’t certain….and if he didn’t…I knew a girl named Eden…she was a topless dancer…her real name was Crystal….she had a few stretch marks from having a baby when she was 16…but…her name was still “Eden” in my mind….and I might have named the whole thing after her….
it was a sky full of lights…little bright stars…so we sat down and gave 3,976 of them names…..names we could remember just in case we were asked….we knew…and knowing was what counted in those days when prices were high and everything else seemed to be an exclamation mark on our page….she tired of the nightly conversation of the statues….how we examined each part from the very beginning….seemed no end was in sight for her…so by the grace of some intervention…a few quick shots of courage…and a guy with some navy tattoos….she called Earl some days and Dave other days…she moved forward…said it wasn’t me or her….it was really more about….she needed a different time zone…a place where it was earlier than where she was…I suggested California…they’d already decided Tinian…..she was looking for the place where it starts….and who could blame her…the headwaters of the time space contuinum….that’s like the inventor of Oreos…for God sake….
I watched the pump go up….the pump go down…counted it a few times just to make certain things were sequential….and had that rhythm I liked….one that was sort of bluesy….not to slow that it cramped my feet when I wore those two toned shoes…..so it was the days of whisteling….any song that entered my mind…sort of a really bad Muzak…that was nothing but whisteling….one you could hardly eat pie to…or heaven forbid a giant meal with the whole family all wearing their….Sunday clothes…hoping some guy doesn’t come up to the table and says…”Excuse me….I can’t take it anymore”…. and blows his brains out….that kind of whisteling….sort of a “Be careful” kind of whistling…has an unpredictable edge to it….I guess I’d think twice before….getting into the whistling posture….if it was me…..
“Life in abundance comes only through great love” – Elbert Hubbard
there is no doubt…that great love not only supplies us with abudance…but much much more….I sense that each day…feel that each day…and am open to it each day….many of us are in “That Time” of our lives….however we define “That Time”…but we all a common thread that we each know…with little or no discussion…it is the family secret…no bullshit….sort of living…I guess…or the secret of age…but how blessed we are to be walking this earth…the giants of the planet…King Kong for a few more years….
I lay in bed this morning…thinking how this whole process works…it all depends on where you want to start it…mine starts at awakening….I then have a day…that I have to do something with to make the whole thing worth while…when night begins …I have the night I have to do the same with …and no matter what happens…the day and night will pass whether I am in the game or not…it is up to me to make what happens happen….how I go about that is the exciting part of the play…I can rob 7/11’s for the thrill…or make the day exciting enough that the consequences…don’t involve jail time…or a hail of bullets from a SWAT team….
I can only say I am thankful….I don’t have a photo in the post office….I have wonderful people in my life….everything is becoming what it is…and the compass is pointing in the right direction….that in itself says I can take my hands off the wheel a few times at 90 mph…..or close my eys….if I need the thrill….
The photograph below is of my entry in the”Valley of the Art Dolls” show at Dreamscape Gallery in December
“Alternate Jesus” 2009
here is a closer view:
I hope you can make the show, I’ll keep you posted….
“All of us have moments in our lives that test our courage. Taking children into a house with a white carpet is one of them.”- Erma Bombeck
I debated about writing this…until I awakened at 3:30 this morning….the exact same time I was born 53 years ago….today….I share this day with my brother…who too was born today yet is 7 years older than I…happy birthday Kenneth….
the very first thing I remember in my life was a visit to the hospitol…my brother had scarlet fever….I sat in the waiting room on an overstuffed brown couch…with chrome handles….my feet just reached the end of the seat…..that day I learned…I liked the smell of exhaust fumes….my head was out the bus window….on the way home….we sat in the back….where all of the gear noise was….
it really all began a few decades later….it was that left in front of right way of…living….knowing that without that there was really nothing other than the same…which I knew so well…it was no longer easy….I’d outgrown the aquarium….needed a place to put the things that fit…but I didn’t have to wear everyday….so it happened…she waved the wand….the dust sprinkled into my hair….I said a few Hail Mary’s…..along with a prescription that slowly….worked….wrote a few pages each day….tried my best to think about how a vegetarian would look at this whole thing….consulted the Tao…a few hundred times…turned everything inside out….so many times that i wasn’t sure if inside out was outside in…or not….had those long discussions with the 3 of us….until one of us left from frustration and habit…and the other….I conquered playing the home version of…. ”Jeopardy”…best 2 out of 3….so there I was…where I was….new…exciting…a bit fearful…but clearly…ready to ride each of the carnival rides…not because I had to but because….I could…I had the “Endless Day Pass” ….there in my hand for the very first time in my life…..and do you have any idea what that means to a kid…..of 53…..
I am at the very best place I have ever been in my life…this second of my life….what a gift……
“The first half of life is spent in longing for the second-the second half in regretting the first” – French Proverb
the phone rang a few short rings…not like the ones I knew…more like someone else’s number but on my nightstand….that made it seem all the more certain I was …but not where I was…was starting to make the difference…it was a soaring sort of feelings….that gliding past the cliff edges…just close enough to hear my feathers scrape the hard rock edge….without a worry about the finished product…or if it could stand on its own or not…the savannah is a dangerous place…either get up running or sit down..let’s eat…at least that’s what they told me…on my birthday…that one year….that year was so many years ago…but it seems like I could grab it from the bag …I kept them in…that close…that close…and I’ll pinch my fingers closer to show you….I mean that close….
she wore the hat with the candles…even though “Candles” was spelled “del” instead of “dle”….we just didn’t care…we’d been invited but decided to make other plans….the second they said….”Do you”….I knew what the rest of it was…and wanted to say “No thanks, we already have plans”…but I waited until it was clear…all clear…crystal clear….just to make certain it was…what it was….but what did I know…I still wore Velcro shoes…and those 80’s shirts….that made me feel a little younger than the other guys at the….plant…
so it was really January…but I kept the calendar a few months ahead…to make certain I was always on time…my dad always told me…”It’s better to be really early than a second late”…and the brown plastic shoes of simulated leather…bit my feet hard this day…maybe it was the job I wanted…or the chance to just say hello to a few hundred people in an hour or so…I didn’t care about anything but the lunch room…and if they served everything on red trays or blue….ones….and I like that smell of a parking garage…they all smell the same….like cars but … like car wash water…on a summer day…before it gets to hot…..and they always say…”Thank you sir…have a nice day”……I don’t say anything…..
we acted like time travelers….in that way that only other time travelers would know…so it was difficult to let on that we knew…when we saw people like us….it was more eye winking…slow head nodding…half smiles…all of those things that identify…some level of sameness….like shells on the beach….or bullets in the gun….except a little different because we could have talked…but we opted to smile…those strange religious smiles…like those people who come to the door with their hands clasped…that have a “Message” for me….why me…I always think….Jesus loves me yes I know…for the Bible tells me so….that’s the message….I heard once….but I was young…really young…when his blood was grape juice…and I thought…how I do I get grape juice blood….and a body made from a salteen cracker…. there was far more here than they were explaining… or willing to explain….at least not to me……
“We know too much and feel too little. At least, we feel too little of those creative emotions from which a good life springs.” – Bertrand Russell
Well…another Art Tuesday has arrived….oh my…I chose three of my favorite historical painters and three of my favorite paintings from each…each of the paintings is truly about emotion…draws deep the feeling of fear…defeat…anguish….joy…happiness…playfullness…in each of the paintings…there are consequences…and each story in my mind continues..i’d live to be able to turn the page and see what happens next…I hope you enjoy these….as I do….
Eugène Delacroix. The Massacre of Chios
Delacroix shows a true sense of defeat…there is nothing more…nothing left except what remains from the conquerers…I love the level of an ending…how things are going to chnage and change really fast….
Artemisia Gentileschi, Judith Slaying Holofernes
One of my all time favorite painters and paintings…Artemisia Gentileschi shows a beheading…that seems so “Let’s get this done”….sort of caption…I really enjoy the look on both of the women’s faces…they seem calm…composed…almost as if they have done this a few times before….there is an emotional rawness for me that seems to come forth…doesn’t make me uncomfortable…or concerned about the end result for Holofernes…as it seems pretty obvious….more I want to know if the women talked about this the next morning over tea….
Caravaggio, Amor Vincit Omnia
Caravaggio typically used street urchins for his models…he used dead prostitutes….the homeless and down troden to make such beautiful paintings…usually there is something that indicates the model is homeless or an urchin…perhaps…sunburned hands…or a dirty neck…this boy seems very happy to be who he is portraying…I suspect that the wings on the model have some how become real…and if I knew the rest of the story…he would have flown away…to some other town….
“That is happiness; to be dissolved into something completely great.” – Willa Cather
I awakened late…after a night of horror conversations and “what was our scariest movie…we ever saw”….and realized that what scares us is as different for each of us as what…makes us happy…there is no….universal happiness that covers all…like a “One size fits all”…. suit of happiness…happiness is not like licorice…red or black…no other colors..I don’t know if I could even eat yellow or green licorice…just the thought of it makes me wonder….and I guess what I saw last night…heard last night and was part of last night made me see that whatever “IT” is…..is A OKAY….
searching for anything becomes the elusive act of never finding the object of the search…what comes to us does…what doesn’t ….doesn’t….and to think that by going out and finding something will make that something a part of us is unreal…..to force the issue never works….everything enters our lives when it does….not necessarily by our desire for it…our want/need for it…but when we are ready to accept it…when we have done the work…stichted up the previous wounds….understood that hot burners burn hands…that there are consequences….all of the lesson stuff that makes driving the car with the blindfold on just a bit easier….and there is no garuntee…..look for it long enough and you will find some facsimile of your search….question that facsimile long enough and you will know it is not what you were searching for…probably more of a band-aid for an arterial wound….
sure we should go get what we want….strive for happiness…all of the things that will make our lives complete…full…rich…juicy…but those things come from……being those things….so we have to be the example of what we want in our lives…and by developing that persona…we draw that persona to us…by being juicy…we bring in juicy….that’s seems like a win win …..the secret is doing it….
look around you…there are a few people in your life that do this…they get what they want by being what they want…it may not be that obvious…or clear…but it’s right there…I have a few of these people in my life….and I am beginning to notice them more….not because they do anything differently…more because….they are doing things the same….because it has been working for them….they are the best examples of success I know of…
it is recipie…nothing more….they developed a recipe that has worked…and periodically they add something new to the mix…not as an experiemnet..but knowing full well it will enhance the flavor…make it juicier….more rich…more thick and luscious….
“Make yourself necessary to somebody” - Ralph Waldo Emerson
“It never rains in Southern California”…was playing on the radio….I was wondering where to hide the dope…and she was only 15…Arizona wasn’t good to people like me… and we had apples….”NO PLANTS ALLOWED”….
crisp is the other word…..not sharp or fresh…he always said “Crisp” in a way that sounded like it would snap right there in front of you…but he was a gimp…lame…crippled…wore those Polio braces with the dark brown straps….his dad owned the Lucky Boy hambugers…..pale white German blood…not a Nazi…more a liberal….politician…and young like his father…he fell from the car onto the freeway….we harmonized….Mrs Kinney…David fell out of the car”….she screamed with her see through red scarf on her hair…in curlers….he sat there….waiting…wondering if we’d left him for good….
he never wanted anything other than the really sour red lifesavers…wouldn’t eat the green ones or the yellow…never the creamy white…never…but he was wired differently…sort wired not to work…like a real bulb or one of those yellow bug light bulbs with all of them swarming around like a tornado….to do what is always what I wondered…collect them…didn’t kill them…just drew them in…sort of like a trap with no end….but he would end it…all by himself…no more lifesavers for the life taker…can’t suck a candy to a razor sliver….when it all doesn’t work…now can you….
it landed first on the horn of the saddle…then it landed on my neck…stung me….I crushed its yellow and black striped body between my fingers…had to look to make certain…felt the sharp pinch….her head was low…we were walking away from the rental corral….her name was “Candy”…a big sorrel….resigned to be a carnival horse of sorts….for the big kids…like me….I was 12….standing in the back…Jesus was on the cross behind me in glass….my hair covered part of my forehead….with my sky blue shirt and navy pants….no sweaters because it was May…..it erupted on my chin….the beginning…of the long teens….no more Mr. Nice Guy….I was headed for manhood…no matter if G.I. Joe wanted me to or not….
her boyfriend was going to Vietnam…Republic of…she wanted to give herself to him…in that young girl way….she was 15…I was 14….she asked me to help her…I thought she meant groceries or homework…or maybe mow the lawn…for her….with the electric mower on Saturday….he died a few weeks after getting there…..and it became a dusty west Texas summer that year…wind blew from May to May….hot water sounds moving through the pipes…all day long….and it never stopped….
we hid the dirty magazines in the desert….in a mesquite skeleton…under the dirt in a box…I had a pack of Camels…and a Zippo lighter…I kept there too….somedays we’d have Rutpit buy us beers…and look at the pictures…wondering what all of that was going to feel like…..we’d laugh nervously…sometimes ache that young boy ache….try not to think to far ahead…everything was still very unclear….you known…sediment clouded it all…the dirt from beneath somehow made its way through the gravel…..and mixed that water chocolate milk brown….not enough to dive in head first….for fear of breaking your neck and ending up like MIke J……more like staring in and seeing that murky reflection…the one you weren’t sure if it was you or not…and you’d been warned….more than once….maybe more than 10 times….but the warning was like a new barbed wire fence….just had to touch it…see if it really was sharp….like the edge of those “Cutco” knives…he sold….my mother…..with their hard plastic….wooden looking swirly handles….I think it was 1972……..
