All in this Together

Ode to a Favorite Shirt

Somebody might say,

and I would believe them,

that they wouldn't wear this shirt

For All The Tea In China.

In other words, this shirt

May not be everybody's Cup of Tea.

But it is mine

and my Cup of Tea.

Green Tea, hot and strong

not your Black Tea or

your

Iced Tea.

Well, HELLO, ladies and goonts (gents), haven’t talked at ya in a while (yes you have Ed, just the other…) Sorry about that! I won’t be a stranger (you aren’t, Ed, you aren’t)!

Taking advantage of the Fine Fall Weather the Winsome Wonder and yours truly Ed headed over to the Seattle Asian Art Museum in beautiful Volunteer Park, their motto, “If you want to see the skyline of Seattle through a hole in a sculpture, we’re you’re place!” (They’re working on that, want to shorten it a bit) to see the exhibit of video art by Tabaimo, a Japanese woman artist from Kyoto.

It’s really a cool exhibit, highly recommended, she has taken art from the museum and riffed on it to create her own work, and we thought it really worked well. Two of the items she chose from the museum collection, which alone were worth the price of admission (well, it was free on Thursdays) were two beautiful hummingbird scrolls from the 1850s and all the videos were different kinds of videos than we have ever seen, they go around corners and create spaces you feel like (you can’t, we tried) you can walk through.

http://tabaimo.site.seattleartmuseum.org/

Afterwards, feeling a mite puckish and peckish, we drove up to Broadway, parked in a great parking spot (I wish you could have seen it) despite the very nice policeman who said we couldn’t park there although, he admitted, sobbing, after we gave him the third degree, he wasn’t in parking enforcement and wouldn’t give us a ticket. We are DANGEROUS the Winsome Wonder and I and we parked there anyway (maybe WW has a picture of that parking space, I’ll send it along if so) and headed to Pho Cyclo where we eschewed the pho and enchewed the pork bahn mi and the pork rice.

Afterwards again (there’s more?) we headed over to Dendroica Gallery, where I have a piece in a show and so if you find yourself on Olive Street near (semi-near) the corner of Broadway (actual a few blocks down from Broadway, across from the greatest Chinese restaurant ever (right, Vernon?) Zhu Dang (now, impossibly, out of business) you can walk by the gallery and NOT go inside cuz my piece is in the window and you won’t have to bother anybody. You can breeze by, take a glance, and keep on walkin’, a Person Around Town, urbane and sophisticated, you get your art (foam core) in small doses and move on to the next exciting artistic (or otherwise) development!

http://dendroica.gallery/

So that was our night and we 1) headed home, 2) said good bye to our lovely parking spot, 3) wended our way to 12^th, 4) left on 12^th, 5) to Aloha (the bestest street in Seattle), 6) to 23^rd 7) a little veer across 23^rd,8) to 24^th, 9) to our alley, 10) and home where Frieda read us the riot act.

Hope you are having the BEST DAY EVER wherever you find yourselves,

Yr fthfl corrspdt,

Ed

Process

Well, the thing to do is not apologize for not writing, like it's a good idea not to apologize to people you haven't written to for a long time because they don't really want to hear it and it takes up all the space you have with stuff that they don't want to hear.

I've been struggling with painting lately, and it's mostly because I feel that some of the stuff I've been doing doesn't fit into our day and time as well as it might have used to. So I go searching for something that will, with mixed results. It's an age old problem, I think, for artists.

You look at some artists, though, their processes through the years go a long ways towards explaining what they are all about. Take an artist who always paints western scenes, or landscapes...no, not a good example. Take Deborah Butterfield, who come heck or high water creates stick bronzed horse sculptures.

In years that have been tumultuous (the 80s) she's produced horses, in times that have been excessive (the 90's) she's produced horses, in times (the 00's) when things are unsettled and unsure with a million jillion bytes of information beamed a person's way, she's produced horses.

I guess there's a market for them, but just how can these horses fit so many different times? I think that her original idea and original horse really must have fit the time she lived in the moment she created them, but after that they don't. It's not a good artistic practice to refuse to change with the times.

On the other hand, the time period between 1980 and 2009, thirty years, is a speck of time in the great ocean of it and so a horse in 1980 might say the same thing to it's audience as a horse in 2009 does.

Well, it's important not to judge and it's important not to think that you know all the answers. I guess I do know, though, that I'd like to produce something that reflects the poignancy of our times better than I have to this date. That might mean, however, lapsing into a sort of sadness that I don't want to lapse into, and I want to avoid that.

The upshot of this is that I've been painting over more paintings than normal, I'll work on them for a long time develop a highly crafted piece, and then get rid of it. It's struck me that the getting rid of it part of this particular process is significant and that should become my art piece and so I'm toying with that by painting over paintings and then displaying them.

It doesn't satisfy me though.

There is so much to overcome to become the painter that I would like to be, and particularly it involves my relationship to my audience. A guy can come into my studio and say, pointing at watercolors, Why would you waste your time on these when you can make those? and points to an oil painting. And I give that the time of day because I'm nothing (I believe) without an audience.

But the thing to absolutely remember is, no matter what I do (or any artist does) there are going to be people who like it. For every person who likes an oil painting there will be another one who likes a watercolor. So in the end, I should just do what I want to do and damn the consequences.

Happy New Year

First posting of 2009, hope I do more this year. I probably have more to say, last year I didn't.

On art.

Well, you know you think you have things figured out a little, but really I'd have to say the big thing I think I've learned is not to worry about it too much. I've tried to analyze things and tried to explain things and what I've found is that I don't need to analyze or explain nuthin'.

In fact it's probably better if I don't say a word about any painting or any attempt at art that I might attempt.

I think that's a good thing to learn and it certainly helps me in situations where I'm asked to explain myself.

Of course that does mean that I don' t have as much to say about stuff, maybe I should branch out a little and talk about other things.

On Music. I love music but I can't write about it. You try it, take an album that you like and tell somebody why you like it. You might be good, some people are but I'm not.

I think it's because the music isn't necessarily listened to by my left brain, I think I'm a right brain listener and as such, know what I like, but can't tell you about it.

So no writing about music either.

On Baseball. I could write a LOT on baseball -- it's funny why I would be able to do this and not write about music, maybe I'm not so far off with my left/right brain theories. Baseball is all a left brain proposition if you're talking about it, maybe not if you're playing it. I read once that what the brain does to estimate where a fly ball will land rivals and in fact beats the amount of calculations done by the greatest supercomputer.

Of course that was a few years ago.

On people. Give me some good gossip any day.

Well, gotta go catch my bus. See ya!

Freaking out.

How the heckarini are ya!?

Good I hope.

This typeface is bad, doncha think?

You know I'm going through life minding my own business trying to think up stuff to do some art with, and for the most part doing okay with that. At least I think I am. I really do think that the art I come up is either original or I've just forgotten that I've seen something similar (I worry.)

But then I see something published that is a lot the same as something I've done, and it's a little unsettling.

I think maybe I'm a little better at dealing with it than before but not much.

Just the other day this guy I know Owen, sends me a pic of guy who has done crowds, and it showing them at the SAM sculpture park.

I freak out! Well, no, but it does make me think that:

1) this artist (Mcfetridge) has realized something I've been unable to realize. That is, he has had somebody ask to put up this artwork that looks similar to mine in a public place. I may have my own similar artwork but people haven't asked to put it in public place and so I'm one step behind.

2) or a bunch of steps behind.

3) you can see where I'm headed with this.

4) I suck.

5)McFetridge and I may have similar ideas but McFetridge has done the idea better than I have.

6) I hate McFetridge.

7) Actually, one reason I didn't freak out so much with this is I didn't really like parts of McFetridges' approach.

8) He is good getting different hair styles, and putting on glasses on some people, also good with the spacing of a crowd, all things I don't think I do so good. I have to sort of think to myself that because of the good things I'm doing with crowds, I can't be bothered with everything, every detail of a person in the crowd in order to think that maybe I should be doing more as far as the items listed above (hair styles, etc.)

9) But his crowds are flat, and colorless, the whole idea of my crowds is a little different, they are more alive I think while his crowd isn't. We have different approaches.

10) I get the feeling though that once something is public like in the case of McFetridge's crowds that anything else after it will seem derivative. That possibly even people will think that I copied McFetridge.

11) Actually the first thing I thought when I saw his crowd was that he had copied me.

12) I think that's significant somehow, shows an attitude by me that might go a long ways to explaining me.

13) But maybe not, I wouldn't bank on it.

So there you go, 13 reasons (13 good reasons) to freak out.

Big Man on Stool (and it's not me)

More Drawings

Leener (sort of) before she went to Laska

Self Portraits