Chlorophyll Skin

Chlorophyll Skin from Lucy McRae on Vimeo.

Chlorophyll Skin is an experimentation into color, movement, absorption and the body by Lucy McRae and Mandy Smith. The music is “When I Grow Up” by Fever Ray. (source)

Matthew Langley Artblog: EU has outlawed incandescent lights... what about art?

Matthew Langley Artblog: EU has outlawed incandescent lights... what about art?

“Imagine painting. But you’re 200 yards away from the canvas, and 80 people are holding the brush. And you’re on a walkie-talkie going, ‘Need a little blue there. No darker blue. No DARKER BLUE!’”

—David Fincher’s definition of directing

LIsa Pressman-'Influences'

Lisa Pressman has a feature on her art blog called Influences, a project where she invites artists to share images of their work and to list creative influences. She asked if I would join in and I did. She just posted my entry here: Tim McFarlane's influences

poetry in slow motion

A great video featuring slow motion sequences of skaters doing their thing. The music that accompanies the video is 'Nightfall' by Mileece. Gotta respect the abilities/artistry of these kids.

How artists must dress

What you wear to an opening can be almost important as the work you're showing...

Artists must first of all distinguish themselves from members of the adjacent professional classes typically present at art world events: dealers, critics, curators, and caterers. They must second of all take care not to look like artists. This double negation founds the generative logic of artists' fashion.

The relationship between an artist's work and attire should not take the form of a direct visual analogy. A stripe painter may not wear stripes.

The relationship between an artist's work and attire should function in the manner of a dialectic, in which the discrepancy between the personal appearance of the artist and the appearance of her work is resolved into a higher conceptual unity. An artist's attire should open her work to a wider range of interpretive possibilities.

The artist's sartorial choices are subject to the same hermeneutic operations as are his work. When dressing, an artist should imagine a five-paragraph review of his clothes—the attitudes and intentions they reveal, their topicality, their relationship to history, the extent to which they challenge or endorse, subvert or affirm dominant forms of fashion—written by a critic he detests.

Communicating an attitude of complete indifference to one's personal appearance is only achievable through a process of self-reflexive critique bordering on the obsessive. Artists who are in realityoblivious to how they dress never achieve this effect.

Whereas a dealer must signal, in wardrobe, a sympathy to the tastes and tendencies of the collector class, an artist is under no obligation to endorse these. Rather, the task of the artist with regard to fashion is to interrogate the relationship between cost and value as it pertains to clothing, and, by analogy, to artworks.

An artist compensates for a limited wardrobe budget by making creative and entertaining clothing choices, much in the way that a dog compensates for a lack of speech through vigorous barking.

Artists are not only permitted but are in fact required to be underdressed at formal institutional functions. But egregious slovenliness without regard to context is a childish ploy, easily seen through.

An artist may dress like a member of the proletariat, but shouldn't imagine he's fooling anyone.

The affluent artist may make a gesture of class solidarity by dressing poorly. She is advised to keep in mind that, at an art opening, the best way to spot an heiress is to look for a destitute schizophrenic. Middle-class or working-class artists, the destitute, and the schizophrenic can use this principle to their social advantage.

The extension of fashion into the violation of norms of personal hygiene and basic grooming constitutes the final arena for radicalism in artists' fashion. Brave, fragrant souls! You will be admired from a distance.

-Roger White

(source)

New interview

There's a new interview with me by Brent Hallard up on his art blog, Visual Discrepancies. Go check it out!

Brent: One of the things that intrigue me about your work is how very immediate it feels.
But then, also, there is this fine sense of order; a tension that just reads so. There are often layers, sometime layers upon layers, some almost obliterated, or covered over. There is this sense of frenzy at work, though every move feels so considered, every layer, or clean slate making sense to the next. But this is, of course, looking at a finished piece. I’m sure the actual act, the sitting looking, the going back in, the results so far… these aren’t perfectly arranged layers and movements that happen. What appears in the end as a beautiful display of order and chaos, a pitched tension between control and free play, is something worked at?

Tim: You’ve hit on a lot of what goes on in my decision-making process while painting. There is a lot of back and forth, playing one layer/color/direction off of another, making decisions about how much to save and what to sacrifice. There is a dance between control and chaos that contributes to that tension that you sense... (read more here)

The High Line

Spent part of Friday afternoon exploring the newly opened High Line Park in the Meatpacking District of New York. It’s a great example of reclaimed urban space.

The first section between Ganesvoort Street and West 20th is currently open, but if all goes well, the park will extend up to west 30th in 2010.

Find out more about the park here: The High Line

Up all night

Detail from a recent work on paper.

Had one of those 'brain won't shut off so don't even think about trying to sleep' episodes after climbing into bed last night. The only remedy was to get up and write as much of that stuff down as I could. All of it was art-related and the pages of my art journal from this session were filled with random notes about projects and other things I couldn't stop thinking about for some reason.

From 1:45am until about 3:15am, I filled 7 pages with ideas for projects that I'm already pursuing or might pursue in the near future with painting, mixed media, works on paper, photography, printmaking as well as a major reorganization of the works in my studio. Getting it all written down was a good thing. Now, all I have to do is dust off my alchemy skills to make more hours in the day in order to get these things done...

Plastic mayhem

Artworks and other objects primarily made of plastics have been degrading for years and the problem doesn't seem to be going away any time soon according to this article from Slate.com.

(via c-monster)

waterfalls damage

Cafe sues over 'Waterfalls' spray

passages

Two photos of my main drawing/painting wall. The first one, taken in May, 2007 (black and white), shows the wall not long after I had repainted it (for an open studio event). After that, I decided to not bother repainting the walls and opted for letting whatever wayward marks to remain as part of the space, as in the second shot from February, 2009.

The drips and spatters are like markers in time. Looking at some of the outlines of previous works, I can sometimes recall exactly which piece I painted, if not when. On the other hand, there are outlines marked off that only represent part of the story, an intermediate point in the process where I may have been working on something only to either abandon it or move to finishing the piece on the floor or a table.

Whatever the case may be, the paint on the walls and floor serve as inspiration for me to keep going, regardless of whatever else is happening outside the studio.

Anthropologie art installation

The Anthropologie store at 18th and Walnut Streets here in Philly has this great, bright orange art installation that flows around the lower part of the building and seemingly into its facade. It really brings a nice punch of color and movement to a usually restrained corner in center city. If this were my piece, I would have titled it, Orange Flow, or something like that. I might still use that title for one of my own works one of these days...

Airport show mention in the Inquirer

Happy summer! I'm told that the sun is expected to appear for possibly two days in a row sometime in the next couple of months. This perpetual cloud cover and rain has to let up sometime...

On another note, I received a brief mention in an article by Edith Newhall in the Philadelphia Inquirer about the current exhibitions at the Philadelphia International Airport. If you're passing through the airport any time between now and September and have a little time on your hands, wander over to Terminal F, Concourse 3 to see my works on paper. There's a lot of great art to see all over the airport, so it might be a good time to make PHL a stop-over art destination.

'Back on my Feet' in the Inquirer

Back on My Feet, the current group show that I am a part of at Bridgette Mayer, was mentioned by Edith Newhall in yesterday's Sunday Inquirer:

Group hug

On Washington Square, meanwhile, Bridgette Mayer has assembled a sprawling do-gooder benefiting the nonprofit Back on My Feet, an organization that promotes the self-sufficiency of Philadelphia's homeless population by engaging homeless individuals in running as a means to build confidence, strength, and self-esteem. While not stringent on the gallery artist front - too many of her regulars are here - this summer group show of 100 donated works also boasts contributions from Back on My Feet participants and by such well-known Philadelphia artists as Candy Depew, Tristin Lowe, Eileen Neff, and Odili Donald Odita.

Some of the standouts are by the aforementioned, predictably, but also by Mark Brosseau, Jon Manteau, Tim McFarlane, J. McAleer, David Slovic, Brooke Steytler, Paul Santoleri, Rebecca Saylor-Sack, Ivan Stojakovic, and Jackie Tileston.

All works are priced between $500 and $1,000, and proceeds will directly benefit Back on My Feet.

Source

studio view (6.12.09)

Studio View (6.12.09)

New works in progress.

Glitch

Studio view (6.10.09)

Recent paintings on the left wall, new works on paper on the right. The new series of works on paper is called Glitch and is focused on accumulation, movement, and chance happenings. Those 'chance happenings' being random drips and other interesting marks developing due to overlapping brushstrokes and the interaction of wet and dry layers of ink. Each piece is ink on paper, 30 x 20 inches.



Glitch

Glitch

Glitch (detail)

I took these photos on Wednesday, after spending most of the afternoon hanging out with Tyrus Townsend, an art friend and freelance writer I'd only known previously on the 'net. He has an art blog called, I Heart Art. Tyrus was in Philly gathering information for an article he was writing. In addition, he did a short interview with me that may be published somewhere online, but I'm not sure yet. We walked through center city and wound up hanging out in my studio for a couple of hours talking about various aspects of the art world and so forth.

When Tyrus left, I stayed and worked on a couple of the pieces that make up Glitch. I worked on two of them earlier in the week, then did a third during this session. Three of them together was good, but I thought five would make a good number for the beginning of this project and did a couple more. The ideas in Glitch from a painting that was included in my last show called,Gravity's Architecture, seen below:


Gravity's Architecture, 2009, acrylic on panel, 16 x 16 inches

There was something about the illusion of structures created from the thinly painted, overlapping bars of color, and the force of gravity on the dripping paint, that made me want to explore this direction a little more.

I'm envisioning Glitch as an ongoing series on paper and possibly translucent mylar and exhibiting them in groups of five or six or more, depending on how things develop. I don't know if I'll explore this idea on canvas yet, as I have a bunch of other works that I want to do as paintings, so this will be a works on paper project only, for now.

Linear diversions

Lightstream, 2009, acrylic on panel, 16 x 20 inches

Tunnelvision, 2009, acrylic on panel, 16 x 20 inches

l: Tunnelvision

c: Gravity's Architecture II, 2009, acrylic on panel, 24 x 24 inches

r: Lightstream

Some recent goings-on from the studio

Astor Bell

No Division

I just found out about a new net music site that focuses on electronic music. Astor Bell.com distributes free albums and downloads of electronic music. So, If you're looking for an eclectic mix of electronic music, then check out AB.

From Flavorpill:

A promising example of the emerging Creative Commons music model, Stockholm-based electronic netlabel Astor Bell recently released several free albums online.

The label is eclectically electronic. Astor Bell's releases range from glitch-hop experiments to classic techno. 1st Dude adds orchestral sampling to Ninjatune-style cut-ups, while Dan Brasco mines melodic minimalism, Bubble Shield freaks out your headphones, and Giuseppe serves up a classic Kompakt sound.

Back on my Feet benefit this Friday

This Friday and continuing through July, I'll have two new works on display at the Bridgette Mayer Gallery as part of the gallery's benefit exhibition for the Philadelphia non-profit, Back On My Feet. There will be about 100 paintings on 10" x 10" panels displayed and available for sale by about 100 Philadelphia artists for $500-$1,000, with proceeds benefitting BOMF.

From the press release:

In celebration of eight years in Philadelphia, the Bridgette Mayer Gallery is holding a Benefit Exhibition to honor the non-profit group Back on My Feet. Back on My Feet promotes the self-sufficiency of Philadelphia’s homeless population by engaging them in running as a means to build confidence, strength and self-esteem. The benefit will feature 100 10" x 10" panels by gallery artists, Philadelphia artists and Back on My Feet artists, ranging in price from $500-$1,000. Proceeds from the event will go directly to the non-profit.

More from the press release here: BRIDGETTE MAYER GALLERY CELEBRATES EIGHT YEARS IN PHILADELPHIA WITH BENEFIT EXHIBITION SUPPORTING NON-PROFIT, BACK ON MY FEET

Back On My Feet website

Back On My Feet Benefit

Friday, June 5, 2009

6-8:30pm

Bridgette Mayer Gallery

709 Walnut Street

Philadelphia, PA 19106

215.413.8893

www.bridgettemayergallery.com

Mist, 2009, acrylic on panel, 10 x 10 inches

Chameleon, 2009, acrylic on panel, 10 x 10 inches