Day Trip to India

... my friends Kyle, Anna, and I took a trip to Berkeley to meet with Anthropologist David Szanton, who happens to be an expert in Mithila painting from India. This is one of the areas I want to go study/create/colaborate during my 'Tiny Universe' trip, so it was a real treat to have a private presentation and explanation of their contemporary practices. After going thru stacks of paintings, David busted out some pics from the 1950s of the traditional wall painting roots of the style, which totally made my jaw drop. Too bad I had run out of memory on my digi camera ... so now its stored in the soft grey memory banks and the heart ...


Kyle has a great house ... totally rad paint job by his roomate Lisa ...


... Black (flower) Power kitchen ...


... my new friend Anna, caught in the dream catcher ...


... crossing the Bay Bridge ...


... David droping the knowledge ...


... A Mithila painting done by the Brahman class ...


... painting done by the scribe cast ...


... western and eastern feet ...


... painting done by the Dusat class ("untouchables," aka "the opressed," aka Ghandi: "God's children") ... the outsiders of the outsider art ... dug the dung wash and triangle milkmaid heads ...


... the Tsunami ...


... 9/11 ...


... the face of capitalism ... so epic ...


... rainbow eye in the sky while returning to S.F. ...

... we were famished after this intensive art experience, and went to Walzwerk, an awesome East German restruant on South Van Ness and 15th (check out the veggie-schnitzel) ... I've been going every wednesday for the past year + and doing art for their specials menu. This was my final wednesday, and I was happy to share the meal with good friends. Go there next week to see menu art I created inspired by the Mithila painting, and check out the school David helped set up in India:
http://www.mithilapainting.org/

Pacific Peace Portal

Its my final week in S.F. till who knows when...

made some paper in the ocean this weekend....

got some plans for what to do with them this summer in New York...

future coming into sharper focus...past pulled back into the ocean of time...

Dumpster Diving circa 2001

I hate how self indulgent Blogs can be, but I just came across a pix of me dumpster diving in-front of the Castro Theatre from an article in the SF Gate back in the day, and I thinks its funny.

Happy 100th Birthday Grand-Pere!

Although I never really got to know him (he died when I was 4), the influence of my grandfather's art and life on my life and art is massive. From a child I was exposed to all his iconic and surreal B&W photos, stacks of his LIFE magazine covers, and his collection of artifacts from around the world like African sculptures, Picasso plates, and Dali drawings. His old work studio was my art Mecca as a child, and remains a place where I still go in NYC when I need to tune out, tap in and work on my own pieces. Its also fitting that May 1st (the day before his birthday) was a day of national rallies by immigrants around the country (The one in SF rocked!). Philippe Halsman was on the last boat out of France before the Nazis invaded. He was hooked up with an emergency artist visa by Eleanor Roosevelt, thanks to Albert Einstein's help. So I'm down for the immigrants. I've got that D.I.Y. spirit from my grandfather, a hard working artist who arrived in NYC with 2 suitcases and a family to support and made it to the top of his field based on determination, refinement of craft, and creative freedom. He also cast a huge shadow for me, which I felt I needed to work my way out of to create my own art. His daughter, my mother, was an art teacher and not only raised me to be an artist, but also gave me the opportunity at a young age to help select Philippes work for exhibitions based on criteria like composition and contrast. Its no surprise that aside from my own art making practice I still enjoy the challenge of curating shows. So anyway, Happy birthday Grand-Pere, and thanks via the virtual universe to the cosmic universe for your legacy and inspiration!

Community Time Travelers

Two weeks left in SF...
The sun has never seemed brighter...
Bernal Hill so green from the record rain falls...
Such a sweet city of friends...
Riding my bike with hands in prayer position...
Cut hair for free in Dolores Park today...
A new hobby...
Triple Base is transforming yet again...
Change change change...
Diving in...
NYC, Boston, India on the horizon...
Just trying to be present here in SF for now...
One step at a time...
Trying to remember to breathe thru the top of my head...
I had a casual hang out art sale clothing cleanse on friday...
Here are some pix of the lovely people who came through...

Claire

Patricia

Starlight

Jovi

Nickolas

Jessica

Leah and her cousin

Leah and Leah

Derek

Aya and Chris

Paul and Ariadne

Raul

Gabe and Celia

Inka

Jeanne

Scott

Andy

Sarah

Brion

Kathy

Michelle

Miho

Kevin

Jessica

Sebastian

Sean

Paul

Izzy

Self

Burma dispatch -January 2000

In the beginning.... (Day one, Jan 27th) POW! BLAM! WHAM! (comic book style)Yangon blows my mind. Everything hitting me at once, too much too fast too many new things for the brain to process at once...even sorting out later breaks a sweat (or is that just the heat?). Sensory overload cab ride. Jail cell size room in hotel, bags are dropped and Yangon's downtown drag is ready for exploring, (Canal Street fast forward) long-spine main street with vendors selling every imaginable useless thing ever made (half of which has "NIKE" printed on it), giant ribs stretching north to south, cluttered with old colonial decaying mica-painted buildings (like old Havana) and wires clustered, shooting (rigor mortis Medusa style) in every which direction. Street level; every block specializing in some business (emeralds, sapphires and rubies sold by old Indian women with scalding hot pink third eyes under the shade of candelabra drip trees with altars and flowers attached, shop signs sawed out of multicolor Plexiglas by young boys' small hands, pyramids of radio guts, Monk and Nun gear, closets of pills, "longyi"s (traditional Burmese pants that are more sarong like), food stalls of every sort (some look more like Damien Hirst installations). Ant farm movement of people.

Beautiful people. The Burmese have the high cheek bones and dark skin of the Indians and Nepalese (from the west and north), mixed with the crescent moon Buddha eyes and oval face of the Chinese and Thai (from the north and east). The result is an incredibly beautiful group of bronze skinned people. The women and children (some men) wear a golden yellow paste brushed on their face in various designs (circles, blocks, lines, the whole face occasionally...) It's make up and sun screen, and applied after rubbing the bark of a tree against stone. The kids and teens are incredible (Ford, send your scouts), but the Burmese have a tough life that definitely wears on them. Especially the men, who chew betel nut. It is a red nut, wrapped in a green leaf that over time stains the teeth and builds up like plaque. Apparently the messier the mouth, the better the catch. The men are always spitting like a boxer and his bloody mouth between rounds. Burmese 'what's up?' is "Where are you going?". Sometimes that is all the English they know, that and "hello", which the kids will continue to scream at you until you acknowledge, at which point they will laugh and hide their faces. Mohawk causing quite a scene (stopping traffic and making babies cry). On my walk to buy a longyi and sandals (native chic) retinas blown away by mad colors. Neon rainbow colors of population...dark skinned Indian man in light blue from head to toe, shaved head nuns in variety of pinks (from secret flesh to 6th grade hi-lighter) under brown paper umbrellas, Girl with short (bangs) straight black as the heavens hair in milky purple dress, golden circles on cheeks, kneeling on curb breaking up coal for her fried banana stand (I fell in love), albino old woman in Van Gogh sunflower yellow, monks in brake-light red and maroon robes that are folded so they appear to be wrapped in waves. So much. So much. Wandering around city. Stopping to draw in the Sule pagoda (pagodas are religious monuments that are giant, golden, and in the shape of expired hourglasses -or prison style tear drop tattoos on square bases surrounded by Buddha statues). Curious crowds gather. Disarming smiles. Make my way to another, larger pagoda. More interested in wooden lime green monastery across the street where 7 year old maroon monks are playing hide and seek with me behind giant palm leaves... I walk into complex, drawn towards subway silver painted Buddha sculpture beneath tree made up of thousands of snake like branches...kids had fetched an English-speaking teen layman who works at the monastery...I am invited into the warm shadowed interior where ancient monks stretch out, like they are sun bathing, beneath a Buddha's Christmas light sequence kitschy multiple halo. I tell them I am an artist, and they invite me back the next day to paint (Destiny as the Tour Guide). Bike taxi down crazy streets, with apricot and raspberry setting sun over stately abandoned ghost white buildings and green trees stretching forever above.

Hitting the refresh button

Wowie Maui....

...after an amazing Hawaiian hitch-hiking adventure this winter (post Venetian Plaster job for the Gettys on big island) I remembered the ecstasy of destiny, and knew it would soon be time to emerge from the patterns I had created for myself...

....back in the custody of nature's green palms....

...Destiny as your Tour Guide part 2: "Tiny Universe"....

...and now, I pack up 5 years of San Francisco memories.....

...spend the summer on the east coast working on art projects, and then head to India in the fall....

...6 years ago friends received e-mails composed during the original Destiny as your Tour Guide voyage (I'll post an example above)...

...this blog is where I'll check in from time to time to share elements from the latest journey I'm about to embark upon....

....please come back every now and then...