Friday, August 18, 2006

"Lets go crazy pants.."

A draw walk was taken by me late last night, finding many art materials in the NYC trash as usual, and creating and leaving art as I went. At one point I was trailing a couple, and drawing a moving street scene, walking slowly, and some guy behind me says "Lets go, crazy pants." because I guess even at 11pm people are still in a rush, and white checked pants are just too much for upper west siders. It made me laugh thou. People are in such a hurry to get into their casket....



I made my way to the Hudson river, sat and meditated for a bit, happy to be near a moving body of water, and having space to decompress from all the stress that has been my life for the past 4 weeks. I wanted to go to India to have a deeper spiritual experience, but NYC is really teaching me a lot...

On the way home I found some National Geographics from the 70s, and worked on collages till 3am. I used to love to make collages as a kid, but as an "adult" in the art world I noticed collages were becoming trendy a couple of years ago. I usually try to avoid trends, but I'm ready to shed some self created art world dogma. Ultimately it matters not who's doing what when. As long as a connection to spirit can shine through, all art actions are worthy, trend or not. I am spending the summer living in the same apartment building that was the center of the NY Dada scene (Duchamp lived here), and the collages at the MoMA exhibit planted a seed that wants to grow here. I'm doing a lot of strange art this summer. Fun work, some bad some good. I'll eventually post some when I'm ready. Just exploring shapes and colors and moods and thoughts and philosophies and questions and attempts at explanations.

I like to imagine all flys as time travel machines from the future (I'm developing a screen play based on that idea). Any time one lands on me I pretend it is someone, some fly on the wall, here to observe the moment. If I could travel back in time thru fly host technology I'd love to go to early Egypt and chill on some camel dung and take in that culture for a bit.

Tuesday, August 15, 2006

Sphereism

The cover of today's NY Times science section has two interesting articles that relate to the "sphereism" manifesto I wrote last year for my show @ the Adobe backroom gallery in SF. The first article speaks of a Russian mathematician who solved some 100 year old postulation that any 3-D shape, with out holes, can be reduced to a sphere. Google "Poincare conjecture". So this guy (Grigory Perelman) solves this incredibly difficult math problem (It takes three books of 1000 pages each to explain his formulation), and then disappears into the Russian forest to pick "mushrooms". I love these spirits that manifest themselves truly and help along mankinds progress through science to life's greatest awe. People are so easily unimpressed these days. There is sensual saturation for sale here in America. All needs can be addressed. Temporary pacification hunger pangs like trickster spirit alive and well, a wolf in corporate clothing. Desire Desire Desire NYC's air. Most just inhale here. We're inhaling the whole world up the American nose...imported cars, "illegal" immigrants...we're a vacuum of consumption. Even my pure art world is stained these days. BUT... Grisha can come along and solve this problem, and it really restores my faith in what I'm doing with my "what I can bring" this lifetime. There are ways to show it to different mental "types" out there. I always felt art could do that for everyone, but I get it that not all people are wired the same way, and although there is a certain audience there for a specific art form it really takes a natural disaster ("act of god") to get everyone on the same page.

Lets talk about punishment for a second.

lets talk about the attitude that is dominating politics, on all sides, these days. The chest expansions, the howling, the throwing of vines and coconuts. We are in the zoo folks. We've been thrown in the cage. Even that sweet sensitive boy in Tibet can't escape. But we all escape eventually, and some come back to do it all again, like a ride at Six Flags. You know you're gonna go thru some exhilarating times of joy and panic. Its over quick but feels like it lasted a life time.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!............................

or if you are Buddhist:

OMMANIPADMIHUMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.....................

Got some incense today, and re-arranged this former dark room I'm sleeping in last night, so not it feels more like a home than a crisis center. My grandma's stroke has been downgraded like the UK airline bomb scare. Her care levels are "Elevated", and no longer "Extreme". Like I said earlier, She is a trooper and a fighter. She's fallen through a glass roof and landed on a couch, been hit by a motorcycle while crossing the street, carried my grandfathers supplies all over the world, just to name a few. Still exhausted, and trying to have an early night tonight (finish this, cut my hair, and hope she has sweet dreams about butterflies and potato soup).

OK, [or here's one I came up with: "Boook" (ed translation: "Be Triple O .k.")]
I digress. So, Grisha, Sphereism (gotta dig up that manifesto and post it), and today's NY Times. There's also the matter of the 2 images (one of the universe being born -postulated by a computer program-, and the other of the neurons of a mouse brain) placed side by side. They look like one of those glass globes they would sell at Starmagic down on Broadway and 8th street back in the 80s. Later they could be found at malls, and most recently I spotted one at a dive bar in NJ last week while celebrating a dear friend's birthday. There's probably one in the Exploratorium in SF, or at some vintage interior novelty store. ...anyway, its an ever changing trapped lightning family swarming around the inside of a glass sphere, emanating from what looks like a burnt marshmallow on a stick. Which reminds me of the "spherism" conceptual illustration advancement I achieved in a Tibetan linguistic's octagon hut in the Jungles of Haiku, Maui last winter. It dealt with Guru Rinpoche Padmasambhava. And for the record, I adhere to Buddhism as much as I do to Quantum Physics

Back to the mouse brain... same basic structure as the universe expanding...in motion...emanating from a central source

Ahhhhhhhhhh. It makes me feel at peace. The unity in diversity.... all (holefree) shapes can be reduced to spheres, and the active central spark that all these spheres need to manifest. So, I read a great book on the Kaballah a few years back called "God is a Verb" by a Rabbi Michael Cooper(berg,man?) [strange then it wasn't titled "G_D is a verb"], which was really informative. Kabbalists conceived, if I remember correctly, the universe being unified at one point, and then shattering into countless divine sparks (a human-being being a vessel for one). The respective noble path being that of bringing the free sparks together to free more sparks. So these vibrating energy sources, which are not fixed, and are relative to each other and the energy around it make up our micro and macro world, and to spin it back to the Buddha, the vibration is an illusion, so, then why am I writing this blog, and who are you reading it?

time to cut my hair.....

(I know, I know, what hair???)

Listening to: Deepstate 2/"Everybody Get Down", INXS/"calling all nations", Terranova "Bombing Bastards", Cecil Luter/"Electronic", Herbert/"Its only", Billie Holliday/"Strange Fruit", Unkle/track 11 on NeverNeverLand, Primal Scream/"higher than the sun (dub symphony in 2 parts)

Monday, August 14, 2006

Cabin Fever

Its going on 4 weeks. My tan is fading, my beard
emerging. Spidering memories bundles of information
U-ing my mind.

Tuesday, August 08, 2006

Thoughts today

DNA code = personal musical cellular vibration harmony = individuality with in the notes of a shared vocabulary

Smaller cycles with in larger cycles can be be taken as a sign to the larger cycle to understand it is part of another series of cycles = Spring leaves faith

Be 5 or 4 or 3 again. self liberation from cultural dogma. breathe smiles

Monday, August 07, 2006

My grandmother had a stroke over 2 weeks ago, and I've basically been working around the clock with my mom to see that she has been comfortable since, only leaving her apartment like 4 times. Its been physically draining, and emotionally empowering. I've got a good start on a beard, and bags developing under my eyes. The highs include 3 a.m. requests for "sweets" after 2 catatonic days, and watching her see her great grand daughter for the first time. I'm using the Tibetan Book of the Dead to help guide her when she chooses to enter the next between. I am also seeing the cycles of life so much more clearly now, from watching people on the street age before my eyes, to my own reflection in a mirror. Life is eternal, but this youthful body stays healthy for only so long, so I am trying to really be present with my health and follow my path as it steepens and I have the energy to continue. I am so grateful to my grandmere for this final lesson.

Monday, July 17, 2006

Bird line



I wish I had pictures of my little out door studio I've been setting up on a blanket in Central Park, but I'm trying to get ready for my India trip by being digitally disconnected, hence the lack of blog updates. Life has been exciting. From Waffles and chicken in Harlem to developing a new series of paintings based on time and eyes. Trying to spend as much time in the park as possible, and bring people by my show at The Drawing Center while it is still up for the next week. Wandering the city on hot nights and writing poetry while cabs and delivery guys on bikes zoom by... Its hot, and I pray for peace.

Wednesday, June 28, 2006

2 Blog or not 2 Bloggggg



Invisible universe in our eyes of cosmic waves from big bangs beard

Life is rich with images and experiences in New Jersey York this summer

Breathing out art while moving thru east coast daily soul obstacle course

Saturday, June 10, 2006

Crunch

So, Ive been up in Boston curating an SF landscape show @ Samson Projects (I blogged all about it on fecalface.com), which was a lot of fun. Now I'm back in NY/NJ getting ready to pick up my buddy Clint from Tokyo for an exhibition @ The Drawing Center for our collaborative project www.instantdrawingmachine.com. The opening is June 16th, Pix to come....

Tuesday, May 30, 2006

Jersey Junk

Memorial day was spent sifting through old Playboys, swinger ad mags from the 70s, and Christies catalogues. We went to some remote NJ flea market, and I scored some kooky stuff I really don't need. I was originally looking for an albino snake-skin briefcase, needless to say the hunt is still on...





Tuesday, May 16, 2006

The final cruise

SF, I marinated in your funky stew for five years, and now I am back in the land of my youth, how I will hold you dear in my heart for years to come, always knowing I have a home and a family to return to. My last weeks where amazing, magic until the last moment. On my final day in SF, a friend called and told me how Timothy "Speed" Levitch from the documentary "The Cruise" would be giving a double decker tour of SF. How could I resist? I think he is amazing, and to go on my first tourist tour of the city on my last day there seemed like the perfect closing of my SF experience. I'll spare you all the tourist shots, but it was up lifting and wonderful to see the city one last time in a new way. Now I'm in the NJ 'burbs. Its foggy and green here. Was in NY yesterday. It was amazing. Already feels like I'm in a foreign country even though I know the city like the back of my hand...









Friday, May 12, 2006

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/

Monday, May 08, 2006

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...

Tuesday, May 02, 2006

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!

Monday, May 01, 2006

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