Ritual

Jackson Pollock (1912-1956). Photographer Hans Namuth (1915-1990). Gelatin silver prints, 1950 Published May 1951 National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; gift of the estate of Hans Namuth © Estate of Hans Namuth.

Photo of Liam Everett working (2012).

Photo of Oscar Niemeyer drawing (circa 2000s).

The artist—unconscious and dancing—letting impulses take over his body. At first, he moves quickly, as a mechanism to beat his mind. His muscles are loose, his body is thoughtless, his fists are fast, his painting is music. But with time, he allows moments of serenity and pause (when he masters to think of absolutely nothing). He makes reality like a machine, never questioning his primal performance. 

Alexander Mcqueen Summer/Spring 1999 Runaway. 

Why Is It "Bad"?

Ralph Pugay, Liondix, Acrylic on panel, 12" x 16", 2010. www.ralphpugay.com

Why do we feel the need to call our paintings "bad", "naive", "hobbyist", "crafty"?  
Why can't we just let them be what they are going to be?  
Is it because we are insecure?  
Is it because we want to make sure everyone knows that we are self-aware?  
Does it legitimize the paintings?  
Does it make the paintings humble?  
Does it make the paintings pretentious?
When we make a humorous painting, is it automatically sorted into one of the categories in my first question?
Who does this sorting?
Why are we uncomfortable laughing at a painting?
Is it because it lowers the entire art form?
Is this a bad thing?
Is painting not supposed to make us feel those emotions?
Does a painting have to be witty or conceptually intriguing if it is also "bad"?
Can a strong concept make up for poor aesthetic choices?
Who is evaluating this balancing act?
Must we always tip the scale one way or the other?
What is the difference between painting and illustration?
Is an illustrative aesthetic "bad"?
Why do we have to put "bad" in quotation marks?
When will irony die?

Thoughts on Ambition

Pablo Picasso, Guernica (detail), 1937 / My old dog Cooper

i'm in my childhood bed and my feet are cold

there's a watercolor on my desk but it has too much color on the edges, it looks like it's coming apart, the yellow on the bottom falling off the edge in a flat sheet the color of dog piss

soup in a bowl on the floor is the same color, a slice of it cooling in the spoon

the walls are full, josh hartnett, george clooney, the guy from the o.c., oh alright i know his name, adam brody

mulder and clark gable in white shirts

a painting my mom made of me as a girl looking out the window with red light at my back

my face is blue, the curtain is white and slippery in my small hand

these days i feel like a child waiting for my life to begin

there are things you can't do as a child, you have to wait

i knew it wouldn't come easy but i thought it would come easier, time after school laying itself out like a quilt

for awhile i sat in the sun and worked on my tan, i felt stronger

"gathering my strength like a consumptive in the sun," like diane cluck says

preparing for something unknown that would require a whole warm body and the appearance of athleticism or at least 

health, emotional flexibility

endurance

now i'm a little brown and my breasts are two white triangles, which i like

but the sun is further away and i have to wear socks at night

once again i search out the heat like a snake

in parking lots, corners of rooms, small squares of sunlight, flickering

i'm jealous of people i know who are getting shows, good jobs, i'm happy for them but i feel so far from a world in which that is possible

this bed with the red sheets, red walls, yellow lips of a man from a cut-up catalog, dark green fleece and the copper folds of his face like the gleaming back of a horse

i make paintings almost every day and when i look at them later and see the gray against the pink in the drape of a blanket i feel a surge which is love for a thing that is mine and not mine

but how do you fill a life, especially one so sick with ambition

rising in my throat when i lay down

unemployment, a long half-sleep

although last time i went to the art institute i didn't feel the itch of what i haven't done

i let all those people each have their moment in my day

not like they really need more moments but it isn't a tally system is it

some of them did what they had to do and it's beautiful

here are two gold-colored bookends shaped like shells, i will bring them to my new apartment when i have one

pay my rent with newspaper clippings from my grandmother in colorado and the pieces of my bottom lip that i have bitten off

bringing tears to my eyes

i read that as a girl margaret atwood wanted to write the great canadian novel and then she did

sometimes i go a whole day without touching anyone, even the dog, because i am using my hands to fan my fire

isn't that what those great painter men did all their lives? was it lonely for them?

i think it feels like selfishness because it is selfishness

for me and them both

though what is selfishness and what is just keeping warm

i can have grace sometimes when i need to and i must call upon it now like so many of us

ruined pride keeps us bobbing at the surface

debt a black rock

what are my abilities and are they in me like diamonds or do i call upon them and have them come to me from some 

other place, the field or the street beside it?

a grocery store on the corner has a picture in the window of marilyn monroe, does that mean i am home

today i did not make a painting

does that i mean i will die tomorrow

i want us all to have success, the best kind and on our own terms

i want to love all the people who are better at everything than i am

if they are good enough to let me

Interview: Jake Ziemann at Tartine Bakery (San Francisco)

Jake Ziemann, Pull no. 1, Acrylic, spray paint & collage on paper, 2012, 15" x 11" (unframed).

the face painters:  Congratulations on your show, Pull, currently up at Tartine Bakery!  It seems like you haven't slowed down a bit since graduating from California College of the Arts in May.  How do you think your work has evolved over these last few months since completing your MFA?

Jake Ziemann:  Thanks.  It's true, I was in a high-paced rhythm near the end of my MFA, and one of my goals I set for myself was to continue this momentum after graduation.  Sort of "hit the grounding running" if you know what I mean?  When I took a step back from the body of work I came out of graduate school with, it was clear to me that my work was edging into a more non-representational realm.  I began the series of paintings thinking of each one as a different landscape scenario, but it was apparent that with each new painting I was less interested in the landscape and more concerned about the formal aspects within the work, i.e., the shapes and forms I was creating, the way the paint was interacting on the surface of the canvas, and the color relationships that I set forth.  My new work embraces this lack of subject matter, and in most cases source material, and is blatantly about the formal decisions I make in the studio.  The work does not hold onto any particularly subject or theme, yet there are forms and colors that get recycled and reused throughout the show.  The work has essentially begun to reflect what has been occurring with my painting process, and visually depicts the breaking down and building up of formal layers, teetering the line between structure and debris.

Jake Ziemann, Teeter, Oil & acrylic on canvas, 2012, 53" x 53".

tfp:  I'm interested in the relationship between your small-scale drawings and larger oil paintings.  What amount of influence does each have on the other when you're working in the studio?

JZ:  I think the smaller works are a way for me to get the ideas out more quickly, a way for me to use the process of translating cut-up old work and found forms to create fragmented sections of what appear in the larger paintings.  In the smaller drawings, I limit myself to only a few gestures, whereas in the larger paintings, I usually labor over them and use many methods of applying layers of pigment over the surface.  I think of the smaller work as extractions pulled from the larger pieces.  I take a single thing I see present in a larger oil painting, for example a cutout form, and make that the main focus of a drawing.  My works on paper are refreshing to make and act as a reprieve from over-thinking and over-working.  I foresee them influencing my paintings more and more as methods of isolating potential solutions that could in turn help me un-complicate the irresolute mess I make on the canvas.  They ultimately help me make decisions and become less hesitant with the brush, which for me is not always an easy task.

tfp:  Where do you think your paintings will go from here?  Will you stay on your current path or shake things up even more?

JZ:  It's hard to say.  I'm quite enamored with the process of formal translation and extraction I've begun, and by no means have any plans to stop it.  I can envision getting more entrenched into my method of rebuilding and breaking down forms to a point that it implodes.  I don't know what the resulting work would look like or have any clue how long this would take, but the possibility of taking something so far that it almost obliterates any sense of lucidity within the work truly tempts me.  I do, however, always have grand ideas and plans for the next big project.  For the moment I've written them down and decided to focus on diving headfirst into my current method of making.  I'm sure I will get restless, but I think I'm going to let the work lead me blindly into an uncertain terrain for the time being.

tfp:  Do you have anything else exciting coming up on the horizon?

JZ:  No upcoming exhibitions; I, however, am going to Vermont Studio Center for a four-week stint this winter.

tfp:  Thanks, and congratulations again!

If you would like to see more of Jake's work, check out his personal website here: www.jakeziemann.com.  

And if you're in the Bay Area, don't forget to come to the opening reception of Pull on September 19th from 8 - 10PM at Tartine Bakery (600 Guerrero Street, San Francisco, CA, 94110).  See you there!

Rachel Hecker at CAMH (Houston)

Marcel Duchamp, Bicycle Wheel, metal wheel mounted on painted wood stool, 1951 (third version, after lost original of 1913).

While visiting Houston this July, I went to an exhibition titled It is what it is. Or is it?, curated by Dean Daderko, at the Contemporary Art Museum Houston. The text provided in the exhibition guide centers around the idea of updating the term readymade and its use in the contemporary art scene:

"As forms go, the readymade is a slippery one. Its originator, Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968), spoke of it as 'a form of denying the possibility of defining art.' Now, as the form nears its 100th anniversary-- Duchamp made his Bicycle Wheel in 1913-- CAMH presents It is what it is. Or is it?, a group exhibition that explores how the form has changed... Duchamp's point was for us to get caught up in a conceptual effort to consider what we can and what we can't see, and what happens when we encounter something familiar in an unexpected way... These artists' works chart changes in perception, demonstrating that artistic practice has become notably more engaged in addressing a diversity of social, political, aesthetic, and temporal realities... The readymade, and its multiple legacies, demand that we be active viewers."

While it is important to note that Daderko was not necessarily making a direct statement about a connection between the readymade and painting (out of the 31 pieces in the exhibition, only 7 are what one could call traditional paintings), I find the association intriguing. To be honest, I had never really considered how the readymade has affected painting before. Obviously, the conversation around pop art painters such as Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, and James Rosenquist has been mostly about appropriation. However, the readymade is about to be a hundred years old, and artistic appropriation strategies are at least fifty. Looking around at what is happening now, I question how useful these terms, especially the readymade, can be when thinking about painting.

Rachel Hecker, Jesus #1 (Viggo Mortensen/Lord of the Rings), 2011, acrylic on canvas.

Citing Hecker's Jesus #1 (pictured above), as an example, I believe that many painters and artists today are doing something very different that can't quite be covered by these blanket terms. Duchamp, with his Bicycle Wheel and Fountain, took things from 'everyday life' and presented them as art with little or no alteration. Thus, the act of placing objects in a new context becomes paramount to the work. Hecker, I would argue, is not really doing the same thing. Yes, she is taking the iconic image of Jesus out of the context it would normally exist in, religious worship. And yes, she is taking the iconic image of Aragorn out of the context it would normally exist in, a Lord of the Rings movie or fan website. But, what would be considered the "readymade" here? Is it the image of Aragorn that the artist took from the movie or the internet? Is it the image of Jesus?

I believe that what Hecker is tapping into shows an overall shift in popular culture that we have been experiencing in the past decade or so, where lines between large cultural institutions such as entertainment and religion are becoming more and more blurred. What is the cause? Some may say the internet, others may say the role that celebrity culture and reality TV now play in many of our lives. Who really knows? But it is evident that this kind of mixing, combining, and regurgitating is happening all over the place. And this process cannot be easily contained or explained away by the readymade. You can follow the logic of Duchamp's readymades fairly easily: he takes an object or two and places them in a gallery as art. Hecker, on the other hand, deliberately complicates the relationships between her two conflated subject matters by the methods and materials she chooses to paint them with. The painting is not 100% photorealistic and therefore not "readymade": Aragorn's clothing is simplified and any background indicating the Lord of the Rings universe is stripped away. He is just a man in robes. But he is also Jesus, a savior among men. The airbrushing technique creates a soft-focus image which readies it for intense and sincere devotion (something which is shared by zealous Christians and obsessed fanboys alike). 

While Hecker has two more of her Jesus paintings in the show (the other two are of Pink Floyd's David Gilmour and model David Axell), Aragorn and Jesus are the perfect pair for this type of painting because they share more than just a physical likeness. In their stories, they are both heroes that save mankind. So is this stock character, the trope of a savior with mythological greatness, the real readymade here? Is there an emerging term that would do better justice to this complicated relationship? I recognize that this exhibition was more about broadening the term of readymade and don't take issue with the inclusion of Hecker's painting (on the contrary, this has made me think more about the nature of art than any other show all summer), but I can't help thinking that there is a better way to look at and talk about this kind of painting.

I am very interested in continuing this conversation, so if you have any thoughts, please feel free to leave a comment!

You can view more of Rachel Hecker's work here: rachelhecker.net, and photos of her Jesus series, (along with in-process shots), here: rachelhecker.blogspot.com.
And you can view more images from the show It is what it is. Or is it?, here: CAMH

Lucas Arruda: Landscapes and/or Abstractions

Lucas Arruda, Untitled, 2011. Oil on linen, 50 x 50 cm, Everton Ballardin and Mendes Wood, Sao Paulo, Brazil.

I came across Lucas Arruda’s paintings while walking around Chelsea last summer. Arruda had a great show at Galeria I-20 called Deserto – Modelo, which consisted of 25 small-scale paintings. I decided to write about Arruda’s work because his paintings got stuck on me—and I find it hard for paintings to do that these days.

What has kept me thinking about Arruda’s paintings for over a year is not only the fact that I thought they are beautiful, but that I cannot pin-point what kind of paintings they are. When looking at them, I ask myself if I am looking at landscapes or if I am, in fact, looking at abstractions. I noticed that at times I am more inclined to think one way than the other depending on the painting and on the moment in which I am looking at them. Although there is what seems to be a horizon line in every painting, the paintings are not descriptive, and therefore, I am left with Arruda’s formal elements as my only source of information. Sometimes I think I see dry brushstrokes that wipe away a prior wet surface, a thick horizontal line and the exposed linen. At other times, I see clouds, horizon and dirty ground.

Arruda leaves me in a beautiful space between Mark Rothko’s abstractions and Van Gogh’s landscapes without directions for an exact answer. 

More images: http://www.lucasarruda.net/
http://i-20.com/lucas-arruda/select-works/
http://mendeswood.com/lucas-arruda/#imagens

Thoughts on Katelyn Eichwald's Cowboy Project

Katelyn Eichwald, Images from the installation Cowboy Project, 2012 (ongoing). Mixed media on black wall, size varies. 

Katelyn Eichwald’s Cowboy Project is an installation composed of over 600 (and counting) paintings, drawings, writings, objects, and collages. At first, these small pieces together on a black wall construct the myth of a man. Each piece functions as proof of his existence. Eichwald paints his sister, his blanket, his ruptured spleen, show us his lunch receipt, presents a photo of a mountain he climbed yesterday, but we are never sure of his precise identity.

The inclusion of pieces such as an exhibition postcard of Picasso with the text,  “the cowboy calls him papa,” a used paper palette with text “he painted a bird,” and another text piece made with a faded highlighter “painting is like playing the guitar,” are examples of pieces that point to this man's relationship to painting. To me, however, the project refers not only to this man’s relationship to painting but, more particularly, to the history and myth of the male painter. By having these references, Eichwald reminds viewers of how distant she is from this history.  

The cowboy’s identity remains a mystery. But my guess is Mark Grotjahn. 

To see more images of the Cowboy Project: www.katelyneichwald.com

Heather Watson at IDA Gallery (Los Angeles)

Untitled (sidewalk series), Spring 2012. Oil stick on paper, 40 X 26 inches.

Heather Watson’s first solo show in Los Angeles at IDA gallery is like reading a personal diary in which strokes become a language. Watson shows oil stick on paper, sumi ink on paper, thread on linen, and photographs. The works are centered on process and meaning of mark-making.

When walking into the space, one sees works in a variety of media that are arranged unevenly. This display takes away the sense of ostentation and structure that some pieces could have if isolated. The uneven arrangement and media diversity in Watson’s works, on the contrary, creates a dialogue revolving around exploration and playfulness.

In each piece I imagined the artist’s body in the process of making the work. Pressure and speed are constantly shifting. In the piece like Plain Weave, the artist’s body seems to move close to the surface, mechanically and slowly. On Aug 4^th, 1988 (section 1 of 2), the entire weight of Watson’s body seems to press against the paper, in one slow and struggling movement. The piece Untitled (sidewalk series), however, only complicates this relationship between stroke and body. In this piece, a photograph of single spray line on the concrete, the viewer is left unsure of the artist’s body in the process of making the piece.

Despite the fact that the artist’s physical relationship to her work is variable, Watson shows her attention to precision in every piece. Precision seems to be a tool, which Watson uses to create meaning.  In every piece, Watson’s strokes are assertive—they create a sense of space, perspective, and form that seems to have specific emotional meaning. Watson’s play with meaning becomes even more apparent when she displays pieces that are composed of lines next to pieces that are composed of written words. After some time in the exhibition space, I saw lines as written words and written words as lines.

Georgia O’Keeffe once said: “I found I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn’t say any other way—things I have no words for.”  What happens when written words become form and form become written words like in Watson’s pieces? I left the exhibition with this question in mind.

Heather Watson website: www.watsonheather.com

My First Painting

Adair Stephens, Cellmates, acrylic on canvas, approximately 3' x 4', 2009.

I wrote a whole other post about this painting explaining the details, facts, whens, whys, and wheres surrounding its creation, but I’ve realized that those things are not what interest me.  When I think of this painting, I am mostly intrigued by the fact that I threw it away.  Most people say that you should never throw any of your art away, and they are probably right.  But I still throw a lot of things in the dumpster.  My recent attempt to move everything from my studio at CCA into my bedroom in my apartment forced me to toss the things I didn’t like and give away the things I did.  But I’m not saddened by this loss.  Instead, I feel like a weight is lifted.  I don’t want to look at my finished paintings.  I’m excited by the process of making a picture more than the finished picture itself.  Hanging up my own paintings would feel like nailing corpses to the wall.  My advisor in grad school once suggested I go back and work on some of my finished paintings, but that is impossible for me.

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
All the king’s horses and all the king’s men
Couldn’t put Humpty together again.

I love Humpty Dumpty because his story is how I work.  I break things down and try to put them back together again in a different way.  You can’t go backwards once it’s happened.  You can cover up the body, but the ghost will always be there.  And the seams will always show.  It is up to you to either put it back on the wall or sweep the pieces into the trash.