Exhibition at Cypress College this week

I'm excited to be part of an exhibition that is opening this Wednesday evening at Cypress College. ONA2X2 is a project curated by Susie Eaton and Juan Thorp of Bunny Gunner.

They've provided 24 artists with 2' x2' panels and asked us to use this surface to create origional works for this show. It's a great group of artists including Shari Wasson, Michael Woodcock, Steve Comba, Alex Couwenberg and many more. There is also a solo show in the Project room by Macha Suzuki. Macha is an amazing sculpture who's imagery is provocative and haunting and his craftsmanship with leave you breathless.

The works that I submitted are a combination of a surface process and imagery that I have been working with in two different series of works. The surface process that I have been developing in response to my wax encusitc work. I've been using resins instead of wax attempting to create surface nuance and depth that wax allows but in the much more resistive material of resin.  The imagery is from a series of small oil canvas' that I have been doing creating a visual versions of renga. 

Come on over to Cypress, Wed. 6-8pm

Sean Scully

The Bather, 1983, Sean Scully

"My painting, however, is a compression: a compression of form, edge, weight. And colour participates in this density. The painting is immediate since it is painted aggressively, by hand; yet it is difficult because it is compressed. The light in the painting has to be opened up, pulled out. 

And it is exactly this difficulty that gives the work its interior life. It is an incarnation, not an explanation."  S. Scully

digging in the dirt

Well, it's done. At least on the right side. I've been tapped and drilled. The first ear canal has been drilled out. As I mentioned in earlier post my surfer's ear (exostosis) finally became so severe it required surgery. It's kind of strange, something that you anticipate for so long, the thing you dread and fret over is suddenly done. It's done in the same time someone might spend going to the mall. I went in at 1:00 and was out by 4:00. Can I say that general anesthetic

is such a surreal experience. One moment you are lounging around in your fashionable backless gown nervously chatting it up with the nurses and doctors and then He tells you to breath deeply and the next thing you know you are waking up in a different room and there's a whole new set of folks talking to you. You never do see the previous care providers again but this new group welcomes you back to the world of the living so they seem particularly dear (until they start pulling off the surgical tape.) Then out you go. Just like that.

Thank you Dr. Norman Ge and the surgical staff at Harriman Jones. 

Surfer's Ear

Watch SurfDonkey Ep 9 What Up Doc (2 of 3) in Sports | View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com

Back Home

The birds taking their morning shower

Back from Portland. A very productive time. Produced four glass works, left one in the kiln to be finished later. Thanks to my dear friend, gracious host and ever patient glass teacher, Tim. When we weren't in the studio working we were deep in conversation. When not talking we where looking at art, eating great food and taking in the beauty of the Pacific North West. Music, books, film. Art, life, community. It was really an amazing time. Still thinking about the relationship of glass work and my painting. I will definitely be doing it again. 

I want Tim's birds.

out of the kiln

glass after 12 hours of firing

glass work

base glass, ready for firing

pattern making

George Fox University, Glass Studio

Bullseye Glass, Portland, OR

Working in Glass

The last several days I've been in the Portland area, Newberg to be exact, staying with my dear friend and artist, Tim Timmerman. As part of my sabbatical project I have come north to learn the process of glass fusion. Part of Tim's studio production in the last five years has been the addition of various glass processes to his painting and assemblage practice. I am spending a week in the glass studio at George Fox University where Tim is the sculpture and mixed media professor. He's teaching me some of the basic fusion processes as I create a series of small works based on my paintings.

The week started with a supply run to Bullseye Glass. Bullseye is one of the leading art glass studios and glass manufactures in the country. It's located in downtown Portland and truly is an amazing place. I was overwhelmed and seduced by their glass offerings. Row after row of pure color rolled out in slabs of what looked like frozen paint. We bought our glass; a dozen or so colors from my current pallet, as well as frit (ground color glass) and a view other things. 

Back at the studio the first step in the process was to make a pattern of my image. Next was to cut the base colors and lay them out. Glass fusion involves numerous kiln firings of a single work allowing for the layering of color, brush marks and washes (frit), and line work (stringers.) Today I got two works started and in the kiln for the first firing. They'll be birthed from the fire in 12 hours.  

Chisels and drills

"We need so to view the world as to combine an idea of wonder and an idea of welcome."

G.K. Chesterton

"The human gaze is not the closed, fixed view of a camera but is creative and constructive. Both the gaze that sees and the object that is seen construct themselves simultaneously in the one act of vision."  John O'Donohue

Two days ago while making my morning coffee one of my ears opened. It actually happened over a few days. At first I had a moment of opening, a slight pop, and then it closed. A few moments later it happened again. Just a moment, an awakening, a respite from the silence and then silence again. That was it for the first day. But then, standing at the sink filling the coffee pot, bink my left ear opened. I didn't move for a moment. I was afraid it close again. No, it hasn't closed yet.

I went to see the surgeon and as he examined the closed ear I took a perverse pride when he stated, "in all my years of practice I have never seen such an extreme case. Your ear is completely closed off." I swelled with a boyhood since of a job well done. I did it the best!

He then stated that the other ear wasn't much better. It was only when he started probing my ear canal with small metal tools forcing me to squirm in my seat that it dawned on me that this was not such an accomplishment. 

The surgery is scheduled for late August. "Do you use the mirco chisels or the drill?" I asked (showing off my newly acquired knowledge of surgery procedures.) "Both" he said. "I do the rough work with the chisels and then clean up with the drill." Sounds like he's doing construction.  I suppose he is. 

movie night at the boat yard

Tonights movie is by Seal Beach's own, Cyrus Sutton. Riding Waves, Cyrus' first film, was  an award winning freshman effort pulling in a "best film" and "best cinematography." Come on by at sunset. everyone's welcome. 

Demarcations

"A painting is always a map of some kind, if only for being a two-dimensional visual reference to something else, even if that 'something else' is discernible only from its demarcation as 'special', of more deserving of our scrutiny than a non-painting."   Doug Harvey

Space of sound

Today I was working on some paintings in a different location then my studio. As I was working I was aware that normally I would turn on music while I worked. I always listen to music when I paint. Music or podcasts. That kind of sound, along with the paint, takes me out of an awareness of time or I should say what I call "task time." But today, not being able to listen to music, I was aware of how much music is a way in which I occupy spaces. It, my music, is one of the significant ways I link the various spaces that I occupy during my day, week, life. I try to be purposeful about attending and listening to the spaces I occupy but a some point I fill those spaces with my songs. I have a fair collection of songs. According to my itunes I have 43 days worth of songs (a modest amount compared to some folks I know.) I also own a good collection of CDs and vinyl (and a seriously large box of cassette tapes.) I am a true NPR junky: All Things Considered, Fresh Air, Prairie Home Companion, Speaking of Faith, Off Ramp, etc. If not music, then NPR. It's been 9 days since I heard any of this. I do miss it, but I also am aware of how I use it to fill head space. I never compared audio to visual in terms of cultural crooning. But now that I have lost the audio I find myself settled in ways that are surprising. I have become more attentive to the task I'm on. I don't mean physically attentive I mean mentally attentive. I am so in love with the world of ideas that I am constantly seduced from one subject to another by a sound, a spoken statement or uttered phrase. Now that the world is momentarily blocked from my hearing I find myself a bit more settled. My head doesn't have that internal buzz that it so often does.

I wonder what I will do with that latter?

Just read the short story, The Hermit's Story by Rick Bass. Amazing, please read. Thanks, Andrew