video
Let's try this again. If you follow me on Twitter or get this as a feed, the first attempt was pretty bad. More to come, including a studio tour next month.
gawking
I know a part of the draw of this blog is when I show the studio shots. People love that "backstage" feeling I guess. I recently found this blog, Henri Art Magazine. If you like to see artists' studios and read what they mean to them and how they found them, then check it out. I will probably do a similar post in a few weeks myself.
I plan to do some renovations next month, which will change the character somewhat.
I plan to do some renovations next month, which will change the character somewhat.
the fury of Sundays
I pulled out an abandoned painting from late 2008-early 2009 and played around Sunday morning. What I'm finding with the latest work is that it is far more effective if there is a real painting to begin with. That is to say, the works are actually completed paintings at each stage, but I keep going. There's implicit danger here, the most obvious is indulgence.Over the past year or so, I've been using everything I can get my hands on to apply and manipulate paint. Bubble wrap, rags, my hands, masonry tools. The work seems very realistic to me, and by that I mean the reality of the painting itself as object. I'm no longer concerned with whether it is perceived as abstract or not. More and more I do not consider myself an abstract painter at all, because I'm not abstracting anything, I'm simply painting from an arbitrary beginning and following the work to its natural conclusion.
returning to work
eating soil and drinking bullets from a cup, (in progress)oil on canvas, 40" x 30", Rico, 2010
when we were young and did not look into the abyss, (in progress)oil on canvas, Rico, 2010
The shock of the....old
No. 12, 1949, oil on canvas, Mark Rothko
I visited the Walker Arts Center last week and checked out their "Benches and Binoculars" exhibit, a 19th Century salon-style hang of 20th century modern and contemporary art. In a word, terrific. The long answer? Problematic, but perhaps only to some.
For me personally, it was a treat to see some really signature works by Currin, Close, a late DeKooning, and a fabulous Neel.
Charlotte Willard, 1967oil on canvas, 45 7/8 x 30 7/8"
Alice Neel
To the knowing, the hang makes little sense if the intent was to truly recreate a salon. Large pictures cling to the bottom of the wall, while still life and genre find themselves exalted "on high". It would have been fun to at least attempt to label some of our greatest abstract paintings by classification (genre, portrait, landscape, history) and to hang them accordingly, but admittedly I'm a purist at times.
Frankly, I enjoyed the occasional collective recoil of visitors entering into the gallery. Dogma seems to replace dogma, after all.
What struck me most was the fact that most of these works still stood as powerful and worthy of their status even in a decidedly non-modern proximity to their peers. While I think it could have been turned up a couple of notches, I appreciate the problems of trying to pull this off with an existing collection. The challenge, I feel, should go out to the big museums in general and New York in particular. I'd love to see this idea explored with the pooled collections of the big players and hung in the Met. We haven't seen a show like that in decades. Sadly, museum politics being what it is, we the public will likely never see this happen, and that is truly a loss.
I was impressed by the Walker's collection. I spent the night in St. Paul that evening and walked along Summit Avenue, with its amazing homes. Clearly, there is financial support for the arts in the twin cities.
Hope to go back next year.
and still I rise
I have decided to stay in the studio and attempt to hang on another year. This is made possible by the support and love of many people, and I thank them. After people asking for years, I will also hold my first open studio event in November of this year in conjunction with 2 of the businesses in our group of warehouses. I hope to start scrubbing floors and swinging a hammer in about 2 weeks, when I return from MN.
I'm going to create an inner studio; insulated, sheet-rocked and minimally heated to enable me to work through the winter. I'm also going to attempt a large painting along the lines of my current thread of work.
I won't be able to completely finish the inner studio, but hopefully one wall and a ceiling will serve as enough of a cold barrier to get me through. There's always the chance for a mild winter, not uncommon for SC.
In the process of getting ready to move about a dozen paintings back into the studio, showing my father-in-law the work from the past year or so and of course finding older work as I clean up, I've been afforded a perspective of my work through a period of about 5 years. This long view has brought about some realizations, many of them positive.
I know the commentary has been heavy as of late. I hope to get back to the mostly-photo format as this month moves forward.
I'm going to create an inner studio; insulated, sheet-rocked and minimally heated to enable me to work through the winter. I'm also going to attempt a large painting along the lines of my current thread of work.
I won't be able to completely finish the inner studio, but hopefully one wall and a ceiling will serve as enough of a cold barrier to get me through. There's always the chance for a mild winter, not uncommon for SC.
In the process of getting ready to move about a dozen paintings back into the studio, showing my father-in-law the work from the past year or so and of course finding older work as I clean up, I've been afforded a perspective of my work through a period of about 5 years. This long view has brought about some realizations, many of them positive.
I know the commentary has been heavy as of late. I hope to get back to the mostly-photo format as this month moves forward.
visitations
My father-in-law was in town over the weekend. I'm fortunate to have a very good relationship with him and he always insists upon seeing the studio every time he comes to town. It was raining hard that night, and he and my wife got to experience the studio in a way readers of my blogs have read about many times...with the deafening sound of rain coming down on the roof.
I watched this nearly 70-year-old man walk amongst the paintings, both large and small (I know that's a relative thing for me), and all I could think about was how it reminded me of watching my daughters at the zoo. He was lost in joy and wonder. My wife snapped a pic of him in the famous orange chair, staring at a painting that bears her name. Afterwards, we made our way back home and had cocktails and I showed him the film from last year. It was a magical evening.
In those moments, seeing him dwarfed by huge paintings and responding as if he were an 8-year-old boy seeing a rocket for the first time, I realized that this is why I do it. Right there. To entertain the idea, -even for a moment, that I'm able to facilitate that kind of experience by something I do, gives me all the satisfaction in the world.
I may never be rich by the rather absurd standard of making over $250K/year, in fact, I doubt my household will ever see half that number and we are a family of 4. But there is no price tag for what I felt that evening. What, after all, is the value of restoring one's faith?
I'll get knocked down again. I'll get dissed, ignored and refused. The show in Greenville is apparently traveling and I may or may not get invited along, and that's OK. The thing I realized is that I have to get my work out there, -not for money or fame, but for it to have the opportunity to do for others what I saw it do for David. That's the charge. That's what you owe when you answer the call. It isn't about me and my fragile ego and my struggles. It's about getting the work out there, for people to see and respond to...or even to ignore.
I watched this nearly 70-year-old man walk amongst the paintings, both large and small (I know that's a relative thing for me), and all I could think about was how it reminded me of watching my daughters at the zoo. He was lost in joy and wonder. My wife snapped a pic of him in the famous orange chair, staring at a painting that bears her name. Afterwards, we made our way back home and had cocktails and I showed him the film from last year. It was a magical evening.
In those moments, seeing him dwarfed by huge paintings and responding as if he were an 8-year-old boy seeing a rocket for the first time, I realized that this is why I do it. Right there. To entertain the idea, -even for a moment, that I'm able to facilitate that kind of experience by something I do, gives me all the satisfaction in the world.
I may never be rich by the rather absurd standard of making over $250K/year, in fact, I doubt my household will ever see half that number and we are a family of 4. But there is no price tag for what I felt that evening. What, after all, is the value of restoring one's faith?
I'll get knocked down again. I'll get dissed, ignored and refused. The show in Greenville is apparently traveling and I may or may not get invited along, and that's OK. The thing I realized is that I have to get my work out there, -not for money or fame, but for it to have the opportunity to do for others what I saw it do for David. That's the charge. That's what you owe when you answer the call. It isn't about me and my fragile ego and my struggles. It's about getting the work out there, for people to see and respond to...or even to ignore.
hunting and gathering
self portrait, mixed media on paper, 24" x 18", Rico 2005Fall is coming. The time for endings and for change. I've had a cache of paintings in a local event space for a couple of years, and I intend to retrieve them at the end of next month. These were an interesting period; bright, bold palettes, geometric forms colliding and ebbing into one another, suspended space and play with value. Very much inspired by Hans Hoffman, most of them were done that first year I was in the studio, in the Spring, - and they have a jubilant quality to them that nothing since has ever resembled. Thinking about them now brings forth a lot emotion. I don't know what fate awaits them. I do know a massive purging is coming.
I am in an intense period of inner conflict about whether or not to move out of the studio at the end of the year, and so I'm preparing for it just in case. Fiscally, it is a no-brainer. No cash flow means no storefront (or working space in this case). But this feels inseparable from my life. I can't find the boundaries where I end and this begins, and a fundamental part of that is a room of my own.
I am in an intense period of inner conflict about whether or not to move out of the studio at the end of the year, and so I'm preparing for it just in case. Fiscally, it is a no-brainer. No cash flow means no storefront (or working space in this case). But this feels inseparable from my life. I can't find the boundaries where I end and this begins, and a fundamental part of that is a room of my own.
In 2 weeks, I'm bound for Minneapolis for the day job. I'm excited about visiting the Walker Arts Center and seeing my childhood friend, Remi. It will be nice to get out of the South for a few days and hopefully the break will clear my head a bit. Not the trip to NY I was hoping for, but perhaps it is the trip I need.
What does the self-portrait at the top of this post have to do with anything? Nada. I found it at lunch today and, I don't know, there's something about it that I just liked. Sort of Alice Neal meets Egon Schiele. I haven't done one in a while and maybe I should. Anyway, take it or leave it, there it is.
more thoughts on walking away
I've re-engaged the lifelong struggle to peal away illusion and personal lies. It is so easy to lie to ourselves; to imagine a self we want to be or wish we were or, -perhaps more tragically, believe we could never be. I suppose art has a lot less to do with artists than I feel comfortable admitting. Good art, enduring art, is alive in the viewer. It is kept alive this away, arguably life is breathed into it only after someone sees it.
There is power in the making of things, what we call creation. I don't know if art is really creation at all in the true sense. We tend to combine and assemble and re-arrange at best, but I'm skeptical about the position that anything is truly created. Really so-called creativity is another mask of self. This person is creative and so we can categorize them and convince ourselves that we know them and then move on to whatever is next. I wonder how much we actually know about people, because I wonder how much we truly know about ourselves.
I read a John Waters quote this morning that said something to the effect of it is contemporary art's job to destroy what has come before it. So even our creation is imbued with, -or perhaps inseparable from destruction and violence. If my job is to destroy; to dislike the art that is immediately before me with such intensity that I feel compelled to make things whose purpose is to obliterate it, I'm just not sure I'm up to the task. Honestly, I don't know if I want that job.
At this moment, I honestly don't know if I even am an artist. I don't feel comfortable with that label. I think Pop art was funny for about 15 minutes and there were only 2 or 3 people who understood the emptiness of the joke in the first place. The rest were just a herd. Abstract Expressionism, much as I personally relate to it, needed to be made fun of to be sure. It had become a religion. But the hecklers became the stars and then the criticism became the new religion. There are legitimately times when art should be serious, and maybe we've come to that time once again. It's time to talk frankly about the 2-ton balloon dog in the room.
We're seeing the resurgence of greed that mirrors the 80's. So perhaps it's natural to assume that the art should be as bloated and spectacular as ever to comment on it. The sad truth is that those who drive the engines of greed and power and money are not now, nor have they ever been threatened by ironic art and smug artists. How do you take the teeth out of an artist who criticizes the wealthy? Make them wealthy. Not too much, but just enough. Add a little celebrity to the cake and you suddenly have no opposition any more.
The best work I've ever done has been without any monetary goal in mind. I've pondered lately how much I enjoy installations like the one I did last year. It just exists in a moment in time, in a physical space and then that space is gone. Those paintings will never sell, despite the fact that I think they are quite amazing. I'd be lucky to get $2000 each, but I know even that is ambitious where I am. So I wrestle with the dilemma of having them locked away in the dark for no one to see. I wonder if that's right. I wonder if I should give them away, because at least someone might have the opportunity to find resonance in them. But this is against the rules. I'm supposed to get as much as I can for them. I'm supposed to ascend in the system so that they garner 5-figures each and in doing so become "good."
My friends can't afford that. I can't afford that. So who exactly are these made for? People whose houses I will never be invited to? People who would never consider me their peer, even if they truly held me in some sort of awe for what I do? I have people who have bought my work and never offered to show me how it looks in their home. As if the work is allowed there, but I am not. These are people I know personally. Our children have played together. But the distinction of class is clear.
I have long ago dismissed the idea that I will ever be famous. I'm not concerned with that. Honestly, I am probably not very well equipped for it anyway. I just want to work. I want to work at something I feel is meaningful and in my heart I believe that art can be so. If I walk away from this, I just wonder if I am shirking some responsibility to things greater than myself. Simultaneously I wonder if I'm just delusional to believe I could ever take part in something great to begin with.
There is power in the making of things, what we call creation. I don't know if art is really creation at all in the true sense. We tend to combine and assemble and re-arrange at best, but I'm skeptical about the position that anything is truly created. Really so-called creativity is another mask of self. This person is creative and so we can categorize them and convince ourselves that we know them and then move on to whatever is next. I wonder how much we actually know about people, because I wonder how much we truly know about ourselves.
I read a John Waters quote this morning that said something to the effect of it is contemporary art's job to destroy what has come before it. So even our creation is imbued with, -or perhaps inseparable from destruction and violence. If my job is to destroy; to dislike the art that is immediately before me with such intensity that I feel compelled to make things whose purpose is to obliterate it, I'm just not sure I'm up to the task. Honestly, I don't know if I want that job.
At this moment, I honestly don't know if I even am an artist. I don't feel comfortable with that label. I think Pop art was funny for about 15 minutes and there were only 2 or 3 people who understood the emptiness of the joke in the first place. The rest were just a herd. Abstract Expressionism, much as I personally relate to it, needed to be made fun of to be sure. It had become a religion. But the hecklers became the stars and then the criticism became the new religion. There are legitimately times when art should be serious, and maybe we've come to that time once again. It's time to talk frankly about the 2-ton balloon dog in the room.
We're seeing the resurgence of greed that mirrors the 80's. So perhaps it's natural to assume that the art should be as bloated and spectacular as ever to comment on it. The sad truth is that those who drive the engines of greed and power and money are not now, nor have they ever been threatened by ironic art and smug artists. How do you take the teeth out of an artist who criticizes the wealthy? Make them wealthy. Not too much, but just enough. Add a little celebrity to the cake and you suddenly have no opposition any more.
The best work I've ever done has been without any monetary goal in mind. I've pondered lately how much I enjoy installations like the one I did last year. It just exists in a moment in time, in a physical space and then that space is gone. Those paintings will never sell, despite the fact that I think they are quite amazing. I'd be lucky to get $2000 each, but I know even that is ambitious where I am. So I wrestle with the dilemma of having them locked away in the dark for no one to see. I wonder if that's right. I wonder if I should give them away, because at least someone might have the opportunity to find resonance in them. But this is against the rules. I'm supposed to get as much as I can for them. I'm supposed to ascend in the system so that they garner 5-figures each and in doing so become "good."
My friends can't afford that. I can't afford that. So who exactly are these made for? People whose houses I will never be invited to? People who would never consider me their peer, even if they truly held me in some sort of awe for what I do? I have people who have bought my work and never offered to show me how it looks in their home. As if the work is allowed there, but I am not. These are people I know personally. Our children have played together. But the distinction of class is clear.
I have long ago dismissed the idea that I will ever be famous. I'm not concerned with that. Honestly, I am probably not very well equipped for it anyway. I just want to work. I want to work at something I feel is meaningful and in my heart I believe that art can be so. If I walk away from this, I just wonder if I am shirking some responsibility to things greater than myself. Simultaneously I wonder if I'm just delusional to believe I could ever take part in something great to begin with.
on a positive note
I'm going to brag on a friend of mine. I met Heyd at a Lydia Lunch show in Austin, TX circa 1997. My roommate Johnny liked him and they had dated briefly, but for whatever reason it didn't work out the first time out. That night, Heyd had invited Johnny out to the show and he brought me along as part insurance, part escape hatch I imagine. Long story short, 13 years later they remain in a committed relationship and whatever your personal beliefs about same sex marriage, that's an admirable run for love; better than a lot of "traditional" marriages I know of personally.
Heyd is a great guy, and I saw him earlier this year when he passed through SC. He is getting a lot of attention with his painting and just last week got this killer review in the Washington Post.
What I like about his painting is that it is personal and real and still interesting and accessible. You don't have to know the people in his paintings to feel as though you do, and looking at his work I realize that what is often missing in my own is that sense of self which he imbues each of his portraits with.
I know yesterday was a pity party, but I'm really feeling beat lately. I wanted to celebrate the success of someone who I know and feel really deserves it.
Bravo, Heyd!
THE VERY QUEER PORTRAITS OF HEYD FONTENOT
Through Dec. 4 at the Art Gallery, 1202 Art-Sociology Building, University of Maryland, College Park. 301-405-2763. http://www.artgallery.umd.edu. Hours: Open Monday-Saturday 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission: Free. Public program: On Nov. 4 at 6:30 p.m., Fontenot will discuss his work with exhibition curator Jonathan Frederick Walz and Anne Collins Goodyear, assistant curator of prints and drawings at the National Portrait Gallery. Free.
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