The Sketchpad

How About This...

2010-01-05T21:14:00.002-05:00

A woman, holding a martini glass, with an angel on one shoulder pouring vodka, a devil on the other pouring in some cranberry juice.

I call it "What Urinary Tract Infection?"

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A man, holding a cocktail glass, with an angel on one shoulder pouring gin, a devil on the other pouring tonic.

I call it "What Malaria?"

Note to self

2009-12-22T13:54:00.003-05:00

I start working again in a week or so...after flu and home improvement and xmas.

I have 4 things to work for:
1st: Show of recent small work at Riverbend Winery and/or the coffee shop in the lobby of the building at 3rd and Broadway.
2nd: A commissioned piece for a company that helps people pay off medical debt
3rd: A show at Glassworks in March
4th: June solo show at Tim Faulkner's.

I'm going to finish 3 pieces I started in Nov/Dec
I'm going to do an angel/devil piece about horses and the carrot/stick cliche.
I'm going to do an angel/devil piece about health insurance
I'm going to do series of small individual angels and devils and other archetypes. This will not only take away some of the content preoccupation allowing me to concentrate on technique, it will spawn other ideas to incorporate in future larger works.

Recently I have gotten away from drawing a composition on the computer before painting it, instead skipping that step and painting direct from photos. I don't really prefer this as it takes away a level of separation that can introduce more variety and fearless improvisation. I am going to try to correct this and return to composing on the computer first.

Can't wait for xmas to be over.

I Hate Your Work

2009-11-07T12:27:00.008-05:00

So happy, happy good times at the Tim Faulkner's Gallery this 1st Friday. I had rented a wall for some old stuff and he decided to include two new pieces, "Apologist Accepted" (not shown) and "Valid Realities" (shown) in his hallway because he like them so much and wanted them to get seen. Yay, Moe!

There you have it again. I tend to get nothing but praise these days. Any criticism comes in the form of a less enthusiastic response. The better pieces get talked about more while the less well accepted pieces are just ignored. Either my bad stuff isn't so bad, or people are too polite to say anything that might offend. Talk is so positive in fact that this spring I'm planning on inviting a bunch of artists to my studio for some food and drinks and to critique my work. No holds barred. Let me have it.

My desire for criticism, you would think, would have made me welcome the conversation I did have last night with a person I had only just met. She simply looked me in the eye and said "I hate your work."

"You hate it," I replied

"I hate it."

"That's it? You just hate it?"

"I hate it," she said again.

That's fine. She hates it. No problem. I don't even know her name and from the way she was dressed, her taste wasn't exactly beyond reproach, so my feelings weren't hurt. To tell you the truth, I thought it was a gag. I had reason to believe she was trying to get my goat, so I played along, asking her why she thought my work is bad.

"Why do you think it is good?" she asked.

I realized then that this might not be a joke. Never mind that no one asked for her opinion, but saying you "hate" something pretty much closes discussion. There is nothing more to talk about. Still, perhaps due to the discomfort associated with the thought that I may be talking to a crazy person, I explained I just wanted to know why she hated it.

She revealed a degree of defensiveness at this point that I tried to diffuse by saying that it's fine I just want her to HELP me understand where I might be failing...it was too late I knew. She was a crazy person.

"I'm not trying to HELP you."

Okay. Fun. I'm not interested enough in her to care because I'm thinking she's at best obnoxious if not completely sociopathic. While I wonder what she gained by this exchange, I do look forward to initiating conversations with her in the future, but by time I'll be able to hang out at the gallery again, the guy she came with last night will have dumped her and she'll never be seen again.

St. James: Fair and Unfair

2009-10-05T16:06:00.004-04:00

I'm ALL for the St. James Art Fair and all the money and people it drags down to my lovely neighborhood. I like the nice street lights, litter pick up, flowers, tree trimming, historical house plaques, and other things it pays for.

I don't like scarecrows or dream catchers or much of anything else there but there are some REAL artists that sell REAL art for prices that can be a lot cheaper than you would expect to find in a REAL gallery.

Let me tell you. Just because the crap at the Mag Bar is reactionary and cheap, doesn't make it any better...though it is to me a 100% valid alternative. Just like St. James, 95% of the unfair is shit. The reactionary and cheap and outsider aspects are their ONLY "merits".

I'm all for different though. I think the organic things like this that sprout up around big events are exciting and rich and real and only result in a net good for anyone involved in the official goings-on.

It is all a big shame, but many of you need to quit trashing St. James. Without it there would have never been an unfair. Der. You don't like it? Fine. Don't go. But thank your butts it was there to justify you dragging your shit out of your mom's basement and tossing it up against a chain link fence a block away from a few hundred thousand people. I mean, a real pessimist would see the Unfair as just a way for the mag bar to sell a few more PBRs to dirty hipsters than they normally would.

I'm looking forward to something else that is bigger and better to sprout up as a result of this. Maybe a map of private residences in the neighborhood that can host display and sell art for the weekend. A big group of Salons. Shit I think this sort of thing should be going on all the time if any of the underground outsider "artists" are actually serious about having their art seen. Other towns have this sort of thing already on a weekly or monthly basis.

I might actually make this happen...just so my Burgoo party at 1518 S. Third can be included. Any frustrated Old Louisville Artists who want to participate contact Moe Profane on facebook.

The crazy thing is that the 5% I like is different from the 5% you like, and grandma likes, and old Weird Harold, Uncle Slappy, Mr. Slim and Juanita likes. It all just adds to the intricate tapestry of flavors and tastes that make up America. What binds us all together is a love of crowds, scarce parking, capitalism, and port-a-johns.

Short, Medium and Long Term Goals - just like the motivational people tell you to do it.

2009-09-21T19:31:00.005-04:00

I always told myself I needed a body of work before I could worry about getting a show but I was able to do enough one offs this summer in addition to my past work to get a choice spot at the Tim Faulkner Gallery for a solo show in June. Once I have that accomplished I can shop that show around in other cities and see what happens as I begin work on another solo show for 2011.

The short term deadlines of the past summer burnt me out to a point of exhaustion. Now I have a longer term goal set. I have the floor plan of the gallery laid out and plans for how much work I will need to go where. I just need to produce slowly but steadily through out the fall, winter and spring to put together a top notch super A+ okey dokey #1 show. But I also need to produce smaller one offs for group shows and Sunday Salons to keep my stuff out there in front of people. Hopefully I'll sell a few along the way too.

Currently I have 6 painting in various early stages of completion:

A dinosaur fossil piece with devils as a remark about Christian Apologists who blame every piece of evidence that disproves their superstitious beliefs on the devil.
A 4'x4' Buddha a friend ordered years ago but I never got around too. Now is the perfect time in my conceptual and stylistic evolution to execute it. Just have the Buddha holding a devil and angel in a closed jar.
A smaller painting featuring a close up of 1968's mirrored angel and devil shooting each other.
A 6'x4' painting of my wife lying on a big red couch in a rather not-so-dainty pose watching her Twilight Zone box set.
A point of view piece with empty taps dripping their last drops onto a half empty/full pint glass with a devil and angel expressing their opposing opinions of such a situation.
The head of Klimpt's Judith wearing a tie that features his mass produced overly consumed Kiss.

This weekend I have to have two older pieces framed to fill in some space at the 640 Gallery during the East Market Festival or whatever the hell is going on. Then I have to collect "Cities of the Dead" and "Ash Wednesday" and deliver them to Evansville for a show my high school art teacher is putting together in a downtown office building.

Tonight I'm watching the Colts. If it is over early, I'll go down and start painting on the beer piece.

Girding My Loins

2009-08-22T01:49:00.006-04:00

The maddening quiet before battle, toeing the edge of a cold pool, the first plodding steps of a 5 mile run, the first 100 miles of a 10 hour drive, the first few inches up a tall mountain...All unpleasant reluctant times where someone might hesitate and try to avoid the toil and trouble, to willingly give up the rewards of a struggle so they may bypass any unpleasantness or discomfort.

I feel these feelings and urge these urges - wanting to stay on the couch and avoid the untold amounts of work and concentration, fighting doubt and the fear of failure - when I sit down to paint. I often begin knowing what I need to paint and have a good idea of how I want to pull it off, but as I begin, the emptiness of the space I am to fill is like a mountain of coal and the paint brush a tiny shovel.

I know all about just putting one foot in front of the other and so I am able to force myself to plunge into the icy waters of artistic expression. Once I'm in, I'm in. I won't get out, I won't give up. It is as hard to quit, harder even, than it was to begin. And when I'm finished, too exhausted to continue making positive decisions about a piece, and before I can allow myself to depart and hit the bed, I sit back and enjoy any successes and start to plan for my next struggle against the forces of chaos, trying to coral the cat-like elements of two dimensional form as they dart and run in every direction.

In other words, art is a bitch. I real pain in the ass. I'm so glad I have the reward of a finished piece and any praise and money that it may bring because the act itself is not unlike marching hip deep in shit.

Too much to do - but this could launch big things

2009-07-22T13:04:00.014-04:00

Just wrapped up one deadline as a new one was dropped on me...and then another. Commitments too enticing to pass up.

1. New Orleans themed fundraiser at LVAA Water Tower - Tim Faulkner calls me Friday, July 17 about show he's hanging for LVAA fundraiser. A can't miss. I'm too honored and excited to even consider turning it down. I'm leaving town twice though before I need to get it done so it is going to be tough.

I'm not going to be able to spend as much time hashing out an idea on the computer like I have lately. Just roughing in basic spaces and background and starting painting before rest of subject matter included.

I already started a print that had a voodoo theme. Something I started with my cat "Mojo" before he died:

sketch:

I thought about a painting all weekend and started working through two ideas.

Ash Wednesday: This idea puts a man draped on a Riverwalk park bench like he's been crucified, sleeping off the Marti Gras fun early into the next morning. An angel prays a devil nurses hang over above his head, each with beads AND ashes smudged on their heads. At his feet aren't the same lamenting saints Jesus often is seen with. Instead, he is flanked by two fellow partiers sleeping off their binges.

sketch:

painting:

Jazz Funeral: The idea for this evolved from a simple depiction of a signature New Orleans funeral procession into something that mirrors the X's marked on voodoo tombs with the X's spray painted on Katrina houses...even incorporating the X into the composition itself.

Katrina House:

Voodoo Tomb:

Sketch:

Painting:

2. Twist of the Wrist; Louisville Art of the Motorcycle Culture Brought to you by our good friend Brad White, it is set to be a one night event for the 1st friday hop August 7th. It will coincide with art car weekend and the vintage motorcycle show at KMAC. He has a great space lined up in the old Arctic Ice building on main.

Open or Closed Coffin: For this I researched a vintage motorcycle, put a shadowing figure on it, flanked him with an angel with a helmet and a devil with the wind in his face...also a live possum and a dead possum. The bike from the front resembles a crucifix, resting on a cracked skull like is common in Crucifixion scenes. All this to convey something an old biker friend once told me. The only difference a helmet makes is an open or closed coffin.

sketch:

Gmail Postmodernism Debate with Family

2009-07-15T12:35:00.001-04:00

By my sister:

As stated in the chart we are obviously postmodern people - or at least kicking and screaming in a postmodern society. But who writes the chart? How many people does it take pulling in the same direction to make a society? Is it just the media who decide now? Are more people living on the fringe than living in the society as stated? How many pieces of fringe are there? Is it clunky, heavy corded fringe, or is the fringe gossamer and fine? How much yardage does it take to fringe the entire society?

And what's all this about purple? If the light is reflected in a certain wavelength and we in a society call it purple, why isn't it purple? Are there other non-colors?

I'm in the Gallery

2009-07-10T13:20:00.004-04:00

Tim Faulkner stopped by last night.

I showed him stuff new and old. Prints and paintings. He like a lot of it. Told me that I'm "in The Gallery". Now all I need to do is produce and let him take care of the rest.

I already feel the pressure that makes artist take heroin but that is just because I'm so scared of commitment, responsibility, and more work.

Show maybe the middle of next year. Stay tuned. In the mean time will have prints for sale on his site (soon) and work hanging at River Bend Winery, and a piece here and then at his First Friday and Sunday Salon events.

Show Work to Gallery Owner

2009-07-09T13:18:00.004-04:00

The Gallery Owner comes to my house to dig my work today.

Let's see him be polite when he walks into my 3rd world abandoned vicorian house 1st floor and look at what a slob I am. I am a child of postmodernism, the product of postmodern conceptual-minded art professors. Formalism give me hives. Making archival pieces, taking care of pieces, being neat clean and professional...it all makes it less fun for me.

Maybe that is why I don't do it more. It is a nihilistic diversion. I do it to relieve my creative agitation. Self gratifying rubbing of my artist bone. I don't much care for the end product. I just pile them up. I have to get the shit out of my head and move on. I don't do it for the money, for the recognition, or for the chicks. A little of each is nice but not enough to motivate me to do anything I don't want to do. The art is an end in itself. I couldn't really give a shit if it sells or if it is hung on a wall. That's why I'm someone who makes art...not an Artist.

Monday Night June 29

2009-06-30T15:21:00.004-04:00

went to bed at 8 friggen o'clock. Of course woke up at 1am.

went down to make some paintins. Can't loose hard fought momentum and settle back into non-production. Artistic inertia works both ways, body making art tends to stay making art, body not making art tends to stay not making art...BUT...this is only the case in a vacuum. Unless constant force is applied a body making art will succumb to friction and slowly come to rest again as a body not making art. THEN to get going again one has to fight both the inertia AND friction to get going again.

I made changes to Manpower painting

and started roughing in Swamp Monster head in gray and white primer.

Mourning Mojo Painting

2009-06-29T11:12:00.003-04:00

I've prepped the surface upon which to paint, I'm almost down with the image I'm going to paint...now I just need to decide if I'm going to keep the two figures in medieval style robes or make them timeless, more subtly evoking the Christian paintings or keep it obvious like they are now.

testing

2008-08-15T13:53:00.001-04:00

is this thing on?

you damn skippy