Long Table Discussions

This part of the class was by far the most underappreciated exercise by my fellow classmates, or so it seemed in our last class.  Most days I was into it and there were only a handful that I barely participated in.  I think the best long table discussion took place the week we discussed the book Art and Fear. It was in the small low ceiling conference type room in Humanities.  It could have just been the fact that we all got really into the reading or perhaps the intimacy of the room.  I think there were other discussions that were successful and others that fell short of being productive.  As I may have mentioned I’m a bit nervous in speaking to larger groups but I tried my best to be a part of the weekly conversation.  I felt my voice was not one of the most pronounced at the table but I felt I contributed thoughtful insights every week.  I’m one who likes to listen more than I like to speak.  I felt that I participated as a great listener during our discussions.  I’m fortunate to be in a small community of brilliant and thoughtful minds.  That makes it easy to listen.  Overall I felt the long table discussions were yet another good way to build a stronger dialogue between all of us first year students.

Presentations

I felt that I was well prepared and the information was clear in my presentations.  I was poor with the timing on both occasions.  I went long on my influences presentation and I came up a bit short on my Silver Buckle Press speech.  Also I had carefully thought out jokes that I planned to strategically place throughout my presentation.  I failed to do so on both occasions.  Overall I thought the presentations were very informative and sometimes quite delightful.

I’m currently wrapping up three major projects that still have a decent amount of hours left before they’ll be complete.  Two of which are collaborations.  One collaboration with Briony and the other with Marcus and AJ.  Briony and I have been working on an etching for several weeks that we’ll have finished for our final critique in graduate etching on Wednesday.  Due to the hard ground being extremely reflective I couldn’t get a good shot of the plate.  It’s basically a hyper detailed underwater scene that’s packed with the best images our collective imagination can muster.  It has been a very slow and intricate process but we’ve managed to become more and more excited with every square inch of image.

AJ, Marcus and I have been working on a large-scale screenprint that is ridiculously fun.  We split up the composition to where we all are working on a separate part the image.  It’s kind of an exquisite corpse project to the extreme.  My part is the man in the bear suit looking surprised at the fact that he’s half toad.   The toad is AJ’s and Marcus will be creating something in the stomach.  I finished my layer and passed it so my photo isn’t up to date.  I’m excited to see what AJ and Marcus do with the drawing.

The last of the studio projects that I’m wrapping up is an etching.  I’m finally getting the richness in line that I’ve been looking for all semester.  I’ve been experimenting with all sorts of tools that will scratch away a hard ground on a steal plate.  My new favorite mark making tool is a flat head screwdriver.   There are so many possibilities for creating line or a mark and I can’t wait to explore that more.  The break will give me some time to find all kind of tools to experiment with next semester.

In other news the UW had a snow day.  I was surprised to hear that the UW hasn’t been shut down because of snow since 1978 (I heard it on ESPN so I’m not sure how valid it is).  My small group had plans to meet at Lazy Jane’s for breakfast and since it wasn’t closed we made it happen.  There were other groups meeting at the same time and we had a makeshift long table discussion.  We spent the first part of the meeting enjoying delicious scones other tasty breakfast items.  After filling our bellies with that deliciousness we got down to business.  Our conversation was thoughtful and everyone seemed to be stay on track with the reading.  Out of all the chapters in the book, chapter 9 fascinated me the most.    Understanding the body and the mind scientifically and using that knowledge to more or less manipulate nature not only interreges me but scares me out.  The best parts of the discussion were when we discussed the role of science in our culture and how we’re involved as visual artists.

It will undoubtedly take me some serious time to digest the experience of our graduate seminar class.  Looking back on my transformation as a graduate student/artist this semester I can’t believe how far I’ve come in such a short amount of time.  The course was the greatest intellectual challenge that I’ve come across in my academic history.

When the semester first started I felt like I was shot out of a cannon.  All the classes, the lectures, the openings, my PA, etch.  It was a great feeling but after a while I became burned out.  After becoming sick on two separate occasions I decided that I couldn’t do everything that I expected of myself.

I would rate my performance as average and my personal growth as extraordinary. When I go through and pick myself apart it’s pretty clear where my strengths and weaknesses lye.  I wouldn’t call myself a standout in any particular category in this self-evaluation but I feel that my performance in the overall dialogue of the group was my strongest attribute.  My participation in the long table discussions wasn’t the most thought provoking but my presence was engaging on a regular bases in each class.  As a whole I feel that my blog entries were well organized and thoughtful.  I attended as many required opportunities as my schedule allowed but unfortunately was unable to fill all the requirements for the semester.  I think if I would have stepped up a bit more I could have impacted the group more positively.

My writing isn’t the strongest and putting something out there that I feel really good about takes serious time for me.  Blogging is a different kind of writing because it’s public and in a comfortable setting.  Blogging is something that I explored in my travels abroad to keep family and friends updated on my adventures.   This class blog was a bit different and I tried to approach it with my unique personality.  Although I didn’t earn a chocolate bar any of the weeks I feel that my blog was an overall success.

My classmates were my favorite part of the course.  I feel so fortunate to be a part of this unique group of interesting and brilliant artists.  Certain people brought there “A” game every week and people like me had good weeks and bad weeks.  Naturally there will be people that don’t feel comfortable speaking in a group setting so it was too bad that not everyone was completely involved during class.  I think the dynamic was great and I look forward to working with everyone in the years to come.

The Graduate Seminar class has been helpful in understanding the program that we’re in, inside and out.  This semester has been a constant balancing act of all the exciting things offered to us.  Each week I’ve been feeling more and more comfortable organizing my time.  Things are kind of crazy right now but I’ve very happy at the way the semester is finishing.  It should be a glorious transition into next semester.  I’m officially all signed up for classes.  I’ll be taking Advanced Drawing with Fred, Advanced Litho with Jack, Grad Etching with Francis and independent credits with Derrick.  I have a rough idea of whom I want on my committee and by the end of the spring I should be closer to that decision.  I was really impressed listening to Fred and Derrick speak about their work and other relevant topics during our seminar.  I’m really looking forward to working with them next semester.  For sure I can see John and Jack on my committee.  I worked with both of them this semester and feel good about the progress I made with them and my work.  I still have plenty of time to figure it out but I feel like I’m on the right path.

I doubled up on my academics this semester so I decided against taking one in the spring.  With my PA and two seminars this semester the volume of art I made this semester suffered.   I’ll make up the academics this summer because I have a PA and my classes will be free.

I’m excited about several of the academics offered at this school.  The art history that will definitely be on my plate one of these semesters is in contemporary art history taught by Michael J.  I’ve only heard good things (mostly from Eddie) and listening to him speak to our class was quite enjoyable.  I’m still up in the air to my other art history class.  Perhaps the history of graphic arts, but who knows.  Before I leave here I will definitely get my fair share of film classes or at least a class.  If I were to pick my outside academic today I would most likely go with something in the Communication Arts Department.

I’m almost certain that I’ll be going for both my MA and my MFA.  The 3 year two degree structure is something that really attracted me to this program.  I was strongly considering going into teaching after school and I felt the MA/MFA would make my resume stronger.  Now that I know more about this program and what it has to offer I’m interested in the MA for different reasons.  I see it as a way of strengthening my work going into my MFA year and a good opportunity to focus on a significant body of work before my final year.  It’s an experience that will make me a stronger artist.

I’m thinking about having my qualifier in the early spring of 2011.  I’ll be working all summer long in Madison so that’ll give me a good jump on creating some solid work.  There aren’t too many spaces that I’m really excited about.  I’ve been to the common wealth gallery and I feel that my art could work well in that space.  I’ve been working pretty traditionally with printmaking and I’m going to try to experiment more with the process over Christmas break.  This semester has really helped me think about my work not as prints but visual art and that opens up more possibilities for creating.  I want to be able to engage my audience in various was perhaps with sculpture and instillation.

There are a few galleries that I would love to see my work in but some are a bit to big for me.  Recently I’ve been looking at the Richard Heller Gallery, David Zwirner Gallery and Cinders Gallery.  I love the artists that show at these galleries.  Cinders Gallery is one that takes submissions via email and it seems like a great place for my work as an emerging artist.  I know the whole process takes patience and time but I’m looking forward to getting my work out there.

This past week for me has been one of the most exciting weeks of the semester.  I’m deep in collaborations with Briony and AJ.  I’m also collaborating with Jason but it’s going to be a pretty ambitious project that won’t conclude before the semester ends.  I’m also working on some new etchings that aren’t collaborations.  I’m making great progress in my etching class and I should finish strong overall.

On Tuesday Eddie and myself joined the small group of Briony, Jonathon and Ryan.  It was nice to mix it up this week with some different people.  We all attended the Colloquium after which was one of the most engaging lectures of the semester.  Kim Abeles was the lecturer and she was absolutely delightful.

Also this week there were great exhibitions and various venues.  The ceramics show at the lofts, Katie Hundle’s show at the lofts, the sculpture show at Humanities and Marina and Trina’s instillation at the Laundry mat by Schenks Corner.  My favorite part of being a grad here is being a part of an outstanding community.  The chemistry has been great and I imagine it’ll only get better.

fist pounds -patrick

Wednesday was one of the better days that I’ve had all semester.  Wednesday’s are my longest days with class from roughly 9am until 7pm and I usually go to the studio after that.  This particular Wednesday was going to culminate with an hour-long critique on my work in Jack’s Interdisciplinary Critique class.  Dyani would go before me and her critique went a bit long so I got bumped to next week.  It was great to take the full class to talk about one persons work.  The discussion we had was very engaging and it really got me fired up to work the rest of the night. I’m very much looking forward to the opportunity to have a two-hour critique with the class this week.  I’m a part of a very thoughtful group and I know their feedback will be well constructed.

Before my Interdisciplinary Critique class on Wednesday I had Graduate etching with Francis Myers.  In almost every class we have a demo on some form of Intaglio.  Francis knows a plethora of techniques so it has been a great experience learning from her.  This past week we learned how to create photo polymer solar plates.  The process is a bit tricky to explain but essentially one is able to take a positive transparency/film and convert it into an image on a plate.  The plate is inked up in a similar fashion as a normal etching and prints like champ.   Francis has free solar plates for us to use so I’m definitely going to have some fun this week.  I have an idea in my head and I should be able to carry it out in one week.  Another great part about the solar plates is that they are extremely fast to work with.

Going backwards one more time on Wednesday puts us at our Intro to Graduate Seminar class.  Our classes delivered one of the liveliest discussions that we’ve had as a group to date.  We steered away from the reading quite a bit this week talking about 5-year retrospectives and NPR vs. Fox News but I think we hit on some topics that addressed some key issues in contemporary mass media.  The most interesting parts for me are on how we fit and exist as artists in this visual world.  The reading for me is far more thought provoking to discuss than it is to read.  I’ve been reading with a focus on relevance in relation to the issues I’m trying to address in the context of our visual culture.  I want my work to be accessible on many levels and thinking about perception from various perspectives has been helpful.

This graduate experience has been everything I could have hoped for and more.  Receiving diverse perspectives in all areas of thinking has in many ways challenged my own thoughts and ideas in the realm of creating.  My two seminar classes are by far the most thought provoking classes I’ve ever taken and also two of the most challenging.  It’s been a great feat organizing all the info I’m taking in and it may take me years to fully process.  I feel I’ve progressed more and more every week in understanding what I’m doing here in graduate school.  It’s an incredibly exciting feeling that is translating well to my studio practice.

Before I exit for the week I want to acknowledge two events from this past Saturday.  Since the start of the summer I’ve spend at least 20 hours a week working at Tandem Press and Saturday was the first time my parents stepped foot in the facility.  The first time they were exposed to a print shop was in Albuquerque at Tamarind and that really rallied their interest.  Now at every opportunity they are eager to learn about the art of making prints.  Tandem has a holiday open house every year at this time where they open the shop up to the public.  The master printers do demos in various printmaking mediums with emphasis or educating and exciting their guests.  My parents had a lovely experience meeting all the staff, walking through the facilities and seeing some of the prints that I have been involved with.  It was a good warm up before the graduate graphics exhibition later in the day.

The graduate graphics exhibition was from 6 until 8 on Saturday evening.   I was most excited about seeing all the great work that our department has churned out this semester.  It was a successful opening and the exhibition was one of the more interesting ones that I’ve seen in that space (I will admit I’m a bit biased).  It was a nice way to close a productive and exciting week.

On Monday I visited the University of Maryland’s art facilities and meet up with  UW alum Justin Strom, an associate professor at the U of M.  I decided to make the trip because Judy Pfaff and Karen Kunc were showing at the school’s gallery.  The exhibition highlighted the collaboration of 13 prints that Judy made with Tandem Press titled “Year of the Dog”.  This was the first time all the prints were shown together so I couldn’t miss it.  The show was fabulous and Judy Pfaff definitely stole it.  Not only did she have the 13-framed prints but she also had a sculptural instillation.  After checking out the exhibition we walked around the grad studios and the printmaking facilities.  It was a great visit and a huge thanks goes out to Justin for taking the time to show us around.

Also on Monday I was able to meet up with some of my old faculty members from MICA.  I took a ride out to Brian Garner’s (my old litho professor) print shop about 10 minutes outside of the city.  Brian Garner is an artist/ collaborative printmaker/ printmaking professor in Baltimore.  He worked as master printer for Goya Girl Press more many years before they stopped publishing.  Brian is a great mentor to me so spending a few hours with him in his beautiful brand new print shop was super cool.

Before this visit I hadn’t been back to Baltimore in more than a year.  Squeezing everything into a day and a half time period was unfortunate but still exciting.  I will be heading back for a wedding in January so I might try to squeeze a collaboration or something in there then.

So back to Madison and back to school.

I was a bit run down by the time I came back to Madison Tuesday night and unfortunately I missed out on Colloquium and my classes on Wednesday.  By the end of the week I was starting to get some energy in me and I put some solid hours into a few drawings.  I originally thought I would be able to crank out a new print for the graduate graphics exhibition but I decided not to force that.  As the end of the semester is quickly approaching I’m thinking about putting all my energy into having a strong finish.  This semester has been a bit of a rollercoaster as I imagined.  All in all I’m enjoying the ride.

On Friday night I took a break from my studio to check out the 4D graduate exhibition.  I didn’t really know what kind of circus I was going to walk into.  As soon as I entered the space I found a significant portion of my classmates partying on couches in a make shift living room area at one end of the gallery.  That totally caught me off guard, as I’m sure it did for most of the visitors that night.  As I walked around to the other works in the space I found it was really tough to concentrate on what I was viewing.   The exhibition was bold as a whole but it seemed that some of the pieces were quieter and more thoughtful.  I’ll have to go back and experience the show again when there isn’t a party going on.  I feel like I missed a lot.  The show was definitely memorable so perhaps in that was a success.  It doesn’t seem like an opening like that can be topped or should be topped.  I’m very interested to see if there is any aftermath to the rule breaking.

The IFPDA fair is held at the Armory in where I believe is the upper east side of Manhattan (67^th and Park Ave. ish).  The Armory is an elegant building and a perfect space for a classy art fair.  The IFPDA fair hosts galleries and publishers (specializing in multiples on paper) from all corners of the globe to sell their work. Some of the galleries are selling the work of old masters and it’s a very interesting conversation with the contemporary prints.

Madison’s very own Tandem Press was occupying a booth and showing off some of the most impressive prints in the fair.  Their booth was in a prime location and all the work looked fantastic.  Way to represent Tandem!!

The EAB fair is always more hip than the IFPDA and the print publishers are usually printing work of artists that I don’t know but should.  This year the EAB was in a horribly cramped venue in Chelsea.  Usually it’s up the street at a place called the Tunnel. I love these two fairs because they showcase the newest and most inventive prints by some of my heroes in the art world.

Another cool reason to go to the fairs is to meet up with friends that I haven’t seen in ages.  The first people that I ran into were my good friends from Tamarind Bill and Arif.  It was such a treat to see them after graduating from Tamarind more than a year and a half ago.  We are all Green Bay Packer fans and at some point we collectively shook our heads at the current situation of the team.  It was also great to run into all of my Maryland Institute friends who annually make the trip up from Baltimore.  As I’m writing this I’m actually on a bus from NYC to Baltimore where I’ll be visiting friends until Tuesday.  It’s not a lot of time to make the rounds and hit all the old spots that I miss but I will sure as heck try.  Two priorities are to check out Judy Pfaff’s exhibition at the University of Maryland and to also visit Brian’s (my old lithography professor) new Printmaking studio.  The exhibition at the University of Maryland is the first time that all 12 “Year of the Dog” prints are being shown together.  It should be fantastic.

Back to the NYC trip.

I have to note that I also meet up with a dear friend of mine from Argentina, Catalina Chervin.  She’s an incredibly warm and kind person and during my 8 month stint in Buenos Aires she watched over me like one of her own.  Catalina also is an important Argentine artist (check her out) and she’s been making the trip up to NYC for all of November the last 20 years.  Catalina invited me to visit the MoMA with her and her Daughter Lucia.  The MoMA was especially wonderful this visit with two great exhibitions outside of their powerhouse permanent collection.

The first exhibition worth noting was a grouping of Monet’s water lily paintings that were created in the final years of the artist’s life.  I loved the paintings more than I thought I would. These were the juiciest paintings I’ve ever seen in my life.  They pretty much melted my face and it ruled.

The second exhibition was an extremely thoughtful and interesting display of small works by a large collection of contemporary artists.  This was my favorite two hour span all weekend.  The work was installed in an unconventional sense with pieces purposefully overlapping each others space to create an interesting conversation with the work.  I wish I had another day to go back to that show because there was just so much good content.  I made some exciting discoveries on artists that I’m for sure going to look into.

So much to do in so little time.  I couldn’t just check out art on this fine weekend in the big apple.

I got duped into checking out the Yankee Parade.  I expected madness and madness I received.  I’m talking public intoxication from thousands of loud/filthy mouthed New Yorkers, high rises dumping all kinds of paper (shredded paper, sheets of copy paper and even toilet paper) out their windows for the wind to consume and of course motorized floats filled with New York’s beloved Yankees.  There were also appearances by New York’s Spike Lee and Jay-Z.  I got all my celebrity sightings out of the way in one sitting.  It was some kind of circus and I didn’t feel right enjoying this moment for a team that I don’t really care for.  Nonetheless the experience was wild, and I like that in an experience.

Another experience worth noting was in the culinary realm.  (This story is kind of dorky btw) I’ve wanted to dine at Otto (Mario Batali’s pizzeria) for years now and on Thursday I got my chance.  It was surprisingly affordable with personal pizzas for around 9 bucks and pasta dishes for about the same.  You could go big if you wanted by having a white truffle pizza for 65 big ones.  We decided against that of course. The meal was amazing and my friends and I dug in with three spoons on some olive oil gelato.  I just realized how hungry I am.

So anyways, I’m almost to Baltimore right now and I should pack my computer up.  Wireless on a bus, how cool is that?  I look forward to bringing all my inspirations from this whole experience back to Madison.  See you in a couple days y’all.

236 Memorial Library

728 State Street

Madison, WI 53706

Ph:  608.263.4929

Email:  www.silverbucklepress.library.wisc.edu

This past Wednesday I presented 3 information packed minutes on Silver Buckle Press to my graduate seminar class.  The goal was to educate my class on this facility and also to explain specific resources students might be interested in taking advantage of.  I felt my delivery was a bit dry.  I should have slipped a couple of tastefully humorous one lines in there to spice it up.  Oh well, next time.  I’ll jot a couple of notes from that info session in case you missed it or are interested in the info.

My information was gathered from the Silver Buckle Press website and also from a tour given by Tracey Honn, the director of SBP.  I should start by saying that Tracy was extremely helpful and a delight to speak to.  Now the Facts:  SBP is a working museum of letterpress that focuses on preserving printing techniques through education, publications, tours and exhibitions.  SBC has 5 functional printing presses that use movable type.  70 fonts in wood and over 200 fonts in lead make up the entire collection of movable type.  Students have opportunities to receive work-study opportunities at SBP.  Students that work there gain useful knowledge and experiences with all the facets of printing in letterpress.   In the spring Tracy will be offering a class as an introduction to letterpress printing.  Feel free to contact Tracy with any questions regarding work-study, classes or taking a tour.

Studio Time

This past week was filled with great energy in the studio and many long hours leading up to our class’s exhibition in the art lofts.  I haven’t seen the exhibition yet but I know that every night during the week all the studios were buzzing with my classmates cranking out some incredible projects.   I sacrificed some much-needed sleep on an 8-day stint where I started and finished my piece for the show.  I probably shouldn’t have went all out but I felt I needed to put a killer piece in the show.  It came down to the wire and I finished by Friday morning when the show went up.  I feel really good about the completion of this print and I’m hoping to carry that momentum throughout the semester.  Perhaps just a little less aggressive in respect to keeping myself healthy.

I’m at a point where I know I made the right decision on studying here and things are starting to get real exciting.  For me this graduate experience has been tremendously draining both physically and mentally.  There are so many stimulating and inspiring experiences going on all day everyday.  It’s really tough to turn down any of them.  At the same time that my brain is soaking up all this great stuff it’s piling up questions that tangle themselves in a giant knot somewhere in my brain.  I’ve been putting a lot of time into sorting out all these thoughts that are getting stuck in my head through writing.  I’m starting to feel a sense of clarity with these thoughts and my frustration has manifested itself into the production of images.  I really don’t know where my work is going and I guess that’s part of the fun.  I’m trusting my concepts and letting them run.  We’ll see what happens.

This piece that I made for the first year graduate exhibition is titled “week 8” and it’s a piece that came about while sorting through all this confusion in my head.  I look at this print and I can’t help but smile.  It’s humorous but at the same time it’s kind of awkward and dark in many ways.   I feel that it was good transition from my last piece of me, which was me on the boat approaching the ambiguous claws in the water (with the penguins and the dead 3 legged wolf).  I’ve really been interested in keeping producing an ongoing narrative that highlights certain experiences from my life as they happen.  I’m also currently producing a collection of drawings that I cover my body with is I were a badass seaman.

Practices of Looking

Let’s talk about reproduction folks.  Chapter four started out a bit dry when going through a brief history of realism, perspective and such.  The part of the chapter that really got my attention started when contemporary issues of reproduction we’re being brought up.  Issues of reproduction are constantly being discussed in the printmaking world (and the art world for that matter) and technological advances have drastically changed the medium in which I make art.  It’s insane to imagine how far we’ve come since Johann Gutenberg invented the first printing press in the 15^th century.  There is a line in the text that is worth rereading in my opinion, “the discovery of how to print pictures and diagrams was tremendously important to the emergence of modern life and thought.”  This inherent historical importance of printmaking is something that I try to embrace when creating my work.

It’s interesting to see the evolution of art with technological advances over the years starting with the various forms of printmaking and moving through the age of photography and digital imaging.  It’s undeniable that technology has been a primary influence in the direction of art and the means in which we can create visual work.  I think there are an endless amount of questions on this subject that I think are interesting to discuss including:  How has technology and reproduction influenced art as whole and the mediums in which make up visual art?  What have been the pros and cons of this evolution in technology?  How will mediums like printmaking survive the test of time against the age of digital?

It’s getting a bit late and I figure I should do myself a service and hit the hay.  I’ll leave you with a pictures of me from Halloween.

A stand out that I feel I need to mention from that contemporary wing of the Art Institute was the Charles Ray scupture titled Hinoki.  The Sculpture was this grand Japanese wood carving of a old and rotting fallen tree.  There was a passage written on a wall in the room that the tree occupied. It read:

“Ten years ago, while driving up the central coast of California, I spotted a fallen tree in a meadow just off the highway. I was instantly drawn to it. It was not only a beautiful log, but to my eyes, it was perfectly embedded in the meadow where it had fallen decades earlier. Pressure from the weather, insects, ultraviolet radiation, and gravity were evident. Total collapse appeared to be no more than a handful of years away. I was inspired to make a sculpture and studied many other logs, but I realized that I was only interested in this particular one.

At one point, I determined that its armature could be its pneuma, the Greek word for breath, wind, or life. Later, I considered making an inflatable sculpture but realized that the tailoring of the form would bring an unwanted complexity to the surface. It then struck me that the breath or life of the sculpture could be manifested in the very act of sculpting. Making a wood carving of the log by starting from the inside and working my way out would bring a trajectory of life and intentionality to this great fallen tree. With several friends, I transported the tree, cut apart by a chainsaw, back to my Los Angeles studio. Silicone molds were taken and a fiberglass version of the log was reconstructed. This was sent to Osaka, Japan, where master woodworker Yuboku Mukoyoshi and his apprentices carved my vision into reality using Japanese cypress (hinoki). I was drawn to the woodworkers because of their tradition of copying work that is beyond restoration. In Japan, when an old temple or Buddha can no longer be maintained, it is remade. I visited Japan often and had a difficult time bringing this work to completion and allowing it to go out into the world. When I asked Mr. Mukoyoshi about the wood and how it would behave over time, he told me that the wood would be fine for 400 years and then it would go into a crisis; after two hundred years of splitting and cracking, it would go into slow decline for another 400 years. I realized then that the wood, like the original log, had a life of its own, and I was finally able to let my project go and hopefully breathe life into the world that surrounds it.”  —Charles Ray

I thought this text was perfect to have with the carving of the log.  For me it wasn’t only the romantic idea of recreating this dead and decaying tree so that people for generations long after the death of all of us can enjoy it.  I had a good chuckle to myself about all the time, money and other resources it must have took to make this project happen.  Don’t get me wrong I loved the piece for many reasons.  It’s just ridiculous to think and to dream about being an artist with these kind of resources. Ahh, that would be the life.

After the Art Institute we wandered around a few galleries and received helpful and honest advice from a few gallery directors.  The Western Exhibitions was my fav and listening to Scott Speh the owner and director was a blunt delight.  He was the first to compare an artist finding a gallery to the metaphor of dating.  “The chances of you walking up to someone at a bar and getting them to come home with you right then is probably not going to happen,” said Scott.  “If you send me images in an email and I don’t know you, I’m going to delete them,” added Scott.  It’s humorous and it makes sense.  The Q and A was for sure a high light of the day for me.

The trip closed with a Mexican inspired feast at a local spot that was recommended by a classmate/Chicago native, Gabe.  The dinner ruled mostly because our class is incredible, the food was mouthwatering/gluttonous and Laurie Beth hooked it up with some tasty cold refreshments.  Thanks again Laurie Beth!  On the way home a few people sang to the bus every song they kind of knew the words to.  Even though I was trying to sleep and it was going on in my face I loved it.  Best field trip ever.

So then there is the production in the studio.  I’m feeling good about this new print that I’m working though.  I started up an etching that kind of pulls most of my recent emotions.  I’m hoping this piece turns our super bad ass in time for our group exhibition this Friday.  I’m going to have to put in a little over time to get that deadline but I’m certain it can be done.  I have a few images below on the current state of it.  Printmaking takes a serious amount of time compared the way I draw so I’m going to have to step it up.

Original drawing, without completed textured areas

Current state of hard ground etching on steal plate as of 11pm Sunday.

I also wanted to say some words about the lecture I attended on Tuesday for the Colloquium Series.  The artist this week was Lavie Raven who was a graffiti artist/ director of hip-hop.  I’ve been extremely interested in street art and graffiti for several years now so I was extremely excited for Raven to speak here.  In my opinion it was kind of a let down.  He was giving a history of this subculture that I felt was cleaned up for an academic audience.  It was great in all to hear about how he fit into this world and what he brought to it that was interesting and new.  I think there were a lot of people interested in many of the questions that confronted the legality of this art form.  He only touched on that when asked.  I guess I just wanted to get more of an idea on what drives this person put up his work at whatever the cost.  Why is it so import to put up an illegal painting in a neighborhood that doesn’t belong to you and you’ve only been in to paint?  I should say that I appreciated a graffiti artist speak in an academic setting.  It’s been a diverse collective thus far and I look forward to ongoing variety.

Also I wanted to share that image of “My Little Boy” a print that I finished a few weeks ago and is going into an exhibition in Shanghai, China.  

The Studio:  A step forward and a step back

My studio progress has been slow and methodical thus far.  Part of it is having access to multiple techniques after two years of being limited to only one.  I’ve been splitting my time mostly in the lithography and intaglio studios.  This week I finally got into the screen-print studio and finished a one-color print.  During the week I was selling that print as a fundraiser for my coin operated newspaper box gallery/public art space.  I’ve been receiving productive feedback on this project and most of the artists I talk to want to help make it happen.  Since I’m doing this outside of class I haven’t been able to fully commit my time and energy.  My goal is to have the project begin on the opening night of our first year group show.  I’ll keep y’all posted on the week-to-week progress.

This week I was trying to close the book on a 3-color lithograph but I ran into a bit of a problem.  I was trying to achieve flawless gray shades for one of my layers and unfortunately it didn’t work out that way.  I won’t go into it too much but the general out come was that working on stone was the wrong choice.  I’m switching to a textured mylar that I’ll expose to a positive working photo litho plate.  I think this week I should be able to crank it out.

My first critique for Graduate Intaglio was this past Monday and I showed my first complete print, “Our Little Boy”. The critique went well and I received some thoughtful feedback. Intaglio production in general has been down as of recently but it’s about to get turned up.  For several weeks now I feel like my mind has been traveling at a million miles an hour.  I’ve been writing more than creating because I think that’s important for my work right now.  I’ve been organizing all my thoughts and finding with more and more clarity.  I believe this is in part due to spending time writing on all the thoughts regarding my weekly readings and conversations with fellow students and professors.

Thoughts on Visual Culture

Our seminar class recently started a new book titled Practices of Looking:  an Introduction to visual culture. I would describe this book as a nice surprise and very thoughtful/ far from boring read.  I got really into this book because it’s acknowledging imagery in our culture in way that parallels and pushes my views and ideas on this subject.

Some key points in our discussions addressed propaganda and how imagery is used to influence all of us everyday.  I often think how I fit into it all as an artist, or how I can work myself into fitting in it.  A name that came to the table several times during the discussions was Shepard Fairey.  I bring him up because I feel that he’s pushing limits in art, limits that I see as important.  He infected the public with his images and has achieved a bit of a rock star status.  It’s most inspiring to know that he never gave up after propagating this idea for 25 plus years.

Recently I’ve been thinking a lot about growing up in such a saturated visual culture and how this has affected my personal aesthetic and interest in being a part of our visual world.  The constant bombardment of imagery throughout my life has had an undeniable impact on who I am.  It’s important for me to pay attention to this while I make art.  I want to believe I have the ability to seduce my viewer with my work.  When I create I constantly think and rethink every decision I make and consider how it will be perceived while still leaving great space for the viewers to bring their own life into the work.

Events of the Week Worth Noting

Friday night was a lecture and exhibition of Nicola Lopez at the Chazen Museum.  This was an occasion that I’ve been anticipating for quite some time because of my involvement in her prints at Tandem.  Nicola is a young artist who has recently exploded on the art scene.  I’m most interested in the way she pushes printmaking in nontraditional ways especially in her installations.  At the Chazen her largest installation was by far the strongest piece.  She creates these environments inspired by urban life that are quite powerful due to the scale and imagery.  She’s working with many printmaking studios and has been quite prolific in the last 4 years.  It’ll be interesting for me to watch her to continue to push boundaries in my field.

After the opening I walked over to Art Lofts to watch Sandy’s performance, Battlesapien, that was based on the game of battleship.  There were about 12 or so members of our class participating in the performance and watching them get covered with red paint was more than memorable.  Although the performance was a bit shaky I definitely thought it was a success.  Before the performance started I picked one side of the room to be on not realizing that moments later I would feel affiliated with a General, played by a member of my class.  The General I was rooting for ended up losing but it was a tough fought bloody battle that I hesitate to say was entertaining.

Today I received word that I received acceptance into an exhibition titled “Symbolic City” in Shanghai, China.  The exhibition will be in the Songjiang Art Museum in Shanghai from November 19^th to December 19^th.  The exhibition is being made possible by Lawrence Technical University in Michigan, the Shanghai University of Engineering and Science and the Songjijang Art Museum.