A salon

These pictures are all from Matthew's salon last week.

Sal and Christine (and Fred)

Tonight my thoughts are of Sal Randolph and Christine Castsifas. Their works go well together.

The three of us met at Sal's studio last night. The talk decentered. We didn't bother deconstructing one another's work, instead we concentrated, naturally on making each other's work better. The purpose of our meeting was to try and instigate Sal's participation in a show at the Good Children Gallery in New Orleans in October. The image above is from the gallery's current show.

I also went over to Fred's studio. I've been going to Fred's about every other week since he started preparing for his show at Pocket Utopia. You can check his progress on his blog. He's working hard. The more I go to Fred's the more I learn. It's centering.

Pocket Utopia was mentioned in an article, in the Village Voice this week. The article was about Bushwick galleries.

I also just listed a new gocco print on etsy! It's over there and away from center!

Sumie Thinking

I seem to navigate a lot of questions from colleagues about the various paths of my work; the drawings (collages), the perches (social sculptures), Pocket Utopia (my salon space) and my various participatory and sometime performative events. Questioning is good.

It is even better when people answer their own questions. Maybe that is what art (life) is all about anyway; finding answers on your own. I recently received this email from another artist and felt it worthy of reprinting here:

Your collages are infused with concerns present in your sculptures and Pocket Utopia which adds an unusual pragmatic feel to the visual pleasure of them.


Above is a sumie sketch by my mom. I observed one of her workshops while in DC this weekend. More on the path of sumie in a later post.

More Leave(s) and validation

I packed up my leaves for more on the road sketching this weekend, and discovered that there's another leaf-inspired artist out there.  Journalist and critic Janet Malcolm has been photographing burdock leaves (her photos are above).  The Times featured her in an article on Sunday. Malcolm's book "Burdock" is due out in September.

Drawing on Nature

I forgot to bring my sketchbook to Ohio. The first day I was there, I walked around, getting the lay of the land, and found a drawing opportunity. I bought some paper and a couple of pencils and filled in what the beetle had left behind.  I am "re-beetling" the negative space which I will then rework into something else, a totally different place.

As Karl Blossfeldt, once said, “The plant never lapses into mere arid functionalism; it fashions and shapes according to logic and suitability, and with its primeval force compels everything to attain the highest artistic form.”

Out in a cornfield somewhere

Order, Ohio-style, where time and space are equivalent to land and sky (and corn).

Silent Social Space

The lap, a child's head and the road accompanied by hours on a bus equals a perfect construction of form and function until we arrive at our destintation.

Bus Window Mandala

While traversing 95 North en route back to New York, I not only took in the familiar whiz of landscape but observed a mandala right out the front window of the bus. The immediate panels of glass, including windshield wipers, and the road beyond the glass was framed in front of me.

Red, white, blue and delicious

For the 4th of July I couldn't resist making a flag cake while visiting family and friends in Virginia. It might be one of the best cakes I ever made and I've made a lot of cakes for different social events and salons.

I never follow recipes and can never make the same cake twice, they're singular creations. I wish I had some cake now, for I just got back to New York after a five and a half hour bus ride with Grant! Each bus ride-a singular creation.

The view from here

I've turned myself around in order to look at art through the back door and have gotten the programming for the coming year at Pocket Utopia well under way. Now I can watch marauding bicycle gangs, the neighbors, and the other galleries in the neighborhood. I can enjoy the view and look towards the street.