coffee / moving closer to producing new work / first new painting after the ANO KATO series /  by Philip Tarlow

1:55 pm: so i whipped into my studio and, after days of having visions of grey & not knowing what it meant, painted over an older abstract collage with shades of grey, punctuated by marks with a grey/black conté stick. i was trembling and my whole body was electric, moving speedily, thinking not.

that's it for today; let's see what tomorrow brings.

11:28 am: 

Today's coffee: a blend of the two Ethiopians and one Burundi you see in the jars, all home roasted within the past 48 hours, maintaining the high anti-oxident properties of the beans, which drops precipitously after 48 hours. 

I order the raw beans from sweetmarias.com. After grinding them, they're placed in my moka pot and in a few minutes, the brew is ready. Unbelievable taste, which chages with each new blend. By the way, raw beans are about half the price of roasted beans.

the thermos is by zojirushi, and keeps the coffee very hot longer than any thermos we've tried.

in a while i'll head to the studio & see what happens. something's cooking....we'll see.......... received a call from the gallery in houston an hour ago, that the first tube has arrived. the first response was really enthusiastic. that means a lot to me, so thanks for the call harwood!

contemplating grey /  by Philip Tarlow

11:59 am: in considering next steps for paintings, i'm contemplating grey. the rocks are in our master bathroom shower. the bag and the shadow it casts on our cement floor are temporarily in our entry way. the watch strap is a sample and may be ordered from a strap maker in new mexico.

i noticed that grey played a big part in the paintings i made for my ANO KATO exhibition. i'm envisioning a new series of paintings with a grey theme running through them. as soon as i start working, i'll know if that really means anything.

more about our school experience yesterday in denver / progress of paintings being shipped / what's next?? /  by Philip Tarlow

1:22 pm: so WHAT'S NEXT on the painting front?? i have no idea. and i like that. about to embark on a voyage; could be to zanzibar; could be to jupiter. i suspect that the next series will be targeted to my new denver gallery: SPACE. since the director, mike burnett, took me on as a gallery member based on my abstract work, that's the direction the new paintings will take. i expect, as i've said in earlier posts, they will bear some traces of the recently completed parade series, which i'm re-naming ANO KATO, the title of my upcoming exhibition in houston. beyond that, i can't say. will they be collages on canvas, like the previous series? (see recent collages, under the dropdown works menu) can't know till i launch in. once i get into a good rhythm with the actionlab proofing, i'll feel more comfortable dividing my day between painting in the studio and proofing here in the house. that will occur sometime early this week; maybe even as early as tomorrow. oh, the anticipation! oh, the adventure! as i've said many times before, it's a gift, for which i have gratitude every day.

11:48 am: i'm working on actionlab curriculum editing today. 

our school experience yesterday was outstanding. we were at a five star stem magnet school in denver,  where we were facilitators in the climate challenge summit to life day. my group of about 18 was charged with coming up with and rapid prototyping ideas for energy conservation. they were all 8th graders. my co-facilitator mark is an expert in the field, whereas my specialty is along the lines of problem based learning skills, as reflected in our actionlab program.

the kids at this school are, without exception, very proficient at collaboration. so they wasted no time in coming up with ideas and then clumping them into categories, putting them on stickies which they then attached to the wall. the three most promising ideas were then selected, and two of the kids in the group self selected to present to a different group, who then repeated the process, presenting to our group. although there were some rough spots that need to be addressed in any future iterations, mikela and i were very impressed with these kids and with the school environment that fostered their high level skills. we met some of the administrators and will continue the conversation in the coming weeks. 

THE PAINTINGS: it appears the shipment of 4 packages with the paintings is on schedule and should be delivered monday. YEA!

on the right: a DETAIL of the denver science museum, 56x12," oil on portrait linen.this is one of the 22 paintings that are en route to houston.

actionlab ready by nov. 1 / rest of paintings to be shipped today /  by Philip Tarlow

4:51 pm: so that's it; the paintings have all been shipped to Gremillion in Houston, and will be in the gallery tuesday. it was a bit of a struggle, and we'd do it differently next time. we facilitated an event at a truely extraordinary denver school all day today. here are some pics. right now we're having a beer & happy hour stuff, so i'll write more later. and on the bottom right, one of the beautiful shots our friend martin took of the lunar eclipse.

6:35 am: in a meeting with one of our IT team yesterday and a call to the other, we received confirmation that the first iteration of our actionlab platform will be ready to go, deliver to the kids & teachers & begin testin by the end of this month. YEA!

the final group of paintingswill be shipped to houston this afternoon, and the gallery should have them by monday. YEA! 

on the RIGHT: a detail of moma 2, 48x48", which is one of the paintings that will be shipped later today.

2 tubes shipped to houston this afternoon /  by Philip Tarlow

6:28 pm: this afternoon 2 tubes of un-stretched paintings were shipped via UPS to gremillion & co. fine art in houston. tomorrow, the 3rd tube, along with 4 boxes of still stretched , somewhat smaller in scale works will be shipped. here's a detail of one of the paintings shipped today: MOMA 6, 32x78" the photograph this painting is based on was shot from above in MOMA in 2010. to the right of the figures, an iconic richard serra sculpture.

continued shipping prep / /  by Philip Tarlow

10:11 am: although we did the bulk of the work yesterday, there are details we need to attend to today. our friend's heart surgery is less than 24 hours away, and that's very much in our awareness right now.

here's a detail of metropolitan museum 2, 60x60"; one of the paintings in this bubble wrapped tube we're preparing to ship tomorrow.

why? / packing paintings / trail walk photos from friday /  by Philip Tarlow

DETAIL: space gallery 35x56" this is one of the 22 paintings headed to houston for my exhibition, ANO KATO.

2:34 pm: in 2 days a dear friend will undergo open heart surgery for a valve replacement. at the same time, we're scurrying about packing up paintings. last night i had a dream of loss. no phone; no way to communicate with mikela & make sure we would arrive at our destination on time. i wasn't even sure she knew what the destination was. fuck, even i didn't know.

i tend to move between the macro and the micro. from the beautiful decaying pieces of tree you see below to the galaxies and our insignificance. and it's tempting to wonder why; why do i make these paintings? why have we created actionlab360, which we believe to be an essential next step in education? our history together is one of "bumping into stuff" at exactly the right moment. opportunities, insights, people we could never have dreamt up or planned in advance. 

2:27 pm: today mikela and i created preliminary boxes for the smaller paintings we left on their stretcher bars. those boxes will go inside larger boxes we hop we'll find in alamosa. if not, we'll wait and find them when we're in denver. next, we'll focus on the larger paintings we un-stretched and will roll & put in a large heavy duty tube, along with the disassembled stretcher bars. we'll breathe a huge sigh of relief once they've been received by the gallery in houston.

7:57 am: from our trail walk on friday afternoon:

the 22 paintings for my gremillion show / The Roost / more shipping & exhibition prep /  by Philip Tarlow

12:37 pm: so i just now completed putting together a 2 page doc with all 22 paintings that will be in my exhibition at gremillion & co. fine art, houston, opening november 5th. these two sheets will accompany the paintings being sent, so that the staff at the gallery can log them and give each of them ID numbers. and here they are.

8:59 am: Yesterday afternoon on our way down from our trail walk, we saw The Roost parked at one of the camp sites.. It is filmmaker Joel Wolpert's pickup truck home. His wife was there along with his 6 year old son, who had just climbed one of our 3 "fourteeners" yesterday. So a 6 year old scaled a 14,300 ft. peak! He gave me his DVD, which we'll watch today. The Roost has a beautifully crafted and finished pine structure atop it's flatbed, which is their living space as they travel around the southwest. Absolutely stunning. A very cool guy to talk with.

a transitional day / renewing our wedding vows at the lake /  by Philip Tarlow

1:39 pm: WHAT I'M UP TO:

a stick i found while walking paintings over to the studio for shipping prep (this stick represents all that i love about the natural world we're surrounded by here in the baca); 2 shots of paintings that will be shipped without being sn-stretched and on shot of a painting in the process of being un-stretched. but don't think we forgot about walking up the trail. in 1/2 hour, that's where we're headed. we'll increase our distance, preparing our bodies for the big walk up to the lake, where we plan on renewing our wedding vows!

1:25 pm: why is herring in wine sauce so damned good?

8:34 am: this is a DETAIL of parade 46, 56x20" one of the 22 paintings being shipped to houston on tuesday. 

now that ano kato 54 is complete, i'll be focusing on editing actionlab360 curriculum and working, with mikela, on un-stretching canvases and preparing them for shipment next week.

we had a good call with our IT team last night, and they're on track to have the product up and ready for the kids to download by the end of this month.

first snow / "ano kato 54" continues /  by Philip Tarlow

3:27 pm: since i still have the may version of this painting & haven''t yet shipped it, before un-stretching it, in preparation for rolling it up & shipping, I placed the two side by side; something that may not ever happen again! at least not any time soon. my opinion earlier in the day has now shifted, and i view my initial "the latest one is better" reaction as just that; a reaction.  i now see that they are both very good paintings. just different.

12:49 pm: i got an early start and, with the awareness of just how much we have to do in the next few days in order to get the 22 paintings off to houston, i worked my ass off, while maintaining my cool.....i think. here's how ano kato 54 looks right now. i actually think it turned out better than the earlier version. they're both good paintings, but revisiting this image allowed me to reach a more successful resolution. as a result, and becasue it's 6 inches smaller in length, it pops al lot more. i think what sealed the deal for me is the reddish tint i gave the floor on the right today. i'm including the previous version below today's so you can compare and decide for yourselves.

ano kato 54  32x72"        today

parade 39  32x78"       may, 2015

7:14 am: last night we had our first measurable snow, which fell above 12,000 ft. on the peaks. this was shot a few minutes ago in the early morning pinkness. below is a shot of yesterday evening's stormy sky to the west, and 2 pics of this morning's delicate pink symphony.

to work early today for continued work on ano kato 54.