this is the 38x38" collage i'll be painting over to create the next grey series painting. i'd like to get started tomorrow now that my actionlab editing is winding down. if so, i'll post photos of the process.
winter storm; if it pans out, it will be great for our snow pack. so far, about 5 inches.... /
Winter Storm Warning
&
Winter Storm Warning
URGENT - WINTER WEATHER MESSAGE
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE PUEBLO CO
442 PM MST SAT DEC 12 2015
THE WINTER STORM WARNING REMAINS IN EFFECT UNTIL 3 AM MST SUNDAY.
* LOCATION...THE SANGRE DE CRISTO RANGE AND THE WET MOUNTAINS.
* CAUSE AND TIMING... A WINTER STORM WILL TRACK ACROSS SOUTHERN COLORADO TONIGHT... WITH THE HEAVIEST SNOW FALLING FROM LATE THIS AFTERNOON INTO THE EVENING..
* SNOW ACCUMULATION...6 TO 12 INCHES WITH LOCAL AMOUNTS UP TO 18 INCHES OVER ELEVATIONS ABOVE 9000 FEET.
afgani plow sculpture in our living room / M.I.A. - BORDERS - M.I.A. (Official music video) /
M.I.A. - BORDERS - M.I.A. (Official music video)
3:29 pm: yesterday i photographed this afgani plow transformed into a sculpture, which is now in our living room. we found it in a santa fe gallery about 10 years ago.
it has a strong presence, reminding you of it's original use, when it was being dragged over the earth by oxen. some of the stones have fallen out. i was inspired to shoot it at this angle when i saw the patterns created after turning a spot light on one of my grey series paintings hanging next to it.
the late afternoon eastern/western skies /
6:04 pm: at 4:30 i sat in our east living room doing my final 5 or 6 days of actionlab curriculum. just behind my head the sangres were rapidly turning blood red. and to the south, the skies above new mexico turned violet and red-orange as the late fall sun set. although we live in a very clean environment, it's likely that part of what created this beautiful color are the pollutants high in the atmosphere, being blown by high winds from who knows where in the world.
l'origine du monde (the origin of the world) / so when will the "grey" series continue? /
5:14 pm: another sunset show. the eastern and souther skies at 4:42 pm.
DETAIL: grey 4, 56x68" mixed media on canvas
4:09 pm: if you follow my blog, you know that i've been dealing with a very persistant flu for a couple of weeks now. one day i'll wake up feeling better, thinking, "ah-h-h-, today's the day i can get back to work on my grey series paintings." but when i get to my studio, the energy is simply not there. i feel tired, achy and a heaviness in my chest. so i just have to be patient. in the mean time, i'm putting my attention on the final 10 days of actionlab editing. actionlab, if you haven't read about it in my posts, is our educational product, originally funded by the national geographic society, designed to foster student driven learning through project based learning. it's a startup company, which we've been working on for about 5 years and is just now ready for testing in a number of colorado middle and high schools. i'm helping edit the extensive curriculum. a painstaking job, but one i love a lot.
l'origine du monde:
According to postcard sales, L'Origine du monde is the second most popular painting in the Musée d'Orsay, in Paris.
In October 2011, a complaint was lodged against Facebook with the Tribunal de grande instance de Paris (Paris court of general jurisdiction) by a French Facebook user after his profile was disabled for showing a picture of l'origine du monde. from the musee d'orsay web site:
The almost anatomical description of female sex organs is not attenuated by any historical or literary device. Yet thanks to Courbet's great virtuosity and the refinement of his amber colour scheme, the painting escapes pornographic status. This audacious, forthright new language had nonetheless not severed all links with tradition: the ample, sensual brushstrokes and the use of colour recall Venetian painting and Courbet himself claimed descent from Titian and Veronese, Correggio and the tradition of carnal, lyrical painting.
acropolis museum 1 /
a DETAIL of: acropolis museum 1, 56x68" oil on portrait linen, one of the 22 paintings in my recent houston exhibition.
this is a prime example of the artificial distinction between realism and abstraction. if you look at the whole painting by clicking on the ANO KATO menu button, you will see a painting of the interior of the acropolis museum in athens, which you would not suspect form this detail.
a tryptych at gremillion /
this '90's tryptych is located in the financial office of gremillion & co. fine art in houston. it's been there for years, so robyn, the CFO, sees it every day.
the imagery derives from the home of a friend in scarsdale, n.y. it's hard to imagine a more perfect frame.
what a detail reveals /another stunning sunset /
4:58 pm: for the second day in a row, as we looked east from our deck, we experienced a spectacular few minutes just before sunset, as the sangre de christo peaks glowed orange/red
9:12 am: now that i'm limiting morning coffee to one thermos, i'm getting an earlier start. until i come out the other side from these flu symptoms, i'm trying to get as much editing done as possible, so we can give the curriculum to our IT team to load & begin testing it in the schools. right now there are just 3 schools. before you know it that number will multiply. and then, before you know it we'll have our first sales.
the chapter i just finished editing is called stay simple. it's about falling in love with the details as you develop your project. paying attention at a deeper level. slowing down.
that inspired me to isolate these 2 details of grey 4. what do they reveal about who i am, what i care about? right off the bat: subtlety; biomorphic shapes; muted, suggestive color; underlying simmering sexuality; the wisdom of the unconscious mind; mystery; playfulness; a love of the informed accident; marks pregnant with suggestive meaning that reveal and embody a love for the entire history of art.....
flu returns with a vengeance / spectacular sunset /
moments before the sun set, at 4:44pm,there were a few seconds of celestial color
i woke up and my flu symptoms were back with a vengeance. i can barely see to type this. mikela had the same experience. so, obviously i didn't go to the studio, and we'll see what tomorrow brings. in the past, breaks such as this have resulted in breakthroughs on the canvas.
6:41 pm: now that i've watched half of the nikon D7200 youTube tutorial and have at least some grasp of the many functions, i shot a few new pics of my grey series paintings. and indeed they're a lot truer to the originals. the more time i spend with them, the more excited i become at the prospect of continuing the series, once i feel better.
continued wind / will i put brush to canvas today? /
2:10 pm: so i ended up not painting today. my plan is to go to town later this afternoon & pick up an abstract collage on canvas i have hanging there. i'll bring it to my studio & start working over it tomorrow morning. it will become the 5th in my grey series.
a few minutes ago i re-shot this painting, as a test of my new nikon d7200. i think the results are better than anything i've shot of this painting using previous equipment.
yannis skouloudis stands, in his characteristic pose, in front of his shop, a general store in chora, capital of the island of andros. he spoke with a lisp, and would always offer us coffee as we passed by; an offer we sometimes took him up on. he represents a chora which is now but a memory. small, humble shops lined the main street, which was closed to traffic and paved in marble. there were, as yet, zero tourist shops, which catered to the zero tourists. familiar figures sat and sipped their "tourkiko" coffees in tiny white cups. new borns were shown off, wheeled slowly down the street by their proud mothers. it was, in many respects, a version of dylan thomas' under milk wood. everyone knew everyone, what they had for breakfast, innocent local scandals.....and andonis polemis might stride by carrying the latest newspapers just in from the port of gavrion. skouloudis was just one of many local merchants, shoe makers, workers drawn and painted by my then mother-in-law niki karagatsi and i during our long lazy summers on andros.
9:12 am: the wind made loud noises all night. moans; cracks; whooshings; skizzy creaking sounds as it squeezed it's way through the faintest cracks in our aging window frames. an exciting night, it was! it gusted to 50mph at the peaks, blowing fresh snow horizontally in sheets of ghostwhite abandon into the space of the crinkled skyscape.
will i put brush to canvas today, finally? we'll soon see.
