January 16, 2022 by Philip Tarlow

12:26 PM: I didn’t sleep very well, so this might be a short work day. when I entered my studio and glanced at 1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 7, I felt like it needed some breathing space. so I collaged a piece of a magazine article which contains black geometric lines on a white ground. it’s just what was needed, giving your eye room to wander more freely and explore the finer details of this new painting/collage.

then I moved on to a new one, which at the moment has a delicate painterly touch and gives the impression of a flying skateboarder with a minimum of painterly strokes and just two colors: violet and yellow.

i’ll likely do some more once I post this, but I don’t have much juice left for today.

2:17 PM: I added a second skateboarder to the composition. after resting for a bit I got a new burst of energy. I like what happened to the composition, which is now much more vibrant. lets see what happens tomorrow morning…

*1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 78* day 1,with a second figure which I added at the end of my painting day today

1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 7 / January 15, 2022 by Philip Tarlow

2:39 PM: today I began 1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 7. right now as I look at it, I can’t tell whether it’s more complex & interesting than it’s siblings, or just too much. looking at it from afar right now is a bit like looking at a colorful map, and indeed there is a piece of map collaged on the right. unlike the others in this suite of 12 paintings (5 more to go) it has no central human presence. it did start out that way, with the figure of a skateboarder on the left, but now it reads more like an abstraction, give it till tomorrow morning, and we’ll see if and how it evolves.

7:30 PM: we both looked at it on our way to our trail walk, and found it to be excellent and resolved. it’s a bit different from the other 6, while clearly in the same stream of energy. so tomorrow i’ll start a new one.

1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 5 - day 3 and 1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 6 - day 1 / January 14, 2022 by Philip Tarlow

3:16 PM: this morning I made a slight adjustment to 1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 6 - day 3, then started 1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 7 - day 1. AND had viber conversations with each of my 2 grandkids in athens.

so the modification I made to 1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 6 can be seen in the red area to the left of the skateboarder. yesterday afternoon before leaving for the house I temporarily attached a piece of cut up drawing to see if it works. this morning, I determined that it did, so I collaged it. in so doing, , a corner tore, thus altering the red area slightly at the top, and for the better. you can compare the two in the images BELOW. before is on the left.

…then, I launched in to 1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 6. it’s inspired by a photo I shot off the tv screen of ll coolj playing. a set, with a landscape at the bottom inspired by 18th century Japanese master of the brush, taiga.

1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 6 day 2 / January 13, 2022 by Philip Tarlow

2:28 PM: I continued painting 1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas6 today. the main figure thus far is a jumping skateboarder in red & blue. right now, although it may be hard for you to make out, he’s located creek-side. some sketchy trees have appeared above him, with mottled rock formations to his right. on the right side of the composition sit two workmen, who have appeared in previous paintings, restoring an ancient mosaic damaged by an earthquake.

as a composition, it hasn’t yet ripened, so a quick glance, while it’s striking, it doesn’t have the same kind of coherence we observe in the previous paintings in this new series. give it time.

1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 4, day 2 /. Moby dick / drawing for 1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 5 / January 12, 2022 by Philip Tarlow

11:12 AM: I dove back into 1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 4 this morning, adding a few collaged elements. the most significant one was a piece of a cut up ink drawing I made a few weeks ago, which you see in the lower right quadrant, and a piece of that, by now famous note I wrote to the ups delivery guy, in blue on the upper left.

if you take a look at the images BELOW of yesterdays version next to what I just did, you may notice that, which todays version is, in a sense more complex compositionally, it is, at the same time, simpler; easier for the eye & mind to absorb, and less literal. so, for example, the patterning surrounding the big drum, which defines the circumference, is now interrupted by a collaged piece of blue map, creating a visual transition from the red to the siena. in general, the predictable rectangular shapes being moved about by the figures have been interrupted and staggered into a syncopated rhythm. an important role in this transformation is played by the blue letters on the upper left. thelonious monk would appreciate what’s going on here..

*1/8/2022 polyptych*, canvas 4 as it looked at 11am today, following some collaging

BELOW: yesterdays version, on the left

every night before we go to sleep, I read a short excerpt from moby dick and from the collected poems of wallace stevens, both of whom I find poetic in a complimentary way. so here’s a paragraph from Moby dick that struck me a few nights ago:

1:35 PM: I started 1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 5 this afternoon. right now, it’s just a drawing. i’ve been working all morning and my energy just dropped off, so i’ll pick it up again in the morning, here’s the initial drawing. these two guys are working on an ancient mosaic which survived a major earthquake. so the ripple you see is what happened to the mosaic in the earthquake, but aside from that it wasn’t damaged!

1/8/2022 polyptych, canvas 4. 5/8/21 hail storm / January 11, 2022 by Philip Tarlow

4:09 PM: so today I started the 4th painting in my polyptych. it’s along the lines of the others, and i’m thinking that instead of mounting them next to each other on a board, I might frame each of them individually and then they can be hung in a variety of juxtapositions.

BELOW are 1, 2 & 3 temporarily mounted on a piece of masonite.

9:37 AM: just found this in my files. pretty impressive!

polyptych, day 2 / January 9, 2022 by Philip Tarlow

I added a collaged element to the skateboarder image & started on a second canvas, which i’ll continue working on tomorrow. i’m not yet sure where this is going, and if it will be a 4 panel polyptych or individual paintings. clearly however, the 4 of them will constitute a family.

new shoes / mounting squares of canvas on the wall for new polyptych / January 8, 2022 by Philip Tarlow

*1/8/22 tokyo olympics polyptych*, stage 1

2:37 PM: I began painting the first of this polyptych a few hours ago. I wasn’t sure what you call a painting consisting of 4 canvases, so I looked it up. four or more is considered a polyptych.

this is one of the tokyo olympics skateboarders, with lots of white space for you to imagine the rest. clever of me to do 4 together. that way I may be able to avoid overworking.

1:21 PM: last month i had cut squares of primed portrait linen from a leftover piece into squares for a possible future painting. today I decided to mount them on my east painting wall & see what happens.

11:41 AM:these were just delivered by fedex yesterday, so what i’m about to say might be a little premature. it’s extremely difficult for me to find shoes or boots that are comfortable on my feet. I have flat feet and a neuroma and usually end up having to send them back. that said, so far these are the most comfortable damn shoes I ever tried. they are made by brooks and are called beast ‘20, made in Vietnam. I had been wearing my montrail flip flops in the studio. as flip flops go they are extremely comfortable & work for my feet. but even with sock, my feet get a little chilly in the winter. so today is my first day wearing them, and so far they’re extremely comfortable. we’ll see how the day goes.

so now lets get to work!

modifying 12/20/2021 oil/collage 33x46” / January 7, 2022 by Philip Tarlow

*12/20/2021 oil/collage* 33x46” following todays modifications

1:55 PM: i’ve been revisiting recent paintings I thought were resolved. when I looked at this one, 12/20/2021 oil/collage 33x46”, I felt the bottom quadrant was too busy and needed simplification. rather than working into it with collaged elements, I used titanium/zinc white, which I then painted into. the delineation of the two dancers white tutus are now more pronounced, and colored pencil marks similar to the ones in the upper right have appeared beneath the dancers & to their left. i’ve learned to stop for the day when I run out of steam, & i’ll see how I feel about it in the morning.

BELOW: a comparative look at the before, on the left & after

day 6 of 1/1/2022 oil/collage / modification to 12/30/21 oil/collage / January 6, 2022 by Philip Tarlow

*1/1/2022 oil/collage* as it looked at noon

12:18 PM: when I entered the studio this morning & cast that all important first glance at 1/1/2022 oil/collage, it seemed too cluttered. so what else is new? that happens regularly. the area that bothered me most is in the central portion of the composition, so I collaged over it with one of the cut up drawings I made yesterday & posted pics of.

the other think that was bugging me were the hands. they were coming from my head not my gut. since I put them in yesterday, the paint was fresh enough that I could wipe it out with a little solvent.

the result, when you compare the two, is rather dramatic. it’s the very definition of unclutter! it breathes. it’s relieved to have lost the excess baggage. so the viewer’s eye is now free to roam the surface and enjoy all the cool details, such as the one you see on the right.

BELOW are the comparative views, with yesterday’s version on the left.

1:55 PM: mikela walked over this morning & gave me some valuable feedback on a few recent paintings, one of which was 12/30/21 oil/collage, which I thought I had resolved last time I worked on it, 12/31/21.

look at the comparative pics BELOW, & you’ll see that, in the previous version on the left, there a collaged element with 3 red triangles. and now, if you look at the modified version on the right, they’re gone. take a deep breath, because that what this painting is doing now that it has cast off those red triangles! the whole composition can breathe, and the most beautiful passages, such as the one in the detail you see on the right, are so much more available to the viewer than before.