Sitename

Just a quick post with a few shots from the grant show, which ends with a reception benefiting the Textile Center of Minnesota on Friday, October 14th. Thanks again to the Jerome Foundation and to the Textile Center of Minnesota for their support. The grant year went by so quickly, it seems like a blur.

[caption id="attachment_142" align="alignleft" width="474" caption="Three small reliefs"][/caption][caption id="attachment_144" align="alignleft" width="586" caption="Lunar Map"][/caption][caption id="attachment_146" align="alignleft" width="640" caption="Fire Cube in progress"][/caption]

It’s hard to believe that the year is almost over, but it’s Christmas Eve Day already. Just wanted to let all of you–especially the Gucci dealers and nice people who have the Ultimate Weight Loss Solution and best pornography–know that I’ve been very busy and do apologize for not being a better blogger.

While I wasn’t writing rants about the sorry state of contemporary art or some other such, I was a working fool and also managed to win a Jerome Foundation Fiber Art Project Grant for 2010-2011. Starting in just under two weeks, I’ll be studying paper casting at Minnesota Center for Book Arts, which is a great shop with excellent instructors. Out of this should come a series of editioned reliefs, which will be exhibited next September at the Textile Center of Minnesota.

In other news, I finally got a website up for my friend John at www.johnrummelhoff.com. He’s so prolific it’s nearly impossible to keep up, but I have some recent shots that I hope to upload over the holiday respite.

Until then, gentle readers, be well!

I owe at least two people posts, and apologize for not completing them in a timely manner as promised. I mention this not just as an acknowledgment of obligations I’ve yet to fulfill but because of an observation I made over the weekend. Sometimes some of the most important lessons have to be learned over and over again. To put it gently, not only are times extra challenging for emerging artists, it’s a rough go for most art professionals. I’ve been worried that the necessities of my life: a day job, a side business, freelance work, and the rest are taking up so much time that I don’t have enough left for the studio and it’s detrimental to my career. How to do more with less? How can I make adjustments to my way of working without making it something false? I was in Tucson this weekend for the opening of the Structures show at Conrad Wilde. This is my second visit, and each time I become more fond of the local art community, dear and supportive people, all at least as busy as I if not more so. Nearly all of us have secondary and tertiary sources of income. We are entrepreneurs, designers, teachers, writers, museum workers, and some of us are lucky enough to have family to support our endeavors not only emotionally but financially. This is why I am continually mystified as to how the romantic myth of the solitary creator persists. We are not alone, nor can we afford to be. We must care as diligently for our friends, colleagues, clients, dealers, critics, teachers, lovers, and families as we do our work. Without them none of our success would be possible. Thank you all. Here are few shots from the show. Apologies to the other artists, who I didn’t cover as well as I should have. There’s more information about them at www.conradwildegallery.com.

I’m writing a brief post to let everyone know about an coming Red Dot event at Conrad Wilde Gallery in Tucson. Having recently moved into a shiny new space, they were burglarized, losing their electronics and several pieces of artwork. Fortunately some of the art has been returned.

In order to recoup some of the losses, the gallery is holding a benefit sale of donated artworks. If you’d like to donate, you’ll need to visit their website and act quickly: works are due there by 4/23. For those of you nonartists, here’s a great opportunity to purchase art at below market value.

Here are shots of the work John Rummelhoff and I are donating and I hope you’ll join in this effort if you can. It’s more important than ever to support independent galleries that offer interesting programming, promote emerging artists, and are vital participants in their communities.

All the works in the show will be no bigger than 16″ square for 2D; 16 cubic inches for 3D. Composition 7 and 8 are about 6 x 6″.

That’s it. Buy early; buy often. And if the burglars just happen to be reading this, shame on you. I hope you have some sort of conscience and bring everything back to the gallery in good shape this instant. As it says on the website, no questions asked. Everyone just wants their things back.

Sometimes I wish I were Saraswati: not only is she the goddess of art, language and literature, she has lots of arms for multitasking! So much to do, so little time.

Anyway, as promised, I’m posting more of my friend John’s work. This time it’s several amazing pencil drawings, nearly all of which he completed recently. These are small works, most about 3-6″ high.

I’ve also neglected to mention something here in my posts of others’ work, and I need to add a notice on my site: all the images shown are copyright their various owners.

More to come. For now, enjoy these. I should add dimensions at some point.

Last night I went to two art openings, one of which was mine. The first was for a woman I’d shown with last year. I love her work. It was great to see more of her stuff but I also got a surprise. When I enthusiastically mentioned having been in a show with her, she expressed disappointment about the way her work was displayed there. It was an installation piece that needed to be hung in a very specific way in order to be read correctly–quite literally. And a second work of hers that I’d also loved had been trapped, horizontal, in a vitrine, when it was intended to be hung vertically, freely.

I mention this because over the course of my brief career I’ve found myself feeling like some kind of jerk too many times. I want control over everything having to do with the promotion and presentation of my work, and if I want to get on in the world, I have to work and play well with others.

My first solo exhibition was given an absolutely horrendous name better used for a neurology conference. The PR for it was equally embarrassing. I don’t like the graphic design of most of my show invitations. I don’t like the photos the gallery chooses. Or the writing. On and on and on.

At the same time, I found myself at my opening last night talking to a man about why I’ve decided to move away from narrative as much as possible most of the time. I told him that I was trying to encourage my audience to look deeper, to avoid concern with resemblances and to grasp the spirit of a work, to look within.

So if with my own work, I’m inviting others to value their own experiences and not shove my personal agenda down their throats, why the concern with the most temporary and superficial aspects of the work? Why not be open to others’ curatorial and critical views?

If this is not to be a shared experience, what’s the point of exhibiting at all? Why not just save time and keep all my stuff at home, where I’m not threatened with embarrassment or loss of control?

Maybe it’s time to lighten up a little…

Wish me luck.

Happy 2010, world. I’m writing this post as a response to an inquiry I got from a nice man and fellow artist who shares an interest in one of my oldest and dearest friend’s art. Here are a few photos of some of John Rummelhoff’s recent work, Aaron, and I can send you some more. I just took a few things when I was visiting yesterday.

For the rest of you, these are fairly recent paintings and mixed-media works by American artist John Rummelhoff, b. 1942, Minneapolis, MN. John’s works are in numerous private collections and museums, including the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.

ZZTop, acrylic on canvas, 2009

One of the great (and perhaps vexing) things about John is that he works in a variety of styles. This is a recent example of one of his visual puns, which often relate to music. He also has a series of national flags that incorporate similar humor.

These are mixed-media works incorporating acrylic, scrap metal, iron oxide, mulch, concrete, and God knows what else. He’s been doing a considerable number of war-related works in the past several months.

Another mixed-media work with iron oxide, copper sulfate, acrylic, scrap metal, and gauze. Here you can definitely see the influence of Alberto Burri, a favorite artist.

There’s lots more. This is about all I have time for today but I plan to build a website for John with his complete bio, CV, etc. His story is fascinating and his skills are amazing. Although I didn’t include any images of his representational work this time (other than ZZtop), I will post some drawings that show his breathtaking drafting skills. John began his career with Louis Meisel, the New York art dealer who coined the word photorealism. Although you’ll find examples of his work in Louis Meisel’s first book of Photorealism, John was omitted from subsequent editions and, sadly, from Meisel’s current 40 Years of Photorealism exhibit. But that’s another story for another day.

Colony, 2009 mixed media

I’ve been spending an inordinate amount of time researching art promotion on line lately. Like most aspiring artists, I find this the least enjoyable part of the job and yearn for the day when I can turn the management of my career over to a highly competent, trustworthy professional who also happens to be psychic.

In the meantime, though, I feel like I’m sifting all the time: sifting ideas, trying to clarify my thoughts, taking in new information and leaving behind old ideas that aren’t compelling anymore.

As I mentioned some time ago, I decided to tackle minimalism as part of my art history education after being thoroughly entrenched in the first forty-odd years of the 20th century. It attracted me because I’ve always been so put off by it–the inaccessibility of it reminded me of being on the outside of an inside joke. And in looking–and seeing, I hope– I’ve found some useful things: the power of seriality to create objects or places of meditation and the potency of pure forms are two of them.

I’m still struggling with some very fundamental issues and have no idea how long it’s going to take to get through. One of the things I’ve realized over the past couple of years is that while it’s human nature to sort, classify, identify, and name, every time that someone says, “Oh, your piece looks like (X),” it makes me sigh inside. I’m not interested in narrative and I don’t want to make things that keep people’s thoughts at the surface. That’s what television is for.

And there are two other things of which I am pretty certain, at least for now and probably forever: I believe in making things, and making them to the best of my ability. And I want to make art that people want to really be with.

Guess that’s plenty for now.

When my friend John and I were in Tucson last month for the opening of the High Fiber show at Conrad Wilde, we noticed an amazing leather and steel chair in the window of an adjacent shop. Although the store is not quite open, we were able to get a better look at the chair and learn about its creator, architect Cade Hayes.

In turn, Cade introduced us to the work of his San-Diego based friend, Dominique Houriet. Shortly thereafter, Dominique sent me photos of his chairs.

I feel very fortunate to have been introduced to these men and their work and look forward to seeing more and learning more about Cade’s former employer, Rick Joy architects. Stay tuned; more about them to come!
P.S. You’ll be able to purchase their chairs at San Diego’s Museum of Contemporary Art soon. For more about Dominique, visit http://www.oo-d-a.com/

My friend John–perhaps the most prolific and skilled artist I know–and I went to Tucson to attend the opening of a paper show I’m in at Conrad-Wilde Gallery

Despite it being off season, the opening was well attended by people genuinely interested in art who asked thoughtful questions. Tucson isn’t exactly a contemporary art town from what we saw and heard, but Miles Conrad (who unfortunately was in Boston at an encaustic conference) and his partner Ryan Wilde (who held down the fort and was a terrific host) have a lovely, smart space and gracious helpers. I was honored to be part of this show, which includes work by fourteen artists who work in everything from books to installations. One of the gallery artists in the show called it “the best gallery in Tucson,” and if you’re into contemporary abstract art, I have a feeling she’s right. Didn’t have time to get to see the small-works show at Davis Dominguez but I heard good things about it as well.

We had great accommodations at Catalina Park Inn. Our innkeepers, Mark and Paul, made us feel right at home. They made us delicious, locally flavored breakfasts and even attended my opening. Next time I’m in Tucson, I’ll be at the Catalina!

I took more pictures of cactus than of the gallery, but I did get a few shots.