Pasted Together In Falling Definitions

ihet – spring 2018 – issue 232

Gladiolas are a favorite flower and this was an exceptionally beautiful bunch, and while past prime, the richness of its color is still amazing. No they aren’t from my garden but a perfect segue . . .  to being in the garden. My spring garden project this year was growing one of my botanical nemeses, wild flowers from seed.  I lavished my attentions on garden endeavors  providing a welcome distraction from the fits and starts that momentarily defined my studio efforts. This one took its bloody sweet time and having survived my relentless attacks, earned naming. Long Shores Meddling Beast #181After all that, back to something a little less chaotic, some space to breath. It’s inspired by the memory of a tranquil afternoon, backpacking in the Grand Canyon, watching the sun set on The Howlands Butte. The butte is named after two brothers killed in the canyon by Shivwits Indians in 1869. I’d started work on this canvas over a year ago then promptly ignored it. Now its mood fit mine and so back to work. Figures pirouette crimson in a misty field of ghostly white . When I set a Trap for You in an Appropriate Floating Reflection #151 .Pieces. I’ve a list of criteria guiding how and when I cut and reassemble, and #151 checked all the boxes. Take  a photo of the painting. Print several copies. Cut into pieces. Paste together. Photograph. Print. This is what I got. A six inch by seven inch image, and a ledge to jump from.Landing here. Sideways on top. More pieces. Pieces of then. Pieces of now. This amalgamation driving the work forward. A synthesis of experiences molded by the passage of time and finding the words to name it.  At the moment it’s just canvas #7. Thirty by thirty inches. In development.The process. Something to use. This time it’s pictures of the twisted, bent and knotted. Shot in close and tight, capturing the language of circumstance with a story to tell.  And this is where they end up. Taped to the studio painting wall. A methodology authenticating belief. Images manipulated, themes extracted, geometries applied, perceptions tuned to desires needs.

Thanks for reading.

Charles

Flowers going wild .

The Long View

ihet october / november  2017 issue 230

When being kind, I regard my propensity to acquire random junk, as collecting. It’s an infatuation fed through impulse and curiosity, stilted toward harvesting discarded mechanical and industrial minutiae.

The reason I’m bring this up . . . I was attempting to implement a method for organizing my confused jumble of things . . . but what actually happened was an exercise linking the bits and pieces together into a celebration of imagined histories.  Here they are . . . The Monuments. Top Left. Monument for a Machine Painting the End of Time and a Hole to Fall Into. In commemoration of artificial nostalgia, this piece was the first official Monument and established the format for the series as theatrical vignettes. The vintage frame and interior images are photographs mounted on board. The frame stand was assembled with machine parts harvested from dental devices. A photograph taken in 2011 from the Paulina “L” stop on Chicago’s Brown Line, provides the backdrop. All Monuments are presented on an eight by ten inch panel.

Top right. Monument for Into the Wild.  In commemoration of the domestication of the natural world. (with thanks: Salvador Dali Riding In A Goat Cart).  The monument is constructed from locally harvested woods, a billiard ball, chain, brass wire, nylon replica of a quail egg, and bottle cap, on glass.  A photo of vintage paint by number, provides the backdrop.

Bottom Left. Monument for a Prime. In commemoration of organizational obsessions . A number five pool ball and cast metal obelisk balanced on a plinth of lacquered wood, glass, and map cube. The backdrop is a photograph of the prime number list I use to assign numerical designations to specific paintings.

Bottom Right. Monument to the Repudiation of Science. In commemoration of a future of the past. A quail egg with drawn elements, dental machine parts, steel ball bearing and painted wood. The backdrop photo was taken while traveling south on I10 toward Tucson.

It’s not all nuts and bolts, tongue in cheek, or just plain fun . . . the last couple of paintings are killing me. Attempts at progress are abominations. Hopeful in their application, disaster in their effect. A series of events painful yet familiar and reluctantly welcome.  It’s harbinger of change, and as the struggle goes on, I know for certain, this will pass.

Meanwhile, no sense letting the good bits go to waste.

It’s idle hands rendered in black and white, plus this detail, scaled down, reprinted, cut out, and applied. The garden of my secret life reimagined as landscape with beet stems and ribbons of paper, eclipsed by premonitions of transformation.

Thanks for reading.

Charles.

click here – To read November’s entries in the 1999 project piece It Happens Every Tuesday.

Birds of a Feather

ihet september 2017 issue 229

Ribbons of card stock and beet remnants on a paper towel. A consideration born of idle hands and fiddling what’s in reach. Patterns on the towel, the partitioning of the beets and their stains, a modest diversion from monochrome now carrying over into paint.

The back and forth, muted ethereal to bright and strong, the question . . . return to muted?  At the moment I’m staying on the brighter stronger side .

Objects of desire. An assemblage. An intimate vignette all in on bright. The backdrop is from the garden, a loose pile of Bougainvillea petals digitally captured and mounted. A wood block, pieces of steel, and the five ball. Monument Five – Memorial to a Prime.

Meanwhile, back in the studio, the middle of a long beginning. The outline of future endeavors with plenty of room to move.

Thanks for reading.

Charles