NOv 30

Nov 30..........this print was a bit light.......I over painted most of the areas with flat color........

Heading down to Art Basel in Miami for a couple of days this week, check out the scene......get discovered, you know that kind of stuff...........

Still Thankful

Nice day with my family yesterday........after most people left my neice and nephew jammed a bit.

Got to remember the simple stuff........keeps us going.........

Thankful.

Happy Thanksgiving..........
A great holiday where we remember what we have, not what we want..........

Third state of this painting...........

TRiggers

I have been reading Doors of Perception by Huxley again.....he was speaking about different parallel levels of perception.......when we are in the "real" world of defined rules and parameters this view is somewhat constrained.  When this veil is lowered, or raised, the natural world and our perception of it is heightened.
This is very apparent as our sense of depth color and feeling are raised.

I have been trying to look at these works without the normal "what is it" reaction of my mind.  To look at it as a blank.....let my mind empty and allow my eye to move around the space.  Here I naturally go to the "face" and go from there As I move off of that defined space I see other spaces emerging.....

Can art function as a trigger between these states of consciousness?  The viseral reaction happens in spite of this, the conscious rationalization is next.  This next state takes conscious intent to let go of that rationalization.

painting by numbers

Started this one this week, the state above was yesterday.........this is where it is at right now......thought it would be fun to post the different states as it evolves.........

What is it?

An aerial view of a man made structure
A persons head
A figure behind another figure, hands reaching out to the front persons head
A strange hourglass

Barriers keeping someone in
Barriers keeping someone out
The blue figure pushing outward expanding the yellow lines, which were once vertical
one more, one more............baby in the womb?????????

Problem Solved.

Nov 25......I have been thinking that contemporary art training is about problem solving. Something starts from a conceptual framework and the work is derived from that. Like putting skin on bones. I think this came out of a concern that art was not addressing the real problems of our society via structural concerns about making art (like a black square on a black background). 
My take on this is that the "source code" or essence of the artists aesthetics is the thing that inspires and creates real change. Also I think it provides the artist a direct connection with the inspiration which directed their path as creative people.

The real world

This one started as two distinct areas, the red for the bottom and the blue above.....I wound up merging them and running one color into another but still trying to hold the sense of individuality of the space and color.

I have checked my inventory and am kind of running out of paper and ink.........I am going to have to stop this project in a week or 2 when the stuff runs out, I just cannot afford to purchase more materials right now......kind of a bummer, sorry to all the followers out there, just the realities of life.......

It has been a great year!  no sales though, and this is the real world.

Movement

I really like the movement in this one.

anatomy of a print

these 2 images were created this morning.  I made the first one, then thought about over printing it with another layer.......this second print was to be that layer........you can see some of the forms......what I do is rewet the ink from the first print, then open up areas that I would like to keep, add ink where I feel it would help.  then I felt I should leave the first print alone.......and reworked the second one on its own........I think
it is kind of an interesting take on the process I use to make layered prints......

2:32

Todays print.......it is 2:32 am........ugh........
Many layers on this one, and the shadows and work on the background was done after the print was pulled. I did a couple of layers in the background by adding white to the base to make it transparent, but ran the roller over it at the end to soften it a bit.  I think the shadows add to the establishment of the foreground.

Bones

nov 20.......I am coming up on a year with the blog........I think it started on Nov 24, 2012.........over 14,000 page views since its inception..........thanks everyone for your support!

started this yesterday.........laid in the underpainting.........

Serve and Protect

Protecting the vulnerable.

Kansas

on the stage.

Just a couple of notes about technique. At first I thought the background was conflicting with the foreground figures.  I mixed white with the transparent base and "painted in" the background with one layer.  I did this a second time adding a bit of blue to the white to cool it down.  Then I added the yellow to the foreground figures as well as some tones of pink to the figures to define them more. I added a bit of color to the 3 figures in front as well to make them less prominent.

For Score

For Score

Seven years ago a new hope was underwritten
By a corporation which broadcasts publicly

Forshadowed by doubt
Encased in shadow
Left to an island unto herself
Configured by metaphor and grief

Ochre....

Two for this morning......
I went to a latin american art fair last night.......saw a lot of work based on ideas that came from european traditions, I thought it was interesting that I did not see much that reflected a particular countries culture, or even like a vibe from that area.....just a thought.

Round

I made these around 1am this morning.......got the idea of working in circles........first tries........
I spoke yesterday to another artist Karen Fitzgerald, who has been working with circular forms for as far as I know her........she inspired me to give it a try.......this is a link to her work......
http://www.fitzgeraldart.com/artworks/

You have to see her stuff in person, she uses gold leaf and the images really shine!

stories...

 Each image tells a story.......if you like in the comments please let me know what you see in any of the images, I will compile the stories perhaps into a book..........

4 today......

 new prints today............

Small prints again.......

I am participating in an event called the Brooklyn Bazaar on Friday night, music, art, vendors......I will have a small table selling prints and doing a demo..........

Registration.

This morning I printed the first image on the left..........thinking I would go with a minimal kind of color thing......I thought it looked a bit "thin", as in unfinished for some reason.

Usually the hardest part of going with a second layer is registration.....I look at the print on the floor and try to get the second layer to match up in some way.  It tends to be pretty inaccurate, which is OK sometimes, sometimes not.  This is all because I create spontaneously on the paper, there is no drawing to work from for registration.

So I had this idea, I held the print to the window and drew the shapes on the back of the paper.....put this under the plexiglass and then had the exact position of most of the forms.......seems really simple now, I do not know why I did not think of it before.

So anyway this is the result.  I also was able to have a cross pattern in the background by overprinting perpendicular lines with the yellow ochre.......

why?

I have been thinking of why I put these images out there every day......I sort of know why I make them for myself.....but what is the motivation for sharing them and what do I hope you, the viewer, glean from this process. 
I think of what I am doing as an inner spiritual journey, that these images function as a mirror or map of something that cannot be expressed in normal consciousness space. The hypothesis is that as I travel this path the images represent a universal part of consciousness and that we instinctively connect to this part of perception.
So what I hope is that you, the viewer, connect to the work in some way and it opens your inner self in some meaningful way.

Lieutenant

She rose to the rank Lieutenant very quickly
Solid masses frozen deep beneath rhetoric and metaphor
Swimming into the interior, defining characteristics better suited to a mans physique
Military requirements to a healthy dose of reality

Over and over
On one side or another
Operating with good faith and a moral compass pointed to freedom
Justified by integrity, resolved.

nov3, 2013

gesture.

This morning's print.....

I started and completed this painting yesterday....simple, 2 blues - cobalt for the cooler blue, smalt for the warmer......16x20 inches.