i’ve had Donovan’s voice in my head on + off the last few days.
Mellow Yellow is such a sticky tune.

The road to the City of Emeralds is paved with yellow brick.  -Frank

Follow the yellow brick road. But don’t run into that back drop!

Blue is the male principle, stern + spiritual. 

Yellow the female principle, gentle, cheerful + sensual. 

Red is matter, brutal + heavy and always the colour which must be fought + vanquished by the other two. 

-Franz Marc (don't you just love this guy?)

... and though she’s not really ill,
there’s a little yellow pill...   -Kieth + Mickey

Some painters transform the sun into a yellow spot, others transform a
yellow spot into the sun.   -Pablo Picasso (talking about himself again.)

Amber Aureolin Papaya whip Buff Chartreuse Citrine Cream Goldenrod Ecru Olive Flavescent Flax Fulvous Gamboge Golden poppy Golden Green-yellow Stil de grain Beige Hansa yellow Icterine Blond Vegas gold Isabelline Arylide Chrome yellow Jonquil Khaki Lemon Chiffon Lime Maize Metallic gold Mikado Mustard Naples Navajo Old Gold Apricot Peach-yellow Pear Saffron School bus yellow Sunglow Tangerine Urobilin .. want more?

So, this will be the a self indulgent page on a project (circa '04?) mentioned in the before post. Just for fun. Lonnie gave me the OK in the comments. So, to forge ahead. i will write under if there were words to go along w/ the painting. You know, as designers, one wants to be as darn clear as possible.

This project was for a 95th anniversary encompassing: 95 painting in 95 hours executed as a live window display at the Texas flagship Neiman Marcus. There were 95 prepped canvas' along with to-size matching fancy frames, sporting white-out. These empty white frames installed on the white wallsin the shoe gallery were a beautiful installation - even before the paintings were added. Below notice a photo where you can see the hours and painting being 'ticked off' as time went by. We were armed with gallons of paint, brushes from a flogger to a one-hair, + stack of favored scrap for the killing + to the liking. We hoped to please every taste. i particularly like the image of me fake working. Throw in spontaneity + ability to dance around each other + a bit of loud music + you have a successful event where all 95 paintings found good homes + the money raised in the auction going to a children's charity. 

The charm of it all was to make it look as though lots of different artist had done the job. Some more finished than others. The copy-cat Klimt was one of my favorites. Reimagined here as an art director makes notes to Gustav K. asking for changes on a WIP.

It was, as Lonnie said in the comment, damn honest work. 

       

 

    

Well, as these things go i was looking for one of my favorite signs placed early one morning on the dirt road into the Renaissance Fair (Black Point Forest/Novato). Something about the ...to the end of the earth being closed because of dust-off ... when i came across this rat thingy that was taken when we worked in Hong Kong...

Ok, so i continued looking + found a handful of WIP images of paintings, some looking finished, from the
95 painting in 95 hours series that was done for the 95th anniversary of major (meaning expensive) department store. i must say the stack was pretty amusing, even now, + i do remember the audience outside the window liking the ongoing live display work.

But before i start scanning + send this into the ether ... i reckon i need to ask Lonnie if it’s okay to show this, after all this time.

i don’t know why not.
Lonnie? Are you there?

Perhaps I am doomed to retrace my steps under the illusion that i am exploring, doomed to try and learn what I should simply recognize, learning a mere fraction of what i have forgotten.

The man that cannot visualize a horse galloping
on a tomato is an idiot.

Leave everything.
Leave Dada ....
Leave your hopes and fears.
Leave your children in the woods.
Leave the substance for the shadow.
Leave your easy life, leave what you are given for the future.
Set off on the roads.

No rules exist, and examples are simply life-savers answering the
appeals of rules making vain attempts to exist.
-André Breton (at different moments)

Again + again — art, then, is an elaborate dance around something you can’t make.

A welcome to those of you over from BOOKWORK... i'm not posting there any more, i've come to realize it's as though i was putting guest into two different rooms.

Somehow feeling the need to vindicate myself, in the moment, + say that i can draw sweet also.

i naturally go toward the asymmetrical in design work.

Actually having to slow down to think or rethink into symmetrical; to work something in that way. As some folks naturally see the symmetrical, + then work through that onto the asymmetric side of things.
Do you get what i mean?

I once thought that you would rob the truly appreciative minds by laying down for the last time.
Rubbing your fingers to your temple instead of the large hand you would faint in.  -kb

Life + death fit so very close together + the hand of god looks more like a fist.

 

One of my favorites. Okay who can tell me what movie this quote comes from. If you know or want to take a guess, don’t give it away! Please do not come right out and say it in comments ... leave it in a cryptic code, or as, the movie where yada, blah, yadity-blah happens. 

i’ll know what you mean. i promise.

  

images from When Sword Swallowing does Not Impress

-Being Red Skelton. 

Three memories with Hats:

1. There was usually a group of musicians over for the day or the fortnight blasting looped tapes out the second story window to see the street walkers reactions. These guys, judging by the sounds they crafted, majored in the most compelling + wonderful feedback imaginable. One handsome devil was obsessed w/ Einstein on the Beach at the time. We’d have parties depending on what we wanted to score. For instance; The Hat Party. People invited would know hats were mandatory. Eventually everyone would get drunk + a sea chapeaus would be left behind. Voila. +, if it ever got too weird, i could always crawl into my loft + pretend i didn’t know what was happening. 

 2. i went down to see the opera production director w/ a hat in question pinned together, mocked up to the nth detail. Upon seeing it, he ripped it apart verbally + shredded it literally. Humiliated, i came back up stairs to the craft room where Charles was huddled over a balsa block pining a turban. He glanced at me sideways for a moment + caught the mortified shock on my face w/ the hat draped over my arms in pieces. He offered, Oh, I forgot to tell you he’s in a snit today.  From Charles i learned of the blind nuns at dawn stitch.

 3. Manhattan winters are slap-in-the-face cold. Turning up toward the sun to warm our faces, we walked along planning a trip to the flower mart. We carried three regular coffees from Chock Full of Nuts steaming into the chilly early morning air. Heading down to the Bowery we traversed Union Square where we recognized the huge pile of fabric as Evelyn. She embodied a fashion statement by building a hat ornament day to day. If you had the time, you would notice that she added a bit of this or that to her chapeau everyday until her headpiece became too heavy. She’d have a two day break + then begin the building ritual again. She inhabited a homeless dingy heap moving from this place to Washington Park on quieter days. Kyle + i had been paid in cash for a restaurant installation the day before, so life was good. i casually handed Evelyn a twenty dollar bill + coffee as we passed her in the park. Her frosty breath rose from the lifeless pyre into the crisp air. When she bolted + came chasing after us, we didn’t know if she was in trouble or if we were. 

Mr. Brown:
It's one thing to out-think a man, quite another to outsmart him.

Mrs. Brown:
And who will say which is which?

-National Velvet

i’m not really here yet. 

i’ve walked up to the library to have a go at public internet.

+ now have the confidant, if not vindicated feeling, that when i give it all up + dump my life’s plunder into a cave i can indeed do the library blog-thingy. 

Of course i will have trouble with the VAs to illustrate the words. 

As this'in here: 

She was never really all there, but we never knew where to find her.