My routine has been to stay up late and work in studio, on coursework related studies, and to sleep for a four or five hour stint, before morning classes; doing this for a couple days at a time, then crashing for a long sleep which I count as my weekend. Upon hitting the pillow after long stretches of work I tend to crack up in laughter, like I’d pent up joys, or maybe more like I’d gotten away with some villainous thing. I first noticed this behavior in Jacksonville, or maybe preceding in Tallahassee, maybe it’s been there all my life; I think it has. Hitting the pillow and laughing. Maurice Sendak includes in his life story his mother’s account of his laughing as he was delivered. ‘What a wonderful way to come into the world’, he recounts. Sendak saw many dark things, especially in his childhood, childhood is much more acutely life or death. Instinctually one fears the dark, and all that. When I hit the hay I feel like I have cheated, or maybe that it’s that I have earned something, like I am happy because I worked so hard; but that would imply smugness. I’ve thought to curtail this laughter by telling myself that there’s no reason to be smug, and to tell myself to be humble, but I don’t think that’s where the laugh is sowing from; it feels that it’s coming from within. Also, although it coming from within might imply that it has nothing to do with god, but I think it might have. To do with my habitual communion with god. As a kid the idea was introduced (washed in) to me, but god became a concept at some point, and one that I find useful. I think the laugh comes from the feeling of union and engagement with all things. No dread. I’m happy when I make art.
I slept late today, until 2 or so. I can feel my body healing when I wake up, I think about my body at the fishy service station being cleaned up by little cleaner fishes. I think of my inside knots unknotting. I think of my racing mind discharging into the hassle-free REM cycle.
The realizations for today are that I do not have to sacrifice a big painting that I thought I had to. The painting might go titled ‘procession’ or something- a 9 by 3.5 foot still life painting. Same goes for an oil painting, I’ll go through the process of painting what I think they need in order to be finished. But the other things I’m thinking about are at least a couple newish ideas. The whole comic book thing has to do with putting many different drawings (a process of confession or oversharing) onto a largish canvas all together. White, oil primed linen, 9 feet by 7, landscape orientation, and oil cartoons in juice thin vandyke brown oil paint. The process is to collage preexisting scans into a larger composition, whereby 200 cartoons will cohabitate a plane, then project those up onto a large prepared surface. The pixelated cartoons will be blurry, so I’ll keep the originals close at hand for reference. This will be a form of enlargement. If the oil cartoons don’t work out, I can wipe them away with a rag or a q-tip. The surface will develop a patina. I can paint into certain images with color, impasto, erasure through white, sanding, etcetera. The painting can balance in an of itself, and the images can be read as confessional spots. I can hang studio-type detritus around the hung work to expand the narrative into ‘real space’. This is very close to Sean Landers’s words on canvas paintings, but better; as I’ll be fucking with images, which tell more and les and less and more. The result will bring into play graffiti, tattoo, I can have words if I want, I can do Graffiti names. I like this Idea; it will be a lot of work. A viewer can stay with this mind-map, getting lost in the nodes, moving quickly or slowly, in a contemplative and museum space. The Ulysses quality, and the romantic/enlightenment relationship will be laid bare. The inexpressible in the space between images, thoughts- independence and interdependence. Okay so that’s one idea.
Another is to build a rocker for a graffiti piece, and a rail up front. I’m not going to explain this one. It’s also going to be a lot of work- woodwork and some metalwork..
I wanna do the big dog painting, about that old hippie woman who would let me into her house with her Irish wolfhound and her English sheephound when I was young and jogging. It was such a sensual and taboo place, in a ‘stranger’s’ house with these massive dogs- I was flushed with love and adoration, and her house was colorful and earthy.
The snake painting is a primary concern still. It’s getting into the world of specificities, so I’m looking at it now with its problems in relation to other problems. I know I just need to work on it. It’s complicated. We’ll make it.
I have this big charcoal sketch of a nude girl who was a muse (how embarrassing to participate in such an artist trope!) of mine for a while. I kind of owe it to her to finish the painting, but also at this point the whole thing means something else. I want to do this painting. I like the sketch. Everything’s oversized, her boobs will be huge.
I wanna build panel for some paintings I have floating around in my studio. PAFA’s open studios night is coming up on February 8th, and I want to have a little show that looks like I’m in control of things, which I am. Now it’s time to show that. Annual Student Exhibition is on May 10th, and that is kind of like when my life is ending in a way. I’m going to weigh everything against that, the largest opening I’ve had.
Tonight I would like to take a nap, go to the computer lab and mock up the cartoon collage, and watch two dvds of artist talks, work on my acrylic paintings. Do some 3d modeling. Do some video editing. . Apply for the ASE. . . These are vague. . I’m gong to write a little more in a notebook so for this blog list, that’s it for now.
