so, it’s been a bit doldrummy.

Nothing all that much to report. I’m woefully behind in the whole cleaning/packing effort. I’m dragging my feet on the website I’m working on (for actual money, no less! I haven’t had any of that come my way in months). So what do I work on? Why, a new piece, of course! That’s what a real artist would do. Christmas. I wonder when, if ever, I’ll be able to refer to myself as an “artist” without cringing a little, on the inside. I mean, it’s not like calling oneself a “doctor,” where you get a degree that officially permits you to refer to yourself as such. Any damn schmuck can self-identify as “artistic.” That pisses me off. What good is a title if there’s no licensing? No oversight? Shameful.

Anyway! Moving on. This is what I’m working on. It’s to be called, I think, “FDP (for Joan Didion and Félix González-Torres).” It’s those two shallow copper dishes I bought a couple weeks ago. I’ve since oil primed the bacs of them, and am presently engaged with glazing (and glazing and glazing and glazing and glazing) them until they’re a nice, deep black (the glaze is actually a mixture of raw umber and indathrone blue–I don’t know the rationale, really, but I still avoid using tube black, like they taught me in the learning-house).

Not much to look at, right now, I know. But in time. In time. I gave up on actually using a brush to glaze them. My fan brush is getting on towards needing to be replaced, and I couldn’t get an even coat. So I just mixed up a whole jar of darkness, and have been pouring it on directly. The title. Right. “FDP” is medical shorthand for “fixed and dilated pupils.” When a patient’s pupils are fully dilated and unresponsive to light stimuli, it’s almost always a sign of imminent and inevitable brain death. Joan Didion talks about it a couple of times in The Year of Magical Thinking, and, if you’ve had the misfortune of ever seeing it, you’ll know it can be the kind of image that sticks with you. González-Torres because it’s going to be two circles, and as I’ve already said, two identical circles always equal Perfect Lovers (aka probably the best, if not the most “important,” work of art in the history of just about ever).

The surface is a bit mottled, at the moment (dust, air bubbles). I’m hoping that a couple liberal dousings of varnish (probably damar with a boatload of stand oil to thicken it up) will take care of that.

In other news, I’ll have my first appearance in print, soon. Sort of. Kind of. Not really. Err, since I’m assuming print-on-demand doesn’t really count. That magazine cover I mentioned. I send the final image to the coordinator-woman this morning. I think it came out pretty handsome.

Now, since I don’t live in Winnipeg, I won’t actually get to see the thing unless someone decides to mail me a copy. But ‘tevs. It’s still nice.

Interlocutor

I’m thinking about un-disowning some of the paintings I did at MICA.  I dragged them out of the closet to look at them, since I wasn’t sure if I wanted to include one or two of them in my little introductory slide show thing at Windsor (for a point of reference as to how crazy I am, I’ve actually been rehearsing what I plan on saying every night when I’m lying in bed–this is just like a five minute deal, and all I plan to say is “Hello, I’m Steven. I’m from Florida and I got my BFA at MICA,” and then cut to slides. Really, not something that needs rehearsing). I figured it might be useful, but really? I’m just looking to prove that my work did have some kind of “edge,” at some point, anyway. Clearly I have little else to do with my free time other than fret about all the ways people might not like me.

Anyway, it isn’t that I really lost faith in the blackface paintings. I stopped making them because the circumstances of my life changed, and I didn’t have the stamina for that kind of work, anymore. Also, I had to leave all of my oil paints in Baltimore when I came back to Tampa. And they were kind of Baltimore-specific, anyway. Granted, critiques were a headache–painting faculty who could only bring themselves to talk about paint handling (my biscuits? oh, that burned them); that guy who referred to me as “that guy who painted himself blue; dozens of people who couldn’t stop telling me how funny they were, and one or two people who just told I was a racist, pure and simple (that was actually the only criticism I got that could potentially be valid–I hope it isn’t, but I can’t say I didn’t see it coming)–but I only took them off my site because a) they don’t really… mesh with what I do now, and they would have been distracting; and b) I didn’t really want to talk about them anymore.

But looking at them again, now, I’m kind of taken aback at how good they are. I’ve been out of oil painting for so long that it’s a bit shocking to realize that I am (or was) actually quite good at it (I apologize, my modesty tends to falter considerably as regards my work–I assure you, gentle reader, that it’s always a shock when things turn out well, but I don’t care to denigrate what I do for the sake of decorum–I spend quite enough time trashing everything else I do. I’ve also been known to find ways of working my SAT scores [1500] into casual conversation, but that’s just because I’m kind of a dick sometimes). The paintings have darkened a little in the last three years; some of that will go away with a little sunlight, but I think it makes them a little handsomer. In any case, I don’t think they’re ever going back on the portfolio, but they are on flickr, now.

Unrelatedly, I downloaded Fergie’s solo album. Mostly so I could listen to “Big Girls Don’t Cry” over and over again without having to hit the “watch again” button on YouTube. And somewhere in the chorus there’s some little synth fall that sounds, for the life of me, like my cellphone ringtone. It’s driving me bonkers. Not bonkers enough to turn the song off, though.

Encaustic: 001. Steven: ???

Hmm. That’s… not exactly what I was expecting, actually.

I’m… a little bit enchanted, a little bit horrified. Yeah, kind of both. I think I may like it, but it’s going to take some getting used to. I wasn’t quite ready for something so… unclean-looking? I may try another where I just mix the volcanic ash with hide glue instead of beeswax–a distemper in place of the encaustic–I think that would look more like what I had in mind (more ashy, less… fleshy), but I don’t know. The encaustic mixture is really bodily and scary and kind of gross, and I’m starting to think maybe that’s a good thing? or could be? I’m going to have to sit with this one for awhile.

Encaustic is… kind of a trip to work with. I think the recipe I had (which, admittedly, I didn’t follow precisely, since I was working in really small batches, not knowing how much of it I would actually need) could have used more stand oil and varnish to keep it pliable for longer. I’m also sure it’s much easier to manage if you work on a flat surface and… work with pigments that actually suspend, rather than sinking to the bottom. But it was fun. Bizarre, to be certain, but fun.

Oh, and for the record, if you’re painting in encaustic on a 3D surface and you don’t have a heat gun and you want to burn in, you probably don’t want to just stick it in the oven at 250 degrees and walk away. Not so much. I couldn’t help but laugh when I opened the door and found that 3/4 of the wax had just run off onto the baking sheet. I don’t know what I was expecting it to do, mind you, but it wasn’t that.

cheats and swindlers

So, despite not having the money for these things, I went out and bought them anyway. I do hate buying art supplies here in Tampa, as I’m invariably swindled, at some point in the operation. That stupid little bottle of damar? $6.50. That beeswax? Fourteen bucks. It’s criminal. And what’s more, that beeswax included the most unsettling product warning that I’ve come across in years: (not as disturbing as the running should that warned that the manufacturer would not be liable for any injury or death that occurred while using the product) “Yaley’s natural beeswax is so pure, it may contain honey bees and/or parts of honeybees.”

Begging your pardon, M./Mme. Yaley,  but I would, and I feel I’m justified in this matter, consider parts of insects to be an impurity, as what I purchased (or thought I was purchasing) was 100% natural beeswax, not 100% natural wax and bees. The copper plates were a lucky stroke, though. I’ve had a small piece in mind for some time now, and I wasn’t sure how I was going to make it until these came along. More on that later.

Oh, right. Because maybe committing to it in a semipublic form will actually encourage me to see it through, I think I’m going to take a crack and submit work to this particular call. I don’t think I’m really who they had in mind (not Canadian, not a woman), but maybe this painting would work for their purposes, at least. I’d rather submit one of the birds, but I’m worried that the link might seem too tenuous. I’d need to write an artist statement (something I haven’t done in years and have never done particularly well) and a bio (something I’ve never had to do, period), and I’d probably have to give cam’s address in Winnipeg so it looked like I was actually living in Canada at the time of the deadline. But it might be worth it. I don’t know.

Oh, and lastly, I’ve been pegged to design the August/September cover of this magazine. It’s nice; small print run (3500), but full color, and something legitimate to put on a CV (I’m really hoping that I’ll be able to start taking off the filler material I’ve included on there, to date). I have no idea what I want to do for it, mind you, but it’s still a nice thing. Anyway, I have, like, two months to come up with something, so I should be fine. No sense in fretting.

Snatch the cat back

So this is the cat after the initial gesso grosso layer. When I was working on the birds, I started with the usual thin gesso, and eventually had to go in with a more paste-like mixture to fill in some of the areas wherethe underlying crochet stitches were still visible. This time I thought I’d save myself some of the work and do an initial layer of gloopy gesso that I could sand and shape before applying the tougher, smoother layers on top.

All in all, the process of making the cat has been much more “sculptural” than the birds were. Even though I still made a stuffed animal to work from, the cat is a lot less stylized/anthropomorphized than any of the animals I’d made before. I’m still not entirely sure how I feel about that. And, ideally, I should have crocheted it in gray yarn, since the finished work is going to be painted gray. I just didn’t have any gray cotton yarn. Oh, and I used an armature. There’s heavy aluminum wire in both the front and hind lets, and an armature wire “spine” that extends from the tail all the way to the tip of the snout. All of this feels like cheating, somehow. But such is life.

Here’s a shot of it after the gesso had dried and I’d gone at it for about an hour with my Dremel tool, sanding blocks, and an assortment of rasps and files. You can’t really see it in the picture, but I actually broke the tail; this is the first time I’ve broken any of the pieces, and that’s kind of an accomplishment, given how fragile they are and how roughly I have to handle them when sanding. I’m not sure if I’ll start the final gesso layers today or tomorrow. I’ll just see how I’m feeling. There’s no hurry, since I can scarcely afford the beeswax and damar resin I’ll need to make the paint.

Things I’ve learned:

1. Horseflies do not like the sound that a Dremel tool makes.
2. 20-foot-range wasp and hornet spray easily dispatches horseflies.

duuuuuuuuuude!

From the Wikipedias:

“A collection of gesso sculptures is properly called a gypsotheque.”

That is almost, almost too awesome for words. Awesome!

oof

So I actually made something for the first time in some time. I was worried that it was going to come out looking either like a rat or a rat with a pig’s face, but I’m pretty confident now that it looks like the cat it was meant to look like. Ignore the odd blue panda-like markings. The cat is going to end up gessoed (I’m currently waiting for the first layer of glue size to set up) and painted a fairly uniform gray, which, if I get my act together, should be done with an encaustic (melted beeswax + damar varnish), tinted with the little packet of Mt. St. Helens ash I found when I was cleaning out Mom’s office.

In other news, lack of sleep + landscapers + pool repairpeople + packing + moving companies coming in to give estimates + grad school + website work have all conspired to make me feel like taking a swan dive into the empty pool. But. I think maybe things are starting to shape up. Going out with friends from high school this past Friday was … pleasant and traumatic in equal measure. I was made aware of the fact that I’m really not quite up for contact with the outside world, just yet, but that maybe I’ll be on surer footing in a couple months, when it’s going to be more urgent.

The paternal threat was that an appointment with a local driving school would be made for me, today. I’m wondering, if I’m careful not to bring it up, if it can be postponed until maybe next week.

Things

These are just some things I’ve had kicking around for awhile. The first photo is all of my little brother’s unwanted soccer and science fair trophies. I took them apart to remove the little plastic genie lamps and soccer players, and I took off the name plates. I don’t know what, if anything, I’m going to do with them, but they’re nice things to have around. I’ve actually never won a trophy, though I’ve always wanted to. Quite desperately. I’ve won a few ribbons (for some reason they’re always pink. I don’t know what that’s about), but never any trophies. I don’t know what I would have gotten a trophy for, mind you, but that’s really neither here nor there.

I’m beginning to think that, if all of my work were to be shown together, it would have the effect of resembling nothing so much as a kind of pathetic, miscarried child’s birthday party (that was meant to mean a miscarried party for a child, not a party for a miscarried child, but either sort of works… though the second reading is way creepier). Between the sadly distorted party decorations and the ambiguously dead stuffed animals,  it’s all getting to be a bit too melodramatic for my liking.

The second photo are some things of Mom’s that I gathered together. The blue saucer on the left is from, I believe, a tea set that she had as a girl (it was in a box with all of her old dolls); the one on the right is a piece she bought a couple years ago, when she was very much into collecting Limoges porcelain. The tag at the bottom is one of her old calling cards. There was a nearly-full box of them in her office. I don’t think calling cards were that frequently given by the time the 60s came around.

I don’t know if I want fix everything in place and seal it up (the box is the backing for a shadowbox frame), make it a “piece,” or whatever. It’s just nice to have. There is sort of a Perfect Lovers feel to it, as it stands, which I appreciate. But I just don’t know. I don’t really have a framework in mind for working with found objects. I’m pretty rooted in labor. Meticulous, repetitive labor. So things like these feel like cheating. Which, in a way, they are.

Anyway, speaking of Félix González-Torres, if you haven’t seen my friend Jack’s work, I think it would be worth your while. “Friend” is a bit of an overstatement–mostly we spent three years at school just smiling awkwardly at one another whenever we’d pass, but, suffice it to say, I think his work is probably the best that I’ve seen come out of MICA in… ever. Anyway, the connection is just that there are González-Torres references throughout. The work is very smart. And cold. But also incredibly sweet, more often than not. Basically, it’s everything I wish my work was.

So that’s that.

Photos

My shrink seems to think that it would do me good to take photos of the house before we move, to stave off homesickness/metal breakdown or whatever. Anyway, the results are in this flickr set, called As for me and my house. A book, incidentally, which seems to be out of print in this country and one that I attempted to start rereading the other day. You know, before realizing that a book about a reluctant preacher and his wife being tormented and unhappy in the middle of nowhere, Canadian Prairies was precisely the last thing I should be reading, right now.

Also, whilst flickr-ing, uploaded the rest of my recent work to a separate collection here. Nothing in particular of note about that, but if you ever wanted to see high-res images of the paintings, you can click on the “all sizes” link on each of the individual photo pages.

quick thought

<rambling>
For some reason I never fully thought about how important eggs are for a lot of the work I’ve made. I mean, my paint is made from eggs, obviously, but when I fist started making my tempera paintings of animals, one of my central aims was to make paintings that were very much like eggs. Physically, there’s a bit of a resemblance: they’re rounded and white and whatnot, but structurally they’re quite similar as well. The gesso I use, a mixture of marble dust and rabbit-skin glue, isn’t meant to go on flexible supports like canvas: it’s too brittle, and is prone to cracking, and those paintings are on upholstered canvases. When I decided to make them, I was keenly aware of how vulnerable and fragile they were going to be, that was kind of the point. Not coincidentally, perhaps (though I’m not even sure I knew this at the time), eggshell and marble dust, chemically speaking, are the exact same thing. The egg line of thought is more interesting, I think, in the case of the birds, though. For those, gessoing the stuffed animals was a quite intentional kind of death allegory, but, in light of the eggshell reference, it was more of a “reverse birth” process, a return to the egg. Painting the faces back on end up being a rupture in the death/gestation metaphor (memory, re-presentation), and that brings us neatly into the territory of “compulsively reënacting abjection trauma,” Freud’s fort/da game, and all of that business. How tidy! It extends nicely to the exploration of representational schemes (basic simulacrum humbuggery) which is where I see my focus heading.

Oh dear. This is going to get me on a “surface” tangent, and then I’m going to have to think about the fetish object, and that’s going to take me back to my old blackface paintings, which I didn’t think I was going to have to think about, and that’s going to mean I’m going to have to take another crack at Homi Bhabha. And that, gentle reader (assuming you’re still with me), is not something I was planning to do or, indeed, was looking forward to doing. One thing after another. Although, it does make it abundantly clear that, at the heart of the matter, my core process is with covering one thing (skin, stuffed animals, or canvas, so far) with another thing (makeup, gesso, paint). Which means that there’s actually what would seem a highly improbable link between my older work and my the newer pieces (it’s actually nice to see some kind of continuity, no matter how tenuous). Also, it means I really am a painter, after all. Crap.
</rambling>