Friday, February 20, 2009

Access to the Magnificent Room


This is my favorite drawing. It was in the show. I wish they could all be like this one. Below are some more drawings, some were in the show, some didn't make the cut.





Below are a few non-HDR images of the installation. I think they look a little better.


Chandelierroom 1


Here is a piece that I just did. It is based off of the below drawing. There are things I would do differently, or improvements that I would make if I remade the piece; but it works for me. It was a quick work. It took a few hours of time (spaced out across a couple of weeks, of course) and is now painted over. I am trying to do quicker works. Letting things happen and working more freely. Quick and loose. We'll see what comes out of it. I'll keep posting as I go through them. This is going to probably force me to get more simple with the lights, at least for now. I might have to take a break from this type of working in order to build some nicer stands, pedestals, or floor platforms for the lights though.
The brown on the wall should probably fade more as is gets closer to the floor.


Sunday, February 8, 2009

It's Alive

Well. I guess it's been a while since the last post. I'm alive and back at it. Here are the images of my solo show at Number 35...four months late. The title of the show was "Access to the magnificent room." The image above is of the piece I did in the window of the gallery. I've been trying to get the images to look the way that I want them to, but have been having trouble. These images aren't ideal, but they are the best of the HDR images that I've been able to make. I'll post images of the drawings soon, apparently, they are too big and I don't feel like resizing them right now. The title of the installation is "The effect of its breadth (Flamingo Casino, Las Vegas; Upper Belvedere, St. Gall Cathedral; Golden Nugget Sign)".






As I get more and better images, I'll throw them up here. These images aren't totally representative of the experience of the installation as the light in the gallery changed throughout the course of the day. These were taken at night just before de-installation. I was pretty happy with the show all and all. There are some new things going on with this installation. By the end of prepping for the show I was getting a bit tired of the piece and didn't really begin to like it until it was time to take it down. So it usually goes. I felt like the piece was a little overworked, at least in my head it was. Most of you probably know, but I was mentioned by Holland Cotter in the New York Times. As brief as it was, it was pretty exciting. Here is the link to the online version of the article:

If you click on the "multimedia/interactive" picture on the left (a picture of dudes dancing), it will take you to an interactive map of the city. Select the Lower East Side and there is an image of my piece and a nice little description. It says I use cardboard and masking tape, but I use neither of those.
Apparently Roberta Smith saw the show just before it came down and said that she liked it. Alas, she didn't write anything. But, I'm happy it was seen.
What have I been doing lately? We'll it seems I've taken a bit of a break from making like mad. I read the Border Trilogy by Cormic McCarthy. McCarthy has become my new literary obsession. I cleaned up my studio. I've been playing with a new foam cutter. The art has been slow. Hit a bit of a slump, but am coming out of it strong. I wanted to work differently on the installation, and am on the verge of working that out. I've read a book on the Baroque and finally finished "The Fold." I'm currently doing tons of the ballpoint pen drawings of spaces. Those drawings are developing nicely and I am hoping to use them to build up a wealth of stuff to work from to make wall pieces. Working on ideas now mostly. More to come...