It is like trying to catch a butterfly without squishing it.

Sometimes the obvious happens, which leaves little room for anything else.

I feel pressure to move on, and yet, I keep noticing stones I need to turn over.

How To Draw A Bunny, 65

That is a really sweet chunk of wood I got in the mail yesterday. It is a fine example of Whiting Tennis' (apostrophe correct?) anthropomorphic doodle buildings.

Yesterday I suggested that Ashland residents, two in particular, could come distract me while I tried to finish a mural I've been dragging out. The two took the bait. I met Jack at the dog park and I've learned that he works at Brammo Motorsports here in Ashland. What? A company that makes "niche production vehicles" here in this gay little theater town? I had no idea. Jack asks me all kinds of pertinent questions as he has starting visiting the blog, but I have no way to reciprocate. I only have a dormant Hot Wheels interest in cars. I don't have a way to engage Jack about this engineering/design thing he does. I'm going to have him give me a facilities tour soon.

Just as Jack was leaving, Marga appeared. I got to paint and chat for the entire four hours! Marga brings to the discussion a whole 'nuther wax ball. But, like with Jack, I'm just getting to know her, and yet, she can "know" me through this blog, which puts me at a disadvantage, unless I'm willing to talk about me-me-me for four hours. I feel as if I have spun various versions of my life story lately. I've been very careful to keep my self-portrait as truthful as I can. I've been thinking about this recent AP story: "A candidate for Southern Oregon University student body president has admitted she was lying when she claimed she had a cousin who was killed in the Virginia Tech shootings. Brandi Freeman spoke at a candlelight vigil held by students at the university campus in Ashland Thursday night. With tears streaming down her face, she had claimed she had lost her cousin in the shootings that left 33 dead at Virginia Tech. By Friday, Freeman admitted to making up the story to appeal to voters for the student body election next week."


. . . . .

I just keep on painting.

Jack and Marga each bring up a lot of basic "how" "why" and "what" questions that I normally take for granted or gloss over as inconvenient. It has been really great to think of these things while crafting-out on a day job (night job now) mural while simultaneously preparing for a solo show. Here are three things I heard myself saying last night:

• sometimes the seven foot diagonal of a door jam determines how big you can paint.
• paint the dog before the fleas.
• please allow me to change my mind about anything I say tonight (or on this blog).

I wonder what they remember.
Oh, and to bracket my night, starting with Whiting's postchunck, I thought I should end with this morning's couch routine.

day job

Here is some swamp material from this week at work (not counting the mural which can be found at 295 east main, across the street from Bloomsbury Books. If you are facing the Blue Dragon bookstore entrance, the mural entrance is on the left. Upstairs to the Ashland Idependent Film Festival offices as well as Kinesis. It is open to the public, when the doors are open, and after hours, like tonight after nine, when I'll be working on it. Hint hint Jack and Marga.)

This client used a cherished glass bowl as inspiration for the dining room paint treatment. There was one spot where the transition was awkward, until I broke out the flame-vines.
This other client had all kinds of different furniture that we sort of tied together with various paint tricks.

(A small Fisher-Price sounding) ding (when a cartoon lightbulb illuminates over my head)

I've been chipping away at a mural in the evenings. I usually like to do "my own thing" after everyone is in bed. Alas, I'm over-booked and I haven't learned to say "no" when it comes to work. So, while I was contemplating my next move on this 12 foot high and 30 foot long mural, it occurred to me why I so enjoy the scale of these ink drawings right now. At two in the morning, after 5 hours of swimming in the environment of a mural, it is so refreshing to just focus. I also realized that I am going to tackle an 8 foot painting soon. I've done plenty of large paintings before, but I don't ever recall thinking of them as murals, that is, environments to walk through, around, or by. Oooh, I can hardly wait. Also, Miso can now hang with me in the studio. I've given up trying to teach her to stay in a corner. We're both much happier if she is smack in the middle of the floor.

"Make the wagon express its carrying power" - Robert Henri

I just flipped through Robert Henri's The Art Spirit
and I am flabbergasted at how my 25 year old copy still glows with hi-liter wisdom.

One step backwards

The following are some charcoal drawings on bristol. The paper is bigger than my ink drawings of late. The dimensions are 17" x 14". I can feel how charcoal wants to be liquid. I am compelled to try and emulate what I've been experiencing with ink. Unfortunately, I seem to have easily fallen back on what I know and let my lexicon of marks from last year take over. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised though, because all the recent ink puddles evolved from that cluster. (I apologize for the late-night-lame-camera shots).

Oh, and this product is good:

The plants are so confused because it snowed yesterday.

Deracinated Green

The following drawings all began as experiments.
Their quality is pending.

Dennis just posted wallop titled Study War.
I sent him an email:

is it about being prepared, without being scared?
imagine the worst
it is healthy?
dreams and nightmares must be respected?

I've been meaning to post the artist vs. the crazy as;
outside society looking in
vs.
outside society looking out

meek does not mean naive?

strong should mean balanced?

It all is woven into the relationship between the society and the individual.
How do we respond to individuals outside of society?
We've (assuming I'm inside some society) got to be ready for imbalance.
Would I have the gumption to wrestle a hijacker?
Is it true that the majority of Death Row inmates do not connect their forthcoming punishment to a crime?
When you get so far outside society that your actions only make sense to you. . . what happens?
Yes. Study war.

my way

Above: "the toughest RK diagram I ever created (from the U.S. Declaration of Independence)" by iBeth, everyday reflections of an academic mom.

The exchange at Pretty Lady's post Grammar Patrol has me flipping and flopping. Am I wrong in seeing an essential conservative/liberal root to all this?

Isn't communication the fundamental goal? I suppose details like the many meanings of "reification" is essential to someone like me who treats abstractions as if they were concrete, (and I'm talking about day to day abstractions like why paper money has value as well as how the emoticon ;) functions as a knowing wink) but isn't there an element of fascism, exclusion, or denial of entropy to some of these rules?

Remember this e-mail?:
O lny srmat poelpe can raed tihs. cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at CmabrigdeUinervtisy, it deosnt mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses itll raed wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!

On a related tangent, read about Oregon's plain language bill:

"The bill calls on all executive branch agencies to begin writing forms, manuals, letters, e-mails and other communications in the plain-language standard of communication.

Plain language means short, easy-to-understand sentences, everyday language and documents designed to be easily read and understood. More simply, it means an end to the confusing bureaucratic and legal jargon that plagues our government documents and forms."

And back to the exchange at Pretty Lady, I find myself thinking of O'Reilly's Blogger Code of Conduct. Meaning and nuance are to be danced with, not resolved. That was some good readin'. Thanks especially to Fish or Cut Bait's staff members Chris and Jacques.

The libraries have been closed for 12 days.

ballot measure 15-75

Whereas: Literate, informed citizens are essential to the vitality of our city and survival of our democratic institutions;

Whereas: Public libraries serve as gathering places and as community centers that are at the heart of our unique communities;

Whereas: Public libraries enhance the services of schools by providing resources and services to youth that foster lifelong literacy;

Whereas: Public libraries as part of a county library system cost our citizens less than running a separate library outside the county system;

Now therefore:

We proclaim and resolve that it is in the best interest of the students of Ashland Public Schools that we support the Ashland Public Library and the Jackson County Library System of which it is a part

and

We express our support for Ballot Measure 15-75, the levy to provide three years of financial support for the operation of all Jackson County libraries.

How To Draw Flies, 6

How To Draw A Bunny, 64

Fish or Cut Bait

can personality exist without society?

do hermits have personalities?

what is the personality of our society?

can you live in society and still be outside of it?

can you be anti-social without being criminal?

is it ok to be angry at society most of the time?

do all poor people hate society and all rich people like it?

who decides on the things that our society values or stands for?

what is the role of art in this society?

Could my answers to these questions really make a difference?

(These questions came from Jacques de Beaufort} Will he ever post again?

bookmark dump to clear my mind

This weekend, I went to ScienceWorks with Zaida. One of the exhibits includes a kalliroscope. It is a lazy-suzan table with a clear top and rheoscopic fluids swirling inside. The fluids were invented by Paul Matisse, an artist working in Groton, Massachusetts. I've often been mesmerised by this thing, but this last visit made me think of a picture I recently saw on someones blog of a geometric formation around one of the poles of Mars. Its a pentagram (insert a sharp intake of breath here). I would have completely forgotten the image, in fact, I couldn't find it again, if it wasn't for the fact that I was absentmindedly making geometric forms with the kalliroscope at Science Works. Here is one picture I did find of Mars. I also came across all kinds of Katrina hurricane pentagrams and magical five sided figures on the sun. But check out what can happen when you spin gaseous fluids in a kalliroscope, especially note figure (c) below:

Nothing mystical there. Just cool shit. I got lost in these other links while trying to understand swirling fluids:
The experimental nonlinear physics group, the physics of everyday life, ferrofluid in a rotating magnetic field, The Rosensweig instability in a ferrofluid, , a diffusion limited aggregation applet, a review of Philip Ball's book, The Self Made Tapestry: Pattern Formation in Nature, Java simulations of pattern formation.

My family has been obsessed with a collection of videos called Avatar: The Last Airbender. For a Nickelodean series it has great character development, plot twists, and cultural references. I'm bringing it up now because, in the series, human civilization is divided into four nations, the Water Tribes, the Earth Kingdom, the Air Nomads, and the Fire Nation. Within each nation, an order of men and women called "Benders" have the ability to manipulate their native element. These Bending arts combine a certain style of martial arts and elemental mysticism. In each generation, one person is capable of Bending all four elements; this is the Avatar, the spirit of the planet manifested in human form. The Avatar is the fifth part of the pentagram. Which makes me think of the band Pentangle. Devendra Banhart says of Pentangle: "It's a perfect name too: five members, five fingers, four elements/limbs plus the spirit!"
Now that I've mentioned music, go trade CD's for one dollar at la la.

(This bookmark courtesy High Low and in Between.)

(INTERMISSION)

yeah maybe I should.
here are some bookmarked paintings:

The graphics take a back seat in the new paintings from Harold Hollingsworth

Bill Gusky gets dimensional and turns the pile into a glaze.

springs and wells paints faces, that aren't really faces, but paintings of faces

Melissa Reischman
Storm II, 2004
Oil on Canvas
36 x 36 inches
I really can't recall how I bookmarked Melissa's blog. Some of her paintings had me leaning into the monitor.

George Bethea
Buddha's Light
acrylic on canvas, 48 x 36"
via Helquin Artifacts
I think I was initially appalled by these paintings. But I'm kinda takin' a shine to them. However, the titles can irk me a bit. All this Asian culture seems to be streaming at me. I am not Asian. I don't want to borrow from or imitate, emulate, copy, or romanticize Asian things. It is going to be hard not to do that with my ink drawings. That and Pollock. I've been avoiding everthing to do with ole Action Jackson. I suppose I'll eventually break down and actually dive into the guy's oeuvre.

Lynda Hoffman-Snodgrass
Soulfire
Watercolor, 21 x 29.5"
I saw this person's paintings in a local gallery and I panicked. I felt my inky-ways could easily look like hers. I was discouraged. I don't like her paintings. Its going to take some soul searching to figure out why.

Karen Margolis

Floating Limbus, 2006
watercolor, gouache, graphite and thread on abaca paper 14 x 10 inches
from the Dieu Donne Papermill via Chris Rywalt
These works on paper by Karen I found inspirational. I wonder what capacity "thread" is used in her work?