history ...

the first month of 2010 is almost history, and i'm grateful for completing a portion of the resolutions going forward ...

for one, i'm managing to continue to build the website, and i followed suggestions by making daily entries on the blog ...

the daily commitment is more difficult than i thought, but thanks to friends like Lally, Elisabeth, Andrea, and Joel [follow the links]; their comments and disciplined examples are always encouraging ...

i know that lending comments is sometimes a cumbersome task, but you'd be surprised how helpful it is - and if 'google analytics' is close to accurate, there are many more voyeurs than participants - makes me wonder ...

and though 'the weather outside is frightful', i've continued to paint large pieces when i could; begin a transitional phase indoors, photograph, and walk - modify my late night dinners, organize and pack non-essentials, work on unfinished business, pipeline future projects, and take on this lymes malady ...

in addition, for February, i'm going to begin a 'studio tour' series ...

once again, following the suggestions of visitors and voyeurs ...

i often take for granted the daily movements from project to project through the studio - showing a snapshot, but not the vista - so i commit to post a little more 'activity' next month in real time [as i get the hang of it] ...

it hasn't been the healthiest month on record, but i'm determined to do what i can to make improvements; including find more time for prayer, meditation, reading, and being of service to people in need of it - after all, if this "period of recovery" is going to work for anyone - its got to be on the level of the soul for everyone ...

and as Jorge Borges said as he let a handful of sand from the Sahara pass through his hand - "i've modified eternity" ...

full moon and jupiter ...

logos ... moonlight ....

jupiter rising ...

like Rickie Lee Jones said on her Ghosty Head album; "sometimes i forget to look at the sky ..." - but not last night - though it wasn't completely full till this morning, last night's moon lit up up the countryside with shades of silver-blue like only Luna can do - and it appears so quiet, peaceful, and still up there - from here ...

i've been plodding along on some of the larger pieces - left over from the 'outdoor painting season' ... they definitely take on a different tempo and rhythm when they're moved inside - more deliberate - kind of like doing overdubbing when recording - looking for the 'right' notes - considered, but not contrived ... it allows me to understand the frenetics of some of the discoveries made during the outdoor improv/painting sessions ...

'rising' is the music [or soundscape] that'll accompany the painting 'jupiter' that i'm working on - as is usually the case with this sort of muse'ic - "i know what i want when i get there ..." - it's another collage of modal shifts augmented with tonal contrasts and 'natural' sound - in this case, excerpts from Voyager's recordings of solar wind around jupiter - perhaps i'll get there today ...

painted and music'd all day - "Jupiter - Rising" is now on youtube ...

bitter cold outside, but i might still get time for a walk-about - maybe the clouds will clear for the moon ...

signals and cells ...

did it! - "Signals and Cells" is now uploaded ...

at least a comprehensive collection of the work from that period -

there's still catalogs that need pdf'ing, etc. - but for the most part, it's there ...

continued to advance what i believe will be called the "Logos" series - the process is enchanting, and it brings me to a good place - where it's fresh, vital - where new information becomes available in familiar, but new ways - fond memories percolate - like first days' of school, new or rekindled love, discovery - all those things that fire the synapses and let you know you're alive ...

and the landscape changes daily ...

traces ...

today, in and around ...

been thinking about the archaeological sites i've visited, and places where evidence of previous culture is part of everyday life - from Pueblo Bonita in New Mexico and the petroglyphs along the Rio Grande Valley, St. Augustine in Florida, Route 66, old Hollywood, Philadelphia's Independence Plaza, the old cathedrals in Seville and Paris, the Mediterranean shoreline, and even some of the hillside caves along the Delaware river - here, where i live - where you can still find shards of native American pottery or arrowheads, or Civil War vestiges, the 1820's barn i renovated ...

sometimes the past isn't old enough to be mysterious - maybe, just legendary ...

with the exception of the monuments and lore that are erected; for the most part, everything blends back into the landscape, leaving only remnants of previous activity ...

there always seems to be tension, or even opposition between objects we make, and ideas - maybe, because we're innately aware of their eventuality - and that being human, in the scheme of things, becomes more of an idea passing through landscapes ...

i recall an interview with Brian Eno, where he describes some of his ambient music as 'landscape' - and, at different times in his career he applied melody - which he described as the human element passing through the landscape - and by its' difference, becomes the focal point of the music, or vista ...

and so it is for anything referential ...

imbued ...

i've had six freshly gessoed panels for two triptychs lying around the studio for a few weeks ...

part of me is excited about starting - part, apprehensive ...

this is the transition; from where i've been, to where i'm going ...

and what's also interesting, is my familiarity with things like blogging - and, to be comfortable enough to share the experience ...

i mentioned having dreamt about the new paintings - or if you like, visualized them after my brain had a chance to do some processing ...

i could feel the tide rising for a few days, but i couldn't launch into it this morning as i usually do ...

having been busy with a schedule of production the past few years, i forgot about the ritual that usually accompanies these early stages of romancing the ideas - almost choreographed - or as i referred to it a number of years ago; 'the chance dance of soul' ...

so i circled the studio for hours; cleaning brushes, scraping the floor, vacuuming, arranging paint containers, discarding things that won't be necessary, etc. - and every once in a while, a sideways glance over to the three pristine surfaces, waiting ...

hours went by - i began to tire and i felt like abandoning the project for today ...

but that's when it happened - when all that nervous energy dissipated - and it all happened so naturally, without reservation, without thought or self consciousness ...

just paint and my brush - something that feels like another appendage after all these years ...

the photo above may not seem like much more than lines on a surface, but it marks a beginning ...

pleasant diversions ...

from a series of cut-out paper pieces - Civics Series, © 1996 ...

symbols ...

silver jewelry ...

George Wein, acquiring ... 91 Limited Edition ...

spent the morning polishing silver jewelry that i designed during '91 - preparing for photographs to include in the "signals and cells" series upload on the web page archives ...

a massive amount of work to edit and arrange - sometimes i forget different projects i was involved in because of the speed of life at the time - but it was a wonderful, sensuous, and almost archaeological experience - massaging the tarnish and blemishes from the surfaces to reveal the qualities i worked to achieve on the pieces; and remembering, uncovering memories ...

raining steadily outside, neutral grey light, with Miles Davis playing modalities in the background ... it doesn't matter how many times i hear Miles [1964 to present] - i always discover something - always new ...

then i recalled having a bit of a run in with him around the same time as doing the jewelry ...

i was asked to do the 91 Newport Jazz Festival poster, and before going into production, Miles saw the proof at George Wein's NYC office - Miles didn't think we should use an image he thought was him, without getting a 'piece' of it - he later let it go with my defense that he couldn't patent posture and that i didn't intentionally represent him - i was only trying to capture the essence of 'cool' and 'jazz', which in effect, is who he was to the core anyway ...

truth is, they were swirls of paint that i Rorschach'd images of jazz - and Miles would have been part of that visual vocabulary ...

anyway, a tender day ...

an open book ...

getting back to that notion - of a studio by the ocean ...

i was re-reading John Huston's auto-biography the other day - an Artist, whom i've always admired - and came across this:

" Now that I'm of a certain age, I'm following a piece of old Irish advice in going to live by the sea: It stops old wounds from hurting. It revives the spirit. It quickens the passions of mind and body, yet lends tranquility to the soul."

An Open Book, John Huston, ©1980.

vigilance ...

it occurred to me, with the help of my friend Lally, that some of my reaction and discomfort recently has to do with fear - and you'd think i would have figured it out by now - that if it isn't love, or indifference - its got to be that third, pesky little option ...

fear has a way of de-railing - and in my recent experiences - it did just that ... yes, the first response was - that i won't be able to accomplish what i want if i don't feel better - now! - that i'll lose financial opportunities, or some cosmic race at understanding something - but more subliminally, is the notion that i'm aging and learning about limitations i don't care to admit to - that can't be fixed by a convertible or beach side studio [i'm not convinced about the studio notion] - that despite my denial, i'm not invincible - and this lymes thing has done serious, sometimes fatal damage to people bigger, stronger, smarter, and richer than myself - and that ticks are a non-discriminating insect - and yes, Elisabeth, i did blame myself - thinking that if i wasn't outside, blissfully working on paintings [like i always do] on that particular day between march and november - that particular tick would not have bitten me - mmm - for me, that's how funny fear can be ...

i rarely anger anymore [on a soul level] - but in the same way the fox, with her cubs in the woods, will let out a snarl or a growl to let me know i'm getting a little too close to the things that are important to her - i sometimes respond from base instincts ... if i don't heed her warning - or if i challenge her - there might be consequences - thank heavens we have the capacity to reason - and if that option fails; watchful vigilance is usually reduced to reaction against what we perceive as a threat - which adrenalizes, distorts, and compounds all those irrational fears - taking it to a new level of dominos ...

and i've got to remember, that a snarl from a bear is perceived differently than one from a fox ...

anyway, perspective is good - even for an abstractionist ...