Gut Shoveler

It's been a slightly-longer-than-usual interval since my last post, and I suppose there are some reasons for that. Life somehow got complicated... and busy.

Speaking of busy, Burning Man was was a fuckload of work as usual. I want to say it was more work than normal... and maybe it was... but it's always so much work. Christina's piece was a wild success; many people I spoke with thought it was the strongest piece out there this year and I also believe that. Then, upon returning from the desert we promptly jumped into The Paseo, our own home-town art festival run by our friend J. Matthew Thomas. Christina and I both showed work - Christina showed Mitt Uthus and I showed With Open Arms - and that was even more work but also quite fun.

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The only kind of books I can ever finish are artist biographies. I think that, when I read these artist biographies, I'm hoping I might get some clue about how I should live. How did these people live? How should I live? What kinds of decisions should I make? Is it possible to be an artist, and also a person? Just like Fleabag*, I sometimes wish someone else would just tell me. *Season 2, episode 4

I've just finished a biography of Leonard Cohen, who I've always loved. His lyrics are beautiful mysteries. But... even though it may not really be part of the consensus myth around him, I believe he was damaged in some way. Until he got quite old, he could never commit to one woman, even when he had a family. He was always running. So I guess he was either damaged, or committed to his own freedom in some way that most people simply can't manage or understand. Like his lyrics, he was a bit of a mystery.

Caravaggio's most important intimate relationships were likely with prostitutes, both male and female, and he was a violent brawler and later in life also a murderer. Francis Bacon's personal life was only slightly less messy; he was a masochist who enjoyed being beaten by his lovers. And Alexander McQueen was not so different; his short life was marked violent relationships, drug abuse, and an early end by his own hand.

But these guys were all wild, raving geniuses! Artistically speaking, they are my heroes. They all managed, in different ways, to bring their own personal tragedy, their own personal pathos, into the world as potent art-mysteries that changed their respective fields forever. Their work, powered by the inner personal turmoil that is coded into it, is why their names will live on.

Is personal turmoil a prerequisite for artistic genius? Somehow I imagine I'm not the first person to ask that question, and I'm sure that much has already been written on the topic that far exceeds in insight and erudition anything I could muster. But I will say that it's probably no coincidence that the kind of art which speaks to me seems to often be produced by tortured souls.

Which brings me to my painting class. I just returned from Austin, Texas, where I took a one-week, one-on-one oil painting class. My teacher, Mark Carder, has established an intuitive and easy-to-follow set of protocols, approximately 95% of which he has generously made available for free through his Youtube channel. If you want to learn to paint, you could do much worse than to start watching Mark's videos. Over the course of 6 days in Austin, I took a painting from start to finish (well I almost finished; I will finish it this week.) 

Here is my source photo (teacher Mark liked it because it was "so different" from everybody else's still-life setups)

And here is the painting in its almost-finished state. This was about 21 hours of actual painting (not including drawing or color mixing). 

Probably the most interesting conversation I had with Mark during the week was about the ingredients that make up a great painting, and we agreed immediately that subject matter was paramount. Even paintings with mediocre technique can hit you hard if you resonate with the subject matter. Furthermore, the subject must not be too literal or obvious. In Mark's words, "if you look at a painting and within the first 15 seconds are able to say 'oh I get it, I know what this painting is about' then the painting is a failure." Just like Leonard Cohen's lyrics.

I'm maintaining a list of painting ideas - every time a new idea crops up I write it down. So now my task (in addition to the more mundane and laborious task of reconfiguring my tiny little office into a painting studio suitable for the winter) is to weed through that list and figure out which ideas are really worth bringing into the world. Hopefully I can exorcise my demons through oil paint.

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I've long resisted discussing on this blog what sort of music I listen to, because... I mean really, who cares. But I'm going to do it anyway, albeit briefly. On my recent road trip I couldn't stop listening to these two amazing songs by Made Out Of Babies: Gut Shoveler and Sugar. Certainly they will not be everyone's cup of tea, but they powered me across Texas.

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