I went to a couple of openings in Chelsea last Thursday that I did not get around to mention.

+ “Road Trip” at Mixed Greens W 26 street, 531, floor 1

+ Pamela Cento “Evidence of Form” at LINK

+ Private Opening at Amsterdam Whitney Gallery - Beneath the Moon and Starts  http://www.amsterdamwhitneygallery.com/

All but the George Adams Gallery was a disappointment and sapped my strength.  I was about to go home but stumbled into a show I had not planned to see or knew about before hand, called Inside, at George Adams, and I found a modern master in the great painting called “Studio Exit“ of James Valerio.

It’s rare that I find a “great” painter - I find a lot of good painters … but not many great ones - the first I’ve seen in years.  James Valerio’s work transcends his technique, even as photographic as it seems to be - he goes past what he’s presenting you - and there’s a power and simplicity in his work that had me transfixed.  I could not pull away from this painting.

 

Everything in “Studio Exit”(care of George Adams Gallery, NYC)  is done to perfection but I was particularly transfigured by the Mop near the bottom center of the painting it’s  superb, everything in this painting is much more than it seemed - and you got close up to the work - it looked every bit as impressive as it does from a distance.

I asked the Gallery dealer how much this painting was - she said 125,000 USD…and I said … it’s worth it.   What is often forgotten is that so much in painting is what can not be said.  With a “photographic” painter of Valerio’s skill, it’s often easy to fall into admiring his skill … but it’s not the skill that I’m paying homage to …it’s the feelings in his work that transcend his technique.  It’s the feeling and what it does to to me …. what can not be said .. for painting is not for words, it’s beyond words - the images are heliography to feelings the artist conveys, perhaps feelings he or she does not even understand - no matter.  

Someone ought to buy “Studio Exit” and put it in a museum, it’s one of the Masterpieces of American Art.  

Like I said, I could not pull myself away and I have, what I consider to be, one of the best eyes for art and artists (I’m not humble about this).

Finally, to reward all of my readers who got this far down the page, here’s a YouTube Video that follows my trip through Chelsea Art last Thursday.  After I got done, I went over to a cafe and drew for a while before taking a cab home - when I just collapsed.   The pressure at work and in the rest of my life, being at a hyper pitch… but I won’t give up my Art.  Never again.

I see something new with my work, something different about the composition - I’ve been focusing on it, allowing it to become part of my work.

Struggled to finish this small study - I went over to the studio to try to stretch one or two canvasses I had done recently possible entry into a show in early fall.

I don’t think I even want put my work onto Stretchers - but I did not have the right size stretchers with me anyway. 

Meanwhile, the 300,000 visit arrived on my Webmetricsguru.com blog this afternoon, while I was painting and I observed as the visit came in and then posted immediately after - 300,000 visit to Webmetricsguru was from Guilford, Connecticut.  

Getting back to the still life, that “new thing” feels to me, like a way to compose space - but I haven’t seen what I’m doing anywhere else - which is good - I’m not out to copying anyone else.

The Window View I did last week had the same sense of a composition and color that borrows from no one, in particular - it’s coming out of me, out my own way of seeing.

Barnes … where have I heard that name before… oh yes. .The Barnes Collection.  You know what ….. now the people living near The Barnes, who wanted to get rid of Barnes, want The Barnes to stay now according to the Philadelphia Inquirer’s Montco’s about-face on Barnes Museum.

 ”…Some in the international art community decried the move as a bad bargain, a way to boost the Barnes financially at the cost of ruining its oddly charming galleries, in which Impressionist masterpieces are stacked as tight as puzzle pieces on the walls of a Merion mansion.

But in Montgomery County there wasn’t a hint of protest. It was as if a long fight over the Merion operations - in which there were suits and counter-suits amid charges of racism - had worn everyone out.

“If you had a 24-karat gold splinter stuck in your [backside], you would not be sorry to have it removed,” Walter Herman, a Barnes neighbor on Latchs Lane, said in October 2003.

Now, in a complete turn-about, Herman and other neighbors have joined the Montgomery County commissioners and Lower Merion Township officials in a last-ditch effort to “save the Barnes” and block its move.

A suburban coalition threatened Thursday to pry the lid off the case and let out buried issues by filing yet another suit - this one to force the Barnes to consider a $50 million plan from the county to help the museum stay where it is.”

“..I think the neighbors really wanted to get rid of the Barnes,” Heckscher said, “and now the powers that be - in the township and the county - have said, ‘What a pity the Barnes is leaving.’ It’s quite ironic.”

No one in the suburban coalition seems quite sure what has brought the about-face.”

My guess it’s all about money and influence … and losing it.

“…He said that while watching Philadelphia raise millions to prevent the out-of-town sale of one painting - Thomas Eakins’ The Gross Clinic - he realized how much Montgomery County would lose by letting the Barnes go.

The county now proposes to issue $50 million in bonds to help the Barnes.”

The local people want some of that money too.  Interesting.