I had a lovely time with Juliette Powell tonight, authoress of 33 Million People in the Room, that I reviewed at WebMetricsGuru.com, maybe 5 or 6 weeks ago.

A couple of ideas “came to me” today; they’re not really new ideas to me, but worth writing down, all the same.

For one thing, I’m passionate about Art, and certain artists and styles/movements  in particular, and it’s been noticed by some of my friends, that I ought to talk about Art more, and even put myself in front of a camera and do it.

The idea started a month ago when one of my friends suggested it as we strolled through the Metropolitan Museum on one of my many visits – a week later, another friend went to the museum with me the following week and took some video of me, but we were soon interrupted by the museum guards who would not allow videotaping.

Finally, today, Juliette Powell met me at RAO and we succeeded and this is the result – judge for yourself – and I’d love the feedback – but tweet it at @webmetricsguru on Twitter as comments are disabled on this blog due to the excessive amount of comment spam I was getting.

One more thing -

Thinking that trusting with my gut feelings – having evolved my own approach – I ought to go all the way with it instead of holding myself back.

Been very busy lately – and couple of projects that I had to handle make it really hard to focus on painting, but one project may be a gallery space to handle artists – it’s  still young idea and I can’t talk about it, yet, but I’m hopeful.

Anyway – it’s strange how in my social network of friends I get many opinions about things like travel – and how some of my friends think a trip to France for me this spring is good, others think it’s bad, and I’ve tended to crowd source opinions, not to obsolve myself of making decisions, but simply to have the best set of opinions and facts before deciding.

I realized, as long as I’m willing to take responsibility for making my own decisions, there’s nothing wrong with getting several opinions; one of my friends who studies Reiki and lives in Germany, says a trip to France feels stressful, and recommends against it.   I didn’t seek that opinion, but I’d be a fool to discount it.

On the other hand, another friend suggested London, where I’ve never been, and the vibes seem better for a trip there.

My painting is about that decision making process – it’s about how I come to decide what to do, how to take action, and my feelings around deciding.

Oh, by the way, this is an iPhone painting, but I’ve been working on it for a few weeks, on and off.

Been sketching a lot – and enjoying mixing in different pen work and pencils – though I do notice my drawings often get very dark, like this one that I did of a garden nearby from where I live in Brooklyn:

I worked hard to try to get the color of the paper drawing as exact to my notebook as I can, and often I compare the two as I’m editing the settings.

I also did this larger sketch today in a larger sketchbook I bought recently.

Lately, I’ve been aware that I don’t need to cover the entire drawing, that I can leave some things out (see below):

It’s just deciding when to stop.

I also did a quick drawing of a model who I liked today at Brooklyn Artist’s Gym (but it was too hot to work much):

I have more drawings to post, but I’m ready to collapse – been a long day, and a hot one as well.

Interviewed this weekend by a well known blogger Anil Batra of  Web Analysis, Behavioral Targeting and Advertising  - decided to post the links to that interview (part 1 & part 2) as many of my art ideas are merged with my web analytics approach and my career.

Interview with Marshall Sponder – Part I

Interview with Marshall Sponder – Part II

Pretty happy with the interview – I put a lot of myself in it.

Here’s the last of the three videos I made which comprise most of the footage from that day – I’ve provided the first two video URLs as well. Enjoy

Video Part 3 (the longest segment) – also note the Tree Breast at 1 minute into this clip – it’s special and way off the path (you have to climb down to it and it’s not seen from the road). Also, there’s some footage of the best and most expensive restaurant in Aix-en-Provence, Le Clos De La Violette, at the end of the file (but the URL link does not seem to work).

part 1 – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZleHXMqK-8

part 2 -  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXuBVOaqayE

part 3 – http://youtube.com/watch?v=j3LJW43WEGk

My guide, Christine Boulet (who lives in Aix-en-Provence and who I met the day before)  on this 4 or 5 hour walk to my favorite Painter, Paul Cezanne, happened on Wednesday, June 6th, 2007 and took most of the afternoon and early evening.  At the end of the long, long walk/hike, it rained. 

Note: The quality of the video that gets uploaded and shown on YouTube is considerably less than the original files – I noticed that, no matter what I do, preparing and uploading online video footage for streaming video makes the videos loose a lot of the details.

Also, my recollection of the color of the sky – it was much bluer than richer than what is coming over from the videos.  My take on that – whenever we translate an experience from one form to another (IE: a part of my life is transformed into a video) something is lost (in this case, a lot is lost).

On the other hand, what is gained is the memory I have as I look at these videos that warms my heart and brings back the fresh air, whooshing sounds, thundering and pungent smell of the the moist earth – the rich warm reddish browns of the earth and the brilliant blue of the sky.   A gray-lavender band of wood, part of the foliage / trees is pushed more towards lavender by the rich greens of the tree leaves and grass on the grounds. 

After the first hour, or so, of our walk, we had the sandwiches and Pepsi Light (we brought no water – or sunglasses) – the heat got to be almost unbearable and when we reached a midway point there was a water fountain – near a dam – and I got my shirt all wet, just to deal with the the intense heat/sun.   But then, as the afternoon progressed, it cooled down and rained and that was magical.

My guide, Christine Boulet, was wonderful company – but little of that is really translated in this movie and yet, I hope all of that comes though, past the limitations of the medium of Online Streaming Video – via YouTube.

Again, Enjoy and for any of my readers on ArtNewYorkCity.com  – I’d love to hear your feedback.  Bear in mind, I’m not the best photographer – fortunately, Christine Boulet took over for much of the footage, she has a much steadier hand than I – but I’m learning.

Yesterday I posted about Paris and the Still Life I did 20 years in Been Busy getting ready for Paris and Aix.   Well, I did accomplish what I wanted at my studio today and also took some online videos which I’ll try to share here.

Here’s the first painting – and I actually like it better – it’s a nude study of a model named Elizabeth and it took about an hour (if I had more time I might have worked on it longer…but who says a painting is ever really done?).

When I look at my work, sometimes I get a “shock” – it’s as if I can feel my energy in it; and reading the World View of Paul Cezanne by Jane Roberts confirms, I think, all that goes into work – all the energy transmitted by touch – all  that can felt but not spoken.

And here’s the movie I made as I painted this painting.  I was thinking, and mentioned Amy Crehore’s name because she’s often asked me about how Brooklyn Artist Gym looks – well, a movie is worth at least several thousand words!

Well, I did a painting today – but I don’t feel I achieved what I set out to do – Oh, I painted what was in my mind ….alright – it’s just that what was in my mind was very vague.

There was a couple of thoughts in my mind and a couple of lessons – so I’ll talk about that.

Thoughts in my mind as I painted this (I believe I’m guided as I paint – the ideas I have while painting often “come to me” – so I like to note them:

- I like Mike Moran’s idea of trying things quickly – may have 100 “failures” for 1 “success”.  I don’t know if this painting is a failure – but it’s sure not a “success” – but i still learn from it.

- My idea was “fuzzy” – I set out with a vague idea that objects in Second Life (IE: a Coke Bottle – Branding) are 100 times more powerful than in regular life because there’s little “noise” in SL.

- “while I had “real life” in the left and “second life” in the right – there’s no relationship in the composition that would make it work.  On the other hand, the painting shows my real state – not knowing how to integrate real life and second life yet.

What I learnt:

- An artist’s work should be evaluated by the totality of it – not on any particular work.  My work is uneven - but so is everyone else’s.

- I’m having a struggle with the materials I’m using and the size / composition of the sketches / paintings I’m doing – but judging from the other artists I’m seeing – I’m not alone in this – several other’s in my studio – several other artists, in general, have the same issue.

- Chalk Pastels, while great for freeing me up – might not always be the right medium to work in.  I find that what I gain in color I lose in control.  The best solution may be a more oily pastel.   At any rate, I think integrating oil pastels and pastels may work sometimes, but now always.

- The Energy wants to go in it’s own direction – I think it’s better to do more experimentation, as I’m beginning to do.  It’s not possible for Artists who are “searchers” to know they will succeed in every painting – for people who “search” part of the painting will be “groping for the right combinations of colors, the right composition, etc.

That’s about enough for tonight.  Yes, I did try to use text to integrate my idea that Second Life brands are much more powerful there than here – but I did not succeed – maybe I just need to work on the idea a little longer.

Boy, is this FUN!  I did a painting in my studio yesterday – Another Studio Painting at BAG.  I was busy writing up a report for one of my clients, an Architect, whose work I’ve been promoting for the last 2 years.

Anyway, in their report I mentioned they should take their house plans and make stamps, prints, T-Shirts and Ties with it – especially to those who buy the architectual house  plans.

Anyway – I had so much fun with it – and Zazzle.com – I decided to take my own Artwork and make a tie out of it – the painting I did yesterday looks quite nice as a tie – and I did not actually have Zazzle.com make me the tie yet – but their platform allows you to see what the product is going to look like and control the layout and design.

So….here’s my first tie using Zazzle.com

Your product, My Studio, is now in the Zazzle marketplace!

Gallery product line: New Products Marketplace product line: Places, Regional > United States > New York > Brooklyn

And here’s the tie

Ok, this is really about my web analytics work but….to me they’re both connected – and I used the referenece to Cezanne midway (at ~ 18:25 minutes into the podcast) - something about “mountain is just the mountain…but it takes the mind of an Artist to make it Mont Sainte-Victoire “.  

Interview with Marshall Sponder, IBM and Kelly Makimaa, WAA on February 19, 2007

MP3 File

The official version will be published on the Web Analytics Association (WAA) website in a couple of days, along with a transcript.  It’s a long podcast – but makes few demands on your browser or our servers as it’s all streamed from Hipcast.com.

I found the best sound settings for my podcast, at least, on my laptop are this (see below):

However, if your listening to the podcast on a MAC, I’m not sure what the settings would be as I don’t have a MAC.

One thing artists can learn from this podcast is what it might take to measure Rich Media (Flash) events.  Many Art Galleries and Artists tend to use Flash quite liberally – thinking that a more Flashy site conveys information and their work much better.

That might be true, but from an tracking standpoint, most Flash and Ajax applications are not visible to your tracking platforms without a bit of extra work – more than most sites are willing or able to put into place at this time.  As Websites become more interactive, more Flash and Ajax oriented – it’s getting much harder to understand how your visitors are engaging with your website.  I think that’s definitely an issue with Sacchi’s My Gallery web site that looks to be entirely Flash based.  But many New York Art Galleries have the same problems.

So for those of you who want to track those things – my podcast to the Web Analytics Association is of value to you as well.

Enjoy – and I’ll provide the link to the WAA site along with the transcript when it becomes available.

I did three studies today, including the Nude Study from my last post. Here’s the other two – and I did not spend more than an hour on each, if that long.

 

There was a woman painting the rest of the group as we all painted the model – in about 90 minutes she had done a finished oil sketch, maybe 30 x 30″ – I could recognize myself in her painting – it was quite good - though I feel she needs to take her work to the next level – but that’s for her to decide, not me.

Anyway, she took a catnap on the studio couch and I decided to paint her Palette – since her palette was the most interesting thing in the studio to me.  She kinda woke up after about 30 minutes and eventually wanted to use her palette, so I made this a quick study and decided to just abstract off it – thinking of Picasso while doing this – started with Oil Pastels and quickly used chalk over it, then spraying with fixative.

The last painting of the day, below, was another view of the studio – with the theme of “painting within a painting” that I started last week.  Only, you probably can’t tell because my treatment was loose and I got exhausted - but it was a good exhaustion.

I like this study – for all the looseness of it – there’s some color effects that happened – that I allowed to happen.

Again, I asked my self – what’s my commitment to these works?  Answer:  I don’t know.  I only know that it feels right to me doing as I am – where this all goes … I don’t know.

I did make it over to Brooklyn Artists Gym this afternoon and ended up doing a self portrait.  Here’s a picture Peter Wallace, owner and manager of BAG took of me with my SideKick 3 camera.

I feel this painting, self portrait, is one of my best.

 

The photo I took is decent – but many of the subtleties are not showing up in the digital picture – the work is much richer when looking at it – and some for the lighting I captured on my face looks more arbitrary in the photo than in real life.   The painting looks better, I feel, standing in front of it - than seeing it online, like I have it, above. 

I think I spent close to 5 hours working on my self portrait.  Once I started painting again last year – I let myself go – when I paint – it’s 100% of me and I often feel as if something else is working through me and I’m just along for the ride – and that’s totally fine with me.

Also feel that I can complete my work now where I could not years and years ago – I had no idea what “finished” meant – I did not know when to stop.  Feel much more  confident of my abilities as an artist.

It’s also nice when artists at my studio come up to me and tell me the painting is beautiful – it’s unsolicited feedback.  Without taking it too seriously – if I “see it”, “feel it” and “know it” and other people (who have no idea of how aware I am of the “energy”) come over to me and tell me they’re drawn to the work…..I must be onto something.

But I’m totally glad I’m not out to sell or even show my work at this time.  It takes a alot of courage to put your work out for the world to see – in a gallery show – my soul is exposed.  I’m not ready for it yet.  Maybe I’ll never be ready – I’m fine going on, just as I have -and I’ll see where the road takes me.

BTW, here’s what my Self Portrait looks like at a distance:

I believe a painting should look good at a distance but also close up – but the power of painting is different at a distance – I hope if this work is ever shown, it’s also seen at a distance, like I’m showing above.   Getting close up, another set of associations takes over as you can see the textures and the forms are clearer.

Well, that’s enough for one post and after 5 hours, I packed it up and left the studio, a little after 7PM, Saturday.

I went by the Chelsea Art Museum tonight for an opening of “Dangerous Beauty” – it was packed and the first time I actually toured the museum.

I also notice there were several books about Jean Miotte at the Chelsea Museum book store in the lobby. I don’t know anything about this artist but I see there’s’ a Jean Miotte Foundation connected to the Chelsea Museum – maybe that’s why the books are available in the lobby.  I don’t connect with Miotte’s work, lets leave it at that.

Took a lot of pictures tonight – but I won’t put the pictures here; I’ll just mention the works that struck me.

Emily Eveleth’s Conjecture, 2004, Oil on Canvas, 49 x 76 inches (great to have a camera and unlimited storage – so I can take pictures of everything, including the name tags next to the painting).   I think this was one of the most successful paintings in the museum and looked like either a gel filled donut leaking out gelly or a gunshot (guess that’s why it’s called “Conjecture”).

I also like Barry Sullivan’s Sirpa Front, painted in 2006, 64 x 46 inches, oil on linen.  I found the nude woman with breast showing a turn on – in a show that was very depressing, actually.

Donald Sultan’s Egg and Tomatoes painted in 1998, 48 inches x 48 inches was pretty darn good as a painting.

I also never heard of a painter called George Condo, whose’s “Fruit Man” painted in 1983 is an interesting painting that I liked a lot.

The Genealogy of the Supermarket by Nina Katchadourlain is fascinating parody of the faces next to our brands and how they gave birth to characters from other brands.

The Mummified Barbie Dolls, made of Barbie dolls, are fairly small.

Meanwhile, Tom Sanford’s painting of Paris Hilton, 29×29 inches was one of the more interesting, if soulless, images in the show.

And I have to say that I was not comfortable in the Chelsea Museum; just the overall feeling about art and what it takes to be an artist.  It makes me wonder if I want to show my work at all – and right now I’m having an identity conflict with doing the work – I’m sorta afraid I won’t end up harnessing my full creativity.  And I need to paint more.

I had dinner tonight with Scott Draves, better known as Spot, and wrote up most of my interview in Webmetricsguru.com which took place in Chelsea.

I wanted to talk with Spot more about his art, and find out what inspires him to create his Electric Paintings – which are refinements on what started out as ElectricSheep.org screensaver.

Spot views the work he’s doing with hifidreams.com as a form of artificial intelligence, helping to bring it to life and he’s selling his more ambitious work in order to fund the development of his art and art form.

There’s an element of visual layering and genetic sequencing in the Electric Sheep online screensaver.  I’m too exhausted to write more tonight and if I can make out my scribbled notes, I’ll pick up where I’m leaving off now in a day or two with another post on tonight’s interview with Spot (Scott Draves).

I was invited to attend Spot’s talk at the Entheocentic Salon last night at the Chapel of Sacred Mirrors by Allyson Grey, artist wife of the visionary artist Alex Gray. Actually, Allyson is an artist and I found her technique interesting – in fact I can’t imagine how much detailed work most go into it. 

Alex Gray’s work has had a good deal of media coverage although I got the impression it’s not really been accepted in the main stream art world (is that any surprise?  the mainstream art world is much the same as the mainstream music world – you have to fit into a “slot”).  Actually, I’m not sure that’s entirely true any longer – it seems like “Visionary Artists” like Joe Colemen and Paul Laffoley are beginning to get some mainstream acceptance – if they can do it, why not Alex Grey? 

A frame from one of Spot’s Electronic Paintings

The main part of last night’s event at the Chapel of Sacred Mirrors, for me, was Spot’s demonstration of his new Electronic Paintings – which I wrote up in Smartmobs.com.  I put a lot of work and thought in that post.

Yesterday I was painting at Brooklyn Artist Gym but I could not get anything much done – it seems like time for a change in my approach, technique, planning what I’m going to do before I arrive, things like that.  Anyway, that’s the backdrop from which I came to view Spot’s work yesterday.

Spot just moved to New York, and is trying to get gallery representation for his large Electronic Paintings – I wish him success in this.   One problem I see is in how Spot’s paintings are marketed.  Presently, Spot has, maybe a dozen works that are packaged with 100GB disks and processor (as one unit) – I think with a large LCD screen (but I’m not sure about the screen part) for prices starting at 30,000 dollars USD.

For me, I’m seeing Spot’s paintings as being much more marketable at a lower price by just selling the software with an High Definition Screen, but that’s me.   I see a problem with trying to go after a niche audience of art collectors based on a technology that’s also open-sourced.   Doubt is created in the mind of a collector that what they’re spending 30K on might also be something they’ll be able to buy later for next to nothing as a more advanced screen saver program.   

In a way, this is the same problem that HitWise has, as a web analytic platform; their main program, fully loaded, is about 60K and they have maybe 1200 customers, mostly corporate.  But they’re not Omniture, not Visual Sciences – platforms that can sell for up to one million dollars a pop (you don’t need that many one million dollar installations to make it).  I wrote about this in WebMetricsGuru recently Was HitWise sold yet?

Can Spot sell enough paintings at 30K and above ….. I don’t know.  I hope he’s successful – but I do think the technology makes it somewhat problematic – are you selling the artist or are you selling the technology?   If your selling the technology, your going to have a problem selling the individuality of your creation, that’s my take.

If Spot wants to be an Artist, in the same line as Kandinsky …… he needs to sell his idea past the technology that houses it – and right now I don’t see that.   His talk was great last night, but I felt the star is not spot, it’s his Electronic Paintings – paintings that anyone can recreate with 100GB hard drive and a nice shiny laptop screen, just like the one I have now with my new HP Pavilion dv6000.

It gets back to what Seth Godin said at Google Unbound, earlier this week – to be successful you need to know that business your really in.  The House Designers, my former client for SEO, thought that buying architectural house plans from a consortium of known architects, rather than from a brokerage house like globalhouseplans.com or eplans.com, would be a competitive advantage – but it was not. 

THD totally misunderstood their true opportunity - as a larger consortium of Architects and knowledge base and tools – something they entire missed the boat on – and now that site struggles to break even.

While I’m am artist, first and foremost, I’m also a web analyst and a marketer – and I have to call things the way I see them – people expect no less from a blogger with an audience.   What Spot is trying to do, as an artist, is great, but he needs to sell his vision, not the technology – to gain broader acceptance that he wants. 

I tried the same thing with using Iron On Art 15 years ago – but what I ended up doing is paralyzing my own creativity, and could not separate the technology – Amiga PC scanned images of faces, from painting techniques – and now, anyone can make tea-shirt art – so technology has taken a technique and made it common, almost banal – yet it seemed like a great idea when I first happened onto it around 1990.

How he does that – I don’t know, but one hint – focus beyond the technology – because technology is copyable – artistic genius, on the other hand, is unique.  Be unique.

This looks good.  I got an email on another site that allows an artist to show their work – and so far, I like what I’m seeing, even though I haven’t signed up yet. 

True, I’m not really interested in selling anything at this point; my art is entirely for my own self exploration.  I’m not against selling it, but I’m not creating anything in order to sell it and it’s fine if I never do.  I noticed FineArtAmerica.com is aiming at artists who want to sell their work.   So, in that sense, maybe I’m not entirely in sync with them.  But that’s fine, I’m more interested in how I can bundle my work, and it looks like FineArtAmerica.com does that well.

But being a search expert and the author of www.Webmetricsguru.com. FineArtAmerica.com appeals to my “Web Analyst” persona.   I make my living as a Web Analyst for IBM and others.  When I see a site that appeals to artists and yet offers Web Analytics, I take notice.  Here’s what I like:

“…AUTOMATIC LOCATION DETECTION – One of the most powerful features of the site is its ability to automatically detect a visitor’s geographic location.  When you visit our website, we automatically identify your location in the U.S. and then display content that is designed specifically for your location! ”

“….If you live in Chicago, for instance, our site will automatically tailor itself to the Chicago area.  If you were to view our list of featured art galleries, you would automatically see galleries that are located near Chicago!  Similarly, if you were to view our list of upcoming events, the list would be sorted with Chicago-area events at the top!

I’m going to need to set up an account and play with this later this week.  

Finally, someone is starting to use technology to improve site experience (which is, by the way, Art).

The other thing that’s really, really smart is the bi-monthly newsletter that’s published by FineArtAmerica; readers to Webmetricsguru.com know how often I mention email marketing as lead generation.  Email marketing, when done well, is very effective, especially when you have a fresh, targeted list of recipients.   Listen to this:

“….BI-MONTHLY NEWSLETTER – On the 1st and 15th of every month, we e-mail a unique newsletter to all of our registered fine art collectors.   The newsletter features artists, artwork, jobs, press releases, and events that have been posted on our site during the previous two weeks.   This is a great way to introduce your newest releases and upcoming events to an interested audience.   Each collector receives a customized newsletter which prominently features events that will be occurring in their area (see AUTOMATIC LOCATION DETECTION).

I’ll let readers know when I have my page set up on FineArtAmerica.com and have tested it out.  I’m looking forward to seeing the customized results, which I’ll probably also write up in Webmetricsguru.com, SmartMobs.com and BigGreenBlog.com, if I think the material fits those blogs.

I went to a book signing for 100 New York Painters by Cynthia Maris Dantzic  tonight; of course I bought a copy of the book and got it signed by some of the artists and Cynthia Maris Dantzic, who were present and in the book. 

 

There was about 25-30 people in the room, on the 6th floor of the YMCA rooftop.

 

  

Personally, I’ve met, known or studied with a couple of the artists in the book – which seems to have a lot of the people around in the 70′s and 80′s when I was studying painting in NYC and briefly in Vermont.

First, I never met Cynthia Maris Dantzic, who is an Art Professor at LIU, but she spoke very well and warmly (she’s wearing a black jacket, seen in the background with her arm resting on a chair).

I studied with Harvey Dinnerstein (who was not present) in 1974-75 at the School of Visual Arts, I was in one of his drawing classes and his work is shown on pages 80-81 of the book.  I met his brother, Simon Dinnerstein, at the book signing tonight and his work is on page 84-85.

Janet Fish, who is featured on pages 100-101, visited the Vermont Studio School when I spent the summer there in 1987 – she often goes there, even now – I may have personally met her but I don’t remember speaking with her if I did – and I like the paintings in the book.

I can’t swear to it, but I may have studied with Louise Fishman at Hunter College (unless I’m mixing her up with another artist with the first name Louise -and that would be in 1971-1972) – Fishman’s work is on pages 102-103.  Audrey Flack also visited Vermont Studio School when I was there in 87, and her work is on page 104-105.

Sonja Gechoff was a personal mentor of mine in 1987-1988 after I returned from Vermont but lost contact with her shortly after.  I even took her to see my painting, After The Bath, when it was hanging in a show I had in the East Village.  It’s nice to know that Sonja is still active and Gechoff’s work is featured on pages 112-113.

I went to Cecily Kahn’s art opening several weeks ago in Chelsea and immediately recognized her as the daughter of Wolf Kahn, who also visited Vermont Studio School and who I saw at Hunter College in the late 1980′s along with his wife, painter Emily Mason.  All three artists are in the book, pages 130-133 and 152-153.

I also notice that Vincent Longo’s work is featured in this book, pages 144-145, and I think was a teacher of mine at Hunter College in the late 1980′s.

Helene Manzo was at the opening and her work is on pages 148-149; got her signature.

I’m not sure, but I may have also taken a class with Don Nice at the School of Visual Arts sometime between 1974-76, his work is on pages 160-161.  Doug Ohlson was a teacher of mine at Hunter College in 1971-73 and I remember him well. 

I seem to recall meeting Paul Resika, that I was influenced by him many years ago, but it’s not clear to me how or when, and his work on pages 174-175.

Susan Sills was at the book signing and lives in Park Slope, I got her signature on the book, on pages 194 and 195; I liked her paintings which are adaptions from Manet, mainly.

Pat Steir’s name sounds familiar – I probably met her in Vermont, her work in on pages 196-197.

Come to think of it, I also studied  with Robert Swain at Hunter College in the 1970′s; his work is shown on pages 200-201.

I met Ella Yang a couple of months ago, she has a studio in the same building Brooklyn Artists Gym is located in – and I first heard about the book from her; Ella’s work in on pages 214-215.

OK, those were the artists that I studied with or personally met – many that I knew well enough that I could say some of them might remember me (15 artists out of 100).

What about the other New York Artists in the book that influenced me but who I did not personally meet?  Well, I remember hearing about Lennart Anderson while taking classes at the Art Student’s League in the 70′s-80′s, but I don’t think I studied with him.  Will Barnet has been a well known figure in the New York Art world and while I took some courses at Cooper Union as a teenager – (Saturday courses) I never personally met him (though I know he taught there).

I also am very familiar with Chuck Close (pages 66-67) but I never met him; I knew of Richard Estes (pages 92-93) via William Beckman, who’s not in the book but whom I studied with and knew in 1973-76 when Beckman taught art in Staten Island Community College – as it was called then. 

Of course, everyone knows of Eric Fischl (pgs 98-99) though I never met him – I saw his work around NYC often, there were many shows of his work, esp in the 1980′s. Jack Levine is well known, and I recall looking at his work though I was never influenced by it; same goes for Philip Pearlstein and Robert Mangold.  I am also very familiar with George Tooker’s work – and yes, he’s still alive and living in NYC, but very old by now.

And that’s about it – I studied with, met, knew or was influenced by half of the artists in the 100 New York Painters book! 

Yes, I had to buy the book.

I meant to write this earlier this weekend but have been so busy with painting and SEO Work, and life (I suppose) that I really did not have the time or energy – but I think I can write it down now.

Yesterday, when I worked on the painting / oil pastel sketch below – a couple of thoughts were on my mind.

One thought – how much different is what I’d doing now than what I painted 30 years ago?   For one thing, I don’t overwork nearly as much, work a lot faster and more focused – but for all that – I feel limited – that I haven’t really challenged myself enough – to go past the edges of what I know how to do visually.

And yet, the painting / sketch above seemed to have caught something I noticed several years ago about my Homage to Manet painting (see below)

There’s a “twist”, slanting that somehow works for me.  Yesterday, the same thing sorta happened, a slanting of the post is the left part of the picture that somehow made it more interesting.   In both cases i did not plan it – but I’m aware of it now.

That reminds me – Brice Marden mentioned in his talk today that he spends the majority of his time thinking about his work and deciding about it vs. actually producing it (he might have said it a little differently – but I think that’s what he meant).  When he was younger – he worked more than he does now - and he thinks about it more  – maybe, then he did earlier in his life.

Now, getting back to my paintings – when I detect things that work – even though there’s a lot I need to work on…..that still don’t work for me ….. I can use that information again – I can be more aware of choices I have before me.

Been busy – lots of stuff to do – but not that many art openings going on this week and next in New York City due to the Christmas and New Years holidays.

I was not planning on going to the Life Drawing session at the Brooklyn Artists Gym last night – I only came by to see the new studio space that’s going to be available starting next month (January 07).  The new space, 10,000 square feet is a significant improvement over our current space, and most of it will be studio space in form or another including: huge wet area in the studio, large room for 3D and crafts, a wood shop, a metal shop, art storage, a gallery that has more wall space and an alliance with Brooklyn Writer’s Space to have a writer’s studio.  BAG is poised to become a vital Art Center in New York City.

Since I was already at my studio and a life drawing session was going on – I drew and here’s what I came up with the same model, Aveida, who I painted last time (see the first picture below – the oil pastel was done about 10 days ago).

 

Here’s my conte crayon and oil pastel on newspaper sketches of the model from last night – most were 5 or 10 minute sketches.

 

I may cover a opening or two tonight and some more museum shows over the weekend – hopefully I’ll spend the bulk of the next 10 days painting.

I’m not sure if they are paintings or sketches.

The first was a model study I did this afternoon (above) – I arrived halfway into the session and spent about 90 minutes on this painting – there was lively conversation from the few of us painting from this model – who I think was named Avieda (hope I got the spelling right).

I did another still life and again, I had problems resolving this study – maybe it’s the coloring in the studio – the floors are a muted brown – green and I try to capture that – but there’s so much of it that I don’t have anything present in front of me to offset it - it’s almost a sea of brown – green – gray.  

I enjoy being immediate with Oil Pastels – little setup – fast results – both studies are 22″ x 28″.

Peter Wallace showed me the new studio space that we will be moving into starting January 2007 – down the hall – it’s magnificent – and there will lots more activities going on at BAG – and room for it.

By the way, the still life I did tonight is along the same theme as the one I did last month (below) with Junot wine bottle (I think it was Red Wine last month and White Wine this time.  I could do more elaborate still lifes if there was imagery I wanted to work with at the studio – most of the time I just take whats lying around.

I think the first Junot still life – the one with Red Scissors might have been more successful – less cluttered than the one I did today.  On the other hand, an artist paints what’s inside – sometimes it’s sunny and sometimes it’s stormy and cloudy – both are equally valid and important.  We can’t just pick out the parts of our life that we like and forget the rest – or else life loses it’s meaning.

So, I’m not sure what I’m working out today that was different than a month ago – or for that fact, The Red Cup still life I did two weeks ago – where I also had problems with figure – ground relationships. 

And I’m also thinking of the Black Nude Study I did two weeks ago.

I enjoy seeing these works together – the first two were new from today, the rest being done over the last month.  In fact, the “tone” of my first two pictures from today appears “darker” and more somber - yet I don’t recall being any more that way than before.

I think we just paint what is going on inside of us – can’t help it … sometimes it will come out bright, other times, somber.

I wanted to post something tonight – been pretty busy with my web analytic work – but here’s a thought – Art Newspapers …on the web – are there any? How many? Are there any Art Newspapers devoted to art in NYC?

I found The Art Newspaper to be pretty good, but not really about NYC – just things in the Art World in general.

Art Daily is another Art Newspaper – again it’s not about NYC – and it does not look as interesting as The Art Newspaper.

The ArtJournal seems seems to be the best of the three (save the best for last?).

I liked this entry from December 2nd.

“ When Admission Is Free, People Flock To Museums (Who Knew?) Admission to England’s museums and galleries has been free for five years. “To mark the occasion, the government released figures which showed an average 83% rise in visits to museums and galleries which formerly charged. That is 30m extra visits, says the government, and something to be celebrated, according to the culture secretary, Tessa Jowell.” But some warn that if the state cuts its support, the price barrier may have to go back up. The Guardian (UK) 12/02/06″ 

Yes, free admission for all museums does seem to help bring more people in. Actually, I think it’s the shows at museums that bring people in – and there are so many good ones in New York right now.