In part one of Joe Coleman’s talk at the Tilton Gallery I mentioned how Joe approaches his work and the details of “I Am Joe’s Fear of Disease” painting from 2001.

Someone asked Joe who was his first collector.  Who was his first collector?  Lady Bird Johnson! 

“At the age of eight, Coleman drew a series of representations of the Stations of the Cross and the martyrdom of the saints. The tension between physical agony and ecstasy with spirituality still riddles his work. By the age of ten, his painting of “garbage” won him an award and the acclaim of the then President’ s wife, Lady Bird Johnson.”

His mother kept the newspaper clippings which he still has today.  Joe also talked about a cache of photos taken by and of his father during the second world war that were both brutal (ie: a picture of his father holding the head of a enemy solder he had decapitated – and pornographic.  In other words, Joe came from a unusual family background – to put it nicely).

Joe also mentioned his being put into a class with the emotionally unstable when he was in the first grade. From that experience, he learned to identify himself as one of the “betrodden” and does not see himself as “above “anyone”.  He sees himself as very open, very sincere.  In fact, he has a bone about Modern Art, which he feels does not value Sincerity.   I’m not sure I understand exactly but that’s what he said.  He felt that he was an “outsider” based on reputation AND that he was dismissed by some because of his sincere approach.   Well…..he may have been dismissed before – but I don’t think he’s being dismissed now.

A couple of collectors in the front of the room talked about how they first met Joe Coleman, and one of Joe’s main collectors talked about how he brought a friend from europe up to one of Joe’s earlier shows on the Lower East Side – where the friend was out of breath by the time she climbed the sixth floor (where the show was) of the gallery building so she could meet the artist and see his work.

Joe Coleman also talked about how he met the two most important people in his life today at one particular show (one of the is Whitney, the other I could not make out at the back of the room).

Comment: As crazy as Joe Coleman likes to say he is, and also what his reputation might suggest, his appearance today showed me his feelings were much more “normal”.   If I were to compare Joe Coleman to any artist – based on his persona, I would cast Joe Coleman, with his violent feelings as a modern day Caravaggio – a much closer parallel than the one he makes out to James Ensor or any of the other crazy artists he might relate himself to).  Were Coleman is a reincarnation of an artist, based on Persona, - a least, as his life has gone so far, Caravaggio is a much closer fit.  Here’s an excerpt from Caravaggio’s bio:

“The details of the first Roman years are unknown, but after the time of the Contarelli project Caravaggio had many encounters with the law. In 1600 he was accused of blows by a fellow painter, and the following year he wounded a soldier. In 1603 he was imprisoned on the complaint of another painter and released only through the intercession of the French ambassador. In April 1604 he was accused of throwing a plate of artichokes in the face of a waiter, and in October he was arrested for throwing stones at the Roman Guards. In May 1605 he was seized for misuse of arms, and on July 29 he had to flee Rome for a time because he had wounded a man in defense of his mistress. Within a year, on May 29, 1606, again in Rome, during a furious brawl over a disputed score in a game of tennis, Caravaggio killed one Ranuccio Tomassoni. “  ….Coleman sounds tame compared to Caravaggio, but I see a lot of similarities between the two of them.

      

By the way, I tend to also write what “comes into me” – the idea of the artist as a “channel” is built in.  The main difference – I have decided art needs to be a two way channel (Yin/Yang).  It’s OK, not to be “guided”  – just put something down on canvas because you want it to be there – the human artist, outside of any “channeling” can be a ”voice” in the painting.  Case in point, compare Cezzane to Picasso:

“I am progresssing very slowly, for nature reveals herself to me in very complex forms; and the progress needed is incessant. (Paul Cezanne)” (passive – receptive – nature tells me what to paint and I follow, as best I can)

I do not seek. I find. (Picasso)   (active – I put what I find – I’m not looking for anything – it’s there cause I want it there)

What I really want is the balance. 

Joe Coleman also talked about a couple of paintings such as Indian Larry’s Wild Ride, 2005).

Joe and Indian Larry were friends and they had talked about doing a project together but it never happened.  After Indian Larry died, Joe took some of Indian Larry’s biker parts and worked them into the painting above.  He used a shirt (or something) from Indian Larry (totem).

Joe also talked about “I Can Still Remember the Glory That Was Once New York, 1994) as an example of painting the view of New York from where he lives in Brooklyn.  What Coleman is painting is the fear of what will happen, what did happen, what can happen when anyone can use technology to make a “dirty bomb” or some other man made disaster.  Coleman thinks that Technology, by making it easier to create destruction, is more scary than anything he can think of.  He worries about this and sees, in his mind, what could be.

I asked a question near the end of the talk, one that I also asked Amy Crehore, when I interviewed her, about how the Internet has influenced Joe Coleman’s art.  I asked the one question he probably had not been asked before – most of the other stuff he talked about today you could have found in someone else’s write up if you searched on it.    His answer: he is not affected much by the internet – it’s not part of his process (at this time).  He does wonder if some of his work shows up on EBay, but he does not seek to use the internet, in a more active role.

I don’t think Joe Coleman is alone in this, as many artists have not yet realized the potential of the internet has unlocked and that everything has changed in the last 5-10 years. 

It’s almost as if Joe Coleman is operating in a world where the Internet does not exist – even though he has a website (which loads very slowly, by the way).  Tina Shafer, a well known songwriter who I took an Art of Living course along with earlier this year, and many of the well known (in their own circles) songwriters had next to no internet visibility – nor any understanding of how much they could have had.

In my Webmetricsguru.com blog, I deal with Internet Issues, Internet Buzz, and I measured just how little buzz these songwriters created.  Fortunately for Joe Coleman, he creates enough controversy to get written quite a bit – and that serves as his promotion.  A search on Joe Coleman in Google produces 217,000 results if you search on “joe coleman”, without the quotes it’s over 11 million pages (but they might not all be about Joe Coleman).  That’s a lot of pages, the man is famous.   Still, he left a lot on the table with the internet.   Yet, at the end of the day, the internet is just a means to an end and it does not look like Joe needs any promotion – he’s already famous.

At the end of the talk I went to meet Joe Coleman and ended up talking to his wife Whitney, for about 10 minutes – very interesting woman.  With Joe, I introduced myself and mentioned that we may have met at the School of Visual Arts in 1976 as I was attending at the time he was.  I may have even saw him being expelled (a famous story) but if I did, I don’t recall it.  We spoke about 3 minutes, I shake hands and left.

As I left the Tilton Gallery I ran into Rebecca Lieb again, who I’ve seen at various Search Engine Conferences I attend, from time to time.  It seems that Rebecca also has her other “life” as a filmmaker who happens to be a good friend of Joe Coleman.   I was interviewed as part of a documentary (I think) for about 2 minutes – so spoke on camera.  I mentioned to Rebecca Lieb that I’d still like to write for ClickZ (hint hint), she mentioned we can talk about it later (she’s in her other life, film maker, right at that moment – the life of not being the lead editor of a top internet marketing online magazine and site). 

And that was my experience of Joe Coleman’s talk at the Tilton Gallery on September 9th 2006.  I’m glad I came to the talk as many of my questions were answered and I had a chance to throw in my own question about the Internet and to introduce myself. 

 

I went back to hear Joe Coleman talk, at the Tilton Gallery today, about his art because I did not see him or his wife at the show opening last Thursday. I also went so I could talk with him, introduce myself and see what else I could learn.  I did speak with him and his wife Whitney for a couple of minutes each.

When I interview people, I don’t take notes – they don’t help much; I’d rather concentrate on what is being said and write down what’s meaningful to me later. This is going to be a long post (or maybe I will break it up to 2 posts).

 

When I arrived at the Tilton Gallery and went to the second floor it was packed with about 150 people who came before me.  Here’s what I recall and when I make a comment, I’ll indent.

Joe Coleman does not plan what he’s going to paint ahead of time – he finds the center of each painting and works out, inch by inch.  What he paints is what comes to him, what appears in his mind.  In fact, he sees what he paints as “ideas fighting for his attention”.  Everything that’s in his painting fights to arrive in his consciousness, and then he’ll paint it.  His process is “passive“ - he views himself as an instrument, a channel for these ideas and feelings to work themselves out though his painting – including those ideas that come to him about his subject as he paints.

Comment: I believe artists of my generation, born in the 1950′s (I’m roughly the same age as Joe) have the ability to “tune in”, or “channel” levels of reality (it sounds kinda mystical – and that’s what it is).  About the same time Television arrived in every household – people began to “tune in”, zone out, space out, and receive input - both to TV and to their feelings.  The “input” comes from all levels of being including the spiritual realm, the ego and from repressed feelings.

There’s a natural inclination to let the spirit and ego forces “tell us” what to paint and “how to paint it”, the artist becomes a passive medium for those feelings.

I feel Joe Coleman approaches his work in this way based on what I heard.  

Coleman mentioned he does what he does because he has to – people can call it all kinds of things, he does not care, he still feels he does what he has to, and he has mentioned he did some crazy things as he had feelings he had to express.  One of those “crazy” thing in was working on a corpse in Budapest, under the supervision of a doctor, to look for the soul in the corpse.  He did not find the soul.  Joe also talked about his movies and performances as being outreach work (and having done some crazy things on screen as well) while his paintings are more private, something you must enter into.

Joe Coleman is proud of being in a exhibition with Peter Bruegel, Hieronymus Bosch, James Ensor (all were artistic influences).  From his Timeline Link: (in 1987 Exhibition at Chronocide sells out. Victoria and Albert Museum curator David Owsley buys a piece and hangs it next to a Breughel in his collection. Other shows at New York Academy of Art, NY Center on Contemporary Art, Seattle).

Anaphylactic shock is a  health problem that Joe Coleman has experienced a number of times and one of his paintings (I also wrote about this painting the other day, “I am Joe’s Fear of Disease, painted in 2001) is all about an experience he had with Anaphylactic Shock that sent him to a Brooklyn Hospital a couple of years ago.  Whitney, Joe’s wife, told me how Joe was on the way to the hospital, begining to go into anaphylactic shock, which can be fatal, yet wanting to focus on some detail, an orange light, something for his painting.   No one seems to know for sure what causes Anaphylactic shock, and they are of the opinion it may be an allergic reaction. 

The painting (Joe’s Fear of Disease) is mounted to a hospital gown he wore when he was being admitted/treated at the hospital.  This relates to his need/love for totems. Some of his or Whitney’s blood is also contained in the painting (I’m not sure if it’s his or hers) as is his wrist band identifier and hospital card.  The online link to a detailed imagemap of this painting is available at http://www.joecoleman.com/gallery/fear/fear.html

For the rest of Joe Coleman’s talk, see part 2.

One of the fanciest art openings I have attended, one that Amy Crehore suggested I attend (and who I dragged my son to), Joe Coleman’s opening at the Tilton Gallery - was more of a “Star” event than an art opening.  In fact, the Tilton Gallery seems to be more of a Joe Coleman Museum – shown in darkened rooms with each painting highlighted so it seemed to pop out of the wall.  Nothing was left to chance for this opening – and it was well attended!

In the Realms of the Unreal (Henry Darger), 1998  Acrylic and Mixed Media on panel, 24 5/16″ x 30 5/15″

I took pictures, or had Adam take pictures for me, but the room was so dark, nothing much came out.  It was clear that Joe Coleman has “arrived” – and no doubt will be collected by every major museum – if he hasn’t already been.   Before I talk about Joe

Coleman’s work (I also wrote about Joe Coleman a couple of days ago in Joe Coleman Gets a Retrospective at the Tilton Gallery in Manhattan), here’s a couple more pictures.

   

I had my son take a picture of me against a couple of Coleman’s paintings that were suggestive of themes I can relate to like The Dream of Sigmund Freud (1993) and the Victory of Hell (1995) (above right photo); I believe that’s also the painting I am standing in next to, but it’s not that clear in the photo.

I also spotted Rebecca Lieb of ClickZ at Joe Coleman’s opening but did not get to speak to her – writing for ClickZ is by invitation only ….and I did not get my invite (yet).  I run into Rebecca at various Search Engine Strategies and also at the first Online Video Conference last June (where I also recorded a Podcast – for anyone who cares to listen – it’s here - you need iTunes to listen to it though). Maybe everyone can send Rebecca Lieb a note and tell her they’d read ClickZ if I wrote a column on Web Metrics for them…oh well, it’s ok to imagine.

Getting back to Joe Coleman’s opening – there were a lot of interesting people – the type of people that you might not see at an upper east side exclusive art gala opening…biker types, people with a lot of tattoos, a lot of attractive woman (that’s normal) in low cut dresses (maybe that’s normal too)!

The paintings were ……. like a cross between comic books and Van Eyck paintings – every bit of every painting had detail, upon detail, upon detail …almost like a fractal – that expanded onto itself.  

Composition ….that takes care of itself – Coleman is painting a Mandala – it’s the same Mandala but the subjects change.  I found the Dream of Sigmund Freud, for example, very successful in doing something I’m trying to do – segmenting life into the various syndromes that Freud wrote about and, to some extent, invented the vocabulary for.

Then there’s paintings where the artist is painting himself, or himself and his wife, such as “Love Song, (1999). I understand that Joe Coleman got married in 2000, maybe the Love Song is part of the courtship…just guessing here.  Almost every painting has a lot of sex – let’s face it – we all think that way ….. Coleman paints it – in grueling detail a morphs it into a morbid dance – but one you can’t stop looking at….and that’s the Art of it…you can’t stop looking at them.   In fact, if you were to stop and really look at a Joe Coleman painting – it would take you hours to read ever little bit of text and image on any one painting – and since he spends a year working on one (he does several at one time – but it takes about a year to complete each one from start to finish) a couple of hours is not too much to ask.

In another painting, “I am Joe’s Fear of Disease”, painted in 2001, Coleman sticks his hospital admission pass to Brooklyn Medical Center and the IV he was given fluids with onto the frame of the painting.

The basis – the need to illustrate every significant thought, idea, event, feeling that’s connected with the subject – and stick them all onto one painting – is not a new idea.  When you get close to Joe Coleman’s work – it seems a combination of illustration and painting – the color pops out (the more so against darkened walls in a darkened room) and every part of the painting is executed in exacting detail.

There’s no question that Joe Coleman is a great artist; who will be well collected.  I think, if I were ever to interview Joe Coleman, I’d try to find out what makes him tick…..what is he trying to say….

Another amusing detail …in Public Enemy Number One (John Dillinger), painted in 1999, Dillinger’s dick is painted, cut off, at the bottom of the painting – Coleman writes that Dilllinger’s dick was collected, as was the rest of his disected body….by collectors.   I enjoyed seeing Joe Coleman’s sense of humor – perverted, not doubt, but what’s not perverted?  Maybe that’s the whole of point of this.  Some people were looking at the images and writings on the paintings and taking them literally – and those people might be offended.

But I was not offended, I had fun looking and reading what was on each painting – and if were not for the crowd and my son Adam, tugging at me, I’d have spent a bit more time at Tilton Gallery looking at Joe Coleman’s paintings.