Today's Underdrawings

Adjunct Faculty Showcase at Brown

 This is an installation I just did in the Brown University List Art Center Lobby.  What a treat to have a short show there with two other new adjunct faculty members this Spring!  Taylor McKenzie-Veal and Becky Brown have wonderful work.  Definitely worth a look.  Only up til this Thursday evening (2/20)!

New Slides

In Process

Studio and Easel

Stupid Damn Romantic

Damn Romantic

Cabinet/Hall in Process, Developments

In Process - The Cabinet, Hall, or Display

Another View from the Easel

Ennui Rainbow

In the thicket / Process

Self Portrait as a Young Pile

Gift

This has already left my studio, and I miss it, but I forgot to post it to the blog a few weeks ago, so as I'm working on a few things I thought I would post it now. It was a gift, so I made it kind. I'm interested in the formal play of these deer, as if the echo of the shape is important somehow. My friend Arthur did a great post on visual rhymes on his blog, check it out here. It just got me thinking about my reasons for doubling and copying. Anyway, this drawing is tamer than some of the things I'm working on now! In the works: pin ups topping cornucopias, new moral messaging as campaign slogan, chopped up figures, all the presidents heads, more political cartoon as still life fruit salad. See you soon.

Young Kennedy and Young Bucks

Deer Miniatures

I had been teaching my first painting classes about portrait miniatures but I hadn't yet been engrossed by the idea of a portrait miniature, even though I had been engrossed by the idea of detail. Here's to a comedic portrait miniature, where line and mark are ham-fisted but delicate! I mean to do a large grid of these, is that silly? I thought it was kind of funny to have trophies that are usually so large sized down to around 3" tall by 2" long (yes these are really small - note the dust and cat hair).

A Poem for Dropped Things

A reference to the unswept floor? Maybe. I would hope this is not what I would wish for my ancestors, or what I think of them. Evidently the Romans believed leaving food on the floor, or tromp l'oeil versions of it would be nourishing for the dear departed. Yikes. And yet there is something wonderful about having a use for those dropped table scraps beyond feeding the cat or dog. I like to think of this one as a harmless cornucopia. Mostly harmless.

Pile of Viewfinder Cameras

While sipping tea I decided to make a new post to keep the blahs away. This is a favorite of mine from grad school. Sorry for the dark detail, but it is necessary to see the way the flags reference the object oriented drawing. I think I lost track of why I included the flags in the first place, as signals or labels or maybe mislabels.

The Ministry of Operatic Self Effacement and Other Such Rot

So my old friend Arthur Whitman blogged about me, so I can remain anonymous and naive no more, so I better start putting up the new paintings too. Hey Arthur, this is what I'm really doing in the studio.. just kidding, I really do like the drawings. But these 9 x 12 foot paintings are kind of my bread and butter right now. Two days ago someone asked me after I had read bits and briefs of my nasty/crazy RISD thesis, in a lecture I was lucky enough to score with a wonderful old professor's class, why I was working with classical still life painting painting if I wanted to talk about operatic self-effacement, eating disorder, perversions of the celebration of identity, etc. I couldn't really answer, but I found the question intriquing. This astute artist mentioned Todd Haynes, also a Brown grad, who has made cracker jack eating disorder work with barbies in Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story. I wasn't sure I knew the work, but when I looked him up I found he had done that lovely little movie Safe, one of my faves, if you are paranoid or germ phobic and sometimes housebound like me some of the time. The color in the movie was startling, and as I started to respond to chemical odors in like ways over the years, I have enjoyed the work even more. I like the stuff he's done with film, I don't know why I remain so classical, or why I'm stuck with this devotional and formal homage to excess. I don't think Brown's media theory really rubbed off on me very well. Maybe I'll grow out of it. Maybe I'm just playing dumb. This big painting is called Pile of Cliches and Dead Things. A big hurrah for dumb and literal in the face of disintigrating notions of what I can do with my paintbrush, my politics, my identity, my stomach, etc etc. Maybe when I post the older nastier big 9 x 12 foot painting I will post bits of my statement, I'm just afraid I might be censored on blogger if I get too gross here too quickly. Cut up torsos and heads on sticks are one thing, but I started to honor my thesis and get into Marquis de Sade territory these past few months in my drawings, and I'm afraid of losing my happy little webspace, or scaring my nice studio-mates. They already think I'm the most well-adjusted creepy big-litle girl artist they know.