Finally Finished "Happy/Lucky/Fun"

Or is it "Happy/Fun/Lucky"?

Either way, Paul and Tara will just be happy (or lucky?) that I finally finished. Speaking of-here's a shot of the my other painting over at Paul's. I had never shot it before, and it's kinda fun seeing it fresh again.

Thanks again you two for the great Thanksgiving feast-definitely a good time!

No pictures from the great crab feed at my mom's house the next night, but trust me-that was tasty too.

Hope Everyone Had A Good Thanksgiving!

Another cool video! Pulled from the Fecalface site-made by Kristofer Strom for the group Minilogue-

Check out these two cool videos...very inspiring!

Great videos from Japan from a group of artists called "rinpa eshidan" that mix street art with hip-hop, that Lisa turned me on to. Very cool!..."1 Week Of Art Works"
"Puzzle"

Another arty weekend...

Another new painting idea and beginning...











I'm still more in an idea-hunt/start-up mode than true-painting mode, so-- another start-up.




And then, more "good times" this weekend. Lisa did such a good job blogging (as usual) that I'll just lift her entry, with a few of my own edits...

A Street's Winterfest

'A Street' in Santa Rosa continues to become an ever more happening little arts district, and this weekend they hosted the third annual "Winterfest" but only the first one we made it to. Sort of felt like the local version of Oakland's 'Art Murmur', if you read our post about that...
1) Laura Hoffman with me in her studio in front of 2 new great paintings.
2) With Bee, out in front of Mario Uribe's studios, where Bee was selling goodies from the new Cafe Saint Rose.

3) Andrea Speer Hibbard, of the great A Street Gallery, looking festive.



4 & 5) Two shots from Mary Vaughan's studio, but you simply have to click over to her studio to see her beautiful work properly!








These guys were playing up the alley--we would really like to hire them for a party one day. We also heard them once at Mosaic (the restaurant in Forestville.) Gin, I think is their name....



Painting by Frank Ryan, up & coming young artist!













Don Bishop, whose work we've always liked... also has a whole show over at the Petaluma SRJC campus

...and then there was this odd fashion show. "Extreme Hair" was the theme-- held in a hair salon. When we first arrived, we just thought we were woefully underdressed (or over-dressed).Ace photographer Bob Stender (he shoots alot of our work) finds the view pretty good from the cat-walk.









Finally, Lisa and I quaff an Ale in Graton's Underwood on the way home. Good Times!





Then the next day we headed out to the East Bay to an early afternoon birthday gathering at Claire Cotts' studio in Berkeley-which was fun, though we did'nt take any pictures to prove it. We did take a few of Erik Friedman and Emma Harris-Sintamarian"s mind boggling installation piece (called "Storm") at Swarm Gallery in Jack London Sq., Oakland (right next to Pro Arts Gallery). Holy moly you guys! These photos are pretty lame & don't come close to show the scale, depth, and insane amount of work-but, well-- that's what you get for looking at art on blogs.
(seriously-the amount of intricate cutting on this makes my fingers hurt.)
Then, on our way to some serious art-store retail therapy, we quickly revisited the Mercury 20 Gallery-but alas, closed. We still got another look at one of our new favorite painters, Tarra Lyons.-love this painting...We ended up bopping around on 4th street in Berkeley-which, by night-fall, was looking alot like you-know-what...and then, on our way outta town, over to Patti's for a quick visit and a late-nite snack (yum!-that was good Patti)-then back home to the shire.

Going in a few different directions...

Howdy once again. So what's this? I'll get back to you in a minute.
First-- what happened to my "drawing-a-day" project? Short attention span-theater, I guess.
I'll get back to it-- but I'm more in an idea-hunting, sketch-phase just now.
But I have a few drawings I didn't post before-- so let's get those out of the way first.



























Some of these look like they might one day "star" in their own painting-- who knows?
So I have been trying to hunt for some new ideas to paint-- I finally bought a new sketchbook-- and, I'm not going to bore anyone with ALL my mental meanderings, but here's a few that I think show promise...
.








(these are supposed to form one composition...the "target" at the far right of the left sketch is the same as the one that surrounds the girl in the right sketch)
(yeah, I been thinking about circus side-show banners...)

This is an idea that's been kicking around for a bit. It's based on an old toy box (the fox magician and rabbit, only I found another rabbit I wanted to use-- Disney's Oswald-- "the lucky rabbit"-- who actually pre-dates Mickey.) Anyway, it continues my circus-themed exploration. I transfered the drawing onto a 4'x4' panel,
but before I could dive in and start painting, I got another idea...

and began tranfering it to another 4'x4' panel, this time first laying down a thin base color-which always helps, but sometimes I get impatient and lazy and transfer my drawing just onto the white-primed panel, creating more work for me later on...
So-- what are these pictures about? I'm not telling.
No, they are continuing my idea to combine several commercial and "popular" forms of art (poster art, label and advertising art, children's book illustrations, comics and toys, etc.) mixed with some cross-cultural fertilization (Chinese New Year's posters, in the case of this second set) to tell a story. What's the story? I'll get back to you on that-- but I'm aware that I am trying to lighten up some.
OK-- well, you'd think I had plenty of starts here, but then I got another idea... remember this painting I did last year...?

I've been thinking about diptychs (and triptychs) again lately. I've also been thinking about the idea of expressing a sense of spirituality with paint and painting. So I've been thinking of India and that brought me back to the bottom half of this painting. Then I found this picture in one of our books...
here's a detail...
and so, that got me to this point last night...
It's also 4' tall, by about 3'. Where does it go from here? I'll get back to you.

Guess I've been distracted...

The people that follow this blog (all three or four of you) know I've been more than alittle obsessed lately. My next series of paintings? A new sketchbook with new ideas?
No. It was the election-and now, finally, that is over and I can get back to the pursuit of my calling. And I can do so with a renewed sense of hope.
Ok-so. I do have some new paintings about to be begun and some are actually from some of the new ideas I've put down in a new sketchbook, so I'll try to post some quick pics soon. Tomorrow Lisa and I head up north to Sea Ranch to hang with her dad and sister Karen's family-so that'll be fun. For now, I'll copy Lisa's post about our fun and art-filled trip to Oakland last Friday. We'd been hearing about this...a collection of new, young galleries concentrated in a formerly (?) sketchy neighborhood in Oakland-- who collectively have opening receptions on the first Friday of each month. It's called the Art Murmur. Here's a SF Chronicle article about the whole thing... and here's an interesting, longer article, that focuses on some of the potentially more controversial aspects: East Bay Express article. Anyways, we met up with friends Pati, Tara & Paul and hit the street, and it was more fun than we might have even imagined. Aside from the actual artwork displayed inside the galleries, there is a large component of block party, street theater, & performance art.
There was a dixieland jazz-style band playing; people were designing hats out of old sweaters and sewing them right on people's heads.
Many of our favorite actual pieces of art were at the Mercury 20 Gallery (formerly Robert Tomlinson's Studio & Gallery . He is someone both Lisa & I knew Way Back, when he showed art at his then store, 'Plate & Pallette'. (He sold one of my large paintings of my favorite model, Merav).
We also, completely by chance, ran into friends Elisa & Travis, who recently moved from Santa Rosa to Oakland. Elisa said they're about to write up a small business plan, and open a gallery/frame shop in this district. (Travis is the framer, Elisa a painter.) Excellent idea!

This is a nice guy I met, Eric. He said he was security (-'cuz you know how outta control those artists and their crowd can get)
This was one of our favorite artists: Tarra Lyons (she just e-mailed us with her name. We visited her website , and now we like her work even more! (click to enlarge any image)

& here's 2 more from the Mercury 20 Gallery--
Margaret Chavigny & Sheila Metcalf-Tobin.

















We were fascinated by these people designing hats on the street. I bet next time both Pati & Tara manage to get one made for them.































Two from the many rooms at Esteban Sabar.


... even stuffed bears need cigarette breaks.




that's Elisa & Travis on the left. (Elisa is gorgeous, and this photo doesn't do her justice! Also, apparently Travis has been seeing my barber.)




Kinetic sculture using... inflatable condoms, what else?