The garbage of eden

I posted a series of in-progress shots to Facebook and I figured I ought to follow up with a proper explanation for those who are interested. And while we're at it, here, for the tech nerds, is a link to the demo tag featured on this blog.

Don’t forget you can click the images to enlarge the pics.

I’ve been craving long, involved near-to-impossible projects since completing Eastern State.  Since I draw so many weird flowers, I had the idea for this garden image and you can see here I worked it out in photoshop. (The procedure: the flowers were doodles I scanned, cleaned up and “painted” in photoshop, then I put them together.  I had a real bee in my bonnet that it should be en endless repeat, at least on the horizontal, and repeat it does.)

I also had a doodle of this woman kind of rolled up in a ball.  I will often pair doodles of figures with doodles of other stuff to see how they go together  (photoshop allows me to try out literraly hundreds of combinations in minutes.)

.…In this manner I generate what passes for an “IDEA”.  Anyway, the balled up woman falling into the garden was too awesome and thus the seeds were sown (get it? Get it?) for “The Birth of Eve”.  The title came last and it may yet change.

In working with the glass I gave myself the mandate gentle suggestion to improvise.  If my work looks like the drawing, I am generally not amused.  And by that, I mean I go into a state of rage and melancholy usually reserved for world wide eco-political disasters.  Just kidding.  ANYWAY:  I wanted to improvise, to learn something new, and test the boundaries and whatnot.   Ultimately, it seems to me I improvised more with the drawing than with the material.  Deep sigh…

What we have here below is the blue and the red glass well on their way.  The glass was cut and ground to shape.  Then it is sandblasted, in most cases, with little or no detail added.  I then went into it with engraving tools and files to get much more detail.  In this image three sections also have black paint fired on.

In this image below, all the black paint is done. (2 firings.)

This image is the gloriousness of silverstain before its fired.  It looks like baby messed his diaper.  When it’s fired it looks the same.  UNTIL…it is washed off and underneath the schmears is bright yellow.

And look!  That’s yellow all right!  A Chernobyl nuclear urine nightmare of yellow!  I just slop that stuff on, fully intending to engrave tons of it off.  Sounds like extra work?  Muhahaha!  I love extra work!

And here’s that yellow tamed.

Here are some images of the layers completed. 

The top image is the blue—you can see that there are two different blues here.  One is Lambert’s blue on clear and the other is St. Just 221 aqua which I had to comb the hills and travel the earth to find.  When I am done with everything I think I going to do to torture the glass I fire polish it (1330f).  With all that engraving and sandblasting, there’s a lots of frosty texture which really makes it hard to see the image when its layered.

In this case, I did not fire polish the St Just as it turns nasty.  So I coated it with a very thin layer of Golden acrylic varnish, which claims to be archival until cockroaches have evolved to become our insect overlords.

The bottom image is red, duh!

Then…I add a layer of pink glass.

The top image is what it looks like on the pieces so far, with no sandblasting.

Below is the layer on its own.  Just like the St. Just, none of this is really amenable to fire polishing, as it tends to turn colors and actually get more opaque kind of defeats the purpose.  So I use the varnish on this too.

And voila: here’s the whole thing together. Am I done?  I dunno, actually, I have a few tweaks I want to try….really, really high risk tweaks in that if I do them and they look awful, I will have to redo the entire red layer…

Doodles

I wanted to scan some of my teenaged doodles for a lecture so here they are.  I was constantly doodling as a teenager (and I still often do, but less and less do I find myself in a situation wherein I can doodle and this is NOT GOOD for my art work!) These are all liberated from their original context, but I can tell you, they were all on pages of notes from classes and homework.  I always got my papers back with big red comments about "NO DOODLING IN THE MARGINS!!!" Well, I showed them, eh?

Anyway--I would doodle anything.  So long as it was a human!  But as you can see, some are "realistic" some are more abstract, some more expressive and some more observational.  Most are done with ballpoint because I was in the classroom.  But as a result of that "training" I now use ballpoint most of the time.

The thing about doodles is this:
When one is a young artist, casting about to find their "artistic voice"...well this is it.  This is the stream of raw material which effortlessly comes out and here you are, the young art student, struggling like mad to be profound and meaningful...to have something original to say.  In my case, I looked in books, libraries, museums, classrooms...I sweated bullets and stewed in my own juices over this...only to find what I had been seeking was there the whole time but I was still seeing that red ink:
"NO DOODLING IN THE MARGINS!!!"

So I stopped doodling in the margins and now I doodle over the whole page!

By the way: my cat Spock's nickname is Doodles.

"Sister"

 click images to bigify

I thought perhaps a post just devoted over to this one window was in order.
Why?  Well, its the only piece from eastern State that I added considerably--more than a border and thus, it has become an entirely new one in some ways.
I knew from the outset that I was going to do this--why and how I know this I can't say beyond an intuitive feeling, but I waited a year to do it and was excited about it.

Two images that influence this are below.  One is the famous image from the Vietnam War by Huynh Cong and the other a stained glass window by Abraham Van Linge.

Everyone knows that photo from Vietnam--you need only type Vietnam and Napalm for it to come up in a Google search. As a figurative artist, it appeals to me on many levels.  First and foremost the gruesome subject matter.  But beyond that I am blown away by how the formal elements support the subject.  She's the only one unclothed...and she's a running crucifixion. She is directly facing the viewer, which makes it impossible not to imagine that she is running right at you.
 Her face expresses her pain and horror while the  boy in the foreground is more or less a "tragedy mask".

The Van Linge window is at Lydiard House, Swindon, Wiltshire, UK.  Van Linge and his bro, Bernard used enamels to create their images.Enamels became popular after the protestant Reformation whose iconoclastic tendencies put a lot of stained glass makers (and suppliers) out of business.  As it became harder to get colored glass, the more painters relied on enamels to get their imagery across...or at least that's how I understand it.
I hate enamels...they look like gnat's piss to me compared to the colors of flash glass.  In my humble opinion, the only enameler worth a damn is Van Linge.  This particular window is one of my favorites.

A passionate aside:  Often people think my imagery is made with enamels.  It is NOT.  My images are barely painted.  They are engraved into layers of colored glass (and just to be super nit-picky: "engraving" is done by using some type of tool to carve into something and etching uses acid.  Big diff!)
I use black paint and silverstain (yellow) and nothing else. 

So, "Sister" is some sort of weird hybrid between these two images, in addition to how the image arose inspired by Eastern State.

Eastern State Windows reworked

Because they were site specific--and by that I mean they weren't just inspired by Eastern State, but utterly dependent on that venue to give them integrity as works design-wise as well, the pieces need some attention after their removal.  The idea was to work with the original idea and to honor their origins as coming from the penitentiary but to give them autonomy at the same time.

In Eastern State, the work was installed in Cell Blocks 8, 11,14 and the hallway of 11.  Each work could be seen as individual works, each section could be seen as individual installations and the whole thing could be seen as one big installation.I wanted to hearken back to this and resolve the pieces as groups, but they are not to be seen as large works--just individuals in a series.

 Click to enlarge!

I worked with images of the penitentiary to create borders for the Con/Fines windows that would emphasize their isolation and solitary struggle.  For this reason the border is exaggerated in scale.  There’s a lot of stone to dig their way through should they be contemplating an escape!  And of course, it is very similar to the surrounding stone in the penitentiary itself.

The ornamental windows were given an ornamental surround.  The idea here, was to  honor the original groupings, but to give them individuality.  These borders update the works so that they reference Gothic Revival and Victorian work.  They are intended to create a dazzle effect of truly blazing color.

For the three Icarus windows, I wished to take the opportunity to point out something no one noticed whilst they were installed at Eastern State and that is they were based on the primary colors of red, blue and yellow.  The border was then given the texture of distressed concrete, which is a familiar sight at Eastern State.  The same distressed concrete texture was used in the borders of the Weeping Chorus works.  They were indeed in cells of stained and cracked concrete.  The Mother and Child windows were actually in cells that had some pretty serious ceiling leaks and thus, the sensation of weeping was all the more evident, as one visitor emailed me to say.

The “Sister” window was built out—the only one of all the windows.  She is now in a crucifixion pose, making the Weeping Chorus an “optional” triptych as would be seen in a church.

 I made no changes to this window! 

I was struck in the making the transformations of these windows how easily and simply they went from “prison” to “cathedral”.  The Con/Fines and ornamentals are the windows one would see along the nave and in the clerestory of a gothic cathedral.  The Battle of Carnival and Lent the large Eastern window in the Apse!  The Icarus windows  could be in a side chapel as well as the weeping chorus with the crucifixion right in the middle where it so obviously belongs. It’s amazing how trust in the process allows these “coincidental” developments to occur without effort.  It was certainly as if it were meant to happen!
 

This is from Lawrence Lee's "Stained Glass"

My tumblr site

Hey folks!
I now have a tumblr.
As you may have noticed, this blog is mostly updates on my art work.  I figured the tumblr can be a way of sharing that which inspires me.

Every day, in the manner of one reading a newspaper, I go though a ton of websites to peruse what images are tickling the fancy of various strangers.  Who knew there was so much weird and interesting stuff out there?  (Cue aging person's astounded rumination at the change in how imagery is distributed in the modern world.)
And no, I don't read the newspaper.  

Please read this post if you are interested in why I like these images...or in the parlance of today's youth "how I prefer to consume them.".

Meanwhile, here's a few images to jazz up this post!

Hey!!!

Should you find yourself in Paris, I have a work in HEY!  Modern Art and Pop Culture, a show with 61 artists.  The exhibition runs from Jan 24-August 23 2013 and is at  the Musee de la Halle Saint Pierre, 2, rue Ronsard, Paris France.  Check Hey!'s website for more information!  Or click on these images to enlarge.

Late breaking noose--due to unforeseen circumstances, the work was unable to be in the show!! But, should you be there, stop by and check out the other wonderful work!!

Battle of Carnival and Lent book available!!

The Battle of Carnival and Lent by Judith Schaechter |


I have finished the book...barely in time for the holidays.

I apologize for the high price, such is the world of self publishing.  To make it smaller would mean less images and/or smaller ones and I really wanted to make a document that was somewhat representative of the experience of seeing the work as it was intended.

happy holidays!!!

Eastern State Penitentiary--Last Chances to see the installation

 On December 2nd, my installation at Eastern State Penitentiary will come to a close!  :(

(Photo by Dominic Episcopo)

 It has been absolutely fantastic to have had the opportunity to design and install for one of my favorite spaces on earth (and in my hometown!). 

If you are interested, please know that this is the  last chance to see the work in its intended setting—one that hearkens to sacred architecture like chapels and even cathedrals, while at the same time being a place of incarceration and also a fantastically lovely creepy ruin.

My work is usually seen in light boxes.  At Eastern State, it is installed in directly in the architecture and as such the images are dynamically powered by nature—the weather,  the time of day and the season.  With constantly changing light, the works truly come alive!!  Seriously, if you like my work, you don't want to miss this!

Please check out Eastern State's website for information on hours , directions etc as well as information on special Flashlight tours!

(Flashlight tour photo by Charles Outhier)

Engraving

Here's some images of the final sections of snakes.  In the images, you are seeing the glass after it has been sandblasted and the patterns on the snakes have been drawn on with a permanent sharpie pen.
Now it is ready to engrave.

For many years I engraved with a Foredom flexible shaft series S engraver which is a wonderful workhorse of a tool.  It is very affordable and if you maintain it, it will function fantastically for eons on end. (Note to students: all Foredoms in art schools are in HORRENDOUS condition.  All of them, everywhere.  Its like trying to engrave with a jackhammer while disco dancing.)

I recently invested in a new engraver called an Emax Evolution.  It is expensive but much more comfortable to hold and it engraves at a faster speed.  So they say--I am not sure I can really tell the diff.  But it is a smoother ride, all in all.  The only issue I have with it besides the noise is that the motor is housed in the handpiece itself.  In the video demo© (a new feature here at The Noose!  :)), you can't see the water.  Know that there is a small puddle in the area to be engraved, as there always must be when using diamond tools.  This preserves the diamond surface and allows engraving to be a smooth operation.

You can see in the demo that every scale in every snake is done with massive amounts of love and care!  Gotta nurture them snakes!  This is yet another reason my work takes forever. 

Slithering away

The second third is done. And woopsy...I totally intended to do a blow by blow deconstruction of this one...but I didn't and I apologize. Things are super busy around here and I just went for it, full steam ahead. Hopefully on the third third I will take more in progress shots.

 Four of six panels complete.  The two on the right are what I just finished.  Two more to come.

 Details: click to enlarge.

Endless, endless snakes.

 "What's this?" you say.  I'll tell you.  This is the alchemist revealing the secret of how to turn lead to gold. This is what you've all been waiting for......this is what has been held back from you by selfish and secretive paranoid art-cabals.
This is .............wait for it.................this is nothing short of the key to how to make manifest amazing visions in material-artwork-form revealed at last....this is how to produce scintillating works of art ex nihilo!

Ok..maybe its more like finding out who Oz really is...

The secret is endless, endless, endless practice and work!  MUHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAAAAAA!  Joke's on you if you thought otherwise.  OK--I know people reading this are almost all artists and know what I mean...but I have to get my jollies somehow.

What you see above  the wizard pic is the panels of glass with the Sharpie pen demarcations on them for the next stage which is engraving.  (Sharpies are so awesome they deserve a link....even though they are already massively popular.)

I want to point out what this stage represents, which should explain why I got all wierd above about revealing the wizard of Oz etc etc):
FIRST, I worked in Photoshop with existing images of snakes to create the swarmy pattern (which I got it in my noggin should be a repeat).  This took over a week.
THEN I printed that out and redrew it, in my own hand with a rapidograph on mylar.  This took about a week.
(THEN  I scanned that and painted the snakes in Photoshop. Please note this stage was not necessary for the stained glass--but because I wanted to use the document for other things as well--also, I was very concerned that although I was using found source material that the snakes be MINE, ALL MINE by the time I was done.)
THEN I printed the black and white document out to use for the glass, actual size.
THEN after cutting the glass, I traced the snakes onto the contact paper sandblasting stencil.  I am not using a photographic process here.  Why?  Because often when I do that it looks like RAT VOMIT.  And I have to spend several extras days trying to make what the stencil wrought into something that doesn't suck. So much for The Convenience of Mechanization...or the superiority of digital methods, for that matter--hand done is way faster!  This took about four days.
THEN, after sandblasting I drew all the snakes back onto the glass, patterns and all on both layers.  This also took about four days.

So how many times have I drawn these snakes already?  Ten katrillion?  That's certainly what it feels like!  On the upside, I feel like a leading expert in "how to draw snakes"!

Next up:  Days and days of engraving.  Or, as I like to say enGRAVEng.   (The whole engraving will take over a week or even more than two and then I will paint--so stay tuned... to get to the finish line, the whole thing will take months.)

So when people think art is some kind of magical process, all I can say is walk a mile in my moccasins, bro.  But lest you think I am complaining:  I love this!  Its just not easy or simple...or magic!