Der Traum

I just spilled a huge mug of Sleepy Time tea all over my bed. This is just awful.

In other news, Rommel was perched up on my shoulder earlier and somehow removed one of my earrings. Now, I've been wearing the same set of earrings for the past four years, generally because I never could figure out how to take them off. But I liked them, see, so I didn't really care. But now I've got only one in and I still can't figure out how to get the darn thing out. Uncool.

I worked on the surface of the new painting today. I'm going to bring out the dark colors more, and then set about calming it down a little. Right now it kinda looks like acid on speed.



Snow storm is supposed to hit tonight. I hope this doesn't screw up my friend's flight from Zurich...

W and I talk a lot about the paintings we're working on, the progress we're making, the challenges we're facing and the things we're discovering. One of the problems I've faced with my work is the fact that because it's pure abstraction there's no real deeper meaning to them. In W's work, a blob of color isn't just a blob of color... on closer inspection, if you look at the piece long enough, you might discover that it is in fact a crude representation of an island, or that a scribble in the corner is actually a hand grenade. And the painting would take on a whole new meaning for you. Even if you don't "get it" you will sense that there is more to the piece than meets the eye. And that's how the best abstractions are – they're rooted in reality.

In my work, I just haven't gotten there yet. I feel like I'm still building my alphabet, and I'm just not ready to start forming words and stringing together sentences. I'll get there, but right now I'm still learning how to work with paint and pushing the limits of what I can do with it. Only once I've built up my paint vocabulary will I be able to pen great stories. For now they're more like primal grunts swoons and screams, but they will evolve. It will just take time and patience.

I worked away at the surface of the new painting today, cleaning it up and prepping it so I can paint on it some more. Here's how it currently looks:



Now I just need to sit and stare at it for a few days and figure out how I'm going to proceed. It's a pretty nice foundation, though. I'm really happy with the color scheme and movement.

I lazed around a little today, which felt good. I read a little of Theory in Contemporary Art since 1985, and got a roast beef sandwich from Swim Cafe for lunch. It was the best roast beef sandwich I think I've ever had, with brie and portabello mushroom. And I worked on the painting, of course. Rommel helped; he's becoming quite a little artist bird.

My friends list is kind of sparse lately; a lot of people who used to post all the time don't seem to be updating as frequently now, so I'm trying to scout out some new people to add.

I did a search for users who list "contemporary art" as an interest, but I found that most of them (the English speakers, anyway) just kind of listed it as an interest and it's not really a part of their life. Then I searched for people who listed themselves as interested in "painting", but found all those journals to be generally written by a really young crowd with no real skill, or people who do comic book/pop culture type stuff, and not really the kind of hard-core/museum quality art that I'm looking for. Maybe artists just aren't very blog savvy. Or maybe they're hard at work in their studios.

The Russians are a different story, and I wish I could understand what they write. They've got the best contemporary art blogs! Really interesting stuff. I added a bunch of them as friends; I can at least look at the photos they post and appreciate what I see.

If anyone knows any real artists* out there please please please I beg you to send me their username!

And if you have someone on your friends list who's just plain fun/interesting to read, please send me their username too ;)


* ie, no hipsters who create funny cutsie things, no crafty diy-ers, no one who draws funny monsters in comic book/ pop culture style, no Sunday painters, etc.

I need to get some sleep!

If I had to use a doll for sex, I don't think I'd want it talking at me. Maybe that's just me, though.

Inventor unveils $7,000 talking sex robot

The new power sander is great. I sanded away on my latest painting for an hour with it this afternoon:



I got the same kind as before so I can attach it to my shop vac like I did with the old one (it makes for a much cleaner studio to have the shop vac sucking up all the sanded debris).

Last week my favorite art store here, went out of business. I pass the place twice a day as I walk from my studio to work and back again, and I used to stop in every few days. I got to know the people who worked there over the years, and they used to always wink and give me a 20% discount because I gave them so much business. They were seasoned artists, and they were all super nice and knowledgeable. If they didn't have something I needed we'd go to the back office and go through their stacks of catalogs and search the internet to find it.

They had a huge clearance sale to sell off all the merchandise; everything in the store was 50% off. Over the course of a weekend I cleaned them out of all their metallic and fluorescent acrylic paint, as well as the majority of their stretcher bars.





I have enough to last me a while, but it'll all get used up faster than you'd imagine. It really sucks they went out of business... the other art stores are out of my way and staffed with part-time employed art students who don't know much about what they're selling, and they don't carry any of the fluorescent or metallic paint that I use. I guess I'll have to resort to the internet. Bah.

I just filled out paperwork to get a corporate card.
I feel like Faust.

I might be flying out to LA next week to shoot some footage.

My shop vac just sucked up a brand new pair of pantyhose. Crap.

My parrot regurgitated on me last night. This is something African grays do to show affection, so it was kind of cute but kind of gross, too.

I heard something rustling around again last night and went to investigate.

I followed the noise to a white plastic bag that, among other things, contained some treats for my parrot, so The Thing was apparently having dinner. I snatched up the bag, but the creature was quick and I saw a dark shape dart out of the bag and behind a board that was propped against the wall. I pulled the board away, and there was no mere mouse behind it, but a giant fucking RAT. It dove under my work table, into a wadded-up plastic tarp. I stood there with my jaw dropped for a moment, and then decided that I didn't really feel like dealing with a giant fucking RAT at 3am, so I went back to bed. I left the light on in hopes that it would frighten it into remaining in the tarp while I got some sleep, but NOOOOOooooo, it kept me up ALL night, scratching at things and running around. I gathered together a pile of cheap Home Depot paint brushes, and used them as projectiles every time I saw it run out across the floor, which did nothing to alleviate the situation, but it was somewhat cathartic.

I think it's only been in my place for the past couple days, but I'm wondering how the hell it got in? I have something of a hell-mouth in my back laboratory slop-sink room, and while I typically keep the door to that room closed, I did leave it open when I ran upstairs to throw some laundry in the drier on Sunday night, so maybe it ran in then. Who knows.

I called my building management and they're sending Pest Control over to deal with the situation. Let's hope this little unpleasantness will be over by the time I return home this evening.

I so this morning at 6:30 I was awakened by the sound of large sheets of paper moving around (the enormous sheets of paper I use for my paintings), and at first I believed it must be my bird flapping his wings causing things to blow around. But then I saw his dark silhouette – he was deep in sleep, perched up on his tree. I tried to peer into the darkness to see, but couldn't make anything out, so I got up and turned on the lights. All was still. There were a bunch of large sheets of paper that I'd dipped in paint a few days ago (to make cool drool-y patterns) stacked in a corner, so I lifted them all up one by one, trying to see if there was anything beneath. Finding nothing, I put it all up on my work table and went back to bed. I figured it must have just been a very vivid dream and that I had imagined the sounds. But then about 15 minutes later I heard something rustling the paper again, so I know it was real. So crap. I probably have a mouse in the house.

On Sunday evening the sun set and I forgot to close the blinds. It was around 5pm and I was at my computer when I heard a rustling outside the front windows. I looked up to see that there were roughly a dozen neighborhood kids staring in my studio windows with wide eyes and jaws dropped; I suppose it must have been strange to suddenly catch a glimpse of my odd, colorful little world. All the paintings that cover the walls and floor, my parrot sitting in his manzanita tree, the gramophone... When they saw me notice them one girl waved and yelled "will you paint ME???" I laughed and waved back, shaking my head. I paint abstract, what can I say? Embarrassed, I politely lowered the blinds. If it had just been a few I would have invited them in, but a dozen kids in here? That would have been nuts.

26"x26"

I did this one a little differently; I didn't use any fluorescent paint and I didn't sand it down. I like it.

Over the Thanksgiving break I deep cleaned and Feng Shui-ed my studio. I threw out a whole bunch of old junk that was taking up space, and made the slop-sink room in the back more usable. It was the "prosperity corner" according to my Feng Shui book, and was in a dire condition, as I'd been using the area as a storage space, allowing junk to pile up. Now the whole place feels better. My bathroom towels match. Old food long past the expiration date was pitched. I finally took care of all the little details that I typically let slide.

I got Rommel a giant manzanita branch to perch on when he's outside of his cage. It's attached to a base on wheels so I can move it from place to place, which is great. I hung toys all over it for him, so it looks vaguely like a really messed up christmas tree.

I got an actual Christmas tree too. It's metallic pink and 4 feet tall. Yay Christmas.