Dave Hickey quotes, from his lecture at The Smithsonian:

"One of the problems with artists is that they have moral principles. They are involved in a vocation. They have taken an oath to be free. They have taken an oath to have contempt for their peers. They have taken an oath to get up on the front of the wave in the absolute pretense of invulnerability. All of these fragile people, out there in the dark, pretending to be invulnerable."

"What if all the people at Art In America got up one morning and said, "This is all crap... let's just wait until we get some good stuff to publish another issue..."

The whole lecture is here.

I am working furiously, but also writing grants that have December deadlines. Planning my solo exhibition for next year, and rying to wrap up the pieces that will be in it. Figuring out what will go to the gallery for exhibition during Art Basel. Preparing to teach a class in January. Starting a new blog, The Last Art Taboo. Check it out. Let me know if you know any appropriate artists I can interview.

On the books for Spring to teach an experimental drawing class at (don't laugh at the irony) Catholic University.

Never Again....

will I redo anything. It did not start as a redo. A curator in Berlin asked about the full size working drawing of Blessed Art Thou (she was interested in the image, not the working drawing aspect). I told her I would have to go to NC and pick it up, as I had no pics of it. When I got it here, I realized that it really could not be shown without color on top.... and it was mostly outlines on the bottom, no value. So I basically started from scratch... but now, it has to work as a drawing.... a whole different set of problems. I am pretty excited about the contrast between the top and bottom, it is creating a completely different emphasis in the piece. I am planning on a green/grey wash on parts of the bottom to emphasize light (or lack of it) to create that oppressive environment of the box store.

Some Studios I Have Known

I am currently reading "Inside The Painter's Studio", a book I recommend highly. It is a must-have book for painters, featuring images & interviews with many contemporary artists, asking them about the space they create in, how it is set up specially for them, and what their daily routines are in the space.

Non-artists sometimes have a hard time understanding how vital an artist's creative space can be. I am guessing that this is because some people with hobbies just take their stuff out, work on the kitchen table, and then put the stuff away. For me, art making has always consumed my life, gradually eating up my (less vital) living space. There is a reason that many artists, given limited income, would rather live in their studios and sleep/cook on a hotplate in the corner than live in a "normal" space.

My first studio was in high school, an appropriated room in my parent's semi-finished basement. I don't recall asking if I could use the space, simply took it over and started working down there. (It had the added benefit of a discrete entrance to the outside to sneak boyfriends in when I was not making art.) As an undergrad, I worked mostly at school, but still had a second bedroom in my apartment where I worked on things at home. In graduate school, I simply spent all my time in the school studio, going home only to crash. For ten years in Miami, I rented houses and set up studio rooms, but art making would inevitably overrun the entire house.
I embroidered on my dining room table, and, if my current painting was small enough, dragged it into my bedroom each night so I could lie in bed and look at it fresh first thing in the morning upon awakening. So I have always had a discrete space for making art. It was often imperfect in some way, but I could retreat there to think, sketch and make with no fear of being messy.

When I met my husband, gave up my tenured teaching position, and moved to NC, I hit the point that all artists dream of, and many accomplish only later in life, as I did: a place more or less built to accommodate my specific art making practice. Due to the wild variance between Miami & NC real estate prices, we were able to take a 1,000 sq. ft attic and do $10,000 worth of renovations to create my studio: put in skylights, a slop sink, clean and dirty areas, storage, etc. Mine even had room for Radley's couch, where he would lie and watch me work.

The studio was the symbol of my new husband's support for my career, my dive into being a full time artist after so many years of killing myself teaching and pushing to maintain the production level required of a professional artist. I was in heaven... until until my husband got laid off last year, a week after I got pregnant & 3 years after we uprooted our entire lives to move to the middle of nowhere so he could work for Labcorp.

I know there are others who are in much worse shape as a result of the recession. Blessed with an Arie's brief memory, I don't usually hold a grudge, but my life has been turned upside down and does not look like it will be getting better any time soon. There are a dozen reasons why I would like to firebomb my husband's ex-employer (and my husband's ex-boss): the worry of an entire pregnancy with an unemployed husband, not being able to set up a nursery for my only baby daughter that I waited a lifetime to have, having to move 3 days after I gave birth so I could have my husband's assistance w/the baby, selling a house I had just started to really make "my own" (with a LOT of painting & faux finish techniques, ALL of which were just painted back to neutral to sell the house), bleeding our retirement fund to cover (to date & still counting) 7 months' worth of MD rent plus NC mortgage as we try to sell our house in this market, having to give up the master plan, even though my career has been taking off, and go back to teaching.... the list goes on. It is a testament to our marriage that, after so many years of living alone, my husband & I have not killed each other co-habitating in an apartment smaller than my old studio with a dog, a cat, and a baby. I am trying to be a trooper, but it's all I can do to keep from bursting into tears when I think about "Baby's First Christmas" in this "temporary", psychologically cold, generic place we are currently living in.

I miss my studio. I fear "that was it", and I will never have such a nice place again. I miss the plans I made for how the Peanut would be up there with me, and, when she got older, how she would be painting alongside me on the wall. Real estate here in DC is so much more expensive, whatever we may eventually buy is guaranteed to be tiny. I am furiously writing grants to try to procure funds to build an addition or rent a studio in this expensive real estate market, so that when we are able finally able to sell our old house and buy a new one here, I do not have to commandeer our living room as my painting space.
So, here we are. One part of the studio setup is at one end of the living room in our "temporary" apartment, next to Radley's bed. During the day, I talk to my daughter while working on this drawing, which is going to a show in Berlin next year. The tissue paper covers the bottom portion when I am not working, so the dog will not dirty it.
At one end of our bedroom is another work area, a table where I am doing hair embroidery. I have brought from NC only the art materials I thought I might need, and filed them in boxes stacked next to the table. I set the alarm and get up a few hours before Ilaria to work on the hair embroidery, and then work on it again at night.

A space is just a space, but, as Virginia Woolf noted, a room can become a symbol of commitment to one's art, a container packed with the potential of greatness.

A space is just a space, but when it is dedicated to creating, it often marks the difference between production and frustration, contemplation and chaos, or despair and sanity.

Been working on this magazine rack for the past 4 or 5 days, (during the day), then hair embroidery at night. Can't wait till this drawing is finished.

God bless Jerry Saltz, for calling it out when being interviewed by Irving Sandler for The Brooklyn Rail:

"The same sixteen curators assemble all the shows all over the world, showing the same sixteen artists. It’s horrible and frustrating. If you’re not on the circuit you can’t get in the circuit. That’s bad. I see a lot of mid-career artists who have done something for years get passed over for a much younger artist doing essentially the same thing. I see younger artists getting passed over simply because another curator hasn’t given them the stamp of approval."

Published last Fall, but just called to my attention. Love the world wide web of working artists, in the trenches in disparate parts of the world, passing the good shit on, in case you missed it.

"Blessed Art Thou" appears in a new 60 minute documentary, "Kitsch", directed by Tink Diaz, and broadcast on the show ARTE/NDR for German Public Teevision.

What I must finish working on & what I can't wait to start.......

Been very busy. Someone would like to exhibit the study drawing for "Blessed Art Thou", and I have decided that the concept just wouldn't work unless the top part has color. I had to go back to NC to get it, and I have spent the last few weeks going over the top with watercolor & colored pencil. Really want to finish this up so I can get to my angel project.

Another Foundation That Used to Support Artists Bites the Dust

"As of 2009, the George Sugarman Foundation, Inc. will no longer offer financial grants to artists, but will continue to serve the wishes of George Sugarman through the donation of his artworks to institutions, museums and universities throughout the United States."

Issue 39, September 24th, 2009.

About Dash Snow (and Other Bad Boy Artists)

What Pretty Lady said....

and later elaborated upon: ".....there are thousands upon thousands of undeniably talented artists in the world who are not drug addicts, and who live productive, responsible, giving lives, producing wonderful art. We don't hear much about these artists, largely because people such as yourself choose to focus on artists like Dash Snow, egged on by a corrupt and dysfunctional art establishment.

If you are really interested in art, not in glamor, fakery and misery, look for some living artists to canonize. You'll do a lot more good for a lot more people."

"Blessed Art Thou" will be the cover image for the Sept 24th issue of DIE WELTWOCHE, a swiss weekly magazine known for its artwork & illustrations.

Have put my lower back out, and am confined to bed for a few days. Since it is impossible to work on my wall piece, I will use this opportunity to cut out more angels for my new project, a seemingly endless job. No less than 5 projects going simultaneously, so there is always something to work on... at home, away, for long stretches, for short stretches.

My Defense Mechanism Coat in the "Dress Codes" exhibition at the Katonah Museum of Art got a mention in today's WWD (Women's Wear Daily), and they note that this exhibition has broken all of their attendance records! The show is up through October 8th.

Stumbled upon a truly unique curatorial process in my web browsing today, one that bends over backwards to prevent bias in selecting work.

I was just notified that some of my embroidery work will be featured in the forthcoming book, 1000 Artisan Textiles, to be published by Quarry Books in 2010.

I am working on a 5 x 7' piece on the wall of our living room in a tiny "temporary" condo with wall-to-wall beige carpeting. The dog bed is right next to the piece, the card table and folding chairs where we eat are 3-4 feet away. The baby stations (chair, mat, swing) get moved around in front of it so I can talk to my daughter while I work. I am wildly fearful that the dog will sneeze on it, or it will be splashed with spaghetti sauce. This piece is going to a great venue in Berlin for a show in 2010. I don't know why I think this is funny.

Very busy. Arms and hands ache from cutting out angel images for two days straight. Still not even remotely finished. Sprucing up a life-size working drawing of Blessed Art Thou, adding a bit of color, for an exhibition overseas. It is hung on the biggest wall of this small temporary apartment. The folding card table that usually serves as our dining table is covered with art supplies. Our bedroom has in-progress works on the wall, and a long folding work table with gouache & water color tubes and a tremendous pile of cut out angels.
There are two or three embroidery hoops with projects in them hung on push pins stuck into the wall, they look as if they are decorating the apartment, but they are not finished, just a way to store them and be able to make decisions about them even while doing things like feeding the baby.

Terribly busy.... deadlines with high stakes consequences, getting the hang of working with daughter strapped on or playing on the floor next to me.

Here are the non-deadline pieces: they get worked on during the stop/start parts of the day, and the large pieces during the unbroken parts.

A new Art World Truth piece,

and I'm not exactly sure how to classify this piece, embroidered on my daughter's baby blanket:

I think it has something to do with being a mother.

Parker Ito's great animated artist statement, via Art Fag City.

Got a mention in the New York Times review of the "Dress Codes" exhibition at the Katonah Museum.

Coincidentally. my friend Sarah just did a great post on self-indulgent artists....

I am stopping the embroidery and grant writing for a few days to shift gears. I am swamped with projects, and may lose an opportunity or two by changing my focus, but it is one of those things... a nagging sense that something has to be made, now......

I quell my anxiety my making art, and, in the past few days, my anxiety has been running high every time I visit CNN and hear what is happening in these town meetings. What I create in my little apartment will change nothing in this country, but it will help me with that sick feeling in the pit of my stomach.

Spent a very stressful day, mostly waiting, at Children's Hospital. (She is ok.) Had my embroidery with me, and almost ate my hands when I realized that I had left the needle at home. Years ago, in a waiting room, a gal might have been able to bum a needle off of someone, but no such luck. Worrying and embroidery were made for each other.

And how did I miss this? Must have had my head in the art-making sand......

Art Scars....

I am starting a new project, collecting scars that artists have acquired through art making. I will post them on a blog entitled "Art Scars".

Send a jpeg of the scar, a brief description or story, and a link to the artwork or a second jpeg of the artwork. Please include your name or a request for anonymity (though you should be proud of your art scars!) to artscarpics@aol.com.

Please spread the word to your artist friends. It should be good exposure for your work, as I will publicize it once I get some more images up. Thanks.