Dealing with form color and scale as a path towards sustainable liberation, my process is a funny one because I’m actually a perfectionist doomed to fail, over and over again. Hunted by the powers in play, I choose submission over the illusion of having a choice. When not complaining I know I’m a surfer riding one of the most amazing waves there is, When I do catch a good one, Its connecting me to eternity, Universal knowledge and all my previous and future lives, worth it. so here I am, doing the only thing im good for. catching waves.
Space
same lines different context - different meaning
Thomas Nozkowski in his own words.
“the idea of knowing what a painting is going to end up being just drives me crazy. That’s absolutely against the rules. I want to be happy in my studio. I want it to be exciting, and I don’t want it to be a job.”
Untitled (MH-5), 2014
“For political reasons, I found the kind of large scale, macho-man abstractions of early SoHo beneath contempt.
These were painters that I liked and admired, and I remember going to shows and seeing a painting that was 20 feet long—it’s like the 800-pound gorilla that sits wherever it wants to sit.
I didn’t want to paint that way, and I decided I would paint at a size that was scaled to my friends’ apartments, that could hang in a three-room walkup tenement on 7th Street.
That was the first big decision. “
“The idea that you can work very quickly is crucial. Another component is the idea that you can have these things in your home, that it’s not a special project to have an art collection. You can have 10 paintings hanging on a wall—what a feast! On a practical level, you can carry them around with you. I have a house in the country and a house in the city, and they fit in the backseat of the car. The issue is to be able to keep working, to be able to pursue your dreams for lack of a better term. This allowed me to do that. “
“The nice thing about the world is that everything stretches out to touch everything else, creating these references and connections beyond the visual scene at hand.
There’s a painting in this show with some Matissean curvy shapes painted in a Matisse blue—that’s not an accident, it was a decision to draw upon that blue for that particular move.”
“I just don’t want to do the same thing over and over again. When I first started working this way, I thought that if I was as absolutely, painfully sincere as possible about what I was doing I would within some short period of time develop a signature style.
I thought that somewhere deep inside was this signature style that would come out if I just let it. To my amazement, no such signature style came to be! I’ve come to understand the signature style as a weakness—that’s as far as you can go. It’s not where you want to go, it’s where your system takes you and stops. It’s like the Peter Principle, “failing upwards.” How far can you fail?”
“I do like the idea of saying “look, every question is different, every problem is different, why shouldn’t every painting be different?” You don’t want to get carpal tunnel, always doing the same damn painting!”
As a painter, you have a project: there’s a thing in the world you want to make a picture of. How do you make a picture of a feeling, of a mood, of a quality of life, even of something like a sunset? The answer is that you just start, and you do it as well as you can. At a minimum, you will succeed in having a picture of how well you could do something. You’re reaching for that sunset.
I work every day. I have a little less stamina as I’ve gotten older, but here’s a thing—all of my ideas about why I make work, why I think other people should make work, are up for grabs. It may or may not mean anything. But what it does mean for me is it gives me a reason to be in the studio that I find compelling. I’m fascinated by being in the studio. Sometimes I’m not happy about it, it’s a real battle. But for me, there’s always something new to find, something new to do. I certainly hope that lasts forever. It feels like it will. It’s been 40 years
RIP
“Intimate Landscape” in 7 steps
First some Context, this project was conceived for PAC, a local spring contemporary art festival of Marseille Provence Métropole, our village is included, and so I am kindly hosted for this occasion at “la voûte rovellotti” An experimental sculpture gallery space run by claude-agathe and her family. Thank you !
The show will be open on the 18 of Mai at 14h- 20h
This installation was an adventure. It started with lots of unknowns,
here is a 7 steps description of how it became:
Plastic protection for the floor - the floor in the space is a hand made mosaic so we covered the 5x10meter with plastic protection.
Paper rolls taped - to cover such a surface I wanted a paper that will be fancy white but also super strong, I ended up taking rolls of renovation papers, that are 10 meter long and 1 meter width
- Thanks Thierry, Sara and Caro
painting - painting in a space that is long and narrow, I had to create two centers, so the blue main spots and than worked around them, I had 4 black spots on one side and 2 XL arches on the other. I started with 11 liter of white building up with red and yellow, than light blue and finally the black
video - Painter’s porn, is a term I use to explain how to shoot my work. beautifully executed by the amazing Julia Gat as always.
Screening composition tryouts - Together with Victor journet the Curator, we did some tryouts before we reached the final composition.
Music - I downloaded my son music from band camp, I really like it, and I feel it carries the space well check him out here
ready set go - join us on the 18 afternoon Paris time, we will be live streaming on insta… https://www.instagram.com/yifatgat/
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Artists:
Ted nelson
Living in an interconnected constantly changing world, its so nice to actually hear people talking about it
Here is Ted on the big screen for the first time-- interviewed by the great film-maker Werner Herzog for his 2016 movie about the Internet and its consequences. The interview is brilliantly edited to present a seamless train of thought selected from Ted's sweeping complex of ideas.
Ted Nelson is one of the original prophets of the information age. Here he talks about about the birth of personal computing, the web, and how to think beyond the currently possible. Read more: https://spectrum.ieee.org/video/geek-life/profiles/extended-directors-cut-ted-nelson-on-what-modern-programmers-can-learn-from-the-past
Drawing Now 2019 highlights
Drawing Now is the name of a historical exhibition that was held in the MoMA at 1976. Check out the MoMA page, its a real treasure, it allows you to dive into every bit of this exhibition. dont miss the catalog, the press release (typing machine is so nostalgic ) the artist list, the works with the curator hand writing comments and more…
Fast forward to the present the latest Drawing Now art fair in Paris, has changed artistic directors.
It is interesting to see how much influence a detail like that has on the overall vibe. French cultural icons can be rather ‘old white man club’, It is nice to replace them with a fresh international Fem touch. get a glimpse of what the fair looks like here:
My first impression was the Pierrette Bloch’s stand, warm grey walls brings out the white paper so elegantly, the press release of the gallery here .
Just around the corner at Gallery Eric Dupont you can see a beautiful expo by Paul Pagk
Hanns Schimansky: L’Espace de la ligne at the Jeanne Bucher Jaeger Gallery
Congratulation to my friend Katrin Bremermann for her duo with German Stegmaier at Goethe institute in Paris and great job to martin for putting that together
I always thought Paul and German represents two sides of the same coin in the way they exploit their frame.
It was a nice surprise to see Marine Pagès papers at Gallery Bernard Jordan. hopefully we will see more of them in Paréidolie Marseilles in the summer …
Fix & Flow
One of my tools to decode a situation is to name the FIX & FLOW
Going to the studio is a FIX, the work I do is the FLOW
Going to surf is a FIX, which wave you get is the FLOW
A camera is a FIX the pictures we take are the FLOW
This blog is the FIX, the posts in it are the FLOW
I find its better to deal only with the FIX to enable the FLOW, rather than trying to micro manage the flow.
For ex: taking the kids to book store once a week is a FIX which book they take is their FLOW.
Control system deal with both FIX & FLOW
Support system deal only with the FIX to Enable the FLOW
New print
Body painting …. boom!
Table painting
The hardware store is my constant source of inspiration. This wooden table comes with a metric ruler on it, folded legs, and a suitcase handle. I could not resist it’s charm…
