Sketchy start

The whole painting has been loosely sketched out. The morning started out on a high note but soon crescendoed into a frustrating comedy of errors trying to locate my computer cable for the borrowed projector. After turning my house upside down, I turned to the media lab at the College of Charleston only to find that the cable they provided wouldn't work (my dumb ass didn't think to actually bring both projector and computer with me). After a couple trips to various offices and departments, I finally thanked them for their help and walked a block over to the Apple store and purchased the right cable for $20 (which is what I should have done in the first place). Trying to save money cost me 4 hours in time. Nonetheless, the sketching was finished late last night. This morning I'm going to pick up some reference shots and fine tune. I should have some paint on the canvas late this afternoon. The settling in has begun.

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You too can learn to paint

Question of the day:
What's the difference between an artist and a painter?

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Guess'o it's time to gesso

Sorry about the bad pun title. Had to do it. I'm getting ready to head over to the studio and gesso the canvas. I'll stop by there later on this afternoon and hit it with a second coat. The comp is finally finished. I thought I had it completed earlier but after my little research trip, a few people dropped out and a couple others were added so the whole composition had to be reworked. Having to travel during Thanksgiving didn't help, but hey, had to see mom and spend some time with her. Some things are more important than painting. I didn't expect that this would take so long but you just can't swap out people like engine parts and expect the composition to work. In this case, I had to swap out a total of eight people which threw the proverbial monkey wrench in the gears. I also needed to place faces on bodies which was a pain but now that it's done, I'm a tad relieved. I finished it last night and took a look at it again this morning and made a few more changes. I'm very happy with it and can proceed to the next phase now. Here's a part of it:

I'm going to reach out to the College of Charleston tomorrow and see if I can borrow one of their computer projectors so I can start sketching. My goal is to have the whole thing sketched out in detail by the end of the week. 

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Thank you, Santa!

Santa's freight services delivered my studio easel while I was in Daytona. I assembled it this morning with the joy and care of a father assembling his kid's first bicycle. Why is an artist so excited about an easel? Much like my studio, it's my first. I've been painting for nearly 20 years and have never had either to call my own. The first studio I ever worked in was during my residency at McColl Center for Visual Art in Charlotte, NC. The space was nearly 1,000 square feet, lit by skylights and came with two studio easels. My head was spinning like a Van Gogh sky for nearly two weeks. For someone who is used to painting in his kitchen and using the countertop for an easel, I was nearly paralyzed by my surroundings. 

I hadn't planned on buying the easel. I was in Atlanta at Utrecht buying art supplies for the commission and noticed that it was 72% off the list price which made it $209! I had an online coupon that gave me $60 off on any order over $200. The on-line price was even lower...$199.99! I bought a pack of X-acto blades to put the total over the $200 limit and now the easel is only $140! Hell, if that wasn't a sign that it needed to be mine, nothing else was. Now that it's here, I can't stop looking at it, nor can I can't wait to paint something on it. That's going to be awhile considering my schedule. Nonetheless, it's here and it's mine and yes, I am going to put a big red bow on it, stand it next to the Christmas tree and act like Santa hand carried it from the North Pole. I might even give it a ride around the neighborhood in my wagon.

 

This is the final week of planning for me before I start painting. The images from the state archives were waiting on me and I'll be incorporating them into my layout the rest of the week. I'll gesso the canvas tomorrow, then again on Wednesday in anticipation of starting to sketch on Saturday. Can't wait. The butterflies are circling below and I'm anxious to get to the point where the paint is flowing and I settle in.

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We're golden!

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Stretching my patience

I had no idea what a pain in the ass tacking up 20 yards of canvas could be. Its a frustrating evolution to say the least. I don't even want to think about how much of a headache stretching it will prove to be when its completed. I'm taking off to Florida for Thanksgiving tomorrow afternoon and wanted to have this thing up and gessoed before I go, but I may have to wait until I get back to do that. I ordered a bunch of art supplies while in Atlanta and hope they will be here before I take off.  I was planning on buying them at the Utrecht store, but found out that the on-line discount coupons saved me more than $250. For all of you traveling this holiday season, have a safe trip and try not to spend or eat too much.

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Jeffrey Day Blog

I received an email from an old acquaintance, Jeffrey Day, today. I'm somewhat reticent to call him a friend; after all, he is an art critic. As far as they go, I have found him very competent, even handed and dare I say it, likable. Though he has shown me much love over the years, he maintains the right to take a chunk out of my ass when he sees fit and being an artist, I respect that. He was a columnist with the State newspaper in Columbia, SC, but since the precipitous decline of subscribers (in all print media these days), those on the periphery are being marginalized. If you're not covering a story that left a blood trail, you're on the periphery. He was the only reason I used to buy the State newspaper. Like him or not, he covered many art openings, mainly in the Columbia area, but on occasion his scope widened to encompass the entire state. It was nice reading an in depth article or opinionated review rather than the press releases Charleston's Post and Courier tries to pass off as art reviews.  It's such a shame. In the past couple years, proliferation of and appreciation for the contemporary art scene in Charleston has grown exponentially. Between the Halsey, REDUX, Walk Gallery, Pecha Kucha, Kulture Klash, etc., (sorry if I overlooked anyone), awareness and interest in contemporary art is at an all time high. Thank God for the smaller niche publications like the City Paper that cover the arts and give commentary.


Since leaving the State, Jeffrey has been keeping those interested through his art blog, Carolina Culture. His latest entry was about the state's art collection and what's missing. It seems about every three years, there is a discussion about what's to be done with the collection (from permanent housing to exhibition to prospective additions and so on). This is usually done in conjunction with an exhibit of selected works by a particular gallery (the collection is often loaned out for agency display and outside exhibitions). In an effort to drum up attendance and support, the common sense addendum to the exhibit is a panel discussion about the collection which leads to what's in, what's not in and who deserves to be in or out. I absolutely refuse to attend such discussions. I'm too old. It's like sitting at a bar listening to college freshman talk about relationships in between bubble gum shooters then asking your opinion. It ain't gonna happen. Once upon a time in the latter part of the last millennia I was a member of the commission that decided what was purchased for inclusion in the collection. The state set aside .01% (don't quote me on this) of the state budget for purchases, which was managed by the arts commission. I was amazed by the submission process and thought it ass backwards, if not stupid. Artists, and/or their representatives submitted works for inclusion. Huh? I always thought that the convened panel should have been given the responsibility of identifying works of art and/or artists that were on the rise in the state (kinda like some secret hush-hush Nobel Prize or MacArthur fellows award) and then tasked with either purchasing existing work or better yet, commissioning them to create something specific for inclusion. Since the choices consisted of what was submitted, the process led to purchase of art by artists that were knowledgeable enough to be plugged into the process, but not necessarily deserving of the honor...in my opinion. This has opened the door to an ongoing debate about the overall strength of the collection. The last I heard (more than a decade ago) was that the selection process was put on hold until the arts commission could figure this thing out. In the meantime the budget was cut and that's a whole different story.


Jeffrey's latest blog entry probes these concerns. I write about it because he graciously included my name as one of the artists deserving to be represented in the collection. Thank you, Jeffrey. It would be an honor to be included, but to be honest with you I really could care less. All I know is that when and if the time comes that they should seek to purchase a piece of my art, trust me, I'm going to tax the bastards. 


Prior to Jeffrey's posting, he contacted me via email and asked for an image to post as an example of my work. He pulled an image of a series I am working on (my Jim Crow racist clothing line series) seen here, but never exhibited:

I already have the entire line of works planned out (including actual wearable pieces), but haven't accomplished them yet. I'm still making a few mental tweaks. Who knows, you may see this on the wall of some state agency one day...heh-heh-heh!

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Research, research, research!

I'm apparently on a world-wind tour of the southeast. I went to bed at 2 a.m. and woke up at 6 a.m. in Durham, had breakfast in Chapel Hill, lunch in Raleigh, dinner in Charleston and now posting this at 3 a.m. in Atlanta. I'm afraid to sleep lest I wake up in Shanghai. 


Despite the hours of travel, it was a most productive night and day. I was supposed to have dinner with Barron last night but after gathering a trove of material from Ann and the library, I needed to sit with it and mentally sort. I stayed up until two in the morning playing with the layout again (Remember - "Scripts are never done, they're just abandoned before shooting".) What I am most concerned with at this point in the game is conversation. I've been re-reading the bios of all the individuals and trying to find out who would be talking to whom in this visual fact based fictional narrative. This line of logic may sound silly, but it's important because ultimately what we're trying to do here is tell a story - one that makes sense to the audience. Though they may not be aware of that on the conscious level, the subconscious will be more than happy to inform them that something is wrong. Once that happens they get stuck in a mental loop trying to figure out what doesn't click instead of diving in and engaging the piece. But more than that, it needs to make sense to me. If it doesn't, the execution becomes a hair-pulling chore because you find yourself trying to illustrate Lewis Carroll's Jabberwocky.


The most productive part of the day was my meeting with Kim Cumber at the state archives in Raleigh. This wonderful woman runs the photographic collection and adeptly supplemented my collection of grainy thumbnail portraits with higher-res images. She also alerted me to images of significant scenes and suggested a couple other people (I was in need of more women to profile). I will submit the names to the historians tomorrow via e-mail and see if they pass muster. Thank you, Kim!

Kim Cumber

Before departing Raleigh, I made it a point to stop by the Credit Union building (it was only a few blocks from the state archives). During my meeting with the suits, Michael Spink told me about a commissioned sculpture they had in the lobby and I wanted to see it. The piece is about 40 feet long and ten feet high.

Nice, huh? I was surprised to see who the artists were, but shouldn't have been. Tom Stanley chairs the fine art department at Winthrop University and has been a highly regarded artist and curator for some time now. If I'm not mistaken, I met Shaun Cassidy at McColl Center for Visual Art in Charlotte. I believe he was an artist in residence there the year after I left and faintly remember having a conversation with him while he was installing a piece on their front lawn. This is the label on the piece:

While looking at the piece, I was struck by a budding rationale behind the credit union's willingness to step in and fund the SOG's missing history project. They get it. What? The importance of funding and displaying art in the public sphere. This subject was on my mind because less that two weeks ago, Mark Sloan, the director of the Halsey Institute for Contemporary Art in Charleston, asked me to speak to a political science class about the issue of censorship (gee, I wonder why?). A day later, one of the students, Tiffany Cox, was writing a paper for a philosophy of aesthetics course and wanted to know my take on whether art should be publicly funded and whether these institutions should have some form of censorship. My response:


"I'’ve always found this debate rather ridiculous from a habitability standpoint. The question always seems to pit commerce against culture in the shortfall while ignoring the obvious long-term reality that culture in the form of the arts has a positive influence on commerce. One only has to look at what many consider to be the most vibrant cities and communities to see that the common denominator is the aesthetic values they have chosen to embrace and exploit. If benefits are to be enjoyed by all, then all should share the burden. The only real decision left to be made is how much public financing is enough and into whose hands this responsibility is entrusted. Those placed in charge of a public art policy need to be well schooled in the internal and external needs of the community and insulated enough to place co-operative need above individual desire.


As for the issue of censorship, though a victim, I wholeheartedly believe that any institution - public or private - has the right to censor material they deem motivationally questionable. This opinion, however, is based on the utopian ideal that any elected or self anointed gatekeeper of aesthetic virtue have sense enough to understand that if the work in question displays any ability to ask meaningful questions, then it should have the opportunity to do so."


Apparently, the Local Government Federal Credit Union agrees with me. I can only hope that other institutions and local governments see the benefit and get on board soon.

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Credit Union meeting

I'm currently in Chapel Hill, NC on the campus of UNC. I had a scheduled meeting with some senior staff of the Local Government Federal Credit Union (LGFCU). They are the organization that graciously stepped in and decided to fund the commission. I'm not going to lie to you, the suits usually scare me to the point that I try and avoid them at all possible costs. Corporate and artists are usually oil and water that separate along a distinct creative line. But considering what this crew has done and their affiliation with the School of Government, they had to be given the benefit of doubt and assumed cool until proven guilty. I'm happy to report that we had an absolutely wonderful lunch meeting. They were attentive and very committed to the project beyond their financial aid. It's attitudes like that that makes you appreciate the sponsorship even more and want to work even harder to ensure that they are kept in the creative loop as much as possible. I even went so far as to extend an invitation to visit Charleston and view the process first hand, which I hope they will take advantage of. The meeting was also attended by a couple members of the staff (SOG Dean - Michael Smith and Faith Thompson, Assistant Dean of Development) as well as one of the original committee members, Chandra Cox.

Chandra Cox (Head of NCSU Dept. of Art & Design), Ann Simpson (SOG Associate Dean),

Michael Spink (LGFCU Comm. Mgr.), Ashley Ruffin (LGFCU Marketing) and Mark Caverly, (Exec. VP, LGFCU)

After the meeting I spent some time with Ann going over the names of the chosen few for the painting. Alas, a few heads rolled, but a couple were added. This process reminds me of a quote by film auteur John Huston who once said of movie scripts, "they're never finished, they're simply abandoned before shooting." I get the feeling that right up to the moment paint hits the canvas, history will continue to unfold (as it should). She produced some extra research material that contained more photographs of the subjects. Some have proven to be rather elusive. I also had a chance to meet a graduate intern, Barron Monroe, who has done some preliminary research at the Wilson Library that will save me a tremendous amount of time. I shall have to feed the young man and fill him with much drink for his efforts. 

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Mural comp

I was having a difficult time working on sketches for the mural (I hate that term, at least in reference to what I'm doing. I've always felt that a mural was something done on the wall whereas a painting is something hung on the wall - hell, no one refers to the Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel ceiling as a mural), anyway, I was spinning my wheels  due to the size and complexity of the process. I couldn't see the whole thing. Then I came up with the brilliant idea to use photoshop. That way I could scan and move images around, but once again, seeing the entire layout on a 13" Macbook screen was bothersome due to the length of the piece. I finally broke down and did it the old fashioned way. I hinged foam core together and drew out the exact size of the painting in inches (48" x 5"). After that, I sat like a kid cutting out bodies found in the newspaper, magazines and scanned family photo's that were resized to fit. That way I could move them around at will over the whole game board. Much easier. We live and learn, don't we? I finally finished the layout yesterday and am relatively happy with it. The background photo's are simply placeholders at this point and will be replaced later this week after I do some more research at the library in Chapel Hill and in Raleigh. I scanned the layout in last night and added a few silhouette viewers in to give it scale. Here's what it looks like now:

(click to see larger)

There are actually twelve real faces already incorporated. Now that I am happy with the layout, I will have to photograph some actual persons in more exacting poses. 


I'm heading up to the SOG in Chapel Hill tomorrow for a luncheon with the Credit Union personnel who stepped in and funded the project. I'm looking forward to meeting them and thanking them personally for stepping up to the plate. I'm not sure who made the decision to write the check (or spearheaded the appropriation) but if it's only one person (or two), I may just photograph them and place them in the painting as a thank you. Yes, some corporate bigwig(s) may find themselves a busboy (or waiter) to history. I'm planning on staying in the area until Thursday evening and spending time at the Wilson Library on campus, then onto the state archives in Raleigh if I can ever get in touch with the archivist to set an appointment. I'll try her again after I post this entry.


The canvas arrived on Saturday! Only two days after ordering. Utrecht rocks! I'm heading to Atlanta this weekend to spend some time with the grandbaby and was planning on buying the gesso there, but Utrecht has a 40% off sale on one no-sale item ordered online. I'll order the gesso and get the discount and just pick up the paint and other various and sundry supplies in store.

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