Museum outings and expeditions

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The end of the semester has led me and fellow NYSS-ers to exploring new areas … like the Brooklyn Museum, where the art we saw was quite surprising.

We started off with a tour of African art by El Anatsui, whose art essentially consists of found pieces of almost everything. I got a shot of Gravity and Grace (pictured). This work wowed them at the Venice Biennale six years ago and has been getting first rate exposure ever since. It’s proven to be a centerpiece of the world’s most prestigious contemporary showcase.

In another section of the museum there are several hundred pieces of watercolor by John Singer Sargent. We spent some time here and could have been here longer. Sargent’s work is worth a close examination and frequently there will be a small iPad located next to the painting with a demonstration of the work in production. For sure we will return to the Brooklyn Museum. Getting to the train after the party was a new experience. (Note: Walking the street to the train was not something i want to do again.)

Other expeditions have led me and Deanna to wander the streets of classic Village areas after Mass and grab lunch at a delightful place where I got a fantastic grilled cheese and tomato soup and Deanna had a spicy duck burger. I had a bite and it was better than okay. We have also discovered a tea and coffee company on Christopher Street (not unlike Anderson’s in Austin). The place is called McNulty’s Tea and Coffee.

At the MET we saw the first of the cubist work in the process of being donated to the by an Estee Lauder heir. The full gift will be in place and fully curated early in 2014. We saw Picasso’s first cubist work, the only one in place at this time. The colors are mostly browns and blacks with some yellow. This was done in about 1910, I think. Then there’s a section of Bonnard and Vuillard, always stunning. It’s hard to believe that David Ohlerking said the my early art (which I gathered the courage to show) had a Bonnard quality. I’d like to ask more about that at some point. My main goal was to spend time in the Cézanne collection, especially transposing his wife paintings. You may recall that Cézanne is given credit for being the originator of the cubist style of painting, which Braque and Picasso took on as their own. Of course, there were many others like Leger, Gleize, Lewitt, and even Schiele.

This week holds a trip to Mt. Kisko in Westchester County where we will be guests at the Louis-Dreyfus Collection, which includes Graham Nickson’s work. The Noguchi Museum Benefit was last night, and by Saturday we’ll be at Canopy in Austin, where we’ll hope to see our Texas friends.

With seeing such vast art (i.e. El Anatsui and Nickson’s large-scale pieces), I am profoundly confronted by scale — the monumental nature of their work — and how the colors and form envelop the viewer. It’s impressive food for eyes and thought.

Hope all is well with everybody. I would love to hear from you.

Best,

Jack

Changing views

The time is drawing near for us to return to our home in Austin for a few weeks this summer. Beautiful weather in NYC, and we will miss that as we move into heat.

My critique is behind me with Deanna taking good notes. I’ll digest those more carefully later. In general, the art evaluators were clear in their remarks and were positive and helpful. I’ve made reasonable progress in the past semester with form, shape, color, and perception. As there is still much to learn in a classical sense, I spend several hours in the library each week studying the art work that has gone on before me.

Today, for example, Leger was my focus and I slowly worked my way through two of his books. He was a cubist more than anything else in his efforts and a variety of color. I think our Dean, Graham Nickson, is not much in favor of spending time and effort in this path. I’ll be careful with the energy I put out and turn to a more traditional format. I can always return to some aspects of this at a later time. 

I’m going from this classical world of art in New York to Austin and my studio where fellow Canopy mates are putting together a weekend show to introduce patrons to our new work/show space. That will happen on Saturday, May 11. Amanda Winkles, my studio assistant, is putting together an acceptable introduction to the space at Canopy. A great group of artists is coming together there, and I look forward to meeting and knowing each of them. 

Thanks for staying with me in my ramblings. Please keep me posted on yours.

Best,

Jack

Photo: View from my NYSS studio

Dear All,
A few lines to go with the photos of spring. But first let me mention Calculus. My first and only Algebra teacher, Herbie Knutson, would like the idea that I was spelling Calculus correctly. Know this. Herbie tried hard to teach a group of youngsters in Albion, Nebraska the secrets of this very helpful way of solving problems. Some came to it naturally. Most of us worked hard to get it right. A few breakthroughs brought real comfort to a few of us. However, we never got close to Calculus. I honestly don’t think it was offered in the Albion public schools. Probably not in any of the small town schools in the farm country where I lived. I know now there are secrets of Calculus that would have been a worthwhile effort even then.
Exponential function would have brought the house down around the supper table in my home town. Inverse trigonometric functions would have stopped all the conversation. And my mother would have looked at me with wonder had I started a discourse about differential equations and slope fields. Well it didn’t happen then or later as far as I know, even though it was touted as one of the great mathematical  breakthroughs. When did you take your first dip into the Calculus pool?
It is the beginning of Spring in NYC. Little green buds are popping out on all the trees and some are flowering into real beauty. We bought some cranberry shoots at the outdoor market Saturday and they are flowering right now in their own water vase on this desk. The lonely trees in the space between our apartment “backyard” and the apartment building beyond that are shooting out the season’s leaves for all to see out our large back windows. The temperature is in the 50s most days now … a bit chill as we walk from here to art school and as  Deanna takes her train for the trip to midtown. Scarf weather and comfortable.
It’s mid-week already but we had a wonderful, busy weekend from just about one end of Manhattan to the other. We went to Harlem (127th Street) to hear a Gospel choir of people who like to sing gospel, including Laura, who is Jewish and is a fellow art student from London. She sang with a close replica of Mehalia Jackson on the classic “Lord, Turn Me Around,” and we all clapped in the beat of that powerful song. The group moved through all the classic gospel music, to our delight.
We zipped by train from there to the Lincoln Center on the other end of the island to hear a concert of eight cellos played by the leaders of respective orchestras such as the NY Philharmonic. I’m trying to get a CD or something close to that to pass around to all who would enjoy that experience.
Sunday was a regular church morning, but the afternoon was a different delight with a performance by Vanesa Redgrave at the Cherry Lane Theater in the heart of Greenwich Village. She’s 73 and very powerful in her work. The play is called Revisionist and was written by her male fellow actor. Two hours, no break.
Last week of school coming up and I’m working on my last painting for this semester with our model. We have an end-of-semester school wide critique next Monday and Tuesday with four judges… two well known NYSS professors, Graham Nickson and Elisa Jensen, a NYC artist and a NYC gallerist. I find it a nerve-wracking experience.
That’s it for now dear friends.
Think good thoughts about me for my upcoming evaluation.

Happy Spring: Art life continues

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I had my first NYSS Gallery show last Friday, 4/12, with Sirena LaBurn, one of my fellow students in the program. The above was the promotional postcard, with my art on the left. I presented eleven pieces of my art, and all but one was from this semester. One piece was from an end of summer oil class. Our work was well received by a good steady crowd of students and others for several hours. I was nervous when it all started but settled down as good remarks flowed in for both of us. Now, I’ll put that behind me and get on with a new pose by a model and try to get some canvas work down in the few weeks we have left in the semester.
Actually, the semester ends about May 3rd. We plan to stay for the MFA gallery show of several of our friends and then leave for Austin about the 9th of May. We miss the dogs, feeding the koi and being around family. We will probably come back in late May for a sculpture marathon beginning June 4th.
The MET just received a billion dollars worth of cubist art from the Estee Lauder family. As you will see later (when I post some more art), I’ve been concentrating on several cubist geometric pieces in the last few months. Oddly, I find drawing free hand cubist versions of whatever I’m attending to — like the model in a pose — a relatively easy task. I can’t explain that but I’m going to continue. I’ve spent some time in our library reviewing the beginning of that movement from Picasso to Braque and on to the more complicated versions of that approach called orphic cubism, which usually includes color. 
If you follow me on Twitter, you may remember the NYT piece earlier this month on “What the Brain Can Tell Us About Art,” by Eric Kandel. He’s a professor of brain science at Columbia University and was the recipient of the 2000 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his book, “The Quest to Undertstand the Unconscious in Art, Mind, and Brain from Vienna 1900 to the Present.” I plan to find that book and see if the thesis holds up. Will keep you posted on that front.
Best to all, and thanks for checking in here.
Jack

Art read: The death of galleries?

“These days, the art world is large and spread out, happening everywhere at once.”

Fellow artist and friend Laurie Frick directed me to this interesting article by Jerry Saltz about the economics of art and the (imminent?) death of the art gallery (as a result of the simultaneous rise of the art world’s online life).

Any thoughts on this one? Do you visit galleries more or less than you did five years ago, say? Where do you go for art?

Best,

Jack

Art, art. Everywhere.

We enjoyed a beautiful sunshiny Saturday in NYC. After the snow, rain, and general slush of the previous day, the sun was most welcome. I think we have about seen the last of “winter”.

There is an enormous amount of art all over this city. The yearly event called the Armory show started last week and went through the weekend. It celebrated the 100th anniversary of the 1913 show. In addition, there is an Armory show on Piers 92 and 94 with two huge spaces that jut out into the water. Then PACE has two large shows featuring people like Jim Dine and Kiki Smith. Yes, as best I can tell this is the Pace that originates in San Antonio. Pace seems to be all over town. We went to a three-story Pace gallery on the upper east side last weekend and mostly it was good art and fun to see; then MOMA opened yesterday with a display of Henri Labrouste, the architect who invented the modern library.

In Chelsea, an art fair sponsored by the Art Dealers Association of America is up and running. Some 40 galleries are spread over three floors of the Dia building. We made this one last year but may miss this time. We will do well to get to the two versions of the Armory show. Then, as if that’s not enough, The New York Historical Society on Central Park West is showing Audubon’s Aviary. On display are the paintings of Audubon from the 1820s. This show will run through 2015 so plenty of time.

Just so you know: New York City is opening up the path to shuffleboard — 12-foot-long wooden tables — a hands-on bar game if there ever was one. I have been known to play, and if I get close to the seven places where they are set up for this bar game I’ll try to stir up some old memories. Join me?

Finally, a word about my activities at NYSS. I was given a slot for an art show at the school with another student, Sirena La Burn. The show will be Friday April 12 from 6 to 8 PM. It turns out Sirena is originally from Beaumont, Texas. She lives in Germany when she is not attending NYSS working on her MFA. We will both have about 10-15 pieces of art that has mostly been produced here in our ateliers. We spend most of that Friday preparing our art to hang, painting the walls of student gallery, and getting ready for the show. Deanna will be starting her trial in D.C. but may be able to take the train and have some time at the gallery. We will try to have some Texas tidbits for snacks and whatever goes with that.

More to come later,

Jack

Art, color, and beauty

Dear all,

Finally I’m getting up some photos from the City Hall People’s Gallery exhibit in Austin from a couple weeks ago. The work, which comes from something like 100 Austin artists, will be up for a while so if you’re in the city take an opportunity to go see it. The opening reception was a delight to attend, and there was some impressive work.

Also, the NYT has another interesting read on design. The article, Why We Love Beautiful Things talks patterns and forms and mathematics of such. Even more: bad design costs us more than just aesthetics. An excerpt:

It should come as no surprise that good design, often in very subtle ways, can have such dramatic effects. After all, bad design works the other way: poorly designed computers can injure your wrists, awkward chairs can strain your back and over-bright lighting and computer screens can fatigue your eyes.

Enjoy the photos and the week.

Best,

Jack

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