The Artists of El Zaguan

The Life of an Artist

2012-02-24T00:50:00.000-07:00

“To live in this town you must be tough, tough, tough,tough, tough!
You got rats on the west side
Bed bugs uptown
What a mess this town's in tatters I've been shattered”

The Rolling Stones

That album did inspire me to want to move to the city. Made livingin New York sound cheap, fun and crazy. I was looking for some way to find myself,a chance to leave that life that I was living then, and leave it far behind.

I wasn’t ready to leave home, not just yet. But I did find away and I had that chance, through a grueling chain of events, to be there onthat plane, the one that had just touched down at La Guardia. A weeklongexcursion, high school, the drama club. That overwhelming sensation that atthat very moment when our plane did land, that I had found my true destiny.

We walked out of that plane and down onto the tarmac, thenoise sudden, loud and brash. The sky smog-filled, the air hot, moist anddirty. Masses of people soon became visible. There was a general confusion, an erraticelectric eclectic energy. This wasn’t L.A.; this wasn’t anywhere that I hadever been to before. Every pore on my body was suddenly vibrant, alive and awakened.

We stayed at the Hotel Edison, heart of Times Square. 25high schoolers, two adult chaperones, the cute twenty-something Gay couple, mydrama teacher and me. There were no cell phones, no computers, no socialnetworking, kids who could afford it might call their folks once or twice. Acompletely different time and place, mothers must have been going crazy withworry. It really didn’t seem to matter to us, to me.

The Hotel Edison was skanky, smelled like piss, the carpetsrolled damp underneath. There was a palatable odor of decay, but I felt like Iwas in heaven. I guess that I could have stayed there then, but I knew somehow thatif I would have, that it would have been hell for me.

There I was, just turned seventeen, the fragrant humidity ofthe streets piled with someone else’s trash. Pimps, their hookers, lost boysand girls, everyone strung out. Drag Queens, X-rated adult theaters, gutsspilled out before me. So bitter, so sweet. Explicit weirdoes, guys on thestreet, selling to anyone, loose joints. The facilitator kept telling us justto ignore those things, walk past, and pay no attention. I felt like I hadfound paradise.

We were there for the theater after all, the bright lights,the great white way. Did I mention that by this time I also wanted to be amodel, a fashion designer and a ballet dancer?

I think now that even though I did want those things and thatI would have loved to have taken any one of those paths, that eventually Iwould have to choose and through a process of elimination and sometimes harshrealizations, that ultimately I would focus my energies on the visual arts. Thatstill would take some time to fully realize.

I ended up seeing eight plays in seven days that week. Thatincluded some Rockettes show, Glenn Close in a Sherlock Holmes story and Annie.I was so sick and tired by that point, having snuck out the in the middle ofthe night, ending up standing in line at Studio 54, walking afterwards, halfthe night, alone, lost, high on the uppers that Sam had shared with me.

As that child actress sang while we sat in the theaterwatching Annie, “The Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow”, some kid puked in the row infront of where I was sitting with my drama teacher. It was then that Iexperienced life, all on my own, no ma, no pa, just some teacher, who was notso much a mentor, but just someone that I could have become.

Years later, after I had been living in the city for awhile, he and I would meet again, a bar in Times Square. He was starting to go toNew York City regularly, we met, had drinks, I was in my prime. We eventually wouldhave a falling out and now I hear that he is on his deathbed.

We went before all that, back to our week in the city, to aplay before we knew what our future would bring. It was about a grown man andhis father. It was towards the end of the old guy’s life, terrific sets, endscene. Knew that that scenario was no longer a possibility for my dad and me. That was something that would haunt me forsome time to come, like whenever I achieved professional acclaim or reached along sought after goal, not unlike that one day when I had lived longer thanhe.

Mom picked us up at the airport after that trip was over; I hadcome back, home. A few of my friends were there to welcome us; they werestuffed into the backseat of ma’s car. I was just quiet. I didn’t say anything,didn’t tell Andre that his cashmere jackets were ruined by some New York City rainstorm,didn’t tell anyone anything that night.

That drive back to the trailer as ma dropped everyone off,one by one, I looked off into the dark night of that old little town. Whatlittle it offered me, what I would then still need to endure there and how Iwould need to plan to leave as soon as possible.

I vowed to myself to do it, to finish high school, to get ajob, to save up some money, to get as far away as I could, because I knew afterthat trip that I truly had found a place to call home, my home.

The Life of an Artist

2012-02-20T18:34:00.001-07:00

The Life of an Artist

“Ding dong, the witch is dead.”

Wizard of Oz

“Fame, I’m going to live forever!”

Irene Cara

Senior, high school, from the moment I stepped foot onto theschool bus, till the time I arrived at the end of the day at my grandma’s therewere verbal taunts, goddamned faggot, fucking faggot, freak. I would never backdown.

My dad had just killed himself, and yes we did sing a chorusfrom Wizard of Oz, he was a veritable force in the Chicano community, helpingthe poor find healthcare, access to food, building community centers, leadingthe pack of his peers, all around his age, 40. They adored him. I did not. Thatold story of the activist, who though revered by the public, was not much inthe way of a loving father.

There was a time when I was a kid and we’d play records, heloved Johnny Cash, and one of his favorites was A Boy Named Sue. Sure, so itwas tough love all the way. There were a few moments when he was proud, onebeing when I joined the R.O.T.C. in the 9^th grade, yeah I did it forhim, and the uniforms were fantastic.

He and mother fought nightly, usually in Spanish, I neverwanted to learn, this kept me safe from knowing what all of their fighting wasabout, anyway I assumed it was all my fault. But those days were over, we werekicked out by my grandma, his mother, spent a month at my mom’s mother’s house,our stuff on the porch, sleeping on the floor, shopping for a mobile home.

When I came back to my senses it was time to return to highschool and continue my studies, art, drama, photography. Then it became clearthat since I was still a minor I was entitled to Veteran’s Administrationbenefits, money? Me? I did have a part time job in the library over the summer,chump change, but this was gold, and though it came at quite a price, I couldchange my life some.

Mom had finished her G.E.D. and was working as a medicalassistant at the clinic, she was seeing her first husband, apparently that wastaking place even before dad died, and supposedly dad was messing around too.Anyway I had a new attitude, one that encouraged me to come out more, thoughnot sexually, too repressed, although there was no doubt in my mind what that Iwas Gay.

I learned one day in drama class that several of the highschool drama clubs were getting together to plan a trip to New York City. Thedrama teacher that I had, Sam, was an old school Gay man; everyone knew it,though he had never officially come out. But he would show up exhausted after anight at the baths, and nap while we wrote plays, shared our dreams and plans,and basically had an opportunity to teach ourselves, that was perfectly finewith me, although having a dedicated teacher might have been nice.

Sam and I decide that we had better sign up for the trip,there were some meetings scheduled at a different school, west side, bitterrivals. There were kids from many of the city’s schools, those who could affordit, what a better way to spend my benefits than on a trip to NY? I had beendreaming of this for a while, so I thought that I had better take advantage ofthe situation.

The facilitator was a bubbly big man, full of humor andideas on how to make the proposed trip pleasant for everyone. I signed on, sodid Sam, we were going to The Big Apple! At the Safeway grocery store, I wouldstand and read the magazines while mother shopped, Town and Country, New YorkMagazine, GQ, Vogue, The New Yorker. Sometimes I was clad in one of my outfits,inside out, buttoned up the back, my sister’s jumpsuit with enough length tocover her high heels.

I dreamed of the big city, Santa Fe was too close, SanFrancisco too earthquake prone, New York, yeah, escape the daily ordeals, livein a world where I could start again and become a star. I actually came out tomom, in line at the Safeway, she was shocked, never understood that one.

Pretty soon all of my friends knew that I was going on thetrip, I borrowed a couple of cashmere jackets from Andre, paid my trip dues,followed the travel tips, and was ready to leave on a jet plane. New York wasbankrupt, the trip would be cheap, we were prepped on never to look at people,not to talk to hookers or drug dealers, to be cautious and ultimately have fun.

Some of the kids were jealous, many already despised me, myfriends were happy and knew that even though I had been through all of the crap,that I was doing what I wanted, so they were encouraging and thrilled for me. Ipaid all of my dues, this included tickets to six Broadway shows, we were onlythere for a week, airfare and hotel, it was somewhere around a thousand bucks.

It was time to go, did we take time off from school? I can’tremember that, could look it up in one of the old journals, but will justcontinue instead. I’m sure that mothercried, prayed, worried, I had had a lifetime of that, though looking back shehad every right to be concerned. There were only a couple of adult guardians,maybe twenty to thirty kids, Sam, a young Gay couple, I was so trying to becool with them, they were friends of the trip facilitator.

My family was so poor and happy to stay put that very few ofus had flown before, my father being one of the few who had been to the eastcoast. I had taken a plane ride in R.O.T.C, prior to that we traveled by bus,but I did get to fly to L.A. once to visit my sisters that lived there then.That was when the flights could be taken for $30 one-way. But my flight to NewYork was approaching; I had my model’s smile, my dreams of being discovered, aplace to stay and a group of my peers who would take the journey alongside me.

It was a small plane, our group all eager and excitedfilling nearly every seat. The energy was high, there was nothing but the skybetween us and our dreams. The plane circled the city, palpitations, New YorkCity, just as I imagined it. The moment we touched down, the moment that thosetires screeched to a deafening halt, the moment we were let out onto thetarmac, I knew, I knew that I would finish school, and find a way, this washome, that was where I belonged.

The Life of an Artist

2012-02-11T19:06:00.000-07:00

"How bleak was my puberty." Agnes Gooch, Auntie Mame.

Just to recap, born early 60s, both parents second marriage, age of Camelot, raised American, entitled to pursue happiness. Self-discovery, awareness, path in life all came pretty early, shocking to my little mind but dealt with it through creativity, focus, empathy, lots of love, and later drugs.

Late 60s, family foundation begins to cave in, slowly, a constant string of negative experiences, bullied regularly, living poor, but my ideas and individuality were encouraged by my elders. Move to California for a couple of years, introduced to a whole new way of living, it was tough being uprooted but it did create a sense of adventure, then back to New Mexico, the onslaught of harsh times would really kick in then.

Focus focus, good teachers, good books, music, start coming out, trip the fuck out of a lot of small minded folk, learn not to back down. Create support system, amazing loving friends, elders, hell I even felt safe at church.

Okay, where was I? Oh yeah, calamity Jane.

Dad was a community activist, everyone loved him. He was the kind of guy that edited school textbooks, was invited to China after that wall fell or whatever. Built clinics, all for the cause, the poor, the Chicano people, wait a minute, I'm a Chicano? Anyway, so he was a grand public figure who gave voice to the under served, took some kind of vow of poverty or whatever, became a Communist after China, life was strange, but I had my outlets.

Then one night, boom, Dad kills himself. The community turned their back, my grandma, who once sewed my outrageous outfits, kicked us off the small plot of land, I blanked out. Took a month off, we, ended up in a trailer on the west side mesa, pretty much extricated from the idea of home, so I got gayer, and more productive. Then also it became clearer that even through all of this turmoil and upheaval, change, that I still had my dream. So I had to finish high school and get the hell out of Dodge.

It was then that I first began to dream about Santa Fe, it was only an hour away, obviously gayer, seemed a little more snobby and I could go to school to get my degree in acting. Oh wait, I forgot to mention that, yes I wanted to be an actor, well and a writer, a photographer, a video sensation, a ballet dancer, and something else, oh a model. The high school art teacher was originally from Santa Fe, she would tell stories of the time when she was a girl growing up there, you know it was a different time, kind of glamorous.

I didn't know how to apply to college, and even though I could pull a 4.0 average even under the duress, my records were shoddy at best. Then something like disco and the Village People, Punk, New Wave, all of those alternatives occurred. What about San Francisco? Hey I am talking late 70s here, the joint was jumping, and cheap.

In the meantime I was still being harassed daily, had accumulated enough credits to have art classes three to four hours a day, flunked algebra, never took gym, took typing and dj'ing instead, was out to my family, lots of drama from many sources within and without there, but mostly support, dated the class president, son of a state legislator, fell in love with a basketball player, went to church everyday at 7am, had my support, my derision, doubt, draw, write daily, survive.

Judy introduced me to Queen, the band, we were both members of the subversives, the ones that would take lunch in the art teacher's classroom. One day we put up some Monty Python-esque posters during the school elections, something about a Stalin like rat. We would intentionally fuck with things, it was fun, we were bored. Anyway Judy got me into Queen, I bought that t-shirt, that album promotion, it was a robot head, with Queen written in bold letters beneath the image. I wore that to school, some trio of boys say, "Hey Queen, where is your dress." I know, sounds trite now, but that was the least of it. I told my mom later, in the trailer on the mesa, the one that was never placed right on its supports, would rock in the desert wind. She replied, "Why didn't you tell them it was at the cleaners?"

Years later when Grandma and I became friends again, I was living in New York at the time, I would call her and grill her about the past, her past, mine, ours. She would tell me anything, happy to divulge, both of us happy to have that friendship back, but at a certain point she would say, that's enough, and that is when we would wrap up our conversation.

The Life of an Artist

2012-02-04T19:28:00.000-07:00

"Who am I? Why am I here?"
Lloyd Bentsen, 1988 vice presidential debate against Dan Quayle.

When I was a kid, Pre-K, we went on a field trip, the local fire station, I actually got to sit in the driver's seat. I was convinced then that I wanted to be a Fireman, my folks were so proud.

Then in kindergarten, oh I didn't like school, came that day, finger paint. Oh yeah baby. The class was held in a barrack, there was a huge braided rug, what are those called? Anyway came that fateful day, the teacher suggested that every kid come up get two dixie cups of color and a piece of paper then go back to their desks.

I was a shy kid, came from a big family, we lived down the street from the school. With Ma and her twin there were 14 of us. Socializing outside of the family was totally weird at that point of my life so I waited till the other kids had gone up and made their choices.

I am the last kid in line, two colors left, red, black, I gather the materials, head back, sit alone, near a window, New Mexico light. I can still feel the sensation, putting my little fingers together, I was 5, and in slow motion, as the sun shone down, I go into it, rich thick deep color. What the hell just happened? I apply it to the paper, did someone say hallelujah!?

There wasn't much in the way of instruction at that time, and at home there wasn't much in the way of extra money for supplies, but there was always some affordable material at the five & dime, slabs of modeling clay for a quarter, simple coloring books, scissors, crayons, paradise.

Then that cursed Dialing for Dollars, that program, that not only incurred a lustful urge for luck and random monetary gains, but they were also showing really good movies, the kind of stuff that free tv doesn't bother with anymore. One day, The Agony and the Ecstasy, Charlton Heston as Michelangelo, what the hell, why didn't anyone tell me about this? Then wait a
minute, Lust For Life with Kirk Douglas, seriously oh my god!

The movie that sealed the deal was Moulin Rouge with Jose Ferrer. Obviously I am not as talented as these guys, but as a kid these were my lessons. I understood then that this path was going to be long and bumpy and that my chances of success were based on a variety of circumstances, but lordy I was considering the ride avidly.

So life got pretty tough for a while, yeah insert sob story, but to preserve myself, I began to focus, define studio time, this was when I was around thirteen or so, and yes maybe the same time that I started smoking pot, adios braincells hello new way of thinking. Heck if I only use ten percent that other ninety is just extra baggage, right?

At the same time I start reading, my dad has a bookshelf, the classics, way in over my head, I slowly delve in. Then an art teacher in junior high, she has this unfounded faith in my work, takes me out one night, she drove a VW bug, saw some art movies, later a belly dancer, then smoking pot with her brother. She treated me like an equal, with respect and kindness, she let me enjoy independent study in class and then came high school.

Ugh, by that point I had being going through over four years of daily bullying, went from a cute kid that everyone loved to an over weight hippie looking nearly drag queen child. But in high school I really started coming out, not much I could do about that either, and oh the torment was vivid. So I took drugs, not a lot, thankfully we were broke, and plenty of drinking, which I was bad at at that time. But what the hell we had the Bicentennial and Disco became the craze.

I was sixteen going on seventeen, somehow getting through, had a brilliant high school art teacher, more of a friend, someone that cherished me and my vision, not sure if I would have seen what she saw in me, nor even if the system would permit that kind of closeness now, but oh how kind she was, offering me a safe place, guiding the plight of insight, she is still one of my dearest friends to this day. Well some one weekend, in the dark of night, my dad killed himself. I lost it, so what? Everything changed, but we still managed to go to the same school and that art teacher was there, always encouraging and often surprised.

So I am running out of writing steam, will publish this for now, with some images of what I am working on. Will finish this story another time.

I Dream of Spring

2012-01-31T19:27:00.000-07:00

I go out everyday to take pictures, usually this means that there is a leash that I am holding and on the other end a dog. I am not necessarily a dog person.

Santa Fe can be kind of bleak in winter, no not bleak, um, dismal, nah, um, monochromatic, yeah that's it. There are the evergreens which are well ever green, big skies, usually blue, deep crazy intense blues. Clouds that pick up crazy color from the sunset and the sunrise. But there is outside of these instances very little in hue differentiation. Bare trees, adobe adobe adobe, I believe that it is law here that one's home can only be of three shades of an earthy color.

Last winter I freaked, I thought that I would lose my mind, much of my palette is derived through natural color. But over the summer this place comes alive, and on our property here we have some amazingly beautiful blooms. I am still working from that inspiration.

I dream of spring.

From the studio: contemplating prosperity, drawing circles, time, and nursery rhymes

2012-01-20T21:21:00.001-07:00

Time for action

Remember that mantra from childhood "head shoulders kneesandtoes kneesandtoes, eyes, ears, mouth and nose. . ." (in case you forgot) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d8FwBSITW-4 --it came to mind this morning with my sudden burst of bending toward the prosperous rather than the poverty conscious. Benign ambition but action nonetheless. Time is now. Made an eye appointment. My last visit was 4 years ago and the scratches on my perscription sunglasses are easily 10 years old -- dry eyes are really my only climate complaint (besides the lack of an ocean) about living in Santa Fe. I also checked out the LaFamilia dental options and what a pleasant surprise to reach a very friendly and articulate hygenist who explained everything with detail as if we had all day to chat, and when it became clear that "getting in" is slim to none she provided several first-hand referrals and called me "sweetie". Wow. I celebrate by buying a bottle of wine outside my $6.99 budget though the jug red brings it all back in balance. Balance. Yes.

To beach or not to beach. This will be my first winter in 10 that I am not flying to Mexico. I'm mostly fine but it just seems wrong --out of balance so to speak --not to go since this is the first year in a long while that I've actually had enough miles for a free ticket (well free is relative since the bulk of those miles have come from carrying a balance on said Visa which hinders the actual decision to. . .well you get the idea). And of course the money for travel is somehow connected to the need for new glasses and a potential root canal and unexpected visits to Urgent Care or not connected at all depending upon the day and which friend is offering links to exotic locales.

So this is not really about eye exams but action. Time is now. I also invited friends for dinner, had a great walk to and from my part-time day job, roasted the last of the brussel sprouts, read about Christopher Hitchens and took a shower. Okay too much information but I feel the art of possibility and THAT perspective can change a life.

In the studio I'm working on my puzzle panels of "p" poetry and mixed media for the Odes & Offerings exhibition. Here is a sneak preview. A detail. Circles and text and what I thought would all hang together (as 6 panels) but separately I now contemplate attaching as one 24"x18" block. Do I think this because it will be easier to install/hang or because I like it better? And whenever I put a drill in my hand, for seemingly simple tasks, it somehow evolves into a problem I did not anticipate. . .that is the joy and the dilemna in my process. I do begin with an idea, of course. In this case the puzzle panels. The image is often nebulous which might be problematic. Or not. I have remained true to my palette --well sort of. I'm the girl who never follows the recipe though I like to have it for reference. . .always some modification. I am still using Iridescent Pearl and Alizarin Crimson but have added my favorite (it gets into everything eventually) Payne's Gray, and a touch of Parchment to tone down the pink, and the gel medium creates texture that is workable and the pomegranate rich gloss I envisioned is now a dull distressed version. I'm not really into gloss anyway. I'm considering hiding one of the small panels to keep its "solitude" pure because sometimes I just cannot help myself when it comes to color --oh just a little and then it's all over (but the shouting). But I am having fun. And I look forward to the weekend because I have time for the studio. And energy. The ideas are morphing into a whole. There will be a show. The piece will participate. Hang with those other 30+ artists. Hope you can come and stay tuned for an official invitation. Put if you want to mark your calendars now consider yourself invited:

WHAT: Odes & Offerings

WHEN: Opening Reception 5-7pm

Friday March 23, 2012

WHERE: Santa Fe Community Gallery

@ 201 W. Marcy, Santa Fe

Gallery Hours: 10am to 5pm TU - SAT

When words and images come together in the guise of creativity we give you Odes & Offerings

Pomegranate in the studio and when life brings death

2012-01-15T19:16:00.003-07:00

The Happy Coast

I am back in the studio this weekend after a long holiday hiatus. Deadlines are good for motivation. And emotional Saturday's pondering the death of a friend. A birthday/memorial. Working on a new piece for an upcoming group show (April 2012) curated by Santa Fe poet laureat Joan Logghe. "Odes & Offerings". Pons Asinorum. Punica granatam sent me to the dictionary. More than once and still I need cliff notes. It is my job to create a piece and use the text of poet Phil Geronimo's words in my art. Not to respond to the poem though how can you not? With all those p's: pomologist, pomegranate, prose (by Robbins), pons. . .and so I decide on iridescent pearl and alizarin crimson with a little pyrrole red (which is a very expensive color for some reason). That --and circles and photographs and other interesting objects. A bit of a puzzle on panel. Excited. Yesterday I spend much time contemplating. Looking. Printing. More contemplation --hmmm? Never know what brush to use. Gesso. Medium. Move things around. Think. Take a walk up Canyon and Acequia Madre then back to Pandora Radio. Pour myself a glass of red. It is a beginning. That is good.

Alberto 2005

I find out through the FB grapevine that it is the birthday of a man I had a "fling" with in 2005. An Italian chef musician transplanted to a small beach community on Golfito Bay along the southern Pacific Coast of Costa Rica near Panama. I went there for 4 days after a yoga retreat, then back again (unannounced) for 9 days two months later. I won't tell you how I walked into his restaurant in a dress with no panties since that is too personal. . .Alberto Ferrini. He rocked my world --this skinny passionate person. Long dark hair all the way to his waist. And played a mean harmonica. Guitar. Gravelly voice. Bob Dylan and the Rolling Stones all rolled into one little package. Smart and political and on fire in the safest place he could find to live out his days. La Puerta Negra a little beach cafe. Pizza on Thursday nights. Decent wine. Lali. Music. One night he knocked on the door of my casita (well shouted really Brenda are you in there?) and I emerged straight into "Like Water for Chocolate" in my April Cornell nightgown jumping on a 4-wheel stallion in the spring darkness we blast up the beach. Hair blowing, stars galore and I hold on tighter exhilarated yet fearful of a log in our path that will tumble us head over hills. He slows down. I've always appreciated that gesture. That sensitivity. At the end of the 9 days I felt a bit like Shirley Valentine but that's okay. Such is life. My long blonde hair. Said he would know it anywhere. And he stayed in touch. A post card from Paris, phone calls from Zancudo. . .saying it is important to remember your sweethearts. And so I light all my candles and remember --wishing him a Happy 51st Birthday though he died a week before --go well my sweet Alberto into whatever is after. A life lived full out and without apology. You touched the hearts of so many. May your light shine. Shine on.

La Puerta Negra

I find it amazing really how a person I knew only 13 days can have such an affect on my own. My time there inspired a body of work (paintings over photographs) entitled Postcards from Zancudo http://www.brendaroper.com/work/fenced.html. And I reflect on our choices to be authentic. To break free from expectation (often our own) and go forth onto a path not known. What to give up and what is gained? He thought he was dying once years before. A heroin addict. Went to the beach and laid down. Then woke up. To begin again. A shot of rum and a glass of water every morning. A little codeine on the side. A business written in the guide books (Frommers, Lonely Planet the Moon. . .) for those lucky enough to find themselves there. Making his way, tending a garden, making foccacia, anchovies and parmesan fresh from Italy. Pasta. And music --always the music. Wine and joy to a life he created on the black sand beaches of Zancudo. A reader of good books. Spanish, Italian and English. What a gift. The only man I've slept with that kept a machete by his pillow. No judgements please. One of the most authentic human beings I've met. And loved. Thank you Alberto. May your light shine on.

Someone Forwarded This To Me.

2012-01-15T18:53:00.000-07:00

I am not the author of this information, thought that I might share it on this platform. While very basic I think that there are a good number of points made by this writer. I find a lot of this demeaning and pedantic, what do you think?

Mistake #1: Presenting an inconsistent body of work.
Artists generally love their freedom. They want to experiment. They love a challenge. They crave variety. All good things, except when you are presenting your work to a gallery. The work you present to a gallery needs to be unified. It doesn't need to be repetitive or formulaic, but it must present you as a consistent artist with a clear vision. Often I feel I am looking at the work of multiple artists as I review a single portfolio. To avoid this problem you need to find focus in your work.
If you work in several media and a variety of styles, focus on just one for the next 6-12 months. Create a body of work that feels like a "series". Once you have 20-25 gallery-ready pieces in this series, you will be ready to approach a gallery. You can further create consistency by presenting the work in a consistent way. Use similar frames for paintings and photographs, similar bases for sculpture, similar settings for artistic jewelry. Make it very clear all of the work is by the same artist. If you simply can't rein your style in, consider creating multiple portfolios, one for each style. Don't confuse the galleries you approach by presenting multiple styles in one portfolio.

Mistake #2: Producing insufficient work to sustain gallery sales.
Many artists create marketable work, but in quantities too low to make a gallery relationship viable. Successful artists are consistently in the studio creating artwork. You may be surprised to learn the results of a recent survey I conducted. I asked artists how many new works they created in the last twelve months. Painters responded that on average they were creating 53 pieces every twelve months. Sculptors 31. Glass artists 500! A gallery owner needs to feel confident you will replace sold art quickly and maintain high quality. They want to know if you are successful that you can replenish their inventory. Don't despair if you are far from reaching this goal. Rather, look at your creative production for the last year and set a goal to increase the production by 25% in the next 12 months.

Several suggestions to increase productivity:

1. Dedicate time daily to your art. Maybe your schedule will only allow for two hours daily, but you will produce more by working for those two hours every day than you will by waiting for big blocks of time.Treat your studio time as sacred. Train your family and friends to respect that time. You don't interrupt them when they are at work; ask them the same courtesy when you are in the studio.

2. Set a production goal. If I could tell you the secret to producing 50 or 100 pieces per year, would you listen? Here it is: create 1 or 2 pieces of work per week.I know it seems overly simplified, yet few artists work in a concerted and disciplined way to achieve this goal. (A common objection I hear to this suggestion is that quality will suffer if an artist works this quickly. In my experience, the opposite is true. A certain level of quality may only be obtained by putting miles on the paintbrush, spending hours in the darkroom, or moving tons of clay or stone.)

3. Remove distractions from the studio. Relocate your computer to another room. Unplug the telephone. Nothing kills an artist's focus faster than the constant interruption of technology. Your inbox and voicemail will keep your messages safe while you work.

Mistake #3: Delivering a portfolio in a format inconvenient for gallery review.
Often your portfolio is your only chance to show your work to a gallery owner. Poorly formatted portfolios are rarely viewed. Your portfolio should be concise, simple, informative, and accessible.
25 years ago, formatting a portfolio was simple. A portfolio was either a literal portfolio with sheet protectors and photos, or a slide sheet. The choices have since multiplied. CD? Digital hardbound photo-book? .Pdf file? Email? Which format is the most effective? None of these, actually. Each has drawbacks limiting effectiveness. They are either too much work for the gallery owner to access, too easy to delete, or too hard for the artist to maintain. A couple of things to keep in mind with your portfolio:

1. Your portfolio should contain no more than 20-25 of your most recent works. You should not create an all-inclusive portfolio. A gallery owner does not want to see your life's work. They want to see your best, most current, most relevant work.

2. On each page you should include pertinent, relevant information about the art. Include the title, the medium, the size, and the price. Don't include the date of artwork creation.

3. Place your bio, artist's statement, and resume at the end of the portfolio, not the beginning. Your artwork is the most important feature of the portfolio- don't bury it behind your info. Limit press clippings and magazine articles to 2-3 pages.

4. Include 2-3 images of sold artwork. You should try to include at least one photograph of an installed piece. These images will establish your credibility more rapidly than any resume ever could.

Mistake #4: Lacking confidence and consistency in pricing.
Is your work priced correctly?
One of the greatest challenges you will face as an artist is knowing how to correctly value your work. Many artists price their work emotionally and inconsistently. Galleries can't sell wrongly priced art.
Worse, nothing will betray an unprepared artist like not knowing how to price his/her work.
Many artists mistakenly under-price their work. They do this because they feel they are not established. They do it because their local art market won't sustain higher prices. They do it because they lack confidence in their work.

Mistake #5: Approaching the wrong galleries.
My gallery is located in an art market dominated by Southwest and Western subject matter. My gallery stands apart from most of the galleries in Arizona because I have chosen art outside the norm. Yet I am constantly contacted by Western and Southwestern artists. They seem surprised and hurt when I turn them away. They could have saved us both some discomfort by researching my gallery before approaching. Which markets should you approach first? How should you research the galleries? Is it safe to work with galleries in out-of-state markets.

Mistake #6: Submitting art through the wrong channels.
Conventional wisdom and even some highly respected art marketing books will advise you to send your portfolio with a cover letter to a gallery. You may also hear it's best to call a gallery and try and make an appointment to meet the owner. You might visit a gallery's website to learn of their submission guidelines.

Fall down go boom -- Syncope

2012-01-07T17:17:00.002-07:00

Village at Grand Traverse Commons
former state hospital in Traverse City

They call it "syncope" that language of the medical profession. In layman terms it means to faint. A black out where not enough oxygen is getting to the brain. The body shuts down just like your computer. Poof. It happened to me for the first time at 10pm last Monday. I was standing at the sink doing dishes after reading a Nelson DeMille novel in a very comfy chair for the past two hours. Up for the rest of the keylime pie. Back to the story. A Happy New Year's day off. Ran into an old friend at a local bookstore. And his mother. Life is good kind of day. I suddenly felt very hot inside my funky new flannel pjs and couldn't focus or hold the dish and so I turned away to contemplate -- so sudden, I went to the kitchen door and fumbled with the lock. To let in the night air. I held onto the very thin wood that crossed the screen door not sure what to do. What is happening? The next thing I remember bang the back of my head hurts and my neighbor Max is asking "are you okay?" --I am on the floor trying to sit up. I tell him I think so. "I was hot and I hit my head but I think I'm okay". At that point I didn't understand that I had fainted. I was confused. I got up and looked in the mirror. My pupils were dilated. Hmmm. Was it an aneurysm? Am I bleeding? I check out the back of my head but not even a bump. Not a headache. But ouch it slammed hard. Is there such a thing as a mini-stroke? I have a good friend who lost her sister to an aneurysm a few years ago. She was my age. She called 911. They found her address book on the floor near the phone. She didn't make it. But I feel fine now. I'm okay. Should I be worried? No insurance (though I have had it off/on) which suddenly is a big factor in the decision to go to the emergency room or not. Do I just go to bed? Should I call someone? I think I'm okay. I go to google and look up stroke. No tingling. Not a seizure. No bleeding. I guess I'll just go to bed but before I do I find Max and tell him I think I had a mini-stroke. He tells me not to google anything but I ask him to check on me in the morning then lock myself in. I send an email to a sister before I go to bed. Just in case I die in my sleep. Sounds ridiculous I know but at this point I think it is brain related. I wake in the middle of the night grateful I am still alive but wonder why my tailbone hurts. And then I get it. Wow. Fell back on my tailbone and slammed the back of my head onto the kitchen floor. Grateful it is wood and not brick. There's a rug.

Now I know it was just a faint. Syncope. Low blood pressure. But why? I didn't do or eat or not do or eat anything different than any other day. It was quite a burst to the "I'm the healthiest person I know" bubble. I am healthy. I like being healthy. But do healthy people faint away onto their kitchen floors? Hmmm? Blood sugar? Too many carbohydrates? Was it the keylime pie? The wine with my early dinner hours before? And after I vacillate about the expense and whether to go to Urgent Care or wait two months to get an appointment at the low-income clinic I find myself making an appointment for Urgent Care. Before I walk into the office where I live, here at El Zaguan, just to talk to someone. I am emotional. I haven't even called my family. Might as well wait until I have something to report. A sweet little dog named Pierre jumps into my lap. What a gift. Turns out our Administrative Assistant has a history of fainting. Wow. 10 times? Turns out (as the week progresses) that there is a history of women in my family with low-thryoid. And a cousin who fainted because she didn't use enough salt. And Grandma Higley (who lived to 96 years and bore 12 children) had a goiter. She took a shot of iodine in her glass of grape juice every morning. My mother tells me these things. My sisters. I look up the symptoms for low-thyroid and the only one that jumps at me is the poor memory.

But now nearly a week has passed and I've been in a doctor's office twice. I had my first EKG. Normal. I took the little pink paper gown they gave me to put on with the opening in the front. It might turn into an art project. My results were normal. Low blood pressure. 90/60. This is a good thing I think but my doctor tells me (prefaced by he would never tell this to everyone as if the salt police are listening) "you might want to add more salt to your diet". The glucose was good. He writes up an order for blood work: cholesterol and thyroid. I'm waiting for results. By now I've talked to many people who have fainted. And I feel naive in my good health bubble. Amazed really at how uncommon to be so well but now I'm just like everyone else. Fainting with no good reason. It is very perplexing and a bit sad to walk into Tricore at 8:30am on a Friday morning and find every seat taken. They offer a 50% discount to the uninsured if you pay now which is a whole other topic I find interesting but do not have the energy to explore. Hmmm.

I am healthy but I fainted. Get some perspective. Okay. My sister tells me, after I lament that I don't want to be on any medication for the rest of my life, that if I have to be. . .thyroid is the best option. High cholesterol runs in our family too. I know this and hope the oatmeal I eat is enough to compensate. The walking. No fast food. Hard to give up my 1/2 & 1/2 in my Italian Roast. I bought myself a NY Steak in case I need more protein. Eat meat. One neighbor is sampling a vegan diet. Another is going in for a second heart surgery on Monday. Life is precious and it goes along until it doesn't I suppose. These little wake up calls.

And I sit here today trying to organize my priorities. How to make a living tops the list but not nearly as interesting as where to travel, or is it possible to move to Mexico as I ask myself if I'm simply done with visual art --the making of more "stuff" and how I need to resign myself to working for other people but I love to write and how do I design myself on paper for anything? Is it worth applying for a residency? A grant? Do I want to move? Is $700/month really a savings if I have to pay utilities? I like my apartment. Even if I could afford to live where I can sit outside in a chair before the ocean would I --or would I be inside watching a movie? Last night I opened the door to say "hi moon" but so often I miss it --tucked inside this old adobe when darkness comes. I am well but I haven't ridden a bike since I moved to Santa Fe three years ago. What does that mean? That I'll never ride a bike again? Does it negate all the places and joy that bike riding brought me? That time to the top of Trail Ridge Road?. A moon light ride down Going to the Sun in Glacier Park? All those years to Kincaid Park and back? Up the Big Mountain Road in Whitefish? That time I rode up those steep grades in Tuscany going so slow I almost fell over but never giving it up? Something that was once as vital as breathing I just let go. Sold it. Still have the bike rack on top of my car. Just in case I suppose. I walk. Sold my tent too. Does this mean I'll never go camping? Do I even want to? Maybe--Is this aging? I know it is all about perspective. The ability to love yourself and greet each day as it may be. To paint or not to paint. To read or write or watch a movie. To eat steak or sweet potatoes or key lime pie. The joy of "fainting" as far as I can tell so far is the connection I forge with my family. With my neigbhors. Of telling someone where I hide the key in case I don't come out in the morning. Of stopping and facing that I live an independent life and I need to figure out what to do if I suddenly don't. Who to contact. Let someone know my wishes (not to be on life support) or what to do with my art and all those journals under the bed. For me. For them too I suppose.

The irony is that is what I do. My day job is to organize information for someone else. How to get inside her house if she dies overnight or over the weekend? How to get beyond the slider bolts if she doesn't leave them open. How to know if she doesn't answer the phone (because she never answers the phone). How to remain independent and safe --? And now I'm getting off track but this is where my thoughts have gone this week. This is what happens when you live in the "I am the healthiest person I know" bubble. It bursts.

CIRQUE JOURNAL: Pantoum poetry and other artful words & images

2012-01-01T10:17:00.002-07:00

A good friend of mine started an on-line arts and literary journal for the North Pacific Rim three years ago. The same year I left Alaska to move to Santa Fe. Since I live in the desert now I brushed off his invite to grandfather me in (though I did submit photographs for Issue #3) but Cirque updated their submission guidelines for this and future issues to include artists/authors who have a history or connection of 5 years or more to the North Pacific Rim. I'm ethical that way so now that it is official I took a chance and submitted some poetry along with my textural photographs. One was selected and you can find it on page 68 http://www.cirquejournal.com/ along with a handful of photographs scattered throughout. I am thrilled to be a part of these pages. Part of a dream that found its way to fruition, and to watch the quality of the magazine grow. The on-line format is fantastic and easy to use. It also offers the option of purchasing a hardcopy which is a beautiful piece. For all you writers and artists with a connection to Alaska, Canada, Hawaii, and the Pacific Northwest please take a look and consider submitting your work to a future issue and at the least enjoy what you find by taking a look through these pages.

My poem A Cup of Coffee was originally titled Outstretched Hands and emerged from a poetry workshop at UAA with Linda McCarriston over 10 years ago. Wow. It started in shorter stanzas modeled after something that I don't remember but turned into a Pantoum. "A Pantoum is a Malayan Form. It consists of an indefinite number of quantrain stanzas with particular restrictions: lines 2 and 4 of each stanza in their entirety are repetons --they become lines 1 and 3 of the following stanza and so on. The rhyme scheme is interlocking and follows this pattern." (from Lewis Turco -The New Book of Forms).

A1, B1, A2, B2

B1, C1, B2, C2

C1, D1, C2, D2

Oh how I rebelled against everything in this book. A form felt too confining. I still get them all confused and have to look at each pattern carefully, but the truth is it woke my poetry up. Gave it a voice. The form took my words and put them on the page exactly where they needed to be. Structure can be a very good thing --especially the repetition. This is the 2nd pantoum I've had published so perhaps I should pay more attention to form in my writing life --a life that has been relinquished primarily to my journals while letting the visual side of my creativity run wild. Not a bad thing I suppose but it makes me happy to see it here http://www.cirquejournal.com/ all these years later.

Happy New Year! and since it is the end of one and the beginning of another --that death/resurrection scenario-- on my list of self-reflection & goals for 2012 is to spend one hour a day doing something you are passionate about -- for me that will include a more focused type of writing. Also including deconstructed poetics in my visual art --a technique I used in my recent show Conversations with Bones & Barbed Wire and will continue to explore in the year(s) ahead.

I miss my writing group from those long summer/winter days in Alaska: James P. (Jim) Sweeney and Mike Burwell and the occasional guest sitting around my table by the window. Alute on the deck outside. Wine and snacks, and energy that drove us all forward and sometimes apart -- but never for long. So this post is dedicated to them. Mike and Jim, editors and authors and friendship of the best kind. Love you guys.

Go well into the world of words.

Farolito Walk, Santa Fe, 2011

2011-12-26T18:22:00.001-07:00

Happy Holidays

2011-12-23T20:12:00.001-07:00

Artful ponderings & Our Lady of Guadalupe

2011-12-10T11:49:00.000-07:00

The long view up Canyon Road --Friday 12.9.11

The twilight twinkles with starlight and moonrise and candles fuse with adobe while paper bags placed on the ground light the way, but it is quiet in the gallery. Only Max and I make the effort on behalf of the Zaguanistas. Still there are always gifts to be found in the few who wander through the gate and up the path. A young woman takes off her coat, sips an eggnog and we chat about Plaza Blanca and how to spend a day in Abiquiu, another artist has work in Hahn Ross Gallery where there is an opening this afternoon from 4-8pm. A fundraiser to benefit "Imagine Forward" a non-profit created by Tom Ross to inspire and further creative expression while addressing crucial needs in our community --in schools. How do I miss these artful opportunities? Is there a special mailing list? --this has bothered me since my arrival in Santa Fe. I seem to be so after-the-fact. The one avenue I have found, with the Santa Fe Community Gallery, has been good to me and I appreciate the themes and the creative challenge. A few people return who walk Canyon every Friday night. We appreciate them too for their support and curiosity. Still after we blow out the candles, close the gates, turn out the lights and I am back in my live/work studio (that I love) --I am overcome with emotion. At how to be proactive in artful abundance. The kind that will help pay off the Visa bill that is waning dangerous to out of control as each month I hope for a little extra. Maybe a painting will sell or a set of three painterly photos. That $500 would make a difference. I choose images I think speak to the Holiday Season. A cross from the side of a church in Merida, a snowfence that borders the El Zaguan garden, Tapa's for the foodie crowd and a personal favorite: Our Lady of Guadalupe, cards ($5/ea) or the kitsch vintage cake assemblage "Eat Cake & Pray" featuring three images of this miraculous female icon. Though I am not anywhere close to being Catholic I love some of the iconography and adopt it for my own purposes. And I am fascinated by Mexico. . .

Eat Cake & Pray --assemblage $95

Guadalupe day, December 12, is Mexico’s most important religious holiday. On this day people from all over Mexico travel to the chapel Tepayac Hill in Mexico City, where the mother of Jesus is said to have appeared before an Indian peasant named Juan Diego back in 1531. Mary told Juan to go to the bishop and ask that a church be built on the hill so she could be close to her people. The bishop, needing proof of this vision, asked Juan to have a miracle performed by Mary. Juan returned to Tepayac Hill and found Castillian roses growing where there had only been cacti. It was winter and very late in the season for any flowers to bloom. He wrapped the roses in his tilma (peasant cloak) and returned to the bishop. When he opened his cloak before the bishop on December 12 the flowers fell to the floor and in their place was the Virgin of Guadalupe miraculously imprinted on the fabric --the legend was born and the chapel was built.

And so believe --in yourself, in miracles, in peace on earth, in understanding-- when that seems a most formidable task. All our fears getting in the way of truth and trust and the ability to love and communicate. I have company coming today. We will feast on food and friendship and artful conversation. I will struggle with intimacy issues pretending to sleep while the ghosts of the past and present walk naked through the night to use the bathroom, and in the morning when I wake in good cheer (because I always wake in good cheer) we will drink strong coffee and I may call my mother or a sister and life will begin again. As it does. Everyday a choice. An opportunity. A happening. Go well into this holiday season and let the light shine on.

Deck the Walls, Celebrate Art with the Zaguanistas

2011-12-03T17:42:00.001-07:00

Temporary Roomates and Temporary Insanity

2011-12-03T12:29:00.001-07:00

An old friend calls, he's in Scottsdale, "I'm having a solo show here, would you mind if I visited for a couple of days?" This guy and I have known each other through a mutual friend in NYC for about fifteen years now, we partied together and worked on several pubic art installations as part of a team. Even though we knew each other for a long time, I was never particularly drawn to him, except in the beginning, and then I got to know him very well.

It turned out that he is the type of artist that intends to break the system, you know go straight to the top, while burning bridges all along the way. As a performance piece it might work, maybe not. In the art world, definitely not, we've got to pay our dues and it can be years before any kind of recognition is bestowed upon us and our work. While this man, my age, has been prolific and is genuinely talented, there is always something that derails his ambition.

He was out of the city for a while when I was still living there, off to finally get a solo show somewhere in the Middle East, a grand exhibition that would incorporate a huge installation along with his paintings, a really terrific idea and it was executed with finesse, never any doubt about that, but something went wrong. There was conflict and lots of it, his expectations being gargantuan I sincerely doubt that they could have been met unless somehow he magically appeared on the cover of artforum.

Well that is about the time that we started corresponding via email and facebook, with that distance between us I could drop in and out of conversation, offer some level headed advice, I was a gallery director in the city and had a way with calming artists during their solo shows. While the opportunity is fantastic I think that for the most part nearly every artist that I dealt with lost their minds just a little during the process, that's cool, understandable. We are putting ourselves out there, butt naked and maybe just looking for some respect, sales and credibility.

For one's first solo, or even second or third, things may not always go as planned. A gallery represents a roster of artists, certainly they will focus on the exhibiting artist, but there is still the others to deal with, along with maintaining the gallery's reputation, the amount of work the dealer must undertake, the cost to them, and various outside factors, the economy, the competition, and again honing the relationship with the artist on hand. There is no clear single force at work, all the cards played add up to what one has been dealt.

So this fellow has a couple of other shows, and somehow they all end up being disasters, what is the missing part of this equation? Still we stay in touch and when I leave New York we continue our electronic exchange. I have always been the type of guy who would never turn anyone away, so I say sure come stay in Santa Fe for a few days. Turns out we have a wonderful visit and soon my friend is back on his way to Arizona to wrap up his show then return to the East Coast afterwards.

I went to Las Vegas to visit with family, while there I get a call from my artist friend in Scottsdale, everything has blown up, the gallery owner spits in his face, bad bad bad. Sure you can return to Santa Fe and stay at my place till you get your bearings, I'll be back in a week. I return and he is settled in, certainly not uncharacteristic, he's done it before, and well being so broke I almost looked at it like a status symbol in a weird way, that being that most of my friends can take someone in and would gladly.

This artist friend becomes enchanted by Santa Fe, happens all the time, but he doesn't like the way things are run and he is going to change everything and rise quickly. I am a professional schmoozer and believe me it doesn't happen like that here and it doesn't happen anywhere especially if one is flat broke and does not have any social connections. He grows frustrated and manic, I begin to lose my patience, one week turns to two.

In his effort to conquer Santa Fe he ventures out with a bag of paintings in tow to show the neighboring galleries. At first he sweet talks them, then when they say they don't have time to view work he storms out shouting. There are guidelines and protocol in place, sweet talking a gallery is fine, but they are busy folks and even though their job is always to be on the lookout for a new artist, just dropping in and demanding that they see your work is most likely a sure fire way of never being shown in that gallery, ever.

We as artists surely can sell out of our studios, we don't necessarily need the gallery system to be productive or find buyers, but if one wants to work in the business there are just some things that always need to be kept in mind. The gallery is a business, a contemporary re-working of a very old system, one that has evolved with the times and there is a way of obtaining representation, but one must certainly be aware and not ruin the opportunity. Have a good website, share the link, if the gallery is interested be prepared for a studio visit.

So my friend finally left, not before making me feel like an insane landlord and causing quite a ruckus that left a pall on my place. I have no regrets and I surely will take someone in again, but not this guy, not right now or in the near future.

Zaguanistas, December 2011

2011-12-03T11:32:00.001-07:00

Death, Birthdays and Houseguests

2011-11-29T13:07:00.001-07:00

Fourteen months since I left NYC for the quiet beauty of Santa Fe. How has this time and all that has occurred since affect my art?

My life in the big city was never dull and only on occasion easy, still I managed to paint consistently throughout my time there, with or without money. The support system that I developed grew to be a reliable source of means to keep me afloat.

Over the past several years that support system would be marked by loss, death, people losing their jobs, a relationship that ended and collectors who just stopped collecting. So like a mad man I put on my sales hat and voraciously approached any viable collector, often working with them and their means in order to get the cash that I needed to leave and start fresh somewhere new.

The transition to New Mexico came easily at first, found excellent housing in a wonderful neighborhood, was situated quickly and began painting immediately. Then the reality shock kicked in and I found myself in a place where the social terrain baffled me, where employment seemed unobtainable, regardless of my having been an associate director in a contemporary gallery for five years.

Through all of my first missteps here, what did take place was a renewed source of inspiration, the landscape, the light and the natural colors. So while continuing to be a starving artist, struggling to pay the rent, I painted, and painted. I was in the studio at least seven hours a day, this new body inspired new buyers, and soon enough I was able to sustain my life as an artist.

The job search became depressing, I would go through periods where I didn't even bother looking, developing some kind of mental block to the humiliating process. The list of new buyers dwindled, I was back at zero. So I painted.

I became a caretaker for an elderly ill neighbor, the money was enough to sustain my needs, food, lower shelf vices and art supplies. Life on the edge, not an unusual predicament for me, one that I feel is necessary in order to have my time to my self to paint. I had to borrow money to pay the rent, still owe a couple of friends, and then questions, should I stay? Should I go? Where to? How do I get there?

Mother died, she had been sick for a while, still quite a shock. Upon my return from her deathbed I found myself alone and lost, she did not have much, in fact very little, and there was no real family home, but without her here I just didn't feel like I belonged anywhere. The process of mourning took some time, just logistics and not having the opportunity to be where my family was in order to grieve together. We did finally accomplish that though, and once that was taken care of, I thought to myself, I want to go home, to Santa Fe.

So now here, with all of the negatives and positives, I find myself renewed and energized, its like I feel the need to stay and cause some change, minor or radical. Just paid the overdue rent, am working on the next payment, which is due in ten days and after that we'll hope for the best.

In the meantime I have recently celebrated by fiftieth birthday and have a fellow wandering starving artist staying with me. The Artists of El Zaguan have a group show opening this coming Friday and a pending snowstorm. So now it is time to paint.

Brenda Roper, Solo Show At El Zaguan

2011-11-26T18:20:00.001-07:00

Deck the Walls: Celebrate Art with the Zaguanistas

2011-11-23T21:02:00.000-07:00

Adam Eisman

OPENS: Friday December 2, 2011, 5 to 7pm
WHERE: El Zaguan (James L. Johnson House)
               545 Canyon Road, Santa Fe
HOURS: Monday - Saturday 10 - 4pm
                Friday evenings 5 to 7pm
                Studios by appointment

We invite you to celebrate works by Greg Tweed, Max-Carlos Martinez, Brenda Roper, William McLane, Bethany Orbison, and Adam Eisman in a variety of media including painting and photography. For more information on the artists of El Zaguan or the Historic Santa Fe Foundation please contact: cara@historicsantafe.org

Holiday, ART, Joy, Celebrate, ART, Holiday

Max Carlos Martinez "Blue Hill"

Brenda Roper "Merida Series"

Winter is coming or maybe it's already here. . .

2011-11-15T22:13:00.002-07:00

I go too long in between writing and then there is too much to say. Too many thoughts. And a belated photo to thank those of "occupy Traverse City, Michigan in front of the State Theatre on Front Street resurrected by Michael Moore -- and thank you too. The job thing (for me) is evolving quite nicely. Two new jobs mind you not just one. Back to my normal three (3) part-time somethings. Hopeful it will cover the bills, pay off the Visa, the loan to my sister, and maybe a little extra at the end of the month. If not I am having fun, meeting interesting people, meeting my patterns face to face (oh my!), walking across town in the dark (at 5:30pm) --yes winter is here. I love the light in the morning but too early this darkness. It is a difficult adjustment. I start a fire, crawl into pajamas, a glass of wine, swiss chard and chicken. Sigh. Maybe no Mexico this year and I suppose that will be okay though I haven't ruled it out completely. Open.

The good news is that I was accepted into the juried show Odes & Offerings at the Santa Fe Community Gallery for 2012. Excited. I will be paired with a poet and create a work based on his words. This is who I am. A poet who paints. A painter who poets. A good ending to a day that started with tears because a neighbor is grieving and I am too organized or something like that. Everyone is a relationship and we give and we take and at the end of the day there is an exchange --an understanding and it is okay.

This is the final week of Assemblage & Narrative: Conversations with Bones & Barbed Wire. My solo show currently at 545 Canyon Road, Santa Fe. No sales -- well a card or two. This the primer when people ask "how was your opening?" --"it was good." I say. "Great attendance for November. . .image in the Pasa." Supported by neighbors and family and friends far and near. I am happy but always feel the need to placate "no sales" because that is what they are asking. That is the barometer. They want me to succeed. And I have. The bravado of putting "it" out into the public. Of digging deep in a subconscious/intuitive way --that is the ease of art for me, and bravo I suppose. Process. Executing an idea. It is a marriage. A relationship--in sickness and in health til death due us part kind of thing. Some interest. A couple from Dallas. A couple from Santa Fe. I give them my contact information. A woman reads all the words. Aloud. A friend documents. Flowers. Donuts. Time.

I am busier than I want to be and grateful for the evenings where I am not --well except for tomorrow when I'll walk with a friend to the Lensic for a lecture. A workshop over the weekend. Not a day to myself until the Saturday after Thanksgiving. Life is like this sometimes. Everything all at once. I need a massage but haven't had one since my 50th birthday 3 years ago. I buy a vintage sweater from a charming Frenchman at the recyled show on Saturday. Just like that. A perfect fit. It is pink and he tells me I am beautiful and I hand him my Visa. Life isn't always rational. I am grateful for art, for phone calls from sisters, a conversation with my mom, sunshine on the walk to work and even the clouds hanging over the mountains on Sunday to remind me of those long winters in Alaska where I no longer walk along the coastal trail or witness the moaning of the ice, a moose at the mailbox, the memories that make our lives a life. I'm surprised at how long I lived in the grayness. Though it was certainly beautiful. I could not go back.

Pretty In Pink

2011-11-09T12:23:00.003-07:00

Computer, candlelight and decisions

2011-11-07T08:31:00.001-07:00

It's not a seance. Well maybe. Trying to figure out whether a "work at home" job I manifested is really an opportunity Or not. The gut is sending signals while self-doubt is raising her voice to compensate for the bewildered interview, throw in my tolerance for eccentricity and quirky and all the projects I could do at 6:30 in the morning while waiting for the phone to ring (on commission): study Spanish, write a blog, start a new painting, etc. Yes. Still it comes with the feeling of entrapment and undervalue. Who is paying my social security taxes (well me which is the point at 15.what percent). And no training in sight since the software is "very intuitive" --well so am I but a little practice might be good. Is it just me? This is like the third tourism job or maybe the fourth since I've been in Santa Fe. It isn't like I don't have a lifetime of experience working from home, running an office, planning itineraries. . .but none of these make the mark of the past. Maybe that's all I need to know. Maybe it's simply time for a change in aptitude.

Attacked an old painting yesterday and wow! it looks amazing. Painting with my fingers, scratching, dropping gesso all over the place (picking it up) applying pearl iridescent as if I were on fire --which I was of course. But can't burn out. A release to be sure and this morning a warm nervous swelling in the chest of joyful surprise (not unveiling yet). I love that. That calm that comes after the flame but not without the confusion of self-esteem. I don't want to become the girl who just gets a job only to quit a week later but what is it here? No direction. No one taking charge. No information. Okay gut. Do your work and I will go forward into this brilliant Monday morning all systems on. The decision will become known when I access what I have to lose. What I need to keep. What is sacred. How much I value myself, my time, my art, my own life. Because I am the one to decide. Really. Right?

The hours before the opening. . .breathe

2011-11-04T12:01:00.000-06:00

Thank you Pasatiempo for including my image in Exhibitionism, a peek at what's showing around town. TONIGHT from 5-7pm at 545 Canyon Road. Left-handed secret is about finding my biological father --rather meeting him I suppose since he is actually a man I've known (of) since I was a child, though not in that context. . . such is life. Oh and about being left handed which I was and now I'm not, but he is. And more of course. It is about combining words and images to find a balance of identity, joy, questions and answers and what has been lost and found. The players. Death and birthdays and in sickness and in health. So much unknown. I am grateful for the unconscious, for dreaming and the struggle for love but I can barely breathe in anticipation. It is always this way before "exposure" --the unveiling of more self to a public view but such is the path of art. For me. If you live in Santa Fe please follow the farolitos and stop by for a look, a cup of cider and if I haven't met you I hope you will introduce yourself.

End Of Season

2011-10-30T19:50:00.001-06:00

Winter Coming

2011-10-28T11:33:00.001-06:00

A brilliant Friday morning in the making here in Santa Fe but don't let the sunshine fool you --winter is coming. I am trying to embrace this fact with comfort food like squash and swiss chard from the market, homemade corn bread and learning how to make some New Mexican favorites with red chile (still on the list) --that and company coming for Christmas, and a solo show opening a week from today are keeping me on my toes. Still when I sit surrounded by books and a cup of tea in the darkness of too early to go to bed I wonder if I'll make it without getting fat on too much. . .that reminds me of a poem I wrote once so here I share it even though a wee bit premature since it isn't even Halloween. I actually sat down to write about "Bombay Beach" the movie and the Village @ Grand Traverse Commons in Traverse City. Funny how the mind leads one astray.

The poem from Alaska of course, where I spent over 20 winters, but as I ponder other cities close to the water, far from the sunshine of Santa Fe I contemplate how to manage my sometimes limited and unreliable artful resources to spend part of the winter south of the border, part of it closer to family, art, travel, etc. but I'm optimistic. Life is good.

Thick With Cream

Windows across the street read them like words:

loose, not connected, solid, not square, rectangular.

A billboard of darkness endorses a simple statistic

of life by north: November, December, January.

Not wind hurling from a frozen sea but a soft gray stillness

uncovers winter bones layered inside cold blue denim.

Cowering beneath silk underwear doughboy skin:

pudgy, cracked, already thick with fat. Itchy,

before the holidays.

You celebrate by drinking coffee thick with cream

and green tea with cake late into the afternoon.

You honor a social moment, a conscious thought,

a ritual to commemorate decision. Light a candle

to acknowledge life inside this blackness

that brings stars too brilliant to count. At times

the ocean wind is still as death but often it blazes,

not flame but a severe penetration of memory.

To remind us, the lazy and the sane tucked indoors,

beneath our covers thick with too much that has been lost.

Many survive intact with sameness. And others do not.

Those angels of risk that walked to the edge of the east,

and waited for sunrise.

Provincetown to Portland and other endeavors

2011-10-21T08:02:00.001-06:00

I am back from a wonderful two week foray with friends and family. East Coast time zone, the Outer Cape, Crane's Beach, the Isabella Gardner Museum and the gritty working waterfront of Portland which is really not all that gritty --lobster benedict at The Porthole sitting outside on the wharf on an October morning for breakfast --wow! I actually had the Florentine but yum doesn't lobster and hollandaise sound good? Also a visit to the Portland Fine Arts Museum which was quite fine. I scored a great argyle sweater from a local consignment shop for $13.13. Other highlights included dinner with friends at Vignola, ice cream from Beale's and the Standard Bakery. . .Did I mention it was 80 degrees by day and people were still going "to the beach" --from Provincetown to Portland.

We spent two nights in Provincetown on the Outer Cape. A small seaside town with a rich artistic legacy including Robert Motherwell and Hans Hofmann, among many others. I am interested in the Fine Arts Work Center (FAWC) which provides a 7 month residency for visual artists and writers in the quiet winter months. What a privilege and experience it would be to be selected. Wish me luck. Commerical Street is alive with galleries, though some are seasonal, but the Provincetown Art Association and Museum (PAAM) is open year-round as is Angel Foods a fantastic deli grocery in the East End Gallery district. I think I could be happy here-- with paint and poetry and a bottle of wine when those cold ocean winds begin to blow. . .

My friend Diane and I played tourist one morning by taking a tour with Art's Dune Tours. A very fun way to experience some of the history of this place. Our driver Barb, think Kathy Bates in an SUV, was a character and a wealth of information. First thing is to deflate the tires to 14 PSI which allows the vehicle to maneuver along the beach and through the dunes. Still one steep hill I was holding my breath. Along the way she pointed out the historic dune shacks --no electricity, running water or toilets, but an amazing setting. These small structures with scenic vistas were built by the Life Saving Service to house seaman --forerunner to our current Coast Guard. Sometime around the 1920's, long after the dune shacks ceased housing life-saving personnel, many of the community's creative and/or eccentric characters began using them as retreats and hideways. Now they are part of an artist residency program during the summer months. The shacks are set along the part of Cape Cod National Seashore known as the Province Lands. Only a handful of applicants are admitted each year. If you like rustic, solitude and seek inspiration this might be for you.

It was a whirlwind but an excellent itinerary with food and friends and art and ocean. The week to follow was equally fantastic. One rich with family and celebration and worthy of a blog post of its own.

Greg

2011-10-16T19:06:00.002-06:00

Was Supposed To Go To A Funeral, It Was A Bad Bad Day

2011-10-09T21:38:00.002-06:00

Mom Always Liked A Ride Through The Mountains

2011-10-05T17:44:00.000-06:00

All That I Left Is A Simple Prayer

2011-10-05T17:42:00.002-06:00

Some roads lead to art, food and friendship

2011-10-02T13:46:00.002-06:00

Just back from coffee at the Subscription with fellow neighbors and artists, surrounded by dogs and the silence of Sunday morning purusing the news, borrowed chairs, sunshine, conversation of place and "how to" success, winter coming and finding a niche. Nice. Yesterday I ventured north then right on Hwy 554 to the El Rito Studio Tour. Stopped at the community artist mercado. Walked away with beeswax candles and "no bake cookies" --a childhood favorite at only $1/bag. Then to the wonderful hacienda style adobe gallery of David Michael Kennedy, longtime fine art photographer, working in silver gelatin and palladium prints. . .

I've known of El Farolito in El Rito since my first trip to Abiquiu in 2007. Didn't venture inside then but it has been on my list of "places to eat" ever since. I understand it is on the green chile cheeseburger trail and I couldn't remember if it is best known for red or green but I went with green. Next time I'm choosing the red. An open sign beckons but standing room only. Still it looked possible so I headed in, through the small long room passing tables already taken, to check it out. A tall young man asked if we wanted a table for two, my friend Nancy and myself, then just as quickly offered to sit us with another couple --did they mind? They were already sliding over on the picnic style bench seat. Thanks. And so it was. A lovely beginning to friendship ensued as we made easy conversation between ordering and the (lenghty) time it took our freshly made New Mexican creations to be served --a basket of sopapillas on the side. We covered states and adventures from Alaska to Texas ending exchanging names & numbers, what a beautiful day and hope to see you again. And we did. At Studio 16. . .

Sparksville I call it. Larry Sparks on the brochure. He has a studio. Well actually two studios but the entire compound is artful and well worth a visit. Found objects and mixed media paintings and sculpture. . .even a view of Pedernal greets those that venture here. We had to pass on the invitation to stay for the chili feed but all in all a lovely day right down to that amazing light casting across the late afternoon landscape as we chatted our way back to Santa Fe, where "still much to do" on my mind. I am leaving on vacation next week. A week with a friend to walk along the ocean and explore possible artful communities south and north of Boston. To linger with wine and contemplate the possibility of change and meander the pathway of friendship. And then back to my midwestern roots. To family. Pause. A wedding (niece). Joy. Doubt. Words and silence and golden moments. Smile for the camera and go well into all that is offered. I have some aniexty. Breathe. Mostly excitement. And so quickly it passes. Laughter. A hug. A tear. Remember when?

Art, imagination and obsession

2011-09-24T22:01:00.001-06:00

A preview of upcoming solo show at El Zaguan opening November 4, 2011 entitled Assemblage & Narrative: conversations with bones & barbed wire --about identity, family secrets and a homage to my sister Cheryl though her inspiration may not be evident in the ironing board. It became my obsession yesterday when I attempted to document it in my studio. First carried it outside and placed it against the worn adobe and then back where I rearranged the table, the rug, anything in the way (and everything is in the way) and then I surrendered to happenstance and light and delved fully into the magic of imagination.

When I told her about finding an old wooden ironing board at a antique/thrift store in Madrid she wrote me of her childhood memory of ironing. "Iron the flat things first" she was told. Sprinkle them with water (from a coke bottle with cork placed nearby): pillow cases, table cloths, sheets, etc. then roll them up and place them in the basket. In those days even bras were ironed (can you imagine?). I am five years younger and no memory of such a task, but her childhood was more adult than mine. She took care of me along the way too and I can't even remember though I'm grateful. At seven she dressed us for church and there we walked all alone, so grown up but without our mother. Where is she? the other women asked. And so this piece contains a deconstructed coke bottle though likely no one will notice. Doesn't matter. I don't have a title yet because somewhere along the line it morphed into something else. As art does. Life. Love and intention. The lasts on top are walking forward. One back --I think that might be me. Or you.

My work often uses buttons and thread. Those common themes of domesticity. Dresses. Gloves. Perhaps to honor the women of earlier generations. So many women, their choices and fears. So many children. A man to take care of them. Or not. Wifery. No judgment. Contemplation and scenario. I read recently that "making art is inherently risky. You're exposing your imagination, the most private thing about you" --and I love that. Naming imagination as the most vulnerable thing. Though I have an entire closet of "most vulnerable" it comes down to self-confidence & a ridiculous need for approval.

September Song

2011-09-22T19:36:00.001-06:00

I need to figure this thing out, what is eating at me, no not that crazy stomach bacteria and the fact that I have to wait three months to get into the clinic here, no what is it in my head, what is making it so goddamned difficult to paint.

Photography? I am really getting off on taking pictures, I mean seriously enjoying the hell out of it, but if it is this much fun can it really be considered art? In the past nine months I have taken close to two thousand pictures, large format, eating my memory on the computer, who cares, I am compelled, driven, forced by some instinct, some urge. And the thrill of it, intoxicates me, satisfies me, pleases me greatly, like any good muse should.

The interwebs? Hell today I spent more time on line that I did with the brush in hand, why? I read and reload the same twelve sites hourly, sometimes every half an hour, looking for what? More news on the evil diatribe against Gays, more bad news about the global economy, another impending natural disaster, one that would make the last one seem like Oz? I do try and balance this lust for information with the occasional funny kitty video, and then if I am really horny for journalism I will read Al Jazeera.

My dire straits? I've never had any money, never had a credit card, never had credit. But I have really never been this in debt and it can really fuck with my day. I owe the landlady $500, and today I mistakenly looked at the calendar, oh shit, rent time coming upon us quickly, my stomach bug has great company with the growing ulcer, think I'll call them the twins.

Is it the sparsity of paint? Well one of my best friends just sent a gift card for art supplies, the truck should be showing up any day with that sweet delivery. Is it my horniness? I mean really this dry-spell is record setting, especially for me as a Gay man, and that is hard to beat. Well still I do paint everyday and even though this has been a very challenging year, yeah I've been in Santa Fe a year now, I have also painted like a fool, been consistently productive and there for my friends, so while I may need a break from the stress and day to day, September, November and these few precious days I'll spend with you, these precious days I'll spend with you.

Monday, Santa Fe

2011-09-19T13:16:00.002-06:00

Seems like I have something to say, at least it feels that way. Is this happiness? Am I bored? The ceaseless clouds have given way to rapturous sunshine, the light is perfect for painting. So why am I not painting? The flowers are fading, a few remain here and there, then there are the waves of blooms on this and that other weed, soon these too will fade.

thoughts along the High Road & Ojo Caliente

2011-09-19T09:30:00.000-06:00

Had a magical Saturday with a foray up the High Road for the annual "studio tour" with stops in Chimayo (for chile & weaving), Truchas (maybe the most stunningly beautiful place in all of New Mexico) where I wandered right into a hug from a stranger at Anna Karin gallery and immersed myself in that wonderful mix of their old world adobe with Victorian touches --a special place with oil paintings by Anna Karin & mixed media by Jeane Weigel. The gongs of Bill Loyd danced in a lace veiled window. I turned left to reach Ojo Sarco (where I gifted myself a ceramic pitcher the colors of the desert by Connie Christensen and took a brownie, for later), then to Penasco where I bought an "upcycled" shirt from "Art for the Heart" --a nonprofit project dedicated to creating jobs for women in rural northern NM, and one-of-a-kind fashions at an affordable price. Look for this behind the Walking Woman gallery right across from the Post Office.

My plan was to stop somewhere along the slow moving Rio Grande for a picnic before venturing up to the Mesa and cutting across to spend the night at Ojo Caliente Hot Springs --a somewhat belated birthday present and almost one year from the day I spent there on my way out of Santa Fe for a 3 month adventure into "family immersion" and a self-imposed Art Sabbatical in Mexico --where I went to study Spanish and contemplate my life to date (I suppose). Now that is all behind me. Within me. The trunk unpacked. The lights are on but still I am slow slow in defining the experience. My upcoming solo show at El Zaguan which opens November 4th, 2011 Assemblage & Narrative: Conversations with Bones & Barbed Wire is certainly part of that process.

Self portrait in pink adobe --that's me on a walkabout along the Bosque River Trail at Ojo Caliente and just past the very cool historical and recently renovated Adobe Barn (in the round). The light was amazing as the storm clouds that threatened in the distance easily rolled away to bring in the late afternoon wash of sunshine. So much happened for me here. An apparition to others as I walked along the path in yellow green linen as someone from Santa Fe --a one diminensional being --as if that assumes wealth and abundance and a lack of any connection to wild places. They were friendly and we chatted but I was certainly seen as "the other" and of course I am except for the assumption of wealth. I get that from strangers when I travel --often mistaken as having a trust fund. How funny. One time a man outright asked how I can afford . . .kayaking the mangroves in Mexico, and I was a bit offended and wanted to tell him I don't have a mortgage or 5 bicycles or a big screen TV but he would have missed the point. And it was a good question. I think because I live as if I have money, even though I don't.

I want to write about minimalism and intimacy but my mind is a mad dance from all the contemplation and so I will say that I put too much into things --like this blog post. And often the paintings and mixed media work I do. Oh, and poetry too. I try to tell the whole story, well every story ever imagined all in one place, on one page or canvas. And so I will only surmise that public bathing, or soaking rather, in a pool with 12 (plus or minus) other people, mostly groups of women or couples, many ignoring the "whisper policy" was anything but relaxing. I found myself most contented hiking along the lovely Bosque and eating carrot sticks along the Rio Grande. Hanging out in water with glances of innuendo or perhaps nothing at all except an overactive imagination (or memory) was almost upsetting and the opposite of what I anticipated, to the point of surprise more than dismay, hence the contemplation. But another time for those words. The joy in the adventure was the actually going of course, getting out the door, into the car, on the road. Driving. Stopping. Pulling into one way driveways and out again. The magic culminated in sipping a glass of red under cover of darkness, a piece of harvati with salami, in the garden Ramada in lieu of dinner at the Wine Bar. That was in the spirit of the day as I watched the stars appear in the night-- illuminated by my own thoughts, the gifts of art, the amazing skies in this land of enchantment, an easy walk, the glow of light against the cliffs. And a soft pillow at the end of it all.

2011-09-14T15:51:00.001-06:00

I've put off writing because I've been busy with odd jobs and booksales and a fun friend in town, but mainly due to too much contemplation and not enough focus. Initially I wanted to respond to the 9.11 anniversary and connect it in some way to the memorial dedication at the Encaustic Art Institute and a new sculpture garden where my piece "A Poet's Heart: Reflections on Compassion" has come to rest, but I think I'm still thinking and now that day is past, and on "US time"that means it's old news anyway-- until it becomes a marketing tool or "in our best interest" so I'm moving on: to apples and autumn and a tarantula hawk that I observed in the wilds of Cerrillos Hills State Park on Sunday.

A tarantula hawk is a spider wasp which hunts tarantulas as food for its larvae. The more familiar species are up to five centimeter (two inches) long with a blue-black body and bright rust-colored wings making them among the largest of wasps. The coloring on their wings warns potential predators that they are dangerous (Aposematism). Their long legs have hooked claws for grappling with their victims. The stinger of a female tarantula hawk can be up to 7 mm (1/3 inch) long, and the sting is considered among the most painful insect stings in the world.

The female tarantula hawk captures, stings, and paralyzes the spider, then either drags her prey back into her own burrow or transports it to a specially prepared nest, where a single egg is laid on the spider’s body, and the entrance is covered. When the wasp larva hatches, it rips a small hole in the spider's abdomen, then plunges into the spider's belly and feeds voraciously, avoiding vital organs for as long as possible to keep it fresh. After several weeks, the larva pupates. Finally, the wasp becomes an adult, and tears open the spider's belly to get out. The wasp emerges from the nest to continue the life cycle. WOW!

Fiesta Santa Fe

2011-09-12T20:10:00.003-06:00

Bethany

2011-09-11T18:53:00.001-06:00

Max

2011-09-11T18:47:00.001-06:00

Holly

2011-09-11T18:15:00.000-06:00

Brenda

2011-09-11T18:07:00.000-06:00

Imagination & book(worm)

2011-09-03T17:23:00.002-06:00

Imagination: 1) the act or power of forming a mental image of something not present to the senses or not previously known or experienced 2) creative ability 3) resourcefulness 4) a creation of the mind (Merriam Webster) or something I was told I did not have as a child. Basically I was a bookworm. Boring. Uninteresting. Quiet. An introvert. And of course I was all of those things and more. Or less. Contemplating that belief recently and whenever anyone tells me the opposite I marvel how it has resided inside me all these years. "you have no imagination. . ." Words so formative yet untrue, and it didn't really matter that I didn't know what I lacked (since it existed all along), but strange now to hear that same word from complete strangers in a variety of diction --all glowing and somewhat incredulous. A compliment. In response to my art. "I want to get inside your brain" or "you have such imagination" or "how did you come up with that idea" or "you have such an eye" and well it is rather stimulating. In contemplating "my normal" I have to surrender to sometimes social misfit. That's okay. Sometimes I play the role of the happy extrovert. A delicate dance. I do not exactly marvel the masses on the think index. It also makes my art less accessible though I don't equate that with less important.

All this pondering is not here or there. Not applause or criticism or judgment but rather led me back to the books I read as a child. Not great literature mind you but those early childhood detectives expressing their independence and sleuthing in ways that drew me right down the rabbit hole. My favorites in the early years included: the Happy Hollisters, the Bobbsey Twins, and of course Laura Ingalls Wilder "Little House on the Prarie" series. Moving on to Trixie Belden (my favorite) and a few Cherry Parker and Nancy Drew. Somewhere in those years I brought home the plain orange hardcover autobiographies from the bottom shelves of the basement school library including Clara Barton and others but I remember Jane Addams in particular, and the Hull House. Now I read, just today in fact, that she was awarded the Nobel Peace Price in 1931. I missed that part when I was ten. An ardent feminist and social worker back in the day, before women were recognized as cognitive beings. Interesting these influences on such young minds --subliminal choices I made. I still love a good detective novel to this day (Sue Grafton, Nelson DeMille, Kate Atkinson) though wandered off into the wilderness with Ed Abbey, Doug Peacock, Wallace Stegner, and of course enjoyed the offbeat literary and fabulous writings of Jim Harrison and Tom Robbins, interspersed with the occasional memoir. The Glass Castle a favorite. I still get hopelessly nostalgic whenever I'm in a midwest antique store and stop to browse through the books. All my favorites. If I ever land in one place permanently I vow to buy back those imagination building books that labeled me "bookworm" and "houseplant" --beats turning out to be a serial killer. I'll take artist, poet, bookworm --sure.

The Heat of the Day

2011-08-31T16:01:00.001-06:00

Baby it's hot outside. Time seems to be moving very slowly, maybe it is because I am in between projects. Finished the doughnut piece for Bethany, had quite a critique on facebook about it, for me it was a simple little something to hang when the new organic doughnut shop opens.

Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) 11 1/2" x 12"

Cara said earlier that the newspaper reported that this was one of the hottest Augusts on record. We also had more rain this month than in the last ten, so she said that the paper reported. Inside the two feet thick adobe it isn't that bad, and that cold beer on the desk stays chilled for quite a while. Drinking the Shiner Bock, not too bad, it was on sale at the grocery store.

Greg is asleep, he sleeps throughout most of the day, starting in the morning I will go over and check on him every few hours, make sure that he's still alive or hasn't fallen and can't get up. Some old friends of his were here over the weekend, they were all camp counselors together at a girl's horse riding camp back in 1964, that was the last time that they had all seen each other. Greg held a small party for them Saturday night that I co-hosted.

"The Board", summer 1964, Camp Kiniya, Vermont

I was an honorary member of "The Board" for the evening. I really have nothing in common with these guys, we managed to form a bond though. We sat in Greg's "de-gayed" parlor, many tales were told, vivid reminiscences, apparently Greg was camp chaplain/garbage man. One of the guys had the yearbook from that summer so long ago, there was a shot of Greg behind a pulpit, one of his favorite places to be, speaking to a group of young women, I wonder if any of the girls remember what he said? It was time to re-create the photo from above, I didn't get any shots myself, I know sounds odd, but I did get a bit of video.

One of the guys started strumming on Greg's guitar, they sand songs from the camp songbook, we all sat around, tossed a couple back, had some laughs and soon they were leaving. I got bigs hugs from all of them and many thanks for caring for their friend.

Soon fiesta will be here, this will mark my one year anniversary in Santa Fe, I moved here the night of Zozobra, the burning of Old Man Gloom. This event began something like seventy years ago, from what I understand it was started by a small group of artists who found fiesta way too pious, some of these artists were living up here on Canyon, heck probably the lady who owned El Zaguan at the time was one of them.

Zozobra

Old Man Gloom, built to be the largest marionette in the world, five stories tall, representing the year past, is set aflame and with it goes all of the negative energy of the past year. Last year you had better believe that I had a lot of offerings to send up in the flames. Then I had to face this new version of me. I felt so awkward and shy, didn't really know what to think of Santa Fe or how the hell I was going to find my way, an exciting and scary proposition. Have I done that? Have I found my way? Am I being real and honest? I think so.

The Historic Santa Fe Foundation hosts a fiesta party here at El Zaguan, supposedly it is quite the event. They are using one of my images for the invite and have asked me to paint a carnival cut-out for the event. That is my next little project, have primed the plywood, hope to sketch out the image later.

Monsoon on Sunday & postcards to the White House

2011-08-26T13:36:00.002-06:00

Art Matters - a postcard created to stand in solidarity with other artists around the US sending a message on "artists & the economy" to President Obama in time for labor day --this is mine but so much has happened this week I wonder how much art really matters in the grand scheme of things, yet if not, that is kin to saying I don't matter or beauty doesn't matter or, well it is a long list so let's just say thinking outside the box, imagination, and creativity matter but there is a balance to everything and that is what is missing blah, blah, blah. . . tolerance, compassion. . .the absence of . . . reflection, grace, humility. And this week the rape of Libya. . .

While the East Coast prepares for the onslaught of Hurricane Irene I realize how benign my own small flood over the lip of the door that sits below the road, once a trail for burros, in this high desert town abundant with art galleries. The 9 bowls of water I tossed out into the monsoon on Sunday is relative. Everything is but still stunning when it happens on your floor, to your mother, in your town, country, village. A neighbor found a snake in her bathroom and a black bear was reported prowling around Acequia Madre recently. The 5.8 earthquake near DC was felt all the way north to Maine and all the way south to Atlanta. Having experienced a fair amount of earthquakes in the 20 years I lived in Alaska I sort of poo pooed it until another Alaska now in Virginia said it felt bigger than the 7.9 he felt while living in the Last Frontier. So weather is relative and the earth is alive. But what a crazy year it's been. Christchurch, Japan (as they fade away you know there is still displacement not to mention nuclear particles floating about), the tornadoes that devasted the south and middle of the country, flooding, hugh snowpack in the north, drought and fires in the SW. Is it cyclical? Does it matter? We want to name everything right now. Tame it. Shoot it. Claim it and poo poo the things that don't fit "our" agenda. We are human afterall --such frightening creatures. So dear.

There really is no (profound) point to this blog today, certainly no panacea (though wouldn't that be brilliant) -- just a pondering of too many things as the earth shakes and sheds. Here the sun still shines 80+ degrees by day and cools off after dark. My favorite time the mornings. The quiet. When possibility is soft and moments of grace still within view --a little mystery not yet shattered by the headline of the day or that cut to the quick remark or media hysteria or whatever it is that sets us off kilter. Yes. ART matters.

Monsoon at El Z

2011-08-22T18:58:00.000-06:00

Zaguanistas, Select Clips

2011-08-20T19:46:00.000-06:00

Zaguanistas

2011-08-20T13:29:00.000-06:00

Bethany and Brenda

Greg, Max, Bethany, Billy, Adam, Brenda

Adam and Bethany

Greg and Billy

Interlude before the party

2011-08-19T14:08:00.000-06:00

Having lunch at home in that interlude between shopping for the "opening" and attending "the opening" --fortification for 3 hours of social draw them in AND across the threshold to artful garden gorgeous, wine and music and words and pictures. Looking forward to the Zaguanistas 2nd group show of the summer and winding toward a new season. All is well. Strawberries in the colander, signage laminated (@ $3.99/ea.), labels soon to be printed, tables to be laid, ice in a bucket for beverages, sunflowers to grace the proceedings and joy at the possibilities.

Printed a few new cards on that great Moab paper. It's expensive but when a friend called last week just to tell me she was sending a thank you note on one of my cards and "how wonderful the quality. . ." my heart warmed. I will have digital photo artist cards for $5/each + a great selection of fun images from my travels mounted on 12"x12" cradled panels. A creative framing solution that I hope people will like --little acorn hardware and plexi over colorful images. Still need to print labels, and cut those sunflowers. Hoping for a crowd and at the least a few loyal friends to muse away the lingering summer daze. Life is good at El Zaguan.

Zaguanistas

2011-08-15T19:17:00.003-06:00

Nobody Told You It Would Feel Like This

2011-08-13T18:57:00.001-06:00

I listen to a lot of music, a lot of music. As soon as I wake up I turn on the computer and go to my artreview blog, there I have a playlist, this is a curated number of songs, songs that I am constantly and consistently modifying, the day starts out with these pre-selected tunes.

After that plays I will usually listen to Al Green, been listening to his music every morning for about three years now. One musical thread that I hear throughout broken-hearted love songs is the line about "nobody told me it would be like this". It strikes me as particularly ironic because everyone told me to be careful, that the heart when in love can be a fragile thing and to beware the ides of break-ups.

I am not saying that I have a broken heart, albeit my last long-term relationship was quite challenging and ended ugly, and I did fall in love again and will once more I am sure, but this is more about listening to what people say when you ask their advice.

So over a year ago I began thinking of leaving New York City, this after being there nearly thirty years. I was an associate director at a young gallery, usually ended up behind the bar at the openings, love being the one in charge of pouring liquor, really enjoy getting people high. I asked one of our friends about Santa Fe, she had done the residency at the art institute here, what do you think of Santa Fe, I ask, in her drunken east coast drawl, we all had one after enough booze, she says, oh its so provincial. Well being from New Mexico I kind of took offense, and feeling like a wizened New Yorker I thought that that could be said about any place, including the Big Apple.

After all the big city is tough, and one must prove their mettle every fucking day to be precise. So then I asked a new friend, a beautiful man, one who I met at a local Brooklyn hangout, Olea. This guy was handsome, present, kind and extremely pleasant, naturally I wanted to find him in my bed, oh yeah lots of Gay guys feel that way he says, oh my wandering heart. He had lived in Santa Fe for a spell, worked in the restaurant biz, Santa Fe is filled with wealthy people, they come and go at whim, it is expensive and a tough place to get ahead, you're options will be very limited without money.

Being a native New Mexican I took slight offence, how could the City Different, one of the largest art economies in the country deny a native son, a prodigal son, one who had taken New Mexico to NY in a duffle bag, one who found a certain respect in the big melting pot, why wouldn't this environment accept and embrace me, respect and support me?

Then I asked an old friend, we were New Wavers back in the early 80s, there were a handful of us outcasts who found refuge at a once a month Friday night party at a local bar. We had been out of touch for many years till one day the ex and I went to an art opening, and lo and behold there he was! I recognized him immediately, what the hell are you doing here, I asked, oh this is my friend's show, wow, yeah he's from San Francisco, I still live in Albuquerque.

We exchanged info and eventually became friends on fb. So I tell him that I am thinking of moving to Santa Fe, tell me what you think. Oh it is awful, a transient town, you need lots of money, Albuquerque has a better artist's community and is much more doable, I wouldn't recommend it.

I knew that I had to get out of New York, but I can not say that nobody told me that it would be this way. I am not at all unhappy with my decision, I mean life at El Zaguan is like a vision, one that I had years ago, when I was having lots of visions. A truly beautiful environ, a warm and welcoming place, one that I can call home.

Perfect Studio Saturday

2011-08-13T16:39:00.002-06:00

Backdrops and raindrops and painting on panels (raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens. . .), the poet and the image co-mingle. Sounds sensual. Not naughty. Inticing they await their placement. Composition. Ideas germinate come gather the harvest. The wine is red, the pizza is cold. Laundry up and down and put away. The sun not shining so seldom Santa Fe I feel transported. Happily. I am an internal girl and this weather a gift. Still rumbles the thunder outside the open door. Quiet on Canyon.

The writing is on the wall. . .the shadow dangles all pale and graphic and full of possibility, or electrocution. Go well your heart.

Dialogue and dynamics

2011-08-07T14:51:00.000-06:00

Dialogue and dynamics might be construed as communication or the lack of and because words are said aloud certainly doesn't mean they have been heard or understood or that action will follow or how that action might be railroaded because of dialogue misdirection and suddenly the path you thought you were on has come full circle and the dialogue dynamic has been roughed up and soothed and still a maybe but with greater potential of being back on track. Amazes me and causes great distress like a river with a million tributaries-- all of us in our own boat. And so brings me to regress at the wonder of day tripping to a Monastery in the Desert, the white formations of Plaza Blanca then back to the land of Zaguanistas, the art of communication which is often just chatter to consensus and I feel as if I have failed on some level, and again at each effort. God bless the wilderness. . .

It has been a lovely few days spent tripping around with friendship and forays into Forest Service Road 151 along the Rio Chama to the peaceful place at the end --though beautiful felt tentative as we walked into the silence of reverence. Not the wilderness but through the Stations of the Cross. An odd discomfort. Not with the landscape that spilled before us but the fear of "shhhhh" --it is not a tourist destination though there is a gift shop. Closed for Desert Friday. I buy the beer of the Monks at Bodes in Abiquiu instead though it is sold at grocers and many restaurants all over Santa Fe.

It was not the silence I feared but the childhood trigger of "getting in trouble" --it is that flaw that seems to keep me in constant flux in the flow of communication, of driving the speed limit, of always wearing my seat belt, of not talking on my cell phone while driving or not drinking and driving. . .while those might be commendable qualities it is not because I am saintly, but instead driven by those early childhood dynamics where words were not said to correct but to berate, not said to support but to surprise, to confuse and to criticize. . . and so I am mindful of silence yet struggled to hold in all that beauty, like a breath. Would god really mind my joyful surmising? I believe reverence is relative. . .so go well into the understanding of who we are, the pathways we choose/attract, and the people we meet along the way.

Boar story, in progress

2011-08-06T16:36:00.006-06:00

Lou didn’t know how to drive a car. Not even close. A twenty-eight year old rusted, rattling 3-speed stick-on-the-column piece of shit truck fast down a narrow orange dirt road, slapped by tobacco leaves as big as parachutes, as close as the brushes in a car wash? No. Over a high crown and deep holes full of water and the cans and bottles from the night before and the hangover from the night before and the pressure? Uh uh. But the steering wheel steered and the brake put the brakes on things. He could shift some due to the miracle of having spent most of the spring with Albert Mazza and his dirt bikes on the trails along the dye stream and in the field behind the bowling alley, where the carnival came late in the summer. He could drive, sure. How hard could it be?
Anyway, he said he could. He says he can. Almost always—all the time. All summer. This was the way he was going to do it, he had decided, or realized, the first time Mike and Jesse and Sarah were going to hop a freight train to Chesapeake. They agreed the night before, drunk on single-malt from Mike’s dad’s locked cabinet. Someone was gonna pay for that. Mike for sure, maybe the rest of them too. Mike said fuck it, he’ll never know the difference, while pouring in the water, back up to the line he’d marked with a piece of tape when they started. Lou knew. Lou’s dad was an unlikely snob that way—an enthusiast, he called himself. Single-malt scotch wasn’t something you bought off the shelf to get drunk with your friends. You drank it in special glasses: sniffed it and then swished it around in your mouth like you wanted to put off the loss of it, like you would keep it there if you could, instead of the spit and McDonalds and harsh words that were in there the rest of the time.
That all went well enough. It didn’t come up again, the scotch, and then next day the trains were too fast, nothing you could run beside to grab the thin ladder, pull yourself up and take the ride.
He felt he had gotten some credit anyway, a small piece of regard that he would need to sustain a place with the only kids he knew here, the only ones even that he had seen in this odd, hot place where he would be spending the summer--at least the summer--with his mom and her new boyfriend, away from his enthusiast father, who didn’t limit his enthusiasm to the single-malt but included whatever was on sale, whatever was bought for him in the bar—one for Carl too—a beer for him and a beer for me, and the chaser, always. He went after that too, hearty and often, too often, finally, for Lynne, Lou’s mother. So now North Carolina. She said she was taking Lou, and Carl said fine, but Lou heard “excellent,” when his mom shared the story.

Of course he hit the boar. It would have been hard for anyone to miss. It popped up into the road, from the green mess just off the right edge of the clay. It popped up and then stopped in the middle of the road, just stopped. It was about the height of the bumper, and probably as heavy as the motor of the truck itself. A small hippopotamus, bent on its own demise.
So they hit the hippo, and they hit the roof of the cab and the dash and the steering wheel, Jesse and Lou respectively, as it bumped its way along under the truck. The wheels slid, locked by the brakes and they came to a stop with the giant lump of a thing lodged in a space before the differential and beside the driveshaft. The left rear wheel of the truck was a few inches off the ground. The boar’s coarse grey hair parted in thin lines as the creature, to Lou’s amazement, drew shallow breaths, its pinned torso moving in and out into the space that was left on one side. Intestines lay inert out there, shot from somewhere, and black blood drifted from the crown of the road to its edge, in a twisting trickle, around little clumps of the sticky dirt.
They didn’t speak. Lou was transfixed on the disaster beneath the truck. Jesse surveyed, up the road, down the road, and at Lou.
Jesse started talking.
You did ok, man. You stayed on the road. A lot of people would have swerved, as if there’s some good in that. That would have been a world of fucked-up, you and me upside down in that fucking thicket of leaves.
Lou walked to the edge and looked into the thicket, the place that heaved this mess of an animal up onto the road, into their path. The timing of it was incomprehensible. A cross-field bullet to the wide receiver, led perfectly. From the closed-eyed quarterback to the closed-eyed receiver.
What are we gonna do? Lou said. He imagined getting to town, running maybe, for some emergency vet who would do the work, sweating heroically while the two of them pulled anxiously for the unfortunate monster. It was now moaning softly on the exhale. Lou felt his soaked shirt stuck to the front and the back of him as he tried to even the rhythm of his own breathing.
We can make it over, I’m pretty sure. Jesse tiptoed to get a chunk of two by four and a brick from the bed of the truck. He hammered the two-by-four into the space between the raised wheel and the road. I’m gonna drive it. You stay forward of the wheel. It could fire back that piece of wood, and we’d be dealing with you too, smashed up in the road out here.
It seemed unlikely, but Jesse gunned it, loaded the clutch and near exploded forward, rolling and further compressing the animal as it went. Then the truck was free and Jesse hopped out, smiling.
Yeah.
Damn.
And still the boar breathed, though much less inspired than before.
Ok, now let’s get something to eat. Jesse pulled open the truck door and got in.
What about the boar? Lou was feeling woozy in the sun.
Jesse put his hands into the front pockets of his jeans and then took them out. Yeah, I know. It’s just that I’ve only got a few left, and I was hoping for a rabbit or two after lunch. Jesse waited for Lou to let it go, but Lou didn't say anything. Ok, alright. Ok.
Jesse pulled the shotgun from the rack behind the seat. Put your fingers in your ears.
He blasted it. What control was left in the animal released, and it sank a little into the road. The rising and falling stopped.
Lou's head spun. He crouched down to get right. The blood and little bits of things on the orange ground looked unlikely, impossible.
He steadied, stood up, and got into the truck.
Then they were roaring again, rattling, slapping the leaves. Lou looked through the dirty windshield, but there was nothing to see, just tobacco ahead, tobacco on both sides. Up there a ways the sides converged, seeming to pinch closed the path. Lou rubbed his hand up and down the back of his freshly buzz-cut head. Everything is one way, and then it's another. Lou and his mother were not going back to New York. They weren't going anywhere.
Jesse turned to Lou, looked at him hard.
Let it go, man, you did great. You stayed on the road.

Them There Clouds

2011-08-02T18:13:00.000-06:00

grants and grandma's

2011-07-29T09:31:00.000-06:00

We Were Born (left) is my foray into believing in myself as a painter. I have finally gotten a palette that is colorful, neutral, yet vibrant and if you look closely some graphite scratches begin to give it the texture I envision. This is the 2nd in a body of work I am currently putting together for a November show entitled: Assemblage & Narrative. My work investigates social relationships, identity, and family secrets. The paintings here are 48"x24" oil on canvas. I still want to work bigger but this is a start and I'm having a ball!

You have to believe in yourself or it really isn't worth putting in the effort of getting a grant application together as I did this week. A grant for US painters over 45, gifted by the Lillian Orlowsky & William Freed Foundation. They studied with Hans Hoffman. Hours really-- of thnking, writing, rewriting essays on why "you" are deserving, how this will advance your career at this very moment in time, financial income, expenses, four copies of everything including images on CD. Artist statement is optional. Actually the biggest roadblock besides my own confidence (or lack of) was understanding how to 'fill-in' the text on the downloaded pdf. I actually ended up uploading the application to a website called http://www.pdffiller.com/ that provides this exact service. For a fee. I surrendered to the $12.99. Sometimes it's like that --nothing to do with the fee but with that goal/dream just to apply, to believe enough, to keep articulating in your own best interest. Have to believe that you are as deserving or worthy of being chosen --one painter over 45 out of a pool of 300 which actually doesn't sound like that many, and I do believe but have to practice it into a positive mantra. . .to articulate who I am and what I want as an artist. If you don't have "the dream" how can you make it come true. . .?

Ferne & Grace is homage to my two grandmothers. In their respective boxes. One I never met and the other I wish I had more time. She lived to be 96 but I was too late in my own "enlightenment" to even know the conversation I wanted to have until she was gone. Grace married at 16 (though the marriage certificate said 19 --she lied) to a gentleman farmer, had 12 children. He died when my mother was only seven. Ferne had four blond boys --my father the youngest and the only one still living. They used to sing together. A mother that encouraged singing in the house must have been a loving person. I keep looking at the canvas not sure I have them here at all. Not as beautiful as I'd like. Maybe I'll add some yellow. Not the clean washed palette of above but then I see two women separated by a conversation, a river of life that kept them in their own small towns. Windows to their own world or the others they might have imagined --if they did. I guess I want to know their dreams. Did they have them or were they content within the walls of their own family, baking bread and playing cards? Grace loved baseball, the Detroit Tigers, and ate bacon for breakfast. Shouldn't I know more about her than that? And Ferne will come alive as I poke into the past. Poke and scrape and excavate.

All About a Summer's Eve

2011-07-28T17:49:00.000-06:00

Sweet Dream Baby

2011-07-28T17:42:00.000-06:00

All the bills are showing up. . .

2011-07-22T20:07:00.000-06:00

As the bills announce themselves in my IN box: Student Loan $151.00, Wifi $36 (for the first 6 months and then increases to $45), Verizon $47, etc. I am proud to say my gas bill is only $17.49 this month. A friend teases me that I chose my apartment because it came with a parking space, but at $900/month + utilities not an inexpensive undertaking. Truth is I'm a walker. I used to ride a bike and I miss it but now I walk. I like to walk. The highlight of my day job is the walk up Abeyta every morning --and maybe a few other perks. Electric is cheap, even with the fan blowing cool air onto ancient adobe walls (I keep the windows open), only $10.49. I figure even my wine budget is at the poverty level though I haven't yet resorted to the "box" good on river trips and such but thank goodness for Trader Joes. The day job is going well but at only a few hours a day the paycheck dwindles to under $350 this week after GRT. What's a girl to do?

--well I've decided to create my own Girl Friday will work for. . .ad --not sex of course because at 53 frankly it isn't worth the freak show for any amount of $ --not that I actually know this. Really, it is my upper Midwest upbringing --that good girl ethical thing, throw in compassion and always rooting for the underdog and well, money is not my priority (as in driven by greed and violent methods of making) and so I contemplate how to mainfest my own creative destiny. I try the Louise Hay method of positive thinking. Of verbal daily self-talk on my way to the day job which includes the possibility of two bronze currently on display in various Santa Fe locations selling so I can pay off my Alaska Airlines Visa before the next adventure. . .I contemplate a grant but first I must explain in articulate language why I deserve it, gather rave reviews as attachments which brings me back to present time. To not enough money to go around and yet I am thankful I'm not in a wheelchair in a building where the electricity is off because of the heatwave or my refrigerator filled with food and rotting because the electricity is off --Ferndale, MI --well you get the idea.

I am thankful for my good sense, my intuition, my joy of painting, my belief in the possible despite all odds. And not once in all the debate on how to settle the budget crisis have I heard anyone mention the wars we wage around the world, the money spent on guns and armor and special security forces and border crossings and violence because that's what it boils down to. A bottom line that has nothing to do with the people of America or even the country as a whole and so I am grateful for my little slice of heaven. For now. I am a survivor on so many levels. My battle grounds of family secrets and domestic violence and financial insecurity are simply footsteps on the path to everything else. Maybe a beach in Mexico if I can put enough miles on that Visa to make it so. The gifts of the week include an abundance of key lime pie, 3 days off in a row and a few sprinkles in Santa Fe that might turn into rain. Okay so this is a ramble but not quite a rant and so goes the life, my life as an artist in residence at El Zaguan in Santa Fe.

El Zaguan

2011-07-21T23:07:00.001-06:00

Sunday Evening, Santa Fe Style

2011-07-17T18:47:00.000-06:00

Sitting alone in the casa, a bad Grateful Dead album playing, a light cocktail poured, the fan blowing.

This past couple of weeks have been quite a challenge, one that I somehow managed to get through with at least a little grace and a sense of humor left intact.

There is one more week left for my solo show here at El Zaguan, eight works on paper, all unframed, hung the show with clips and push pins. The presentation would be stunning of I could afford framing, not that it looks bad, but we all know that everyone loves framed work, makes it real art somehow.

The foot traffic on Canyon has been light for several days now. I think it may be a combination of several things, maybe the fires scared people away, well many of the mountain destinations and camping grounds were closed. The air quality could potentially get bad, as it has on occasion, that plus the heatwave and whatever negative economics that would deter a middle class tourist have all created a potential lack of seasonal monetary influx. There are still tourists here and they are frequenting the galleries, but our non-profit space is often overlooked.

The potential for bad inter-personal politics of residency, emotions and drama can run high, have seemingly passed over our little group here, for the most part. This program is a boarding situation, artists are entitled to stay for years if they choose to, as long as they are not completely disruptive and manage to cough up the subsidized monthly rent. We all live very close in what might be called a compound, it is nearly impossible to slip by unnoticed. We do respect each others privacy but do not shy away from gathering often, talking, laughing, drinking, planning.

The foundation is not focused on the artists, they have a mission and they stick to it, historical architectural preservation. Once in a while it feels like we are leeches on each other, but for the most part things flow together with an open and honest understanding. I have done my research on residencies and there are the artists and then there is the need to raise money and bring in support. The staff here is small and busy, still it would be amazing to generate some focus on and funding for the artist/tenants.

Am still unemployed and beginning to lose my interest in looking for a job, this has become combined with a fear that I am unable to even find a suitable position. I have been assisting my neighbor Greg, bitch is a hot mess, he pays me in the form of a stipend, yes that's what I'll call it. I certainly do not mind doing anything for him, think I might be hypnotized. Actually he is a very good friend and I will be there for my friends, he said once that we poor need to take care of each other.

One curious dynamic that adds to the mix here is the intern position, a ten week internship during the summer when a college level student studying architectural preservation applies for the right to come here and work alongside the foundation. From what I understand the likely candidate usually stems from New Mexico, but this year a brilliant young man who is attending Columbia, wooed the jury, in comes Peter. The intern is housed in a tiny barely private adjoined casita, the placement of the room is situated so that one might feel like everyone can always see inside. Don't get me wrong, not unlike everything else about this place, there is charm up the wazoo, though I am not sure that I would feel completely comfortable in that room.

Well soon Peter will be leaving our humble adobe, and with him will go a certain energy, one that has been captivating, invigorating and sometimes frustrating, for all of us, including Peter, I think. It is a tough position requiring great physical stamina. The opportunity sounds very romantic on paper but doubt that I would have made it, although at 23, well still, I just hope that he takes some of this to heart and takes with him some fond memories.

So now my lite cocktail has reappeared, there is a nice breeze, big fluffy clouds, sun slowly descending. Haven't much energy, not enough to read the three books that I am working on, Pynchon, Joyce and Pound, the sound of wet paint does not sound appealing either, could hang out with Greg and watch bad tv, could head out for the portal and swing, maybe I'll do some show promoting. Anyway whatever I do do, it is a summer eve, I live in a fantastic home with terrific neighbors and I couldn't want for anything else right now.

Gregory.

2011-07-16T11:20:00.000-06:00

Bethany.

2011-07-16T11:18:00.002-06:00

Adam.

2011-07-16T00:31:00.000-06:00

The Art of Pastry (in a tiny space)

2011-07-14T22:11:00.000-06:00

Finally today after two and a half months in this residency I truly christened this tiny little kitchen that is wedged in between the bedroom, bath and studio/living room space. "Sally" my gun metal gray Kitchenaid mixer who has been holed up in storage for 12 years while we were on the road traveling here and there (Sally weighs about 20 cumbersome pounds so she had to stay behind) was brought out into the light of day and she and I bonded over pate a choux and tropez pastry cream to make cream puffs.

A 400 degree oven on a 90 degree day in a very small space is nothing you want to experience any time soon.... but I have lived through worse conditions in professional kitchens of the past so I dove in for the stuffy hot ride. Eggs, sugar, milk, vanilla beans and pastry flour come together on the stove top for the pastry cream... set it in the fridge to chill. The choux paste is baking science starting with water, butter and salt simmering... add the flour, stir, stir, stir.... the mixture is shiny and steaming.... stir til your arm hurts, until the paste goes matte.... then into the mixer to release the steam... add the eggs slowly and the mix turns a deep satisfyingly rich hue of yellow... turn Sally on medium high speed and watch the dough quickly get sleek and shiny again. Gorgeous. Into a piping bag... pipe the little mounds on to the buttered sheet tray and into the 400 degree oven they go for 45 minutes (turn down to 325 after 15 have passed.) Steaming and puffing and turning golden brown the choux is transformed. The end result is perfectly delicate vessels of pastry to hold the rich tropez cream inside.

When the time comes to fill the pastry... whip up some heavy cream, fold it in to the pastry cream... creating a light, sweet, silky vanilla bean cream. That's a lot of cream y'all. Ghirardelli bittersweet chips and guess what? More heavy cream get whipped up for the sleek ganache that graces the top of each pastry. They look good enough to eat, right?

Worth every minute of hot kitchen time, YES! Worth every calorie? Only if you eat one or two... which is what most folks do... Billy and I? Ummmmmm.... yeah. Let's just say our end number was a multiple of two.

Painting is Process and the Roadside Cash Store

2011-07-14T17:35:00.001-06:00

In the beginning there is gray and oval and I think of my friend Kathryn's "artist talk" at the Bunnell Street Gallery in Homer, Alaska (kick ass place to have a solo show and yes I did too) on how her painting changed from inception to completion. About process, and though she likely had "a concept" or at least a sketch (or several) I seem to work completely from an intuitive place. My "concept" easily distracted though it rallies around texture and idea and palette and though I swear I have a visual "concept" it is nothing like what originally appears on the canvas.

Week 2: Transformation of palette and scratches, windows and conversation

I am distracted by possbility, by happy accident, wistful of de Kooning, Rothko, Anselm Keifer, and Sandra Pratt from across the street at Selby Fleetwood (one of my favorite galleries in Santa Fe. though they never visit) --that's what I envision for myself. Success --not exactly, more along the lines of Aha moment! --I actually have them on occasion and then I wake up, look again. . .apply the paint, think, scratch, palette, wipe, more of the same, different color --oops! For me art is process. Maybe even survival. And despite the obessive nature of my painting of late it has been good, even delirious with happy stay up past my bedtime painting before work moments, after work, wine in the afternoon, paint on my face kind of joyful moments and I give thanks as the moon rises to full. It has been a good two weeks in the studio.

New Mexico Skyline from Sparksville somewhere near El Rito

Not a bad thing I suppose as I paint and paint over like Tom Hanks on that island talking to that soccer ball, as if this is the last canvas of my life. And please Scotty beam me up to the roadside cash store.

The Gardens of El Zaguan

2011-07-14T12:06:00.000-06:00

Who Am I and Why Am I Here

2011-07-13T13:22:00.000-06:00

Eleven months ago I found myself in Santa Fe and during this period of time my world has been filled with life, painting, photography, loneliness, new friends, and a rejuvenated inspiration.

Today I find that I have been compromised by a nasty little flu bug, certainly after the hectic week that just passed my immune system was open and prone to harbor such an unsettling dose of the flu.

This dreaded attack on my body has made it difficult to derive the necessary energies to sit for hours and focus, so my painting sits there pleading to be worked upon. It's funny how my physical force goes into painting, not that I am splashing paint, no I am very precise and slow, but when I don't feel well it doesn't matter which technique I do use in the studio, I just don't have the ability.

As a matter of fact my mental and physical prowess are currently being challenged, so after a little snack I may need to take a short nap, recuperate some, and hopefully later today I will paint, I must paint.

2011-07-11T13:24:00.003-06:00

just saying.

2011-07-10T01:18:00.000-06:00

Mining the Unconscious. . .

2011-07-08T07:46:00.000-06:00

This is a video, an art exhibition and a way of life. If you haven't please put this on your calendar of "artful happenings and things to do" in Santa Fe. At the Santa Fe Community Gallery through August 21, 2011.

"Formative Years"
This was sand cast from a baby hot water bottle (nursery rhymes, etc.) as a symbol for healing

2011-07-07T23:37:00.000-06:00

Got home and made the case for bantam chickens to Bethany and Billy. All in. Drank vodka and sugar-free raspberry soda on ice with Max and Greg in Greg's pad. Pad. Then another. Sugar free is too sweet. It's a crazy world. Made the case for bantam chickens to Max and Greg. Max is in. Greg deflected. It will happen. I will make the coop. The chicken coop--I will make the chicken coop. If you've got a table saw, you've got to cut a couch in half from time to time. If you're carrying around an axe, you better damned well cut down a tree from time to time. If you claim to be a cannibal, and you don't eat a friend from time to time, people will wonder. I will make the chicken coop, and it will be a glorious chicken coop, the sailboat of chicken coops. Chickens will salute me as I pass. "Thanks for the coop!" they'll say. I'll nod, stoically

This Earth is on Fire

2011-07-03T16:12:00.000-06:00

Annie Bundren could not want a better one, a better box to lie in. It will give her confidence and comfort. As I Lay Dying, William Faulkner

2011-06-30T14:26:00.002-06:00

The Living Room: An Exhibition by Artists in Residence at El Zaguan

Closing Reception: Friday, July 1st, 5:00pm to 8:00pm

(show will be open Saturday 10:00am to 5:00pm as well)

“The Living Room” or “Sala” pays homage to an historical precedent set from its earliest days as the James L. Johnson House. In the 1920’s the home was purchased by Margretta Dietrich and made available as a residence for artists and eccentrics, the first artist being her sister Dorothy Stewart. We are pleased to announce an exhibition by current residents in what is the expression and continuation of the living history of an authentic art colony on Canyon Road.

John Gregory Tweed, El Zaguan’s senior tenant, will be exhibiting primitive style New England bucolic paintings that have never been on view. Currently Mr. Tweed is recuperating from a recent surgery.

Brenda Roper spent over 20 years in Alaska and is currently living her creative life crossing borders, painting large, writing small and taking photos to mark her path. Her work investigates the texture of social relationships in a variety of media and is published in Calyx, A Journal of Art & Literature by Women, and Cirque.

Adam Eisman has been making objects and writing in Santa Fe since the 1990’s. The work includes modern furniture, sculpture, fiction and non-fiction. His furniture is by commission and he has shown art at the Encaustic Arts Institute (Dialectic (in collaboration with Douglas Mehrens, May/June 2010)

Max-Carlos Martinez, born and raised in Albuquerque, recently returned to New Mexico after spending thirty years in New York City. He will be showing work on paper that continues his exploration of the formation of the American West.

Bethany Orbison is a photographer interested in exploring and creating dreamscapes and heightened images of reality through her photographs. Her inspiration comes from a combination of nature, imagination and emotions evoked through story telling.

Mandatory has options. . .

2011-06-30T08:30:00.003-06:00

An unexpected day off and my mind percolates with "to do" --Artisans for mineral spirits and maybe a brush since starting to paint again I realize I don't know how to paint at all. . .I bumble with the palette knife spreading, scratching, cover up, back up, look again, obsess and still the vision in my head not at all what I scrape out on the canvas -- but too soon really. This is a beginning. And pressing upon my own self-indulgence is a fire burning close to Los Alamos and "the lab" birthplace of the atomic bomb. Plutonium. And perhaps a resurgence (which assumes there was a decline) of a nuclear weapons manufacturing plant. . .So easy to forget it exists just up the road and I won't ramble about that here except to say that a mandatory evacuation has options apparently, but not without reprimand. Still I am glad people have the ability to think for themselves, weigh their options, choose and even refuse to leave if that is what they prefer. Democracy does exist in Los Alamos and that is reassuring on some level. And we can only hope common sense prevails in the on-going debate to firework or to not. . .

Back to the art front of self-indulgence, inspired by a visit to El Rito recently, I ordered custom cradled panels this week. To assemblage and possibility, antique hardware, and an unfinished series of "34A" wrapped in a box under the bed --somehow the eccletic hunting and gathering collection of bowling pins, bowling balls, license plates and a variety of rusted signage a bolt of lightning to my own sense of aesthetic. Thank you for the Spark! Also I have 5x7 cards of these images and others for sale --$5 at the Galleria at El Zaguan. Studio visits by appointment.

I Never Promised You A Rose Garden, A Solo Exhibit by Max-Carlos Martinez

2011-06-28T11:56:00.004-06:00

Max-Carlos Martinez

I Never Promised You a Rose Garden

A Solo Exhibition

El Zaguan

545 Canyon Road, Santa Fe, NM 87501

July 8 through July 23

Opening reception July 8, 5pm-8pm

The work on view is from an ongoing series that explores an identifiable American idealism while piecing together a conceptual history of liberty and the pursuit of happiness. These paintings are inspired by mid 19^th century illustrations that originally aimed to depict the re-creation of the American West. Modern influences are varied and include Pop Art, paint by numbers and Post-Impressionism. Max devises a history lesson with a tongue-in-cheek acid flashback vision and retells the stories that were fundamental to his understanding of his identity as a child. This is Martinez’ first solo show in New Mexico.

Max-Carlos Martinez is a self-taught artist who upon returning to New Mexico last year after a thirty-year hiatus in New York City found housing and inspiration at the Historic Santa Fe Foundation El Zaguan residence on Canyon Road.

Recent exhibitions include solo shows at Christopher Henry Gallery in New York City, Methemodi Cockpit CSID in Switzerland, The Sangre de Cristo Art Center in Colorado and the Tweed Museum in Minnesota.

“These paintings read like the peyote induced vision of a modern-day illustrator; their incandescent traceries and wavering figuration convey psychological uncertainty.” Jane Harris, Timeout NY

“I am also attracted to Martinez’ orientation, to visions and dreams another point of universality. Artwork from this base tweaks perceptions, expands thinking and induces humility as one’s knowledge of truth is shaken.” David Hopkins, duluthworld.com

“Max-Carlos Martinez produces a pictorial universe that is at once frivolous and tormented.” Rudi C. Bleys, Images of Ambiente: Homotextuality and Latin American Art

“These are not quiet, sentimental memories. Based on the style of psychedelic art of the 1960’s, his images vibrate with obsessively patterned pointillism and eye popping swirls of hypnotic, electrifying color.” Roy Sonnema, The Pueblo Chieftain

2011-06-28T06:36:00.000-06:00

Bout Billy-time.

Finding perspective. . .

2011-06-24T07:42:00.009-06:00

Maybe something in the lack of water like a plague this week, in finding perspective when words zing like bullets. Like a car crash. Yes, sensitive --but it is more intuitive I think. A trigger in present time like a slap to the face: not about chairs or the night audit or the man who growled while I paused before giving him directions to the closest laxative. Doesn't help I'm reading "Case Histories" by Kate Atkinson which only exacerbates the tears and I, the queen of sleep, am up until all hours trying to find calm and then I do. The morning is cool, quiet, the coffee strong, inviting, and always it will be the birdsong at El Zaguan I remember. A new bloom on the geranium despite the endless dust and I give thanks for tenacity in pink.

It is part of creativity this ability to feel deeply. To pay attention. To process. It is a fine balance this dance between making a living and trusting yourself to abundance. I thank the friend who brings old issues of literary journals to encourage my poetry. --a 1992 copy of Blue Mesa Review, about "Borderlands" --. And the $100 (investment) from another for the canvas empty on my easel. Today I choose to begin. To believe. As for these verbal bullets tripping the brain I hope to find a truth or two along the pathway back to perspective.

The Zaguan

2011-06-23T10:20:00.000-06:00

Haven't worked at a day job for nearly a year now, been a helluva ride, winging it, aggressively pushing my work, ended up at the Zaguan by a total fluke.

Spent the first few months here in near isolation, was a challenging period, but I painted my ass off.

Life in Santa Fe isn't all its cracked up to be, or perhaps it is just that, life in Santa Fe.

There is a fire in the hills.

2011-06-19T18:42:00.000-06:00

Walk the dog, shoot the flowers, paint.

2011-06-18T15:14:00.000-06:00

Normally I would be sitting in my apartment here at El Zaguan, drinking beer, getting a little high, painting, attempting to finish the piece that I am working on and have been working on for nearly a month now.

When I moved in nearly nine months ago, I was instantly inspired, there was something in the air, the depth of knowledge that these walls posses, I quickly became adhered to the history of this home, this site where so many memories were made.

After thirty years in NY I really did not know what to expect of Santa Fe, I hadn't ever lived here, a cousin at that time was a recent transplant to this city and she assured me of opportunity and beauty. But there was that fantasy of Santa Fe, a cool, chic hip city smack dab in the middle of some of the most stunning landscape in the world.

Now I am sitting in the office of the Historical Santa Fe Foundation, our group show is hung, going into the second week of the run, if we want the gallery open on Saturday it is up to us to unlock the doors and meet and greet. I was just talking with a tall goodlooking intelligent man who popped in just on his way, a neighbor, 10 years in Santa Fe now he says, for the first two though it was tough. Santa Fe Society, a lot of walls he goes on, doubted his move for those two years, from NY. I hear this all of the time.

This is kind of why I just went nuts in the studio, I mean I was painting everyday for at least six hours, got that awkwardness that comes from spending too much time alone, live on faith and doubt, painted like I hadn't painted in a couple of years, I have no trouble being proficient, but without the shenanigans of socializing I could just work. My palette shifted, my process changed, the way I applied the paint felt different. It took a while to get my stroke back, was having some issue with my eyesight, much better now, but I found that I was completely relying upon the colors that I found around me, the sky, the plants, the flowers, this humble gracious landscape that seemed to be willing to unfold for me. So I started taking pictures, lots of pictures, and now the roses bloom.

This has been a wonderful opportunity, the chance to live within these walls, not sure what will happen from here on in, should be planning my solo next month, feeling like maybe things might be going in my direction a little, but basically I live on faith, not in any one thing, just the belief that this is where I belong and that I will wake up tomorrow, walk the dog, shoot the flowers and paint.

work, play and a pink chair

2011-06-17T07:56:00.005-06:00

All work and no play. . .or too much play and no work. Work is relative. Most of us think of the 9 - 5 paycheck type of job. The one that lets us pay the rent to live in this magical compound that is El Zaguan. I have two "day jobs" --part-time but sometimes the social around the table in the yard is work too or around the table in other yards. I realize how conversation pushes me to face myself, articulate outloud that refrain of what I believe, who I am, what I want and why am I waiting for permission (and from whom) to follow my dreams. What is the dream? I suppose I'm in it. This is part of the path. The pink chair inviting me to look again rather than take a seat. Take a photo. Remember. Artists who have photographed Bob Dylan but still working to carve out a life, plant a garden, fall in love, conversation, the moon rising, bottle of red, coyotes yip yip, a million ideas trip the brain, canvas or assemblage and I could use one of those "professional" art bins to display my matted photos, though the payne's gray basket from Michaels seems to suffice just fine.

My refrigerator is empty of the essentials at the moment: spinach, eggs, chardonnay and I am off to Trader Joes to replenish. More bottled water for "the Living Room" now on exhibit through July 2nd. The day job has its gifts too. A man opening a retreat off Old Santa Fe trail is kind and gentle and giving back, a letter to the New Mexican that brings joy and results to the woman I wrote it for, a Georgia O'Keeffe incarnate, I her loyal personal assistant. And those friendships that come from proximity invite us to linger longer, push our boundaries, open our hearts. . .full moon, pink chair and the art of possibility.

Thie Old House Once Knew Its Master

2011-06-16T18:45:00.000-06:00

Stumbling around here has been a blast, sometimes I feel like Miss Kitty from Gunsmoke or Hoss from Bonanza, it depends. Every step of the way is storied but the facts can sometimes be historically murky. Is this place haunted, I say yes, not a lot of ghostly sightings, but a few.

kitchen window thursday

2011-06-16T07:20:00.002-06:00

Opening Night, The Living Room Exhibition at El Zaguan

2011-06-15T13:08:00.001-06:00

The Living Room: An Exhibition...

2011-06-11T14:37:00.003-06:00

The Living Room: An Exhibition by the Artists in Residence at El Zaguan
Roadmap Variations: A, B, and C
Storyblocks

Sneak Preview --the Living Room TONIGHT 5-7pm

2011-06-10T09:50:00.005-06:00

Beautiful morning and hope your plans include a stroll past the white picket fence, two grand chestnut trees, through the turquoise gate and into "the Living Room" at 545 Canyon Road this afternoon at 5 o'clock. Here is a sneak preview from one of the 6 artists in residence. A great show on the walls of our "sala": sculpture, photography, painting in a variety of styles. We invite you to join us. . .

Heavy Skies

2011-06-06T23:26:00.000-06:00

The fires in AZ fill the sky over Santa Fe with a heavy smoke and it is strangely beautiful at night... what an odd beginning to summer. The moon shines through the choking haze while we all consider the flames which are scorching the parched the landscape miles away.

The Living Room. An Exhibition by Artists in Residence at El Zaguan

2011-06-06T18:39:00.004-06:00

The Living Room

An Exhibition by Artists in Residence at El Zaguan

545 Canyon Road, Santa Fe, NM 87501

June 10 through June 25

Opening reception June 10, 5pm-7pm

William McLane is a third generation painter from New England. McLane is primarily a self-taught painter having developed his own style and technique after years of experimentation and practice. His oil landscapes capture the atmosphere of a location with rich, expressive color and rhythm.

Bethany Orbison is a photographer interested in exploring and creating dreamscapes and heightened images of reality through her photographs. Her inspiration comes from a combination of nature, imagination and emotions evoked through story telling.

I can see the sofa.

2011-06-06T12:09:00.001-06:00

Roadmap Variations: A, B, and C

this is what they do

2011-06-05T16:33:00.000-06:00

The whole family was there when Alice got to the storage unit. They were all wearing black. The sofa from the ad wasn’t gonna be that great. And they wanted too much. Alice had half the price in one pocket. She hid the rest in the other.

The teenage kid rolled up the metal door. He looked hot in his black shirt. They all looked hot.

The sofa was fine. Alice started to start. Before she said a word, a woman, in black, wailed.

“Mi abuela!” Everyone looked down. “Mi abuelita muerta. Eee, she loved that sofa!”

Alice paid the full price for the sofa.

The next car drove up, probably for the desk.

This is what they do.

Dreaming of water

2011-06-03T21:10:00.004-06:00

A beautiful coolness after a hot dry day and I dream of water in a land where rivers have no water. Last night the scent of fire wafting through open windows all the way from Arizona distorts my dreaming but the dawn is fresh with birdsong and clear skies. Working on a new painting that is a continuation of an old theme and will I finish it in time for "the Living Room"

Opening Reception next Friday June 10th 5 - 7pm. or save it for the triptypch I envisioned? Things change. Painterly inverted photographs and colorful south of the border imagery take me to the ocean that in New Mexico is sky. After 20 years in Alaska I have come to appreciate the rain. May it come soon.

LR progress

2011-06-02T22:12:00.003-06:00

Skeletal

2011-06-01T21:06:00.001-06:00

Lack of rain... we are starting to see the skeletons of the trees along the parched river bed. Phosphorescence and dry fluff take over where moisture recedes. Dust turns the sky tortoise shell green and we all listen harder for the arrival of heavy clouds carried on the tireless breath of the wind.

Moving Toward the Living Room

2011-06-01T15:14:00.000-06:00

Layout--piece 17

Hazzard

2011-06-01T14:23:00.000-06:00

I always wondered how a car got upside down. On the Dukes of Hazzard, it would go up a little ramp on one side and then drive on the wheels on the other. You didn't see the ramp. Usually things went fine--they weaved through a gap, outsmarted Boss Hogg. Sometimes it turned upside-down.
I don't know what we hit. It wasn't a ramp.
"It's gonna blow," Andrew said.
"It''s not gonna fucking blow, " I said.
We looked at each other. He unclipped, dropped from his seat and squeezed out through the window. He ran east. The mesas hung heavy above the blue sky. Andrew tripped and went face first into a yucca. I lit a cigarette and waited for the explosion.

05/2011

Memorial on the patio

2011-05-30T23:03:00.000-06:00

2011-05-30T22:50:00.000-06:00

Tom Waits on Memorial Day

2011-05-30T12:03:00.000-06:00

Finally getting started on art making in my new studio (after a 6 month hiatus of family which is often poetry, and Spanish lessons which could be artful if only I were articulate. . .) --a neighbor said "a lot of chaos going on in there" and I suppose this is true: gesso, little girl dress, ruffle torn, a button off then on, needle, thread, black and white and color, and windy enough I feel like Dorothy.

Shut the window. Sweep up the desert dust. Print a few photos on archival paper (so they say), linen tape in water, a hinge lesson and not the one that did not keep my door knob from falling off. Afterall the building is 150 years old --forgiven. Tom Waits serenade and not even noon. Let the gesso dry. Contemplate the next layer on a walkabout in St. John's arroyo. Dorothy Stewart add on in homage. Orange poppy at the edge of the portal and wisteria greening upon the artists of el zaguan.

Midnight at the Oasis

2011-05-26T23:19:00.000-06:00

Well it isn't midnight yet, and this photo was taken earlier, but now all I hear is my music and the crickets.

And so another day comes to an end here at El Z, awoke to sun shining, house guests leaving, greeting the neighbors throughout the day, some new faces, some old, fast friends, co-conspirators, alliances, challenges.

The idea of an art residency is nothing new, and still we have these groups of randomly selected eccentrics who will find themselves shoulder to shoulder, cast like actors in an impromptu play, we will find each other and we will find ourselves.