Ross Bleckner

Wow! I love these paintings. They are both psychological and physical. They reflect form and color from nature and the body and also internal worlds.

The Doors of Perception

I am currently reading The Doors of Perception by Aldous Huxley. This is my attempt to wrap my mind around some of his proposals.
His discourse about seeing and perceiving the universe is pertinent to all artists throughout history and the current day. He begins to describe the relationship with the object and its connection to infinity. Huxley argues that even renaissance painters of religious symbols and stories conveyed a sense of infinity within the folds of cloth worn by a saint or angel. The cloth not only describes the body but meanders in and out in space, coming and going freely as if a cloud. ¨In the average Madonna or apostle the strictly human, fully representational accounts for about ten percent of the whole¨ (Huxley 30). The other 90 percent of this religious icon is free to a sense of abstraction enacted by the artist. Not only is this an interesting idea in terms of artistic freedom in a time of strict religious patronage but also in the concept of the artist expressing godly creating when depicting ¨god¨.

Huxley compares his altered state of a mescalin trip to the artistic process ¨What the rest of us see only under the influence of mescalin, the artist is congenitally equipped to see all the time. His perception is not limited to what is biologically or socially useful...for the artist as for the mescalin taker draperies are living hieroglyphs that stand in some peculiarly expressive way for the unfathomable mystery of pure being¨(Huxley 33). In the classical tradition, creating draperies were an opportunity the abstract and express an inner perception of these folds. Opposed to the fixed patronage of the latter days, the contemporary artist does not necessarily choose her/his subject or concept (although art institutions still have a strong pull in determining subject matter) . The artist is simply a vessel to filter the tactile and visual human experience into something plastic and suggestive of this infinity.

The idea of the drapery or more generally the naturalistic form is suited for transfiguration. I think this is where my rotting banana/shrimp/fossils/turkey business is heading. I have been abstracting these forms into types of psychological landscapes that meld into their surroundings....

Progress/ random ideas

A few more paintings... Within these paintings I have been more concerned with taking interesting objects and extracting meaning though form and color opposed to subject. This method challenges me to think about separate qualities of organic forms and how they integrate with the natural world. Abstraction has been a method in this integration.

I have been thinking about the process and action of painting. I believe that people paint to release certain emotions and thoughts quickly, physically and beautifully. It can be a very immediate form of visual communication opposed to more tedious process based arts . We live in a society that is so instantaneous and digital. Since the advent of the internet labor and everyday life has been less phsyical. Painting and its physicality seem only natural in this mechanized society,

Cecily Brown

Sexuality runs throughout the chaotic paintings of Cecily Brown. Her sexual references hide subtly within the energetic strokes of colors that Brown expressively applies. There is a certain clarity within portions of the paintings that describe genitals and other body parts which, paired with the swooping brush strokes propose the fleeting pleasure of a sexual encounter.

Lisa Yuskavage

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The crisp and exaggerated curves of Yuskavage´s women echo the absurdity of current ideas about beauty and sexuality. These women are painted pristinely without imperfection besides awkwardly large butts, boobs, or occasional pie in the face. I enjoy details of these paintings, the tan lines, the corsage, and the pomegranate.

Yayoi Kusama

Yayoi Kusama works with repetition and pattern. Her idiosyncratic paintings, sculptures, prints and installations echoes the chaotic repetition of forms in nature. These forms also relate to the body and are deeply psychological. Her installations also incorporate principles of two dimensionality with 3-D space. The repetitive use of polka-dots suggests infinity.

Peter Doig

Through his paintings Doig explores the mystery of the natural world and its relation to mankind. Often taking the form of abstract landscapes, Doig integrates the figure into these spaces. His use of contrasting peculiar colors furthers the sense of mystery and beauty of his subject.

progress

Donald Sultan

Donald Sultan takes traditional subject matter such as flowers or fruits and abstracts them. These paintings, often large feature vibrant colors and thick textures. Sultan´s forms achieve a level of abstraction that retain original qualities of his subject . His subject remains in a place between familiarity and abstraction. The forms used are quite simplistic however the subtleties of color and texture are elegant.

Terry Winters

Terry Winters paintings suggest chaotic networks of energy and their relation to organic form and color. I enjoy his attention to detail from the tiniest string of color to large swooping painterly strokes. The forms created by these lines can be a view into a microscopic world or a graph of energy from a city or map.

Jim Dine

David Salle

Salles montages deform the figure, nature, and memory. These disjointed paintings refer to the figure and quotidian objects. However, the mundane objects are arranged in enigmatic compositions that narrate a nonlinear story.

Progress 7/14

Today I started began painting my THANKYOU with mold. Upon a preliminary wash I laid out my text. Then I continued building
very loosely over to create different spore formations. I drew upon it in charcoal and then painted upon the drawing. The effect created adds depth and body to the mold. I have to work on my palate and implying the fade/mold of THANK YOU.

Works on paper

Places I´ve Never Been...

My online portfolio

http://anitatrombetta.carbonmade.com/

Progress

I began my series of paintings not knowing where my initial infatuation with bananas would lead. After three classes they are beginning to act more as a vessel for metaphor than just a banana. Thats what usually intrigues me about objects.
In order to keep my subject matter interesting I have been approaching the blank canvas differently each time. Laying down a wash of color chosen by pure intuition has been an interesting method to start a painting. It also has kept my painting fluid and loose.
I need to buy more medium. I am finding layering of washes very nice.

William Cotton

The paintings of William Cotton are sumptuous landscapes of various candies and desserts. Although rendered meticulously they often suggests whimsical estates featuring gingerbread houses and chocolate lakes. Often the human figure is used to emphasize euphoria, ecstasy and sensuality. Cotton paints with oil on linen facilitating the smoothness of his subject.

Julie Mehretu

Ethiopian painter, Julie Mehretu creates systematic networks of colors and shapes implicative of energy. These compositions create depth through line and shading. Through these formal elements Mehretu suggests urban settings, maps and geography.

Wangechi Mutu

http://dailyserving.com/wp-content/uploads/art/Wangechi-Mutu-3-19-07.jpg

Nairobian born painter, Wangechi Mutu deforms the human body. Using collage, drawing and painting her
work probes female identity and sexuality. Using portraits and full figures Mutu disjoints the body, for example in Fibroid Tumors of The Uterus she pairs massive lips with genitals as the nose or brain.
http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/artists/artpages/mutu_uterine_fibroid.htm