-References to the Body-
Artist talk begins at 6:30 pm
Art Czar
art blog
Talking to Tamara Rodriguez
Question: Tell me about “Worth Its Weight”
The show serves as an exploration through venerated satire of classical and cultural images on preciousness and the perimeters that define it.
The work examines the quest for beauty and associated consequences, addressing balance and value, while interpretation is left to the viewer.
“Worth its weight” : Tamara Rodriguez
Opening Reception: Saturday, June 1st, 7-11PM
On view by appointment only June 2nd- 8th, 2013
Opening Reception: Saturday, June 1st, 7-11PM
On view by appointment only June 2nd- 8th, 2013
Co-Lab
Talking about YLA 18
This campaign was created to help fund the international art exhibition curated by Michael Anthony García for Mexic-arte Museum in Austin, TX.
Michael Anthony García an artist and curator based in Austin TX. I have been living and working here for almost thirteen years and feel that this community has had a profoud impact on my artistic career. Some of you may be familiar with another exhibition I curated at the Emma S. Barrientos Mexican American Cultural Center in the spring of 2010 with Los Outsiders. I am humbled to announce that I have been honored with the task of curating this year’s iteration of Mexic-arte Museum’s YLA (Young Latino Artist) exhibition series.
This exhibition series has played a big part in my artistic life in one way or another since I’ve lived here in Austin and was very anxious to take the reins. The excitement of opening this exhibition up to international artists, regardless of the extra budgetary constraints this adds, actually helped me develop the concept for this collection of works.
I have selected an amazing group of artists to not only show their own work, but to collaborate on new artistic endeavors making their world debut in this exhibition. The selected Texas artists hail from Austin, Houston, Dallas and San Antonio. This year other cities represented are Bogota, Colombia as well as Mexico City and Guadalajara, Mexico. Keep an eye out here for the press release with a full list of the artists involved.
As you can imagine, opening up the exhibition to international artists adds a bit more of a strain to the budget we are working with at the museum. That is where you can be a part of this creative endeavor to help redefine what is presented as “Latino Art” and help foster extended communities and connections amongst artists.
The idea of “community” has various interpretations. At it’s core, it is about groups of people working together directly or in parallel and under a social contract, be it implicit or not. That idea is the centerpiece of “YLA 18: Con / Juntos,” this year’s iteration of the annual Young Latino Artist (YLA) Series at Mexic-Arte Museum. The title, which means “With / Together,” reinforces the importance of the joining of ideas and of individuals with a common cause, while also referencing the idea of conjuntos, a group of musicians collaborating and unifying their talents to create beautiful music for the public to partake.
Even with the YLA series’ inherently constraining eligibility for inclusion (being Latino within a particular age parameter), these limitations create an opportunity to explore and/or create community in different ways. Much like our true cultural reality, this community is comprised of individuals from our various Latino nationalities and cultures, gender identities, and sexual orientations.
This exhibition is about nurturing a diverse community of individuals while paying reverence to a shared common space. The selected artists collaborated and opened their homes and studios to each other, sometimes across the globe via the internet, to create many of the works in this exhibition. From many voices, stories and ideas, a community is formed and compose a common song in “Con / Juntos.”
Please, help us reach our goal to make this a cultural focal point in this year’s arts calendar and expand the ideas of “Latino Art” and community for the city of Austin.
If anything, please help us get the word out about this campaign.
Thank you so much for your time, attention and assistance in sharing with your own networks!
Talking “IF YOU LOVE IT, LET IT DO”
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Talking “Infinite Perfection”
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Talking to Brandon Maldonado
Brandon Maldonado was born in 1980 in Denver, Colorado, but grew up in Albuquerque, New Mexico, an area rich in Latino culture. To escape his daily existence of cacti, tumbleweeds and adobe houses, he engulfed himself in the fantasy worlds of Star Wars, He-Man, and Michael Jackson’s Thriller. Around the age of 10 he was introduced to graffiti and simultaneously influenced by local writer Giant One (better known today as Mike Giant), an impact that can still be seen in his current works. However, in high school, Maldonado learned vicariously from the mistakes of his peers and decided to stop ‘keeping it real’ and start keeping it on canvas, which eventually led to his independent study of the old world masters.
Maldonado’s painterly style is a hybrid of graffiti, ancient iconography of Central America, and classical imagery. His finished pieces evoke feelings of the human experience, from life’s joys, sorrows and struggles, to the mysteries of our mortal existence. “I pick up my paintbrushes and attempt to use art as a vehicle for inspiring change,” says Maldonado. “The process of making a painting in itself is a meditation for me. I discriminately choose the themes of my work, making certain that each concept is ultimately something I believe is worth saying and contemplating.”
Major influences in his creative life include Mike Giant, Jan Van Eyck, Frida Kahlo, Dominique Ingres, Joe Sorren, Mark Ryden, and the melancholy music of Jeff Buckley. Maldonado’s painting ‘Our Lady of the Merciful Fate’ was chosen by The Zac Brown Band to grace the cover of their current album ‘Uncaged’. His art is in the private collections of Aaron Paul, Zac Brown, and Gina Gershon. Maldonado has been honored to exhibit his works at Stolen Space Gallery in London, Thinkspace Gallery in Los Angeles, as well as numerous other galleries in New York, Colorado and Korea.
Talking to K.C. Collins
Question: Tell me about “Not Yet Titled”
“Not Yet Titled” is kind of an inside joke. I have been working on this show for a little over a year and when I’m in the studio titles are the last thing on my mind. My previous solo show “Untitled” was in December 2008. Four years later I still haven’t come up with a fitting name. There’s something about a title that suggests finality, and for me painting is an on going process. With each painting influencing the next.
This body of work starts with the diptych “ History is hard to know”. What followed was an exploration of landscape and still life mixed with found objects and faint memories of places and things. The ascending arrangement of the last painting in the show (Large box install) is a subtle nod to this process of work influencing work.
Talking to Katy Horan
Tell me about “Spinster #3”
I use a process of layering textures, materials and details to rearrange elements of Victorian costuming and portraiture. These characters were specifically inspired by the figure of the unmarried woman in Victorian society, especially the specific clothing that was customary for Spinsters to wear.
Talking to Andrea Pramuk
Question: Tell me about “Moon Tide”
These small paintings are made using heat with alcohol inks, alcohol medium and rubbing alcohol on the Ampersand Claybord surface. I do these little paintings late at night to decompress kind of like my version of sketching. The light in “Moon Tide” resembles moonlight as it might be experienced in an altered state or deep underwater looking up at the sky while being tossed around by the tide. The recent blue moon provided some inspiration for this on
Talking “Game On”
Brooklyn, NEW YORK—The Active Space is pleased to present “Game On,” a presentation of new works by Alan and Michael Fleming, on September 14, 2012. Opening Reception: Friday, September 14, 7-10pm. Open Hours: Friday – Sunday: 1-6pm or by appointment
From 2010-2011, Alan and Michael Fleming began living apart for the first time in their history as twin brothers. Stretched between New York and Chicago, they were forced to redefine their practice and reinvent their collaboration across two different time zones. This separation came after many years of a shared embodied art practice where proximity and presence were a necessity. GAME ON features two bodies of work from Alan and Michael Fleming; one from this year of separation and the other made after reuniting in New York. While apart, the Fleming Brothers attempted to continue their practice through “psychic games”, postcards, Polaroids, calendars, and other ephemera as a record of their communication. Playing with the cliché of latent twin psychic abilities, their efforts became a genuine investigation of cerebral collaboration. Trying to think of the same color every day, or playing “rock, paper, scissors” over the phone and not knowing who won for months became a metaphor for a disjointed studio practice. Through these materials and objects they tried to map their distance and reflect on what their collaboration meant (or could mean) now that they were separated. The second body of work on display (made while in the same city) captures the brothers reunited in play through a variety of different media including performance for video, drawing, and sculpture. Themes of measurement, learning, and failure are made apparent in humorous artworks such as “Game Over (Tetris Drawing Series)” where the brothers made drawings of their losing games at Tetris, or “Who’s Bad?” a video of Alan, a trained dancer, teaching Michael, an amateur, how to dance like Michael Jackson. Like a game of street hockey interrupted by traffic, this exhibition represents a temporary hiatus of play. As the cars pass, the artists think of the potential game ahead. Eventually the players return to the studio and begin again.
Alan and Michael Fleming have shown their collaborative artwork throughout the United States and abroad. They are current fellows in the AIM (Artist in the Marketplace) Program at the Bronx Museum of the Arts and International Artists in Residence at the NARS (New York Art Residency & Studio) Foundation. They have performed at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, the Chicago Cultural Center, the Centre for Contemporary Arts in Glasgow, and the Factory for Art and Design in Copenhagen. Their videos have been screened internationally in Copenhagen, Lviv, Ukraine, Rio de Janeiro and Berlin. Their work has appeared in TimeOut, Art Slant, Buzz Magazine, Chicago Art Magazine, and Artforum. The Fleming brothers received their MFA in 2010 from the Performance Department at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, which they attended as a collaborative. As of 2012, they are both based in Brooklyn.
More information about the artists can be found at: http://www.spatialinterventions.com
Game On
September 14, 2012 through October 12, 2012
The Active Space
566 Johnson Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11237
http://www.566johnsonave.com
Talking to Charles Williams
Question: Tell me about ‘Mirrored Souls’
Mirrored Souls began when I was living in FL and I was missing home. Being on the boat and in the lowcountry, I began sketching ideas of where I wanted to be and it turned into a 36″x60″ oil on canvas painting. I personified the trees in the painting to represent me and family standing looking into the distance. Us(trees) standing in the water shows the reflection of ourselves and what we love. The viewer can see our souls form the place we come from – the lowcountry.
Talking “Las Noticias”, Francisco Moreno
Curbs & Stoops Presents: “Las Noticias”, Francisco Moreno Solo Exhibition
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New York, June 23 2012 – Curbs & Stoops & Rhythmology are pleased to invite you to the opening of our first pop-up exhibition. We see this collaboration as an opportunity to experiment at the interstice of art and performance. We hope to create a venue where engaging cultural conversations can happen in a social context. Because we exist outside of the traditions of the inner city art scenes, we can support experimental projects by inner city artists. We also see ourselves as a launching platform for international rising stars breaking into the New York art scene. It is in this spirit that we open with “Las Noticias,” (The news in Spanish), a solo exhibition by Mexican-American artist, Francisco Moreno. In his paintings, murals and installations Moreno explores notions of American identity and iconography. He uses a graphic language of black and white camouflage as a metaphor for assimilation into foreign environments and foreign conditions.
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Throughout his work, Moreno considers the process of assimilation for immigrants as they contemplate immersion into American culture. In one room, the “icon paintings” inccessently question, “What determines our Americaness?” Moreno depicts the Dallas cowboy flags and super heroes that he often found proudly plastered across friends “extra rooms” in Texas. In the main exhibition room we share key works from Moreno’s headline series including his RISD thesis installation “Las Noticias.” In this series of work the artist takes queues from annecdotes of his father reading the sports section of the newspaper in order to be able to participate in conversations at work. Interested in more than association, Moreno takes to the same medium to dissect American values. The artist shares, “I want to examine the images, reality, or sheer absurdity of what America considers news. A headline attempts to captures how we function in society now.” No catastrophy falls out of the realm of representation.
Opening Reception: July 20, 6:00 pm – 10:00 pm
Exhibition Dates: Friday, July 20th – September 7
Location: 361 Union Avenue Westbury, New York 11590
Grand Opening and “Greatest Hits”
Tiny Park is pleased to announce the opening of our new gallery space at 1101 Navasota St., Austin, TX 78702 and the opening of “Greatest Hits”, a group exhibition featuring all of the artists (and in some cases, specific works) we presented in our previous home-based gallery. The exhibition is an opportunity for us to get oriented in the new space and present a tongue-in-cheek “history” of our activities to date. We’ll be working with some of these artists in the coming year, so the exhibition acts as both a history and preview.
Opening Friday, June 29, 2012, 7pm to 11pm, the exhibition continues through July 28 and will be available for viewing 12pm – 5pm on Saturdays and at any time by appointment.
The exhibition includes work by Michael Sieben (Austin), Sam Prekop (Chicago), Deborah Stratman (Chicago), Miguel Aragon (Juarez, Mexico), PJ Raval (Austin), Nick Brown (Los Angeles), Leah Haney (Austin), David Culpepper (Austin), Stephanie Serpick (NY), and Rob Lomblad (NY).
Talking show and soft cover book “Fugue States”
FUGUE STATES
Collaborative works by
Hector Hernandez and William Hundley
opening reception: friday, may 11, 7-9pm
exhibition dates: may 11 – june 10, 2012
grayDUCK Gallery
608 W. Monroe St. – Suite C – Austin, TX 78704
512-826-5334 – duckduck@grayduckgallery.com
Fugue is an altered state of consciousness in which a person may move about purposely and even speak but is not fully aware. Dissociative fugue usually involves unplanned travel or wandering, and is sometimes accompanied by the establishment of a new identity.
In this exhibition, Hector Hernandez and William Hundley combine efforts in a continuation of their collaboration that began with Identity Crisis (2011, grayDUCK Gallery).
Fugue States softcover
***Check it out – pre-order a copy of the limited edition – Softcover + 32 page, full color, 8.5 x 11″ – edition of 50 – signed and numbered
Available here
Talking to Jared Steffensen
Tell me about “Mom’s always afraid that I’m going to hurt myself…I usually do.”
I am interested in how to merge skateboarding and art making into a body of work. One that does not rely on the inherent aesthetics found in skateboard culture, i.e. skateboard graphics, company logos, etc., that are generally assumed when an artist chooses skateboarding as their subject matter. I am filtering the act of skateboarding and the objects used to facilitate its practice through the aesthetics of minimalism, video art from the 60’s and 70’s, geometric abstraction, and abstract expressionism to create objects and videos that straddle the perceived line separating skateboarding and art. This allows the works to exist in either world separately or in both simultaneously.
I am using actions, objects, and the residual marks created by the act of skateboarding, that are central to its practice, and translating them into a visual language that is specific to contemporary art. I am also incorporating an important aspect of skateboarding, the ability see the potential of objects, that serve a specific function in ordinary day to day life, to exist beyond their intended function, i.e. handrails, transitioned embankments, curbs, etc. I am further appropriating these actions, objects and marks to facilitate their existence in a gallery setting.
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Talking Fugue States
Fugue is an altered state of consciousness in which a person may move about purposely and even speak but is not fully aware. Dissociative fugue usually involves unplanned travel or wandering, and is sometimes accompanied by the establishment of a new identity.
In this exhibition, Hector Hernandez and William Hundley combine efforts in a continuation of their collaboration that began with Identity Crisis (2011, grayDUCK Gallery).
Friday, May 11, 2012 – 7-9pm
Talking “Tiny Park Drawing Annual”
2012 Drawing Annual
Opening Friday, May 4, 2012, 7pm to 11pm, at 607 ½ Genard Street. The exhibition continues through May 20 and will be available for viewing 12pm – 5pm on Saturdays and by appointment.
The 2012l Tiny Park Drawing Annual is a group exhibition focused on drawings and the concept of drawing, in the widest terms. The show includes 3-D work that incorporates drawing; drawings made by drilling holes in paper and drywall; and photographs of line drawings made with string. As the name indicates, we hope to have a similar show once a year. This year we will present artworks by Miguel Aragon (Austin), Leah Haney (Austin), David Culpepper (Austin), Stephanie Serpick (NY) and Rob Lomblad (NY).
ABOUT THE ARTISTS:
Stephanie Serpick’s work has been exhibited at Listros Galerie (Berlin), David Weinberg Gallery (Chicago), Scope London, and Paul Kopeikin Gallery (Los Angeles). She received an MFA from the University of Chicago. A Florance Trust residency took her to London in 2004-05.
Miguel Aragon’s work has been exhibited at the International Print Center New York, OSDE Espacio de Arte (Buenos Aires), Austin Museum of Art, and Mexic-Arte Museum (Austin). He received an MFA from UT Austin. He continues a series of multimedia works that addresses the Mexican Drug Cartel Wars.
Leah Haney received a BFA from UT Austin. The first solo museum exhibition of her paintings was recently held at AMOA-Arthouse. Architecture and Outer Space dominate her visually explosive work.
David Culpepper is a member of the Austin-based artist collective, Ink Tank, which is currently showing at AMOA-Arthouse’s Art on the Green. He received his Bachelor Degree in painting and printmaking from Virginia Commonwealth University.
Rob Lomblad received an MFA from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design. His work is in the collection of the Museum of Contemporary Photography (Chicago).
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ABOUT TINY PARK: Tiny Park, an exhibition series and art space located in Austin, presents contemporary art exhibitions, readings, and film screenings by local and national artists. Functioning out of the organizers’ home located at 607 ½ Genard Street, Tiny Park also collaborates with guest curators and other galleries to present conceptually and aesthetically diverse works. Tiny Park is organized by Brian Willey and Thao Votang.
Tiny Park
607 ½ Genard Street
Austin, TX 78751
Talking to Michael A Garcia
Question: Tell me about the artwork in the “Changarrito project”
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Upon being asked to participate in the Changarrito project ( http://changarritoprojectwhat.blogspot.com/ ) I was concerned about how to translate my general body of work and creative process into something that can be sold. I’ve never produced works that were either 2D or for sale. To overcome the obstacle of being a conceptual 3D artist, who generally works in large scale, I had to adapt my usual product by creating found object installations and sculptural forms using altered images found online through virtual shopping and scrounging. The digitally manipulted images are then printed on transparencies and bound to plexiglass. I am happy that the final product still seems to capture the overall aesthetic of my other work and I especially like that shipping it is much more cost effective! I’ve uploaded images of all the pieces at pinterest.com/mrmichaelme/my-work/.
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Michael Anthony García will be selling these new works at Mexic-arte through the Changarrito project booth on
April 14th: 11:00-3:00 p.m.
May 19th & 20th: 11:00-3:00 p.m.
May 19th & 20th: 11:00-3:00 p.m.
Mexic-Arte Museum of Art
419 Congress Avenue Austin, TX 78701
(512) 480-9373
(512) 480-9373
Talking to Marianne C. McGrath
Question: Tell me about “Overgrowth”
“Overgrowth was conceived in the throngs of the heat of last summer in Austin and was finished late in the fall. Although the work is aligned with themes from my most resent body of work, focusing on ideas of reflection on landscapes lost, Overgrowth is my most direct and realistically representative work to date. By employing realistic imagery and form, and juxtaposing actual and unexpected materials, I present the viewer with an alternative idea of the man vs. nature struggle, hoping to leave the viewer questioning which element will, in the end, be triumphant.”
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Talking to Tony Stamolis
Question: Tell me about “Fresno”
Fresno is my birthplace, I spent six years photographing my strange hometown. The Result: a disturbing, often humorous, and consistently poignant insider’s view of a post-suburban American badlands.
Talking to Suzanne Koett
Question: Tell me about “The Study of Aloneness”
In series of photographs called The Study of Aloneness, photographs are arranged into small series. Each series is an unconventional visual journal depicting what aloneness looks like and shows what it’s like to have a relationship with the self. Each series touches upon the elation and freedoms as well as the struggles in having to face oneself when experiencing aloneness.
When aloneness and renunciation is accomplished, identity no longer matters. Within each series, the stripping down of identity is depicted so that the imagery gives way to being universal. In each study, the subject gets closer to becoming no one, which is sequentially the most relieving condition of being alone. The deeper into aloneness one goes ultimately paves the way of losing and unraveling the false identity created over a lifetime. The minimal and simplistic compositions support the idea of forced self-awareness and challenges, the behavioral patterns of avoiding oneself through external distractions.
Talking to Buster Graybill
Question: Tell me about “Tush Hog’s”
It is speculated that a Donald Judd sculpture escaped from the Chinati foundation. Without curators and conservators to care for it, the lonely sculpture eventually crossbreeds with a deer feeder in the nearby rural landscape. Their offspring are “Tush Hogs”. This breed of feral sculpture retains some Minimalist traits, but also functions as a wild game feeder that dispenses corn/feed to wild animals when it is rolled or jostled. The Tush Hogs quickly adapted a more rugged diamond-plated armor and more muscular stature to endure the attacks bywild hogs, deer, rams, critics, and locals looking for some casual target practice.
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Talking “THEM F*CKIN’ ROBOTS”
Question tell me about “THEM F*CKIN’ ROBOTS”
“THEM F*CKIN’ ROBOTS” is a documentary about Norman White, one of the most influential media artists in his field. He produced humorous and beautiful work, but also trained hundreds of artists at the Ontario College of Art and Design to make their own, hands-on media art from 1976 onwards. This is on of the reasons a vast number of acclaimed media artists come from Canada. However, media-art does not cover the realm of White’s work: he produced a large oeuvre, from paintings to light murals to interactive robotics. Ine Poppe and Sam Nemeth filmed White and his students: they visited him in his huge watermill in Ontario and followed him and his students at work.
It took Poppe and Nemeth 5 years to finish Them F*ckin’ Robots. This had several reasons: it was hard to obtain material of the early works of White (video was still a ‘new’ medium) but moreover was it hard to fund a film about media art. In the contemporary cultural climate in the Netherlands no art- or film fund dared to take the risk of financing a documentary about media art, also because the film is about a ‘foreign’ artist. This reflects thematically in the film. The question wheather or not media art has a place in the mainstream art world is adressed as well as why it took Norman White such a long time -he started in the 1960-ies with electronic art- to get recognition. The film contains material from the 70-ies, 80-ies, 90-ies, 00-ies and original footage of the of the White family shot in the 40-ies,50-ies and 60-ies.
The screening of “THEM F*CKIN’ ROBOTS” takes place March 23, 2012, from 7-10 PM. Email ashley@566johnsonave.com.
THEM F*CKIN’ ROBOTS
March 23, 2012
The Active Space
566 Johnson Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11237
http://www.566johnsonave.com
Talking grand opening “The Active Space”
Brooklyn, NEW YORK—The Active Space celebrates the grand opening of its new gallery space with an artist’s reception for “Dreaming Without Sleeping,” works by Criminy Johnson | QRST. February 24, 2012, 7-10 PM. Curated by Robin Grearson.
“Dreaming Without Sleeping” allows viewers to glimpse the artist’s view of our waking world: a bent, slightly pessimistic and occasionally hostile place populated by animals and people who are often reluctant to be interrupted by the viewer.
Criminy Johnson creates oil paintings depicting the strange environments and subjects he imagines, and while working out his ideas, he often makes wheatpastes that relate to these in some way. Many people are familiar with Criminy’s style but may have seen it outside of a gallery setting. And QRST fans might be discovering Criminy Johnson’s paintings for the first time. At Bushwick’s The Active Space, Johnson will have the opportunity to showcase both styles.
Dreaming Without Sleeping
February 24, 2012 through April 20, 2012
The Active Space
566 Johnson Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11237
Good luck Ashley!
Talking to David Culpepper
Question: Tell me about “This Page Intentionally Left Blank”
This page intentionally left blank was a series of work I did about the idea of leaving earth and living in space. When the time comes that human beings leave this planet there will be a lot of artifacts left over. I picked an ambiguous shape between the radio tower and the oil derrick, both of those objects spoke to our ancestors as solutions to futures problems. Depending on how you interpret them, they can change the narrative of why humans would be leaving earth.
This page intentionally left blank, 2010
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Talking to Jason Webb
Question: Tell me about “Flagman Ahead”
“Flagman Ahead” is part of a series of paintings of derelict buildings in the Austin area. It is a scene inside the Norwood House. The house was built in 1922 by wealthy real estate developer, Ollie Norwood, who went on to build the Norwood Tower in 1929, a gothic revival office tower located behind what is now Arthouse in downtown Austin. The Norwood House has been unoccupied since its acquisition by the City of Austin in 1985- that is as long as I’ve been alive. Efforts to restore the house have been slow and fraught with setbacks.
“Flagman Ahead” was painted using a technique I describe as acrylic posing as watercolor; meaning no white pigment was used, just thin washes which rely on the white of the paper for brightness. This process requires careful planning because it can only move in one direction, forward from lighter to darker. There is no going backwards. Alterations always add darkness, and no mark can ever be reversed.
Talking to Mark Johnson
Question: Tell me about “Healed”
“Healed” – Is a destination to attain. I row around in circles trying to find it while people yell out directions to me. The closer I get, the louder they yell.
Talking to Michael Anthony Garcia
Question: Tell me about “Bodies of Work”
Using sculpture and installation, I am exploring the limits of our corporal forms. It begins with our early realizations in childhood of what the limits of our physical experiences are; where do our bodies end and the rest of the world, begin? The other extreme deals with our certain deaths, and where do WE end? The work contains site-specific materials and themes related to exploring what we are, who we are and going back.
The title Bodies of Work plays off the idea of the retrospective, looking back where you’ve been to see how far you have come. This show is very much a homecoming for me in many ways. Not only is it a revisiting of my alma mater, and floods of memories, but also a return to a past way of working and sources of materials. Installing this show has afforded me the opportunity to work closely with Austin College staff and a group of students and as well as familiarize myself with their own artistic endeavors.
This show is very heavily tied to ideas of duality and shifts in who we are throughout life as well as death. But as everyone knows, something must end for something else to begin.
Talking to ABOVE
Hello from Miami. I’m very excited and wanted to share with your blog this new info about my book “Passport”
Question: Tell me about ” Passport “
Passport examines the street artist that has blanketed the world with art covering over 90 cities in 60 countries. The book includes hundreds of plates and quotes from artists across the globe and introductory statements by Shepard Fairey, FAILE, Wooster Collective – Marc and Sara Schiller and Tristan Manco.
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“I first encountered ABOVE’s art on the streets of Paris in early 2003. His large-scale trademark arrows were painted on roll down gates, trucks and storefronts with impressive coverage throughout the city. ABOVE is extraordinarily driven. To paraphrase Radiohead, “ambition can make you look pretty ugly,” but in ABOVE’s case, his ambition makes the streets look very engaging. I am very impressed by ABOVE’s diligence, but after I got to know him and his artwork more, I began to realize that his output is not evidence of selfish ego, but of a lust for life, a utopian life, where his generosity, and curiosity, and his pursuit of creativity and social-consciousness have led him around the world making more friends than enemies.
ABOVE made the time to act as tour guide for me and my wife and our two young daughters in a city he knows well and we didn’t. The gesture made me greatly value ABOVE’s friendship and reinforced my belief that what you give is what you get. The Karma Police are not coming for ABOVE even if the police vandal squad is.” —Shepard Fairey, Los Angeles, California
Technical Specs
- Edition: 200
- Sales start at edition number 61/200
- Hardcover book: signed/numbered – 12.25 x 12.25″ (31.1 x 31.1cm)
- 156 pages
- Over 120 color plates
- ISBN 978-1-937222-04-8
This edition is housed in a vinyl clamshell box placed in a publisher’s shipping box
Size: 20.5 x 16.5 x 2.25″ (52.1 x 41.9 x 5.7cm)
Weight: 9.5 lbs / 4.3 kg
Giclee print: signed/numbered – edition 200 – image size 11 x 16″ (27.9 x 40.6cm) / paper size 13 x 18 (33 x 45.7cm)
Price: $250.00
Talking to Paul Beck
Question: Tell me about “Axis of Evel”
Axis of Evel is a tribute to one of my heroes. As I heard one of the catch phrases for our rally to war, “Axis of Evil,” I thought about what goes through the heads of these men of power. I could not comprehend. So much pain and suffering.
I needed to smile and think of a time when all I wanted was to meet Evel, be Evel. The painting Axis of Evel is inspired by the assembly packaging of my Evel Knievel Stunt Cycle.
Evel to me had the spirit of freedom not a controlled man. He put his life on the line with each jump. He jumped 14 busses and paid his bills. Pure art.
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Art Czar 