Liu Bolin is the kind of artist who makes the kind of art that sort of demands you pass it along. It begs to be shared. It has an immediacy to it. Arresting from the moment you look upon it. And, like all great art, breaks through that initial impact to deliver something deeper than what you expected.
At first look, you get an astonishing trompe l’oeil, difficult to make out where surroundings end and the artist begins. He plays with colors, textures, imagery and anything else he can manipulate to make it apparent that this is a photo of him, but that he is inextricable from his environment. Points just for making something arresting and new. In this day of icons, logos and headlines, standing out in this kind of fashion is a feat in and of itself.
At second read, though, we’re looking at an artist making a statement about the world, about his place in society, about being overlooked, ignored and/or undefined. Symbolic gestures like these should reach you somewhere profound in your body because the notion is very human. He is depicting what it’s like, not just in China, but anywhere, everywhere. We all have one foot in the desire to stand out and be noticed, and another foot somewhere hidden, behind statues and other people, in walls and blended into the world.
Learn more about Liu Bolin here.
This is a nice little article from a nice man with a nice talent for drawing. Something about his story reminds me of a portion of my own, and maybe just everyone pursuing a bit of fine art in their lives. He describes his sort-of happenstance way he came across his career, drawing for theater, dance and music rehearsals. And then says, “It could never happen for anyone the way it happened for me… it was all an accident.” Only that’s just sort of the thing, isn’t it? All creative careers happen that way, being an artist is opening yourself up to situations you wouldn’t otherwise come across. Yes, that particular set of events might never happen again, but equally strange ones do every day to people just like him. The key is to be like him… open to it. Read on:
“Just Drawn That Way” – The New York Times
A few years back, The New York Sun ran an article about a (then) new art magazine, called Paper Monument. I have read and reread this article probably once a month since then. For one thing, it is exquisitely written and of course about my favorite topic of art, creativity and the importance of art and creativity. There is a lot of self-reflection involved in the launch of a new art magazine, that dares to print on paper, in the first place. But it begs questions about the role of art and how, in this crazy world, to reflect upon it. But it is a lesson for everyone, everywhere. I have used it, in speeches, as an example of how to think about new technologies, as well. Most importantly, this line “But nowadays, just standing still, and seeing, and thinking, is a revolutionary gesture.” I truly believe that is true. And it is a powerful notion. Following is the excerpt I try to remind myself of as often as possible, but the whole article is very interesting:
Continue reading ‘“Seeing and thinking is a revolutionary gesture.” An excerpt from a great article, resurfaced.’
Danger Mouse is the guy who did that mash-up album of The Beatles’ White album and Jay-Z’s Black album. He’s back with another album ensnarled in controversy, called “Dark Night of the Soul.” But you knew all that. The album is a who’s who of musical and cultural importance; from The Shins’ James Mercer to The Strokes to Sparklehorse to Iggy Pop to. What was strange was that David Lynch’s name was also attached to it. That didn’t ever seem to make sense. Well, now, because of some potential lawsuit, the album has been released but with, get this, no music. That’s right, it comes with a blank CD. One guess what you’re supposed to do with that thing as, oops, the songs have somehow all turned up online. The thing you might not know is that there’s a show opening tomorrow night (May 30th) of David Lynch’s photographs that appear in the music-less album’s attached book. The show is at the Kohn Gallery on Beverly and is also called “Dark Night of the Soul.” And the music playing in the background will be, you guessed it, the unreleased music of Danger Mouse and crew.
The chaos of it all got me thinking about David Lynch movies, shows, photos and weather reports. It’s all stream of conscious. It doesn’t move in a linear fashion, or even in a temporally correct kind of way. Instead it meanders in and out of environments and realities, the only thing you have left to hold onto are themes, which you eventually come to realize, are the most important thing anyway. It seemed weird for him to be involved in a music project from the beginning, but now that it’s all so confusing, it’s actually starting to make sense.
Here’s where you can listen to the album
Here’s the gallery opening info
Here’s David Lynch’s weather report
When I came to L.A., in the early 90’s, Chaka’s tags were everywhere. You
couldn’t drive down a road without seeing his familiar scrawl on a highway
overhang or street sign. He’s having a one man show over at Mid-City Arts
- http://midcity-arts.com/, giving historical significance to his prolific
tagging. I don’t have much of an opinion on the issues of tagging, graffiti
and the defacement of public property – I don’t see why something can’t be
both illegal and art at the same time. In fact, I think too much importance
was put on the illegal activities involved. Like rap, the surrounding
culture has become too much of a distraction from the art itself.
The important things about what Chaka did are not terribly significant in
the world, but they are interesting, from an artistic standpoint. For one
thing, New York tagging and graffiti was unintelligible. Blocky, intricate,
interlocking letters kept words and names in a code-like obscurity, creating
new objects of design and a level of craftsmanship to aspire to. I visited
New York in 1986 for the first time and, to a young creative-minded kid, it
was completely overwhelming and awe-inspiring. Chaka, on the other side,
made tagging more of an everyman activity by simplifying the mark. You could
read it. And by toning down the design aspect of it, it actually caused
people to pay attention to other things, like location and ubiquity. It
became kind of about fame and self-promotion. A very L.A. interpretation of
graffiti.
In retrospect, what I like about the show is that, in truth, graffiti is
appropriately ephemeral. Here today, gone tomorrow. And, in that way, what
is most interesting about it is the way it marked a time period in my life.
It was part of the marked landscape of my own history. And a show like this
preserves the memory, like an opened time capsule. The show is about L.A.,
not Chaka. The visuals are like old familiar songs evoking memories and
emotions that will mean something different to everyone who sees them. If
that isn’t art, than nothing is.
It’s easy for Wayne Thiebaud’s work to get kind of lost in the timeline of
artistic movements. He sometimes gets lumped in with the Pop Art movement,
but he came before them. He hung out with abstractionists, like de Kooning
and Kline, but wasn’t an abstractionist. His work can be compared to
Hopper’s, but it’s not really even close. Also, that pastel look of his, in
a world where we’ve learned to talk more in terms of fashion than movements,
can appear perhaps dated. But it’s not.
What I know about Thiebaud is mostly from my personal experience, seeing his
work at the exact same time I was getting into fine art. His work, to me,
was simply good painting. It wasn’t conceptual, so much as it wasn’t asking
a lot of questions, but it was of the highest order of skill. Unlike more
conceptual artists, or even the Pop movement, Thiebaud’s work was
undeniable. More than a craftsman, he was a professional. I wasn’t a
painter, but all the painters I knew respected him. That was important to
me, growing up. Art was not a safe or appreciated course of study, so
observing people who were serious about art and who treated it with respect,
pride and honor proved to me that it could be an endeavor of high regard. He
also understood the importance of inviting criticism into one’s life, and
being critical of one’s self, in order to push the work.
“We all need critical confrontation of the fullest and most extreme kind
that we can get. You can unnecessarily limit yourself by choosing your
criticism.” – Wayne Thiebaud
We’re in a macro kind of society that likes to label, categorize and write
the book before the story is even finished. Thiebaud reminds us that
everyday objects, family and the normal sights we see on our daily routines
are worthy of the artist’s attention. You don’t have to worry so much about
your theme and your importance to the world, at large. You can just see the
cupcake and paint it. And paint it well.
