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23 Sep 08 15:36

I really like these things, I'd just like to know a bit more about your process. Could you tell me approximately how many times you have to run to the toilet during their execution? Here's a great time saving tip I use although you probably already know it, just keep an extra large pale handy, right next to your easel.

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24 Sep 08 21:27

Wow, simply throw the door open, I just never thought of it, you're definitely a man of vision. And yes the children of geniuses are unfortunately, inevitably damaged.
My main concern right now is that I misspelled "pail" above. An offence that I believe Arnold could have me thrown in jail for, as it contravenes the laws of The Pale of Settlement.

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26 Sep 08 01:42

This is in answer to your call for help from the guys (I just checked and I believe I'm still one) in your Studio Log entry. As we all know there's no facility yet to respond directly so I'm doing it here.

Well I've thought long and hard on the matter and my conclusion is not everyone can be a de Kooning. But not to despair because what you can be, is a Delaney. By the way quit putting your reds before your blues (something I've just learned). I find it funny that you abstract folk lump de Kooning in with yourselves when in reality he basically always belonged to the classical European figurative tradition.

If I may be so bold as to suggest that you try to stay away from the edges of the beer cartons and the obvious grid that they suggest and try to find the least likely suggestions. In other words project from within (the forms) as opposed to the contours. It's not de Kooning's colour that's so inevitable, colour is always subjective, it's his organic and non cliched drawing that after the fact seem so inevitable because he always formulates his shapes from the interior rhythms and you really have to go looking for those connections, the contours are too easy. Everybody finds them and they become hackneyed.

Alright I guess I've confused yourself and everyone else enough for now.

And Arnold, those things you've put in your Studio Log look interesting but you've got to get them into your portfolio so we can have a good look. You just need some kind of generic photoshop application If you have a digital camera it probably came with one. Any of them are capable of resizing an image. Uploads on AP are restricted to 150k. At that size you'll have no problems uploading work and once that's done my scathing comments will be sure to follow.

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27 Sep 08 00:18

There's no add-a-comment function in the studio log section, by design, as the original idea was to give a space to the artist that is her/his own to manage as the artwork develops - without the "noise" of comments chirping in and possibly causing a loss of focus on the project at hand. That idea obviously hasn't worked out as we can see looking at the very incomplete contributions of the majority of studio logs, and so some sort of revision will have to take place if that activity is ever to become an item of interest. I'm not sure how that will be resolved but it's obvious some more work has to be done in that area.

A short response on the discussion of de Kooning. Even though it's so easy to slip into the labeling game of categorizing ourselves, I personally don't feel that tension of dichotomy regarding the figurative versus abstract approach. As I've mentioned before, our language is dealing with somesuch visual syntax in order to communicate a message that normally isn't possible (for us) to express in other languages either verbally or musically. The relevance then is in the communication - and not necessarily how it has been technically executed - in the end, what visual dialect being used isn't of importance (in my not-terribly-humble opinion). When I responded positively to the de Koonings I saw in Amsterdam all those years ago wasn't an act of sectarian appropriation (in fact I was very much a figurative painter then), but rather an appreciation of the exciting work of an artist of stature. Now that I meddle about with apparantly non-figurative represenations doesn't mean I'm at war with figuration. I'm just finding it personally more useful in whatever (limited) visual communication I attempt at this moment.

Your description of the formulation of shapes from interior rhythms I instinctively feel touches on a fundamental point. Naturally, I'm extemely eager to know what that means, as I simply don't understand what it is you're referring to. If it helps, my approach is very, very simple. As soon as an initial mark is made, the chessgame of resolving the "whole" visual conumdrum is initiated. In the end, I believe that our job is to achieve that resolution.

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27 Sep 08 09:14

Can you say some more on what is meant by creating an imagery in order to demolish a canvas.
Do you mean that the image strives to become something - I struggle for words here - cosmic? ("It is primary, the enabler.."), and should therefore lose it's physicality in some act of destruction?

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28 Sep 08 14:14

Listening to this debate somehow evokes a strange picture in my small brain: It shows something as Saint Augustine, Rabbi Hillel and say Ibn Rushd are sitting together in some kind of shadowy mosque or synagogue somewhere in the middle of a vast desert engaged in religious talk. And more and more getting lost in the fog of speculation, the black depth of theory.

Approximately two month ago John-Paul came up with his suggestion for a new project which until now, as far as I know, no one really got the idea of. From my personal experience I have the impression that J-P is absolutely capable of explaining what he means. So in this case something seems to be extremely difficult to understand or explain. And please be aware that here we only deal with verbal communication done in a language that many of us, at least partially, understand. And then in your debate there is talk about the necessity of learning the private, „symbolic language“ of an artist to understand what she does, about „visual syntax“ and „visual dialect“? ... Are you kidding? What are you talking about?

I know that particularly J-P is devoted to the idea of communication. That’s why he created artprocess, which as he says is made for artist to artist communication. Well, I am aware that J-P isn’t talking about art to communicate but about artists to communicate what indeed is a tremendous difference. But following your texts I slowly get the impression that it is art itself that you think is made for communication. So that’s why I want to intervene for in my opinion this is a completely wrong idea. Or at least it’s a superficial way to think about art. I tend to doubt that communication is the goal. I have the feeling that art isn’t about communication or even dialogue at all. Looking back into art history or at contemporary art it seems to me that the best parts of it are about monologue or more precise about soliloquy. (Other people might speak about mystery but that is not my kind of vocabulary.) Even an artwork that at first sight obviously seems to be made for communication like Goya’s „Desastres de la guerra“ turns out of having been a monologue and soliloquy as well. Something he worked on in secret and never showed to anyone and printed only in two or three copies for private use. And which were published no earlier than 35 years after his death. He was an old man when doing these etchings and probably engaged in a very intimate and painful process of reevaluating his attitude towards the French revolution and what came out of it etc.

By the way, languages are a very tricky thing. There are people like Maria or Patricia who are able to speak several languages fluently but this is very rare. More often as not we are only capable of speaking not more than two languages but many of us don’t even do that. So having this in mind I am sorry to say that talking about that one has to learn the private symbolic or visual or whatever language of an artist and then being able to understand her artwork seems a bit ridiculous to me.

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29 Sep 08 21:52

Yes, I agree with Arnold in welcoming Schmidt over to our table in the artprocess bar, and surely enjoy his good-humoured introductory ""What a load of bullshit you're talking.."" remark (but for which he has to pay for the next round of drinks).
Then returning to the idea of communication, I would vouch to say that there appears to be three different ideas of ""communication"" in the conversation, one being an abstract form that talks about ""language"" i.e. the language of music, the verbal, or the visual, the second instead referring to an ""exchange"" between artists, and most of us would agree with Hanjo in that as artists our work has all to do with monologue. In rare occasions, such as the famous Braque/Picasso cubist period, one could talk about a creative dialog between the artworks of artists, but that's very much outside the norm, and therfore this idea of communication probably has little relevance in our case.
The third instance, and as you know by now - the aim of ap, has to do with artists getting together and simply talking and exchanging ideas, bitching, moaning, and sometimes fighting, but hopefully coming up with new ideas for a collective approach to *our* issue of how to succeed at being an artist today - taking into account all that word refers to - individual integrity weighing up to market appeal.
Following up on Hanjo's reminder of this previously-discussed topic:
[LINK]http://www.artprocess.net/opentopic?topic_id=129&topic_title=Reviews%2C+critiques%2C+thoughts+and+observations.&forum_id=10&forum_title=Artist%27s+Cafe[/LINK]

Yes, I am aware this one has to be taken up again. I've been super-occupied with my dishwashing day job this year (no summer holidays this year) but hope to get some time off in Oct-Nov to properly devote to ap and explore new horizons with all of you.
Nevertheless I must warn you that quite a bit of what I was talking about in that earlier forum topic has to do with the second form of communication I mentioned above - that of the creative dialog between the ""artowrks"" of artists. Are we ready to take on such a challenge, ""Interfering Artists""?

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30 Sep 08 11:04

Γειá μας

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09 Jan 09 20:50

Hillel - back to this again. I can't tell you how much I suffered following your instructions to make the tracing of this thing.. I've always absolutely loathed the world of the graphic artist (I'm aware that you've been known to reside there at times) and I've even dabbled at bing a signpainter myself many years back (and made quite a bit of money doing so). However the very act of tracing - I find even the word repulsive - makes me weak at the knees.

Nevertheless the maestro requires it, so I dutifully go about the exercise. That was during a couple of evenings two months ago. I hid away the result and only now could pull it out and parcel it up in a package for you. Basically it's a rough tracing of this image done on 2 beer boxes exactly as shown, and is on it's way to you by Italian post (don't hold your breath) as we speak.

Let the painting lesson begin (should it ever arrive).

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11 Jan 09 11:29

You're right, there are 2 flattened boxes in the image, each one contained, once upon a time, 24 cans of Carlsberg.
I've updated the studio log with images of the 2 roughly penciled-in reproductions I made (one for you, and one for me).
I've absolutely no idea what we can do with these now, and I'm sure you're quite bemused yourself with the prospect of playing this absurd game of not minding your own business. At any rate, let's try and have some fun, and if anything useful comes of it, all the better.
We can also use this exercise to work out a better way of documenting, as you've already pointed out.