Uribe Art News

New year

2012-01-02T19:13:00.001-05:00

First off, happy new year to everyone! I hope 2012 is full of opportunities that translate into hard work for all of us. I've always said that a painter should be grateful if life has given him or her the chance to paint. Here's to life giving us chances...

This is a painting I just varnished today (matte varnish - wax, turps, damar). I have a couple of paintings that are also almost ready, so I'll keep you guys posted on the progress. Hope you guys like this one.

We too gave Schiele a handjob

(that's the title btw... if anyone was thinking wtf...)

Oh, and it's oil on jute (with a cotton canvas backing), in case you guys are wondering about the heavy weave...

Done!

2011-10-03T17:13:00.000-05:00

I'm done and there's quite a few things that I'm happy with... Hope you guys like it.

Laguna, 120 x 180 cm.

On the easel

2011-09-12T19:48:00.000-05:00

This is something I'm currently working on...

And this is the one that I've been showing finally finished

Flawed

2011-08-21T17:18:00.006-05:00

One of the things I'm horrible at, which is probably the one thing that has become a nuisance when I hope to be represented by a gallery, is that my work is visually inconsistent. I rarely envision what my paintings should look like when they're finished... I try not to anticipate and trick myself into thinking that I prematurely know what the painting needs... I just try to be alert while I paint, and I hope that I'm willing to make the necessary changes, whatever they may be. This, one may say, is probably true for every painter out there, but what happens in my case is that I end up sacrificing the "unity" if you will, of my work. One painting may be painted in one manner while another, which may very well be painted at the same time, is treated completely differently.

This of course is something that galleries detest. Well, it's something they don't particularly associate with figurative painters at least. It shows (to them) that I'm not really worried about creating a recognizable image, an image that may be associated with my name. And I kind of have to admit they're right. While I'm painting, the last thing on my mind is having to subject what I have to say to what I've said previously.

The other day I was reading a book edited by David Evans, Appropriation, a concept I'm very much drawn towards. I felt somewhat relieved when I read a Richard Prince interview with Peter Halley, where Halley was asking Prince why some of his rephotographing of images seemed to have a different approach. Prince's response really hit close to home.

Halley You don´t feel like you're assigning each work, as well as yourself, a role?

Prince It's not that worked out. It's more like I'm conducting an affair or relationship. Each set of pictures has different considerations. In order to produce the effect of what the original picture imagines, you have to play the picture, you can't play yourself.

I guess all of this is a preface to put in context the changes that this painting endured. One of my biggest fears is to find myself painting just to finish a painting. And when I'm referring to finishing something I'm alluding to a technical aspect, a stylistic choice. There were things in this particular image that while I thought were well painted (at least as well as I can paint them), they just felt bland. Like I was in auto-pilot. And I absolutely hate that feeling. If a painter is detached from what he or she is painting, the viewer is going to recognize that immediately.

So I painted, and repainted, and while it looks overworked, it's not a bad overworked. I'm able to exhale and feel comfortable when I'm next to the painting. And there's nothing quite like the feeling of being honestly content with something... when I don't like something I simply can't function properly.

So fuck style. I'll do whatever needs to be done to satisfy the needs the image requires.

Lucien Freud

2011-07-22T09:53:00.000-05:00

Absolute Genius.

Rest in Peace.

On Originality

2011-07-18T20:39:00.011-05:00

Rather than throwing accusations around, and presumptuously acting like I’m exempt from all of this, I’ll start by stating that I’ve suffered, and continue to struggle with this every day. I’ll give you guys an example…

Felix de la Concha is a terrific painter. His electrical posts (like the painting depicting the twelve apostles) are just full of personality. They‘re a fresh blend of Hockney, Antonio López, Rackstraw Downes… anyways, when I saw his electrical posts, all I could think of was “damn, I’ve always wanted to paint one of those posts, and here comes a guy that paints them better than I could’ve ever imagined…”

So after cursing him out, I naturally just HAD to paint a damn post.

And so I started painting a post. I tried to convince myself that if I made it greyer it would, without a doubt, immediately make it my own. Needless to say, that was hardly achieved… Literally halfway through the painting, I realized I was painting an electrical post that could only be described as a post that was painted after a painting of a post painted by a better painter…

So after feeling like an unoriginal piece of garbage, I decided I would alter the lower half of the painting. The painting was representing an inanimate object that was set outdoors, so I would now paint, in the lower half, part of a figure that was set indoors. The post was a vertical shape, the figure would have breaks in it. Then I thought, it needs something in the bottom… shoes! So I painted a pair of shoes… then I noticed it looked like a lazy pyramid composition and way too symmetrical (nothing wrong with symmetry, but wasn’t working for this particular image). So I painted out a shoe and painted a purse instead. Then I thought, “one shoe… like Cinderella…” (yes, thank you, crazy imaginative)…Then I thought, “well… it’s an electrical post from Bogotá, let’s just title the painting “Bogotá Cinderella”. Top that off with some clumsy stenciling to try and desperately connect top and bottom half, and the painting was done…

A sense of urgency was born from feeling unoriginal and the painting was modified until it sort of became my own. Now, I’m not saying that from now on nobody can paint an electrical post because it’s been done so well by de la Concha. In fact, obligating one's self to paint objects that one can relate to a particular artist, could make for a great exercise. Although I think, at least in this particular case, that I would be so worried about trying to make it different from de la Concha’s, that the exercise would just be one of strictly distancing one's self from the original image.

While this particular struggle ended up with a capriciously contrived painting, I was also indelibly tattooed by one of his paintings of pillows… so naturally I went ahead and painted a pair of pillows. This one was just blatant robbery. I thought his paintings were so damn cool, and again, I cursed him because for the longest time I had thought about painting my pillows. I thought that by depicting how the pillows ended in the morning after me and my wife had slept on them, would be a nice portrait of us. Once again I was grasping for straws… another futile attempt at making someone else experience my own. Granted, I made them greyer and somewhat moodier, but they’re essentially the same painting. (These bottom ones are de la Concha's)

These are just a couple of examples of how much I struggle when I look at something I respect. And quite frankly, all this came up when I saw some images of paintings the other day.

I’ve always felt that painting like someone, however talented he or she may be, doesn’t quite make sense. Painting, in my opinion, is such a private process, that unless you are in your formative years, where you are shown, for example, a very specific way to approach painting, that it seems like a waste of energy to try and paint like somebody else.

Granted, sometimes we are enamored by the how. How in the hell did he achieve that surface? Or how did she solve those eyes? Or how did he mix that tone? If we as painters were not curious about these things, then we might as well paint walls. And yes, many times these questions drive us to try and solve paintings in manners which are not our own. I’ve often referred to these actions as an effort on our part to have that same experience that the artist who painted the original image had. Or at least our interpretation of that experience, because we never truly know how an image was executed just by looking at it. If you think differently, then please try and copy a Rembrandt.

I’ve always seen work that you could trace to its teacher, be it my teacher, who I respect enormously, Steve Assael, or great painters that have done countless workshops and have aided students for years, like Silverman, Schmid, Leffel , or more recently, painters like Collins. The thing is, these type of influences should be strictly formal; they should illuminate students in manners of technically approaching paintings. But I seriously doubt that these teachers, even though they all share a huge respect for figurative art, would want little armies of bastard painters that will never be as good as them. Once again, Rembrandt comes to mind.

It worries me to see the influence that great painters like Alex Kanevsky and Sangram Majumdar are having nowadays. Now, I’m not going to put images of painters and compare them with these two talented painters, because I think it’s kind of pointless. The object of this is not to rat them out… partly because I’m sure that the painter that is content with painting like someone else, already knows that he or she is painting like someone else. And quite frankly, who am I to tell a painter what their true objective should be? Maybe a person’s goal in life is to try and see if she can paint skin like Assael’s, or if he can paint drippy buildings (sorry Alex) like Kanevsky’s, or if she can paint cakes like Uglow’s.

Maybe, just maybe, getting close to those images that they hold so dear is enough. But what if this is not just a whim or not just a couple of paintings, but you suddenly become the poor man’s __________. What if a gallery starts looking at you like a cheap Cecily Brown, or an affordable Freud. Your life has now become the scavenging of somebody else's efforts. And that… is just sad.

Again, if I was going to call someone out, it was going to be me. No shame in recognizing that. I feel fine with it, because I know that those paintings I have done are pages I have turned. They are experiences that I have painted through, and I have moved one. They were stepping stones in understanding who I am as a painter. I am not implying that other artists can´t have these same experiences and have them also become launching pads, but it worries me when galleries are quick to offer people a spot in their roster with work that feels awkwardly foreign.

When you think about it, painting like somebody else, albeit not exactly like somebody else, is not that hard. What is impossible to replicate is the reasoning behind the paint strokes; the emotions that become decisions. Those will always be unique to each painter. That is why I’ve always felt that we as painters should just surrender to our lives and accept ourselves as exceptional beings with the potential of sharing fascinating ways of looking at the world.

Embracing Limitations

2011-06-13T18:31:00.003-05:00

Even though I'm quite respectful of the type of training an artist chooses, I can't help but feel odd when I look at people working at Neo-Neo-Neo Classical academies. Among the feelings I get, is an accusing sensation, self-imposed I'm sure, pointing out how badly I draw and paint. I feel terrible when I look at how disciplined and controlled is the manner in which those drawings and paintings are executed. I can't tell you how I felt when I glanced at my palette after I saw the Michael Klein video. While you could have open heart surgery on top of his, mine looks like something that was dug out of Pompey.

While I thought about my technical short-comings, I realized something. I actually appreciate that my drawing ability is not as high as these highly talented people. I don't mind when I find that I messed up proportions, or dirtied colors, or altered my composition. The thing is, I've always seen art as a struggle. Now, that's not to say that sometimes, SOME times, wonderful things happen effortlessly, but most of the time, at least for most of us, it's something akin to labor. And by labor I of course mean childbirth.

In my case, and I'm obviously not saying that this should be everyone's manner of work, painting is a horrible experience. I paint, and scrape, and repaint, and curse the heavens, go to bed frustrated, paint again, look at a good artbook, get depressed after looking at a good artbook, go to bed thinking fuck it, paint again, start feeling confident, fuck it up a smidgeon, hopelessly and frantically try to fix it, give up, frame it and sell it.

So every time I look at these Zen classical draughtsmen, I always feel I have a responsibility towards myself and the sanity of my family, to think clearly, to draw more accurately and to paint cleanly. And I try, god knows I try...

but I can't.

That's when I realize, fuck it. I'm not as good a draughtsman as these guys, I'm not as good a colorist, and I can't make the clear and confident decisions they make... BUT, I embrace painting. I absolutely adore the process of uncertainty, of self doubt that accompanies every image I make. I like that it's not easy, that I can't grasp concepts firmly, that my paintings reflect struggle. I'm ok with that.

God bless these guys working in those ateliers, because I genuinly enjoy looking at the stuff they do... mainly because I'm not capable of doing what they do.

So here's a painting I started a bit ago. It's a bit clusterfucky, but it'll get there. Where you may ask?

... I'll get back to you on that one.

What good is it?

2011-06-01T19:45:00.004-05:00

I was remembering the way Robert Hughes ends the Mona Lisa Curse documentary by pessimistically stating that if the current Art world isn't capable of answering the question of what it's good for, then we should pretty much just wrap it up. Art and the market of Art are not separate worlds anymore, they have melded into a media-thirsty pot, where it is now indispensable that the artist becomes a recognizable brand. And while I do agree that the business of art has opened doors that are going to be difficult to shut, I question if this apparent new direction is really all that different from the one that came before it.

It is true that there are more wealthier younger artists than before, and perhaps most of these artist will not stand the test of time, but I wonder if their motives are significantly different from the ones of artists centuries ago. I know people just love the starving artist stereotype... how Michelangelo had to write letters saying he was broke, how Poussin asked a patron if he would be so kind as to commission a small work because he needed the money, how Sorolla described the difficult times he was going through when he was a young painter, or the ever-popular Van Gogh sob story. We could say that the difference is that the artists used to work for the sake of their art and not for money... maybe so, but that doesn't mean that there were no wealthy artists. Velazquez, Rubens, Van Dyck, even Rembrandt who squandered all his money, were very, very wealthy at some point. In Rembrandt's case, lets not forget that one of his works is not known for its title, but for it's marketing merit- the Hundred Guilder Print. So lets not hurriedly state that the way art was viewed before the 1960's was untouched by the art market.

What does hurt, is that Art is becoming solely about money. The market, which was once an after the fact extension of a work of art, has quickly become an unavoidable conditional in the execution of a work of art. Hirst, which would've been born if Koons and Greed had had a baby, states his view of the Art world with one simple statement - If you were given the chance to own the Mona Lisa or the Mona Lisa's reproduction rights, which would you own? Obviously he would've been banking on the t-shirts immediately.

Hughes, again in the documentary, says an absolutely wonderful line when referring to Hirst's Virgin Mother - "isn't it a miracle what so much money and so little ability can produce (...)" . Just wonderful. But again, I wonder if artists before Hirst were not selfish. I mean, if we believe in l'art pour l'art then there is no other reason but selfish reasons for creating art. Whatever they may be, how ever pure or unpure they may be, they are selfish in the sense that an artist does a work of art only to satisfy himself. Now, this is obviously understanding that a vast majority of works of Art were created under some sort of directing patronage. But regardless of the fact that an artist may have worked within parameters, he or she always found a way to self-express within those limitations. It almost made for a more gallant effort in pursue of selfishness.

So I wonder... so what if those selfish needs involve money? What if those self-serving desires, when coupled with money, produce a wonderful work of art? Should we despise it for its intentions? I guess when it comes down to it, the decision to succumb to the tempting money gods, rests inside every artist. What I can't accept, is an artist who repeatedly betrays his or her creative desire to say what he or she wants to say, by constantly tainting the process of creating art with some pecuniary whim. It's even sadder when the attempt to create a commercial piece fails even at that.

I can understand that a lot of us, if not all of us, will be faced at some point with tough decisions in terms of how much we decide that our economic needs will affect our work. And I'm sure many of us will make work that we're not entirely proud of... the important thing is to remember, at least from time to time, is that Art is selfish... a good selfish if you will.

So what good is egoistic Art? Who the hell knows... Art just poses questions. Sometimes even questions that don't need to be answered. To think that Art is good for something, makes you think there's a preset goal when creating it, and that you're trying to achieve it efficiently. And I'm sorry but Art is not meant to be efficient... it's even at its worse when it's pretentious and pedantic.

So there you go... Art is selfish and useless. And those two things are the reasons I can't live without it.

Done

2011-04-08T18:13:00.000-05:00

I feel this one is done... I had a different intention when I visulized what I wanted to do originally, and I swear I have no idea how it developed itself into a sort of traditional portrait, but what's most important, at least to me with this particular painting, was achieved. He had this look, this really specific look that I wanted to hint at (again, originally), because I didn't want to describe it. So god knows why I ended up describing the features, but I feel it was in an effort to go towards whatever I was hoping to communicate... (talk about being vague...) Aaaaanyways, it's done. Hope you guys like it.

WIP 2

2011-03-28T09:59:00.000-05:00

Ok... sooooo... I would've wanted this to show that I had the balls to take more risks.... but... I don't know... there was something not working out. Seemed like I HAD to try and get that really specific look or the portrait just wasn't going to work...

I know I said I really liked this painting's start... It was one of those things, kind of like the drawing I posted before, that I think is cryptically personal. I guess I was the one who saw some sort of potential in those initial gestures, even though a lot had to be redrawn. But the energy was there... that was the important part. The intention of the painting was clear, and sometimes, many times actually, that intention doesn't appear after weeks or months of work. Many times it doesn't even appear at all...

I'll keep at it until I feel it's done. I should've done a more detailed WIP, but I was struggling a bit too much, searching a bit too much to be concerned with taking photos. Sometimes a painting just solves itself through decisions that denounce the struggle that was involved.

Start

2011-03-18T17:54:00.000-05:00

I like this start... which is annoying because once you like something you're not inclined to risk ruining it. And if there's something I've found out about myself is that I have to feel like I'm right at the edge of messing everything up to really enjoy the act of painting. That's when my panic mode kicks in and when I truly feel like I'm doing something with paint.

Taking risks that ultimately pay off doesn't happen all the time obviously... more often than not, more often than I would like for it to happen, I take a safe way out of a problem. It's a shame...

BUT, I promise I'll take this small painting to see what I can do with it. I love this guy's expression, he's a student of mine... he's got an incredibly intense look... he looks like he could be a genius or a kid whose about to overdose... love it. I have to try and see if I can get that feel, not with small detail, but with shapes of paint. We'll see how it goes.

At least one...

2011-03-08T12:49:00.000-05:00

When I'm done with a drawing session, I always feel that it was worth it if I find that one of the many drawings I did, was able to communicate what I was observing. Many times it doesn't even have to be one whole drawing, but a moment in a drawing. If I'm able to see that little bit of a drawing, and understand why it worked, I'm content with that whole session. And sometimes, it's not even a drawing session, but a whole sketchbook that produces that one little drawing. Now, other people may look at the sketchbook and feel that all the pages are consistent (I wish!), but I find that there's almost always one specific drawing that catched my attention and makes me feel that all those other drawings aided me in making that particular one.

So I drew this the other day, and I guess, for me, this is that little drawing... may be nothing specialto you folks, but to me it reminds me that when you're drawing and things come out well, it just feels like everything just falls into place. A line becomes a little puzzle piece that helps you do another line, and another and another, and when you're done, it was almost effortless. I wish this would happen ALL the time, but the truth is for every good drawing there are tens of bad ones.

I've always felt that while great artists are considered great because they're consistent, sometimes I wonder how many crappy drawings and paintings they did that are hidden from the publications and museums. Because, lets face it, we don't want to see a bad portrait when we open a Sargent book, and god bless him he's Sargent but he did plenty of, granted lets not say bad (that's blasphemy), not so good portraits. They were all human, some of us are more human than they were, but they had good days and bad. The important thing to remember is that the bad days always turn into something good in the future... may not be the next day, but if you feed enough of those crappy ass days into your system, something good comes out of them.

Btw, here's a painting I showed a WIP pic, but never showed the finished version...

Sin Pan y sin Trabajo

2011-01-12T09:20:00.002-05:00

I went to Argentina for vacation... Buenos Aires, Ushuaia, Calafate and Bariloche. Simply amazing. Even though I am horrible at painting lansdcapes, I had a huge urge to just sit there and try and interpret through paint what I was looking at... When you think about it, it's almost a curse... being a painter that is, not vacationing. Everything we look at, we paint; at least in our heads we do. I sometimes find myself trying to let go of being a painter just so I can take in what is there in front of me. The truth is it's impossible, painter and person are the same person, and we have to accept that. I decided to take photos... a REAL painter would've painted, but I opted for my camera... and I have to say I love taking photographs. When done regularly, the process of composing starts to come from your gutt, and in my experience gutt is good.

I was also in Buenos Aires, and had to go to the musuem of Fine Arts (MNBA). I knew they had a really nice Bouguereau (The First Mourning) and an emblematic image in Argentinian figurative painting, Ernesto de la Cárcova's Sin Pan y sin Trabajo, which always reminded me of Bramley's Hopeless Dawn. Now both Boug's and de la Cárcova's work are absolutely wonderful. Boug's is much more subtle than the reproductions I´ve seen, and surprisingly de la Cárcova's painting is somewhat impressionistic. There are blues and purples in the hands... bits of broken color that are intelligently placed. All this would've been fantastic, if the museum would let people take photographs. But nooooo, only the most important museums in the world let people take photos, but here in LatinAmerica we don't trust ourselves yet. The reason they gave me is that the museum owns the rights of the works that are displayed so if I wanted something I had to go to the store. So I went to the store, and they obviously had nothing of de la Cárcova's work, no reproductions of the painting, no postcards, nothing. Their argument made complete sense.

So I realized that we hold on to whatever we can remember. Granted I could've taken notes on the painting, and sketched for a while... but I decided to look. And I stared at it for a looong time, and I tried to take everything in. I asked myself, not how he painted it (although that's an inevitable thought), but why it made me feel so connected to it... how and where is it that human emotion is so purely represented, that 100 years later, when the world is completely different than the one they depicted, I'm still connected to their image. And so I looked... and I guess looking is almost rhetorical... I didn't come up with any answers, it seems a bit intangible. I realize people may dismiss these sort of works as overly daramtic, almost kitschy, but I'm drawn to them. That's all I know, all I care about.

Gypsy Cab

2010-10-19T10:18:00.000-05:00

I finally can post this painting. It was challenging in a lot of aspects... For me it was one of those images that tests my will to leave things as they are. It is soooo hard for me to not overwork something... I guess the urge to "finish" areas or arrive at detail has to do with the way I was taught, or even more so, it's the weight of traditional figurative painting. But I've come to understand, (in my particular process, I wouldn't want to generalize) that I absolutely love when things just work as they are. And I guess I use that word, "work", because I truly believe that every single element in a painting has a purpose. Every single inch of that image has to work in tandem to help communicate something more emphatically. The famous Duran quote always struck me as one of those things that is at the core of image-making - "En art tout ce qui n'est pas indispensable est nuisible" (In art, all that is not indispensable is unnecessary).

I truly feel that this painting is helping me get on the "right" track... at least MY right track. I've always loved the idea that bigger paintings should look like blown up sketches, and even though my work looks nothing like what I envision (that is our curse after all), that's the path I want to follow. I think that this painting in particular is full of little moments that are just what the painting itself needed. Now, don't get me wrong, I don't want to sound presumptuous... I'm not sure if it's my best painting (who the hell am i to say what, if any, is my best effort), and I'm clearly not stating that it's a flawless image... I'm just saying that it's one of those images that I'm grateful for because I needed it. I just had to paint it and solve it in this particular manner because it meant that I was making a conscious decision to follow something. That "something" is probably different for everyone but in my case, it meant not touching things that I loved, even though every ounce in my body begged me to keep painting on top.

I've also been working on a bunch of portraits, together with some other bigger paintings. Here´s a pic of a painting that is currently more resolved but I have this older shot at the moment. I had done a previous Tim Burton one, and this one is Tim Burton revisited. Stripes = Tim Burton... that's how advanced my brain is... I started painting this after I bought (always buy, don't download or copy artist videos) the Michael Klein video. I wanted to see how much I could work in the same manner, without sacrificing my ways, and I think he paints beautifully, and I'm very glad he does because I can't for the life of me paint that way. Wonderful video, get it. I'm always eager to see how other people approach painting, but it clearle wasn't for me...

So after a while I said fuck it, and I couldn't stick to the drawing and I just had to move paint around and mess everything up.

Anyways, here's part of the painting, bad shot, but it gives you guys an idea...

That's it for now... later!

Why?

2010-08-10T10:49:00.004-05:00

That seems to be the one question we figurative painters get asked a lot... why do we paint in this manner? Why? It almost seems that the works we create can't be experienced if this question is not answered beforehand. As if the act of painting can't justify itself solely with the finished painting. I wonder if the opposite could be true - if you looked at a painting and absolutely loved it and later, after learning the reasoning behind it, you absolutely hated it. I can't believe this scenario is possible, and I also can't understand the first one where an instruction booklet is indispensable in order to enjoy a painting. It is in fact a moot point because the image has already been painted. I can imagine a conversation... well it never really feels like a conversation, it feels more like an interrogation. So, I can imagine the interrogation ending abruptly:

"Why did you chose to solve that problem through painting and not some other language?"

"Well... the paintings are done and are hanging in front of us at the moment, so lets not dwell upon it and lets judge the work accepting that the problem was attempted to be solved through painting."

Even if we don't want to accept it, we just try to find gentler ways if answering "because I want to." But the truth is that Art Schools and galleries and critics around the world will not accept such a simple answer. There has to be some sort of enchanting but intelligent reasoning behind such a daft act. Because we all know painting is something apparently ANYONE can do... it's so easy to comprehend, so quickly can one find its limitations, so rapidly can one bore one's self with painting, that it can never be a goal. Maybe a capricious whim, but never an objective in life.

"Oh, how cute, he made a painting."

"Don't worry honey, he'll grow out of it."

And I mention the word intelligent before, because it seems that as soon as a figure enters the realm of painting, it dumbs it down. Bouguereau's women might as well be blondes. I wonder if people have a checklist to establish how intelligent we are:

"Semblance of good drawing..."
"Check."
"Atmosphere..."
"Check."
"Thorough understanding of paint manipulation..."
"Check."
"Harmonious sense of composition..."
"Check."

"I'm sorry sir, 4 out of 4. You are legitimately stupid."

Truth is, we can't do much about it. I think it's ridiculous to try and convince someone that I am intelligent, or educated, nor am I willing to accept that my paintings should be judged on how much theory I can cram behind them. As long as there's people out there that will not give themselves a chance to experience a work of art in the way it was meant to be experienced (lets not forget, painting is a visual medium), we will be faced more and more with these sort of questions. What I have resorted to is blabbering the sort of answer the person wants to hear when they ask a stupid quetion. But in the end, just let them keep believing that dumb people are capable of making great paintings.

"Just Portraits"

2010-08-03T09:17:00.010-05:00

A couple of days back something happened and even though it didn't strike me as odd, it certainly made me realize some things. I was advising a student of mine on her thesis, and for her final work she decided to present some portraits. They were wonderful representations of strangers (strange being the key word here) based on pixelated images from one of her chatroulette sessions. She decided to represent what 20 minutes looked like. It was a really clever way to translate time into imagery, and not only that but she did an installation on the wall with the portraits based upon their geographic location. So it was space and time filtered thru a webcam converted into color theory and form thru painting. I honestly thought, even though it wasn't something absolutely avant-garde, that the work was brilliantly executed.

When it was time to judge her work, her judges immediately, one could say with ill will, questioned the fact that she chose portraiture out of all the possibilities at her disposal. I was somewhat baffled by this attitude, because one could start to blindfully criticize anyone's work by stating that it could've been solved in a different manner. I find it a strange practice to think, when looking at a painting, that it would've been best solved if it was a video or a sculpture. I am one of those people who trusts that the artist's decision to chose a particular language and subject matter over another is an educated choice. I trust that choice, and it is within those parameters that I am willing to experience the work of art. If that experience moves me or not is something entirely different.

I find that this happens a lot with portraiture in painting. Granted, there's a myriad of mediocre portrait painters that don't help the cause, but I guess the same could be said for any other manner or subject matter. There are tons of mediocre films and film-makers, video installations, sculptures, photographs... god there's a lot of bad photos out there... and yet I would be an oaf if I beleived that wonderful things could not be executed thru traditional photography today.

Portrait painting still carries the baggage of being wrongfully interpreted as an elitist-oriented, empty and superficial manner of describing and interpreting a human being. A generation after Freud and Bacon (both of whom have inspired and shaped thousands of figurative painters) people have become somewhat lost as to what to expect when looking for contemporary portrait painting. I fear they want novelty, but amusing and unfamiliar elements are not indispensable in creating great works of art. Humanity loves easily recognizable, iconic traits. They feel comfort when associating El Greco with elongated bodies, Caravaggio with chiaro-oscuro, Van Gogh with thick choppy brush strokes, Botero with an obese universe... I think that when people judge figurative work, they want to be taken into a new world, a world where they are presented (spoon-fed) with that new and identifiable characteristic, where there's no direct reference to Rembrandt or Sorolla or Freud or Bacon. Everything is new and delicious. It's as if we were constantly pressing a "refresh" button in the hopes of being finally surprised with a new flavor that will quench, even if momentarily, our visual demands. A Michael Bay gum.

Well, to hell with novelty for the sake of novelty. And don't mistake this as a cry for stagnation. It's just that art solely depends on fascinating and reflecting human beings. When an interesting artist decides that he or she wants to paint a portrait, then it will be unique. And not because uniqueness was his or her goal, but because the "story" that was told, the way it was told, could have only been declaimed by that specific person.

And after the rant, (you can tell my discontent with the judging of my student's work) I just wanted to show some portrait work that I find inspiring. Are they proposing something new? I don't care to answer that. They just animate me, and that's good enough for me.

Courtesy of (in order) RVK, Brendan Kelly, Sangram Majumdar, Sean Cheetham, Kent Williams, Anne Gale (bow down), and Adrian Ghenie (get his book, awesome).

Medusa Medley

2010-07-20T07:42:00.004-05:00

I can finally post this one... There were quite a few challenges that made the image difficult to resolve. Doesn't mean it's the best of paintings, but there's something to be said about sticking to an image and solving it until you can say it's done. I wanted it to be an unbalanced comp, top and bottom right heavy... there was a bit of a risk, since the top part has the portraits, the swirling hair and the striped pattern. But I thought the "empty space" where the carpet lies gave me the chance to make some diagonals that set the distorted perspective. Anyways, not the easiset of paintings, but I'm certainly glad I stuck to it.

You know, there are times when a painting just paints itself and the end result is aboslutely wonderful, and you are shocked at how simple painting can be. And then there are other times, which are more recurring than one would hope for, where the act of painting becomes chaotic and unforgiving. I honestly think these are the paintings that truly make you feel like you're a painter.

Some stuff

2010-06-01T20:17:00.006-05:00

I'm currently working on a bunch of stuff at once, but here are a couple of studies of larger paintings that I've been working on. Deep down I wish the studies could be a little more interesting looking, but I'm not really worried about making them look cool, rather than treat them as something that can shine some light into some doubts I have in terms of composition or shapes.

The little head (8x10) is actually something that I didn´t plan on doing, and I painted it in a manner in which I don't normally paint, but it was good fun. She has such a great face, that it just made me want to do something allaprima... probably 3 hours... just wanted to get close to the vibe I get from her gaze...

Oh and yes... who needs an easel when you can just prop your painting on top of a cd player...

Greyed out Grays

2010-05-20T09:35:00.019-05:00

Greys, or Grays if you prefer the more Wildish alternative, are absolutely fascinating to me. It still seems that when people refer to color, they make allusion to saturated color or the purity of a pigment; consequently when looking at greys they unconsciously view them as the absence of such clarity. Greyness could be hurridly assumed as a flawed endeavor. It appears to be perceived as a failed attempt of the artist at trying to achieve a certain color while his mind, as well as his palette became muddled in the process.

And while contemporary technology has enabled the creation of sometimes grossly saturated synthetic colors that dazzle the eyes and minds of viewers alike, the truth is our world is greyer. The air we breathe, the water we drink, the streets we walk on, the trash we collect, all make up a world which is a little muter.

It would be almost impossible for an artist to not be attracted by the subtle coloring of greys. Bluish greys, purplish greys, reddish greys, they are a most a welcome sedative. Still, there’s a misconception in people’s minds where a grey tone is achieved by a simple mixture of black and white. A deeper investigation would lead a person to inquire as to which black was used. Was it a warm, rich and velvety black or a cool and more opaque black? The delicate hues that can be achieved through a conscious effort in mixing greys are as varied and as exciting as any pure, bright color.

So here are a few of the artists that bask in impurity, making masterful musings of mud.

Long live the lurking but luring lull of lethargic limelight!

(ok.. .enough with the alliterations and let’s give credit to Justin Mortimer, Victor Man, Ruprecht von Kaufmann, Sangram Majumdar, Adrian Ghenie, Sophie Jodoin and Michael Kareken).

Pecha Kucha sábado 20

2010-02-18T09:31:00.005-05:00

Anoche estuve en un ensayo del Pecha Kucha del próximo sábado y me acordé por qué me encanta el arte. Todos los presentadores tienen un historia absolutamente particular qué contar... Es sorprendente cuán distinto es el mundo de cada uno de los artistas, pero no hay nada más maravilloso que entender que el arte está hecho específicamente para ésto - para que cada quien se sienta cómodo con lo que hace. Ver a personas que han dedicado tiempo en sus vidas para desarrollar proyectos y visiones tan personales es comida para el espíritu.

Ójala que aquellos que estén pensando en asistir no lo piensen más y se animen.

$20,000 pesos. Una causa buena http://www.pecha-kucha.org/pechakucha-for-haiti

Boletas en Quinta Galería o http://pknbogota.wordpress.com/2010/02/10/pre-venta-de-entradasdonaciones/

Nos vemos.

Voodoo Child

2010-02-13T09:50:00.012-05:00

Not quite a Hendrix, but for some reason the title resonated... Anyways, this is finally done. I've never quite fully understood what being done means, but I feel this one is resolved. Pretty happy with it, I especially like a few abstract moments and open color areas.

Recently, moreso than ever, I've been asking myself why I used to paint in a somewhat detailed manner. I wonder what drove me to resolve more intricately certain images, or at times, to indiscriminately "finish" every single area in a painting. And all I could come up with is that I wanted to see if I could paint those things. I realized that I wasn't really paying attention to the overall image, but I was trying to prove to myself that I wasn't going to forget about elements in the painting, that may very well have been irrelevant to the idea behind the image.

Nowadays, and I have no idea if this shows and I hope it doesn't come off as lazyness, I try to understand what it is I'm trying to say, and concentrate solely on those elements. There are important but secondary moments in a painting that can't be overlooked, but having hierarchy in terms of paint quality and resolution in an image really interests me now...

Greg Tocchini

2010-02-01T17:29:00.005-05:00

Wow... I haven't been impressed with a comic book artist for the longest time... but this guy is phenomenal... He's just a straight good storyteller. Something that, I feel and fear, the vast majority of comic book artists have forgotten. Great design, exciting angles, fresh coloring... love his work.

Wow.

http://gregtocchini.blogspot.com/

Peka Kucha Night

2010-02-01T17:14:00.006-05:00

I was asked by fellow artist and teacher Nobara Catalina Hayakawa, to participate in a Peka Kucha night here in Bogotá on Feb. 20th at Quinta Galería http://www.quintagaleria.com/QuintaGaleria.htm . This one is a global iniciative to gather funds for Haiti. For those of you who are not familiar with what Peka Kucha is (as I was), here are some links.

http://www.pecha-kucha.org/

http://pknbogota.wordpress.com/

For some reason it seems like speed-dating to me, but I'm sure it will be fun. I want to show my work, but I don't really want to make my presentation about my work... I just find it weird when an artist talks about his or her work... We visual artists supposedly create images that speak for us...

Anyways, please support a good cause, it will certainly be fun, and the presenters seem like wonderfully interesting people (as opposed to the guy writing this...)

Trophy

2009-08-06T14:59:00.004-05:00

This is a new painting of my sister Luisa. I was urged to further explore what I had done a few years ago where the figure would echo itself throughout the painting. I have to say I enjoy doing these...

Hope you guys enjoy.

Pub

2009-06-20T16:46:00.005-05:00

I was a bit hesitant in showing this commissioned piece, mainly because it's somewhat of a departure from my work, but in paintings like these I like to remind myself that I actually am an illustrator (at least it says so in the diploma... truth is I am one at heart). I have always believed that each image sets its own rules in terms of how it should be resolved. I don't want to call it style... I guess thinking of it solely as a manner of formally resolving something can make the act of painting mechanic and eventually superficial.

What I do believe in is having an image establish certain parameters of how it should be painted... but I guess not how it should be solved universally, but how it should be worked depending on the painter...

Now I'm just rambling... Maybe these are all excuses I make up just so I can grant myself the right to paint whatever the hell I want to paint and do it however the hell I want to do it.

Here's one of the things I'm currently working on (because all the others can't be any more different than this one...)

Crazy glare in this bad pic because of all the thick paint, but I hope you guys get the idea...

HollyWeed

2009-06-03T15:26:00.005-05:00

This was a painting from my show earlier this year; I'm posting it now because I didn't have a decent picture of it. A couple of students were fine models for this disgrace of an Elvgren. It's about love, about weed... pretty much about art school.

More Sketches

2009-05-21T08:29:00.005-05:00

Sketches

2009-05-06T21:35:00.011-05:00

Although every day I wish I would sketch a hell lot more (James Jean's fault), I do a fair amount of sketching. I have to admit though, that I have no intentions of my drawings being anything more than personal notes... I guess that's why I've never thought of my sketchbooks of being worthy of reproducing... on that note, here are some scans.

Some Photos

2009-04-22T17:14:00.004-05:00

My son Samuel and my niece Cristina. Love taking photos of them...

Back Home

2009-04-13T19:36:00.007-05:00

I got back home from my trip to Missouri, with a great sense of satisfaction. The talk I was dreading so much actually turned out to be really cool, and while I was exhausted I did an OK demo. Nothing spectacular I'm afraid, but OK. I don't know why but I wanted to work on a Clayboard sooo bad, and it was horrible... I mean it's actually a wonderful support, but for an alla prima painting it sucks... literally it sucks everything. So it was hard to work around a tough surface to paint on, but it went ok...

As far as the people, they couldn't have been nicer. They treated me better than I deserve to be treated, and the students as well as fellow teachers listened to everything I had to say. It was really encouraging to see that people payed attention to what I talked about, and respected my opinion. Anyways, in the end, it was a great experience.

I went to the museum and was happily surprised by some stuff in their collection. They had great Kiefers, Richters and Beckmans. I also took a pic of nice Frans Hals hand... very cool.

So here are some pics...

Oz

2009-04-04T19:42:00.006-05:00

I painted this one in the beginning of the year but didn't take a decent photo of it until today... the whole image was just a pretext to paint the striped shirt :)

This week I'll be off to Fontbonne University in St Louis to do some workshops! I also have to do a 2 hr. talk... for the ones who know me, they know that 2 hours of me talking is cake... they'll have to eventually shut me up. BUT 2 hours of something worth listening to... well that's a whole other issue. I'll post some pics once I get back!

Samuel...

2009-03-25T06:50:00.007-05:00

All I can say is that my son is a ton of things at the same time...

WPC Still Life

2009-03-23T15:23:00.002-05:00

I've been getting more proficient at making these, but the hardest part is definitely "guesstimating" the exposure times. The collodion is soooo slow, lightmeters usually can't make a reading. Mine goes as low as iso 0,8 and it's not even close!

Anyways, here's another effort.

Done!

2009-03-22T13:52:00.006-05:00

Well... I'm done with this one. I had varnished this with a glossy varnish and it showed off the saturated colors nicely, but I hated it... I'm just strangely annoyed by rich colors. I don't have a problem when other people do it, but when I paint them, it just doesn't fell right... So I painted a nice, cruddy varnish layer with some alizarin and some transparent ochre, and I lost a lot of the saturation and I got some gloppy waxy areas, but I like it a whole lot more. I guess it's all about feeling comfortable with what one paints...

FucsiaFunkPunk

2009-03-08T09:35:00.006-05:00

This is a painting of a student of mine, Lorena. Parts of it are somewhat resolved while others are just blocked in. I'm planning on giving it a warm varnish to try and pull everything together in the end... we'll see how it goes. I'll be posting the finished painting as soon as I'm done.

Wet Collodion

2009-03-03T08:36:00.003-05:00

I have been obsessing about Wet Plate Photography for a while now, soon after seeing some Wet Collodion Plates over the internet and in some alternate photo publications. They are so close to what I want and try to achieve in terms of image with my painting that it only seemed obvious, at least for me, to try and pursue this wonderful but cumbersome technique. There's a sort of beautiful imperfect quality to them, and the process is just pure magic. It had been nothing but horribly frustrating but yesterday, after a lot, and I mean A LOT, of trial and error, I finally got an image.

Here's my Dad.

New Painting Blog

2009-02-04T06:48:00.001-05:00

It is with high hopes that I start this small blog to inform people of the current state of my painting and teaching. I have to admit it will be hard to avoid not mentioning or posting photos of my son Samuel here and there, but I promise I will try and keep it short.

So please, don't forget to check in here from time to time to check current news regarding my work.

Hope to hear from everyone!