Worlds Apart

 Different Worlds - Dec 1982 - pencil crayon on paper - 12 x 20 inches

For some reason, ashtrays end up in my work quite a bit....and cigarettes too, even though I don't smoke. They are usually glass ashtrays. I guess I like drawing (or painting) all the reflections. This pencil crayon drawing above holds my first rendition of an ashtray along with an early inkling towards  an interest in candy wrappers. This drawing represents one of those drifting off moments...deep in thought. I am often contemplating the space between being here and not being here and the space between my own concrete eyes and what I am looking at (or what is in front of me) materially-concrete-wise. Confused yet? The space between the body and the being.
    

Judgement - Dec 1982 - acrylic on canvas - 34 x 40 inches

I was going through a lot of questions while painting this one. A lot of religious and spiritual struggle happening in my life at the time. The hand of God and the hand of Lucifer in a tug-o-war for my being.  God has a better grip on things. This painting was the beginning of a series of works of which I only got to a couple of so far.

Out In Space

 The Apartment - 1982 - 14 x 20 inches - pencil crayon on paper

The Apartment is one of my most well known works. It's widely known as Space For Rent, which is what the sign said as I walked by it. One of those surreal twisted moments in taking the the workd space so literally. But even to this day I have an incredibly hard time not seeing SPACE when ever I hear the word.

These next few pieces are variations on.........on what?......a feeling?.....a dynamic? An abstract notion of distance and scale and movement? These are such simple shapes. The first one did not hold my attention as a whole work or a finished work a couple years later when I filled in the whole paper with color. The second one gives me the feeling of floating amongst these two particles. And the third is a more spaceship-ish rendition of the first in a new medium. 

  Particles Chase I - 1982 - 26 x 20 inches - pencil crayon on paper

   Particles Chase II - 1982 - 20 x 26 inches - pencil crayon on paper

   Particles Chase III - 1982 - 15 x 20 inches - enamel on illustration board

 Let Alone - 1982 - 20 x 26 inches - pencil crayon on paper

Okay then. What is happening here? OMGoodness. This was a drawing I did for a friend of mine at the time. This is a terrible photograph and a somewhat poor choice of materials. I really should have used a white sheet of paper instead of black so that the loose leaf sheet pictured here could have been white. I am sure I was influenced here by MCEscher. The part here that I really enjoy is seeing Christ pulling himself off the cross. I have always wanted to do a large painting of that but, it's a bit silly.

I Am Squared

Ride - Sept1982 - acrylic on canvas - 34 x 38 in.

Ride is an early take I had on the idea of self portraiture. One's identity is not only in the face, but in body language, the clothing and the environment they are placed in. Ride is also about vehicles and with this picture, there is a ride, within a ride, within a ride. Here we have the car (vehicle 1) carrying the body, There is the actual ride taking place in a back seat of a car (vehicle 1), then there is the body (vehicle 2) carrying the mind and soul, and finally the cigarette or roach-carrying substance (vehicle 3). We have a vehicle within a vehicle within a vehicle. The body is going for a ride in the car while the mind is going for a ride in the body. 

   

After Supper - Sept1982 - pencil crayon on paper - 14 x 21 in.

As the potatoe you just ate is churning and divesting, feeding, transforming the particles of your being, you sit there, body as couch and mind as TV.


Go figure, the movie Tron came out in 1982. I loved the simple graphical vision it showed inside a computer game, then voila, we have here an inspired artwork here below. Ah, but look at the mystical vision infused at this intersection and ponder it's deeper significance. How did I get there? Think of numbers, sides, blocks and spaces.

At The Corner Of Seventh And Trinity - Sept1982 - pencil crayon on paper - 7 x 12 in.

Melts In Your Head, Not In Your Hands

Catcher - Aug 1982 -  melted crayon on matt board - 14 x 22 in.

I guess I had a lot of broken crayons......because I melted the bits in a spoon over a candle flame and started drawing pictures with the spoon. Thank goodness I only made two. But the weird thing is that the August of the next year I did some more and the August of the year after that I did some more.

The first one here I took to get framed at the local gallery shop and somebody saw it and ended up buying it. The wizard I gave away as a gift and the ones I did in the following Augusts', I actually still have and I think I've never shown to any body. But next year you'll see them ( and I promise better photos).

One of the ones I did in 1984 I had framed and it was on it's way to a gallery when on route to the car, I left it leaning against a tree while I got more art from the house. When I picked it up again, I had the strangest feeling, as if I was on acid or something because the picture looked really weird in a way that I did not remember it being a minute ago. Then I realized that the image itself was moving!..... I had left it in the hot sun and now the picture was mellllting. Howz that for alchemy, Mr. Wizard?

Wizard - Aug 1982 - melted crayon on matt board - 10.5 x 16 in. 

Deathly Beginning

In my previous post I had assumed that I started my 30 years ago blog with my first 'original' artwork, (the drawing shown below), but in fact the blog was started with my first painting in 1980. So since I made reference to this drawing, here it is now.

Even though I had been drawing occasionally for years previous to this drawing, I call this my first original work only because now I was consciously creating work as an 'artist'. I was also a lot more serious about my creations as well by way of doing preliminary drawings, having my friend sam pose for me as well as starting the drawing for a second time after a botched inking attempt. The interests I had at the time were Marvel comic books and the art of Jim Steranko and Rick Buckler's Deathlok character, along with perhaps some Dali and my own inner cosmic visions. It is most certainly interesting that the beginning of my career starts with Death

 

Death - August 1979 - pencil on paper - 20 x 26 in.

Also, If you want to see the drawing that solidified my soul (is that actually possible?.....I hope it's not the same as having a heart of stone) to being an artist - not the type of artist mind you, just the ideal - you can visit this blog post I made back then.

Dust to Particles

My First Comic

I have always had a interest in comics. First with the Road Runner and the weekend funnies to various Marvel Comics fare and then Heavy Metal Magazine by 1979. My 'first' original drawing from 1979 (see next blog post July 24th) was comic book based somewhere between Rich Buckler's Deathlok figure and Jim Steranko's  psychedelia artwork. As far as this single page comic goes, I'm not exactly sure where the art 'comes' from. Perhaps just me. The words on the other hand I would have to credit to someone else. A girl I briefly knew that I used to work with and she wrote an untitled poem. I edited this poem of hers (wish I could remember her name) by rearranging the lines and paring it down to what you see here. I enjoyed the process but I did not do another comic again until 1984 and there still remains a few story ideas I had back then that I would still like to illustrate. Most all of my comics since this one have been wordless in nature.

 Dust - 1982 - ink & pencil crayon on paper - 12 x 16 in.

Tim Curry - 1982 - pencil crayon on paper - 20 x 24 in. 

 Particles - 1982 - pencil crayon on paper - 20 x 20 in.

This piece called Particles is actually in color, (blue jeans and sleeves and a red guitar), but this was the only decent print I could find right now.

You can start to see that just as I am now, even back then, 30 years ago my interests are all over the place. From surrealism, to sci-fi, to comics, to music, to abstraction and realism. I liked it all and felt an affinity towards everything. I sort of thought that since I did not go to school, that all these interests were my schooling, as if they were different 'subjects' I was taking. I was not thinking about graduating any time soon and just seemed to continue along this path of 'all-overness" of which you will continue to see in the future posts to come.

Renascence

Renascence - May 1982 - pencil crayon on paper - 20 x 26 inches

This picture started within the point of the light at the finger tip. There was no hand or idea of a hand yet. It was a doodle that kept changing in the multitude of directions it sparked at every moment. I could not reign in my ideas. Much later in the night I decided on the hand as holding that infinite spark of power of imagination. Then later on after I had gone to bed and when I awoke, I found that my brother Gary was inspired by my image and added more power with his own spark of Christian insight.    

Under The Influence

Humynx - March 1982 - pencil crayon on matt board - 22 x 28 inches

Green Flyes - March 1982 - acrylic on illustration board - 15 x 20 inches

When I started to create my own work I was under the influence of so many other artists. I liked so many! Hence the divergent paths that were yet to come. Since the beginning there was Roger Dean, Frank Frazetta and Michael Whelan in the Fantasy vein of things. I think Whelan comes out the most in these two works. I would really like to redo the sky in Green Flyes. Also I would like to point out that the image you see here is a scan of the original 8x10 worn out photograph I've been carrying in my binder all these years.

 

Surreal Alien

Alien - January 1982 - 20 x 30 in - acrylic on canvas panel