My Artlife: Painting and Photography

Another day, another challenge.  The past couple of months have been flying by.  I've been in the Duke City Renegades' First Annual Fiesta de Frida, which was a blast, another Black Market Goods show at a new location just off Central (Route 66), saw my photos hanging in the New Mexico Meseum of Natural History and Science, and have been completely immersed in setting up The Wooden Cow Gallery and Art Space. 

Setting up a new business is a lot of work, especially a cooperative.   I'm on tons of committees, in addition to being the treasurer.  There is a lot of excitement, like looking at potential buildings and spaces and imagining what they could look like with us in them, and there are frustrations like worrying about the money and some members not contributing time and effort like others do.  Committee meetings and treasury work can fill every evening of my week, but it is still a lot of fun. 

My art production is slacking, but I did just get a new (to me) Canon Rebel to shoot photos with, and even if I just carry it with me to lunch I can usually find something to shoot and feed that creativity jones.  And I'm trying to find a little balance by going to 30-minute yoga twice a week.  The Agency, an artspace near my office, offers 30-minute sessions at lunchtime and it's nice for me to take that little mental vacation.

So that's how I'm dealing with this hectic pace.  What do you do? 

It's looking like a busy, artful summer. Yay! I will be participating in the following show and events:

May 31st: Duke City Fix's Porque Burque Art & Craft Show 11 am - 4 pm

June 6th: Mama's Minerals Silent Art Auction 5 - 8 pm

June 28th, 2008: Black Market Goods Art Show 8 pm - 12-ish

July 6th: Frida Kahlo 101st Birthday Show to benefit The Carrie Tingley Hospital Foundation - Roosevelt Park, Albuquerque 10a.m.-5p.m.

August 2nd and 3rd: Girls Inc. Art and Crafts Show on the plaza, Santa Fe, NM Sat. Aug. 2nd 9-6 and Sun. Aug. 3rd 9-5

I look forward to seeing you there!

I recently moved to a great new studio space on Central. I have my own locking room with three big windows, carpet, acoustical ceiling, hi-speed internet, and the space has a shared conference room, kitchenette, lobby and restrooms. I love it. Most of the dozen other artists are there during the day, so when I drag in after work, I often have the place to myself. It's a great place to work on my photography and painting.

This past week a weird thing happened.

One of the photographers was asked by management to remove one of his photos from the corridor and related greeting card from the display rack in the lobby. A female artists was offended.

Granted, his work does employ a lot of nudes. His focus is on the fetish community. The photo in question showed the torso of a woman clad in panties with some sort of string nipple clamps on. She was holding the string between the clamps. The was nobody else in the photo. He was not happy about removing the items, but complied as a compromise to the studio group. He had already self-censored by not placing any of his very explicit pieces in the corridor.

Now he has been told that many of the artists are complaining about his work to the management. They say it is offensive in general and do not want it displayed in common areas. When I heard that, I was shocked. These people are artists?

If his work makes them uncomfortable, it is doing exactly what it is supposed to. I asked him what exactly did they say offended them? He does not know, because not one of these cowards has bothered to speak with him about his work. If they had, they would have learned that the models are all people he knows from the fetish community. Nobody was asked to pose in any way they weren't comfortable with. Most shoots were supervised by husband, boyfriends, or others. These are women with jobs and self-respect, not underage runaways from the bus station. His work is a reflection of his life and interests. And he is being judged without being understood.

I do not know a lot about this fetish community, being an outsider to it myself. But I can appreciate his work as giving me a glimpse into something normally unseen, but there. And isn't that a goal of art - to illuminate things one doesn't usually see? To show us things about ourselves and our culture? If not, why don't we all just paint pictures of kittens and flowers? Better yet, the exact same kitten and flower - wouldn't want to go out a limb, someone may get offended.

Many things about this bother me.
Freedom of expression is essential in an art community. Art without risk is just insipid pablum.
Who gets to decide what should be censored? Should we all vote on what gets to be shown in our corridors and at our shows? Who ever heard of art by committee? It smacks of McCarthy-ism.
Is this group so puritanical that they cannot abide anything to do with sexuality? Or are they judging the community pictured? Are they homophobic as well as xenophobic? What about different religions? Would religious iconography be censored, too? What about politics? Also verboten?

I respect the right of anyone to dislike any piece of art. And to not buy it and not support the artist. But to try to silence someone by denying them the right to express themselves through their art really bothers me.

The problem with censorship is it prohibits free thinking and it does not know where to stop.

Yesterday I attended the largest powwow in north america - The Gathering of Nations. What an amazing event! My mind is still reeling from the incredible visual display of costumed native american dancers and the incessant beating of the drums. The dance contests were mind-blowing, and the sheer number of people was insane.
There were artists and jewelers and musicians and all sorts of folks there from all tribes in North America. I met a fabulous and fun artist named L. David Eveningthunder who autographed a copy of his art print calendar for me. He is very skilled at drawing and painting and his favorite subject is powwow dancers. If you go to a powwow, look for him - he goes to a lot!
The vividness of the costumes still in my head, I came to studio today and started an oil painting. It's abstract, but organic and brightly colored. I'm still struggling to get a feel for the medium, but it's getting there.

Sometimes being a self-taught artist has its drawbacks. Being as I live in the desert southwest where the air has little to no humidity, my painting with acrylics has been difficult and I started thinking about trying oils. I always thought they were too smelly, so I never wanted to work with them.
I was amazed to find out my neighbor at Chroma Studios is using oils and I could not smell a thing! I can stand and talk with her while she paints and there is no odor of anything!
So this past week I got myself eight tubes of Winsor Newton Artist Oils, some Gambol odorless mineral spirits and a bit of Liquin. I went to studio Saturday to just fool around with them and see how they are to work with. Geez. What a different world. It felt like I was trying to work left-handed. No worse - like I was holding the brushes with my toes. It was just odd. Sadly, my time in Studio was cut short, but I plan to be back at it ASAP and to talk more with the oil painters around me about how they do it!