I’m having a nineties moment that started on a plane coming back from Arizona. I was squeezed up next to the window having been seated next to a giant. They just took my fancy massage oil and my yogurt at security so the kvetching was about to go into full throttle down the runway. Nirvana’s “I’m On A Plain, I Can’t Complain” pops into my head. I’m always amazed how the catalog of music stored in my brain shows me what I’m thinking. Right, I’m on a plane – returning from a trip at a spa in the desert. I’m on a plain, I can’t complain.
I’m now listening to the Nirvana MTV Unplugged album which is in my phone. I’ve done this route from Tuscon to New York several times so I’m familiar with the fantastic and varied landscapes. I decide to photograph it. Immediately I start seeing the huge potential in collaging with these textures etc.. I’m on a plain, I can’t complain…Re-appreciating that song, moving from cramped and crabby to expansive.That was so much of what the nineties were about for me – movement, and there was a tremendous amount of energy and inspiration that seemed to be penetrating me from almost every direction. The dance floor was still thriving in the underground. There was still an underground actually. Actual artists and musicians were thriving in pop music as well. I think that was pop culture’s last hurrah before the ignoring started for me. My obsession with West African dance was in full swing as well. I hold all of this now with such reverence. All those dj’s, those countless brilliant sets would have me transported for hours. And all the Tori, and the Alanis and the Bjork and the Nirvana, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Smashing Pumpkins, Hole, Live………… It really did seem like no matter where you looked there was something good.
One thing was noticeably absent during that time though. It was amazing in so many ways but I wasn’t grounded really. Nothing was in place that is now. I was flying and twisting and twirling in body mostly. I was going higher and higher but there was usually a crash of some kind. As far upwards and outwards as I was going it was clear to me the next direction had to go inward. It was around ’97 or so that the necessary inquiry started, a meditation practice was established, I met a great teacher that set me on a path of inner work. Life really changed and laid the ground for everything that exists now.
So I’m thinking about what propels me now, about how this all relates in the present. The thought of taking off for a weekend to go to a rave in a van with a bunch of friends or heading out at 4am to catch the last set of one of my favorite dj’s is science fiction at this point. It’s not about re-living anything. It never is.
I am reaching back into my period of “Big Time Sensuality”. I am utilizing the movements and sounds made then now because it’s just a better time for me to do so. These figures are straddling the confines of time and space. They exist in the realm of ALL IS WELL, which is constant and always. They are adorned and made of what we stand on and can take off from. I’m On A Plain, I Can’t Complain.
Here are some new explorations going on in the studio. They’re rather large. About 24” x 36”. It’s just the beginning. The intention is to make my collages on a larger scale to exist as one of a kind works on paper. I’m letting go here of the need for the perfection that comes with scanning and finishing digitally. Perhaps they will be framed in a way that will adhere to the glass to preserve the transparent color films that have been applied to the sumi ink drawing. Or maybe it’s about a light box. Like I said it’s the beginning.
Ultimately I am persevering with my pursuit to pinpoint an exact meeting place of fine art and fashion. I elaborated on this here and this is the work that is coming. Basically all perceived limitations or doubts have been unemployed for this series so my only job here is to be bold and to get completely out of the way of The Force.
The mind can easily slip in there. ”Is this too abstract, not abstract enough? Is this communicating or just indulgent? …
I don’t know but these forms just keep coming almost effortlessly. I have to trust that. There is no under-drawing or sketches, no references, no plan whatsoever. I feel a pull back to this work whenever there is the space to do it so hopefully life will make way for more composing.
Two very distinct elements are at play here: fine art and fashion. There is an understanding between the two that they coexist simultaneously and equally. In constant service to the other they join in a quest to express extraordinary beauty.
The forms and impressions of fashion feed into my internal library of shapes and lines. I am soothed by the symmetry of curves that reflect the body of a woman. I rely on the strength and stability of sharp edges, as if cut from cloth itself to support the structure. In my world, fashion has as much to do with clothes as it does with an internal language of form and line. It is an expression from the inside out.
Going inside to find your imagery is a fine art principle. It is a process of deconstructing and abstracting elements from the outer world. What makes a work successful is that moment when there is resolve. You know that what you have in front of you, you have not seen before. And yet it has come through you as the summation of every exquisite thing you have seen, experienced and loved.
We are in a moment where art and fashion are in a lot of communication with each other, though I am sensing a lot of self-consciousness. I see much of the fashion community running to the galleries to find what is right under their noses. They’re searching for art that gives their brand just the right amount of credibility, giving themselves just the right amount of distance from fashion. There is a palpable distaste for a work of art that actually contains fashion. The “It’s too fashion for art, too art for fashion.” mentality no longer holds any resonance for me.
I am seeing here a somewhat dysfunctional love affair with fashion and art that’s been going on too long. I am interested in a real marriage of the two. Transformation and evolution thrive where there is unity. Judgments and perceived limitations of the other have to be dropped. Neither can be any more relevant than the other. I like the notion that the exact meeting point is the most worthwhile and powerful pursuit. It is where something genuinely new is created.
It is a time when beauty must be exalted and vulgarity rejected. Imagery intended to shock or to be provocative simply reveals desperation at this point. It’s time to put the Andy Warhol playbook away for a while. There is a place for everything of course but in this somewhat dark period in our world where there is an abundance of frivolous imagery I feel compelled to make work that references the part of us that is the most regal, beautiful and life affirming.
We are all sensitive beings whether we are aware of this or not. Imagery is equally as important as conservation and sustainable living are to our wellbeing and survival. We cannot be sustained or even satiated by images primarily intended to sell us something or to create envy or gluttony.
An authentic work of art can serve as both a timeless valuable object or as an image used to consciously sell the beautiful or even the not so beautiful things we make. Here our perception and experience of luxury is deepened and expanded.
I’m thinking it’s the other side of or even the next step from where Warhol was coming from in his approach to the merging of art and the commercial worlds. I feel that at this point everyone can appreciate a sophisticated and skilled work of art. Everything has been moving towards this. Picasso knew this, which is why he brought his brilliant abstractions to such a massive audience. We’ve had time to digest and assimilate what modern art brought to us. Deeply personal work resonates universally. It has the power to magnetize others to it mostly because it is communicating from an inherent common ground. We really don’t have to dumb it down anymore. Everyone gets it on one level or another. There’s nothing corny about raising the vibration of our environment, whether it’s in a gallery, someone’s living room, on a computer screen, or a department store window.
This work is a concentrated potion of beauty and power intended to achieve as much mutual benefit as possible on as many levels as possible.
I’m seeing things. I’m seeing the Light in and around everything and everybody. I’m thinking it has to be all about this right now, seeing the Light in “what is”. The world is changing at a speed that baffles me though the Mind’s Eye is now in charge. The Mind’s Eye can only see the highest, and is all that we need to create and heal and transform.
Monochromatic eye color explorations, via The Mind’s Eye.
P.S. I’ve always loved this commercial. I want to do one like this with my drawings. I’m seeing it.
Making this drawing brings me into complete resolution with my Italian Catholic heritage. Patriarchy being a fundamental perspective of the church and my culture never really resonated with me. I was born a feminist so much of my life has been about reconciling with what I am made from and who I am ultimately. I realize that my work is at its core an expression of the divine feminine.
The Black Madonna is a very mysterious and powerful symbol. She represents the female counterpart to Jesus, the Magdalene in some interpretations.
My Madonna is shattering the archetypes of the past. Her child possibly even a girl. The baby is in a sling as you’d see most mothers these days making their way around the city.
