Category Archives: self publishing

Change Machine

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An image that I should leave untitled, it was another outburst of maniacal distortions, not a chance to have a thought before hand, but I am always tempted as my mood changes and I see the effect the title might have on the viewer. Preferably at a live art show, its always the best to see them in person. This piece is 20 years old at least.

‘Entropy’, 24″ X 24″, oil on canvas, 2003. I also named it ‘Stuffed in a Box’, when I was feeling more confined spatially. And Change Machine. Entropy: Within a closed system, like a box, or the universe, entropy will increase. Entropy being the measurement of disorder. It is the second law of thermodynamics. All we can do is slow it down for ourselves locally by putting in energy, like painting pictures and such. I don’t know what you do. Maybe making shelter for everyone, something like that.

The background here is composed of a part of a branch of a tree in a drawing in the book called Entropy, The Art of Graham Houston….I tiled and squared it repeatedly until this appeared, something always appears.

We are all living inside a change machine, and the rate of change is increasing.

Sunflower Geometry

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‘Sunflowere Geometry’, 15′ X 15″, watercolour. Private collection.

Standing in a field of sunflowers.

Joe Forte’s New York

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These are a few of the books I designed for a friend and fellow painter, Joe Forte. These 3 are part of the series for drawings and paintings of New York over the decades he spent living on the street and drawing the city. Click on a cover to see a preview of the book. They are all available from Amazon in hardcover or paperback.

Joe Forte’s New York, Volume 1

There are 57 ink drawings by Joe Forte of Greenwich Village and its environs.

$99.00

Joe Forte’s New York Volume 2

Another 57 drawings of the streets of New York from the view of living on those same streets.

$99.00

Joe Forte’s New York, Greenwich Village and Soho Watercolors

Original watercolors from the New York series by Joe Forte.

$99.00

My second book

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This is the cover I designed for the book. I made these through Amazon's books and Kindle.

This link will take you to the e-book on Amazon.

A fellow painter of large pieces said to me I should make a record of some kind, a gathering of little images and ideas created from the large ones. Maybe stitched or glued together.

As I have many large paintings, and a great deal of other work, the idea of having something small I could hold in my hand was very enticing. As much for others as it was for me to see what I got up to from my death bed.

Domesticated VI

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‘Domesticated VI’, 24″ X 32″, oil on panel, 1996.

This one does have a title its ‘do as I say!’,

I was using a palette knife and a brush for these. I would mix new dried blood colour for doing each line drawing on the blank panel. I had a little mirror hanging on the same wall, and would usually start with a sketch right on the wall. It was covered with little red doodles of my face and attempted body distortions.

I am trying to make the image with as few brushstrokes as possible.

Domesticated

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‘Domesticated II’, 24″ X 32″, oil on panel, 1996.

There are quite a few painting in this style. I have 32 of them close by or hanging up. Possibly fugurative expressionism, I’m not fond of style labels, it leads far too often to people thinking its connected to or should be compared to a different artist, it is not in someone else’s style, it might be labeled a style, that’s all. The style I developed here was to strip down the elaborate brushwork from the neurotica paintings. A simplification of the image, so the idea that you have been domesticated, is perhaps more easily understood. What are we like when we are put in the same confined spaces as the animals we eat. Soft and mushy bones, fatty muscles, psychological breakdown, extreme violence. Homo domesticus.

Art in a park.

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Once I had recovered enough breath to walk further afield, sitting around the trees was still the best feeling. Maybe there is more oxygen in their vicinity. I never really learned to draw or sketch formally. I had a few oil painting lessons from a local learning centre when I was a teenager. This is all entirely self taught. When I look at a blank piece of paper or canvas or wood, my intention is to create a finished piece, not a sketch. However I have made oil paintings from these drawings.

‘A tree beside the dam in the park.’, 8″ X 10″, pencil on paper.

The foot of the tree in the park across the road from the centre of the universe.

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‘The foot of the tree in the park across the road from the centre of the universe.’

‘The foot of the tree in the park across the road from the centre of the universe.’, 9″ X 12″, pencil on paper.

‘The other side of the foot of the tree in the park across the road from the centre of the universe.’, 9″x12″, pencil on paper.

These drawings were among the first I made following yet another health disaster. Lung disease from living in industrial cities. Doing industrial jobs, I was a sign painter when it was done with paint, also highly toxic, full of lead and every other element of suspicious sources to make real colour that lasts. Forever. That’s what it said anyway. At this point in time I was coping with the 8th time my lung collapsed. Like a balloon popping, you can hear it when it happens. I recovered by sitting on trees and drawing them. The roots mean something to me, the interface to the underworld. The part the tree knows but you don’t. They also look like foothills of mountain ranges like the Himalaya’s which are getting bigger as the glaciers disappear.

M-16

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I have repainted this image a few times, 5 I think. I have one here in my studio. I will probably paint it again.

‘M-16’, acrylic on paper. 2014. I usually get carried away in my head when I like the image. I can use it then as an icon to represent something else. In this case war. I wonder if its related to the repetitive thinking I have, often. Some thank me for recognizing their value defending us, others see it as something far more troubling. The militarization of everything.

Haunted by Orwell.

This is a digital version I have played with. I would like to get more 3d into the image. When I make this one again I will use plaster instead of paint. Build it onto a sheet of plywood.

Art supplies

Thank you for your help.

$5.00