November 15, 2011 – Lucha libre

I am fairly disinterested in sports and pay little attention, but one sport I love is Lucha libre. The costumed, freestyle wrestling that comes from Mexico. But for me it is all about the spectacle, the costumes, the accessories, and the kitsch. When sport becomes surreal performance art, I am delighted. That Lucha libre comes out of Mexico is no surprise. Mexicans can be proud that André Breton declared, “Mexico is the most surrealist country in the world.” These art school smarties who bore us with their video art and dull performance pieces are no match for any Luchadores.

October 20, 2011 – Masks

It’s that time of the year to start thinking about the Halloween Costume or at least a good mask. Today’s piece for the 2011 Project is inspired by my visit to the de Young Museum last Sunday. I went to see an exhibit of photos by Ralph Eugene Meatyard. Many of Meatyard’s eerie photos were of his children in odd masks. I recommend seeing the exhibit if you can and wrote more about it on my art blog.

I had Meatyard’s work in mind as I did this piece but I look at the results and realized that John Baldessari seems to have also have worked his way in there too. There are times as an artist, when the work of other artists you’ve been looking at slips into your work.

April 2, 2011 – Palette Geology

I use a stackable plastic tray for my acrylic paint palette. When I am finished painting, I stack another tray on top to prevent the left over paint from drying out. The palette was really getting full with layers of older, dried paint. Yesterday was warm and dry, so I didn’t cover the palette. I decided to let all the paint dry up. This morning, I started peeling the paint away. The underside of the layers was shiny and smooth. The dried paint had a marble-like pattern. Okay, a very psychedelic marble. I just could not let that go to waste.

The result is what happened after I cut the pieces into strips. Applying them to the canvas created what looks like the cross section of geology of a very colorful place. 

I’ve used dried out paint like this in the past. I even saved it for future projects. It came in handy the time I added them to a Halloween mask.