November 2023 News: A Message From the Artist

It occurs to me that I'm going to have to start updating more often, because there's too much material here in New York to cover on a bimonthly basis. Between studio work, courses, and visits to openings and museums, I feel hard-pressed to remember everything important that happens between posts.

Regarding the studio, the first order of business is to share the Eventbrite sign-up link for our upcoming December 14 Open Studio event. Any of you in or around New York are welcome to come see what we've all been working on; our building is 133 West 21st Street in Chelsea, and our MFA Fine Arts studios are all on the eighth and ninth floors. If you're hoping to pay me a visit, I'm in studio 834 and am planning to have my ongoing Tarot card portrait series on view along with eight or so other pieces that I've completed.

The portraits themselves will likely still be in varying states of completion, but I'm planning to do Tarot readings at the event to hopefully make things more memorable and fun. For anyone who remembers my Death / Rebirth self-portrait, I'm expanding it into a series of 22 portraits of family and friends, each representing one of the archetypes in the Major Arcana. Each act of making is a meditation on that person, an opportunity to reflect on our relationship and perhaps to come to know them a bit better. More broadly, I am exploring the notion of art-making itself as ritual or magic. In connecting the sitter to a corresponding Tarot card, I have to understand something of their challenges, personal qualities, and where they see themselves in their life's journey; throughout the painting process, the work is infused with my well-wishes and those positive intentions are embodied within the finished object. Ultimately, these people will all be elevated into iconic, immortal, timeless entities. And because I'm figuring it all out as I go, and because I can play around with the wall placement and change the relationships between one work and another, the entire project can be seen as a Tarot spread that I am laying out for myself. It will be a lot of fun to learn what is in the cards.

The Tarot wall in progress. The wall color is Sherwin-Williams' Bohemian Black, because of course it is.

Now, moving on to recent happenings around town, it's been an action-packed couple of months. My friend Grey Usurper came to visit over Halloween (he's XII: The Hanged Man, as seen above) and in amidst all the costumed revelry we managed to catch the Chelsea openings for both Judith Godwin and Francis Hines that Thursday. He and I also managed to see the one-night showing of the Kickstarter-funded Onyx the Fortuitous and the Talisman of Souls, which had very nerdy, cult-classic vibes. The following week, the MFA Fine Arts students put together a lovely Halloween party in the common area of our studio space.

October 19, Francis Hines' Bound in Time, Hollis Taggart

More recently, I was able to see Anish Kapoor at the Lisson; some of you know how much I enjoy using Musou Black and the added contrast it provides, so you might also expect that I was eager to see just how much better Vantablack performs in person. It's kind of no big deal, as it turns out, but I do really appreciate Kapoor's large-format oil paintings.

November 2, Anish Kapoor, Lisson Gallery.

Now, goodness, let's see--I saw Manet / Degas at the Met, and took a lot of notes. I saw Andy Dixon at The Hole. I saw Louis Fratino's In bed and abroad at Sikkema Jenkins, which deserves its own photo if only to show you all the image Facebook removed for "nudity and sexuality," rendering my account Forever Problematic. It's frustrating because Meta claims nudity in art is okay, but their system is also set up to prevent complainants from speaking to an actual human being about the automated takedowns. And one cannot help but feel extra cheated when punished for images of the human body that also happen to normalize homosexual intimacy and perspectives. What's funny is my shot of the work depicting two men having oral sex was reinstated after I appealed, but washing one's dick in the sink is just way too much Bukowski for the fragile online ecosystem.

Louis Fratino, Washing in the sink, 2023.

What else? I saw Felipe Mujica's El Cóndor Pasa II at Osmos Address, which was extra fun because he gave a talk at our school and also visited my studio later in the week to give astute feedback on my practice. Artist Williamson Brasfield made a guest appearance in my Documentation class and used my studio to demonstrate how to properly photograph 2D works using a camera and light kits available in our equipment library.

Felipe Mujica's latest textile works on display at Osmos Address, Bowery.

Brasfield does installations and other gallery work at Lehmann Maupin.

Two nights ago, I went out with three of my classmates to see Retinal Hysteria at Venus Over Manhattan, and that turned out to be an absolute blast! We knew going in that Robert Crumb, Peter Saul, Ashley Bickerton, and our professor James Siena were going to be in the show. Walking in, we immediately found our other professor Brad Kahlhamer, who casually dropped that his buddy Artie was there; and I can't imagine getting this geeked every time I meet an established artist, but Art Spiegelman is an absolute legend. Maybe it's because of my illustration background, learning all about the history of illustration and sequential art in undergrad. Maybe it's from growing up stealing books like Mark Beyer's Agony off my dad's bookshelf. All I know is that I have tremendous respect for graphic novels, and that underground comics, RAW Comix and the like occupy a very special place in my heart.

James also kindly introduced us to Peter Saul, and some of our other classmates showed up in another group, and it made for a very energizing night out. A few of us continued on to see Rolf Nowotny's DAPPER PEEPERS at No Gallery in Chinatown. We conversed and had beers outside with the artist and some other nice Danish folks (also artists), and then we all ended up at an afterparty at a karaoke bar. It really was the sort of evening where one can believe that all things are possible in New York, where one can imagine thriving in a supportive and nourishing artist community that looks just like this.

I didn't even know Art Spiegelman had work hanging in the show until I got there.

MFA Fine Arts students with James Siena and Peter Saul, in front of a Judith Bernstein.