Morning Calm

Morning Calm
acrylic, oil, interference pigments and textile on canvas
61.5 cm x 41 cm

Korea is referred to as "The Land of Morning Calm." My son Winter says "it got that name because no one gets up early here." I know better although I must admit, more people stay up late than get up early.

This painting captures truths about both perceptions. The city is neither fully lit, nor completely dark which for me captures Seoul in the dawn hours. Another New York; a city that never sleeps.

This will be my last painting in Korea for a while: we are all returning to Oahu on Boxing Day.  The last eighteen months have been my most productive to date. I completed sixteen important pieces in nearly as many months. The roll will continue when our household goods, with my easel, arrive back in Honolulu.

Close-ups (right) detail the textural gravity of this work.

Island in the Sun

This is the last of the paintings included in the exhibit this Saturday (15 November 2014). Like  Summer's End, it is presentational and strays to the symbolism side of the house. "Island in the Sun" pushed a bit harder on the new variation I explored with Summer's End, twisting the textile treatments and applying modeling paste to parts of the textile to give the impression of them "growing" from the canvas substrate.

Think I have had enough presentational imagery for the time being, and am going to return to work on the Tier 3 "perks" for the funding initiative. I am quite tempted to make good my threat to do something figurative as well; been sketching a lover's embrace composition that I might use as subject material.

Lately I have also been giving more thought about re-working the website which is pretty much in need of a face lift. I am not much of a believer in selling fine art on the web, nevertheless, I am going to make something that is more catalogue like with prices and shipping information (fairly simple that last part as I am willing to ship damn near anywhere with the art framed for the stated price).

Have been thinking about some other guerrilla marketing tactics since the cost of excellent printing is very affordable here in South Korea, and take a page from the DJ playbook: clubs here advertise by taping A7 color posters all over the sidewalk. I might try doing something like that here in Itaewon which has lately become oh so trendy with the monied types. Perhaps I can give a job to Winter and some of his school chums... More pondering to come!

Summer's End

I took a break from producing the Tier 3 perks of my crowd funding initiative, which I have decided to launch in the spring of next year; there are too many events going on between now and December.

Perhaps it is the time of year, but lately I have been thinking about the colors of events in time. This paintings a visual poem about summer's passing into autumn, the green giving way to shades of gold and rust and the hues in between.


The painting had a trying start: I attempted using an abstract drawing I composed three years ago as my subject: I'll never do that again! I plan on having at least one other painting completed in time for my 15 November Studio Exhibition, one of which I will raffle off.

Details

Title: Summer's End
Acrylic, oil, interference and textile on canvas
72.5 cm x 90 cm (unframed)
Close-ups of the work to the right

IndieGoGo Tier 3 Perk

Made tremendous progress on Saturday 27 September on the Tier 3 perks for my IndieGoGo crowd funding project thanks to 선도 and 영화... 감사합니다! Our subject (one of my favorites) are the urban canyons of my neighborhood Hannam-dong, We're taking the landscape and distributing it over 12 16 cm x 16 cm canvases which will be painted using my mixed-media technique.

On Saturday, we managed to draw and paint all but two. The next step will be to identify the areas were the textures will be built up prior to the oil paint layer.

Tomorrow is a day off from work to celebrate "Hangul Proclamation Day; plan on getting past the textural enhancements process with all 12 canvas. I would like to use the following week to add the oil and interference layers.

Not sure what subject I am gong to use for the Tier 4 image, which will be nine 16 cm x 20 cm canvases.  I am leaning to something more presentational, but I might produce another urban landscape; chime in at any time. Suggestions are always welcome here!

선도 [Sonny]

I finished the portrait last Sunday 21 September. 선도 [Sonny] is a big departure.

Top, the finished portrait. Second down, the composition overall, with basic colors blocked. Middle, acrylics with texture enhancements. Bottom close-up. Completed the painting with oil and interference overlays.
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Wasn't able to update this blog or create another entry this week because creating the Tier 3  Perks for my indiegogo crowd funding effort as required all my time this week!

Re-exploring a portrait was a result of seeing the Edvard Munch Exhibit here in Seoul beginning of August inspired me to again explore figurative subjects.  I'd like to do a complete figure, modestly posed: more Renoir than Munch. Probably not going to be able to start on that until after the crowd funding initiative is competed though. I have a Tier 4 perk which will take some effort to produce: next blog read all about it.

Reflection 23 - Week Two: Finished

Reflection 23 110cm X 90cm acrylic, oil, textile, interference and phosphoresce on canvas

Completed Reflection 23 last night. Weather impacted the drying time of the oil layers that are the base for the final application of interference pigments. I may do yet one more version of this painting for myself, but not until I finish The Muse.* Still need to sign and date the work and send it out to the framers

Below, a close up of the work. As mentioned in my previous article, with this particular work I used modeling paste to give the appearance that the supplemental textile was being extruded from the base canvas.

Reflection 23 - Week One

Reflection 17

I started this painting a week ago. It is called Reflection 23, and like it's predecessor, Reflection 17 it ostensibly uses the ocean as a subject.

The Edvard Munch exhibit reminded me that artists can "version"; i.e. The Scream. (Makes me wonder sometimes if Vincent would have painted another Starry Night had he not shot himself.)  In part, this second version is a request: I gave Reflection 17 to Seon-Doh's parents as a gift. But she liked the painting asked me to paint her a  Reflection. So I decided to paint her a larger version using the Sulu Sea as my inspiration for this new work Reflection 23.*

The first week was spent working on the substrate; the Topolism base technique. The method has evolved: I use modeling paste in places to give the appearance that the additional substrates are "growing" out of the canvas base. I began by laying down the wave shapes using phosphorescent blue and green, which following the acrylic application  has become subtle, but discernible. This was followed with applying the elemental water shapes using various tightly defined textiles, and concluded with a spot paste application.

The work in it's first week of progress.

*we spent our first honeymoon in Boracay and the water was magnificent even if the coral reefs were not.

Unknown Legend

Need to rent some space in a gallery in Insadong or in Hongdae to continue my promotion. Targeting the right gallery has become my immediate focus. Gana Gallery in Insadong is expensive: between $5000-$7000 per week depending on the time of year with Fall to Christmas being the most expensive. Ironic to me because that is just about the worst time of year to go trudging around Seoul unless freezing temperature and biting wind are appealing.

Indiegogo makes most sense because it is an international crowd funding source and I believe that visual arts' know no boundaries. I am calling the project Unknown Legend— a term my wife coined for my artistic career.

Perks are going to be T-shirts, soft and hard cover catalogues of my paintings and sample canvases I create before I start on a project. They are textural sketches of the effect I want to achieve on the final canvas. I usually keep these and have made them gifts from time to time, so I am going to include a study canvas along with a t-shirt,  and hardcover catalogue as a perks for major contributors.

Need to finish off the comprehensive 2014 catalogue and come up with a "slogo" for the t-shirt, in addition to writing up the proposal that needs to make contributors reach for their PayPal by bullet point number two.

The Last Mask

Finished the last painting in the Modern Mask Series: Cheabol Son last night. I still need to sign and date the painting, but that will have to wait until some pigments dry.

The six mask paintings are based on Korean Mask Dance a significant cultural art form for  more than a thousand years that flourished in the Li Dynasty. In a nutshell, the Mask Dance was a means by which the underprivileged could vent against the higher born, including the monarchy itself.

I thought it would be interesting to use the Mask Dance (탈춤) as a vehicle for paintings of how a modern mask might look in conjunction with a contemporary story. The plot of the story, written by Seon Doh Kim,  deals largely with desire and the price of self-doubt with a representative Chaebol Family replacing the role of "higher borns."  To the right, the mask paintings in their order of completion, the plot of the dance.

Hannam Mask Dance (한남탈춤)

Young Salary Man and the Bride From the North are engaged. Young Salary Man is admitted to a Chaebol company after a fierce competition, where he meets his childhood friend, Chaebol Son. (They met at an international school before Young Salary Man's family business went bankrupt.) Young Salary Man is a newbie while Chaebol Son is already a department head (as he is the son of the Chaebol Chairman).

While Young Salary Man and Chaebol Son rekindle their friendship to some extent, Young Salary Man finds it difficult not to feel small around Cha
ebol Son. One day, Young Salary Man takes his wife-to-be to a company dinner where he introduces her to Chaebol Son.

Chaebol Son is struck by her “smashingness” and secretly starts to woo her behind his friend's back. He is confident she would have him as he had never failed with women before, what with his background and his charm. While the Bride is flattered, of course, she discourages him of his pursuit. However, when Young Salary Man finds out what had been going on, he finds himself in a fit of jealousy and a sense of inferiority. He starts to become suspicious of his lover, obsessing about her whereabouts.

Young Salary Man is continuously under stress at work, as he works alongside Chaebol Son, who keeps making snide remarks about his relationship with the Bride. The Bride feels Young Salary Man's distrust too, and the distance he is placing between them.

Meanwhile, it comes to the Chairman's attention that his son (Chaebol Son) is infatuated with a common woman with no significant background. As the Chairman sees the infatuation grow, he calls his son to his office to talk him out of it and eventually threatens to cut him off, as he had done with his daughter*, if he does not stop with this madness. The Chairman sends his people to the Bride as well, as he has done many times before with other women in Chaebol Son's life, to offer her money in exchange of his son's freedom. Appalled, the Bride rejects the money and makes it clear she has no intention of getting involved with Chaebol Son.

She rushes home to her dad, the Urban Old Man, to share her distress. Urban Old Man, who lost his job during the Asian financial crisis of 1997, is a wise man with an incisive perception of how the world is run. Seeing the mess her daughter has landed herself in, he goes to see Young Salary Man. Young Salary Man is desperately unhappy, convinced the Bride has betrayed him, and nothing Urban Old Man says convinces him otherwise. Urban Old Man looks through him, sees Young Salary Man's inferior complex eating at him and leaves him in his despair, knowing that the Bride deserves far better.

* The Chairman's daughter fell in love with an ordinary man, invoking the wrath of her father. He threatened her lover with everything he had, and when that did not work, cut his daughter off. She, who had never been a woman of strong character, was in a miserable state until she hung herself the night before the wedding.

 (The boldface is where Death makes his/her appearance.)

I am currently compiling the 2014 Catalogue of paintings which will include Hannam Mask Dance (한남탈춤)
in higher resolution in addition to closeups of the paintings.

The Open Studio Party

Had my first "open studio" in more than ten years a week ago on July 25th. The turn-out among my friends and supporters was fabulous: no kudos for the gallery curators I invited. Didn't really expect the Leeum Museum to show (Samsung's Museum of Art) nor Amore Pacific (another large corporate collector whose curator recently arrived from the same position with the Leeum) but I did expect the BK Gallery (not a block away from the studio) to attend or at least do a drive-by peek*.

The highlight of the event was raffling off an earlier work I painted in 2011 titled On The Beach a cityscape of Busan's famous Haeundae Beach. I  plan on raffling art at every future open studio.

The studio exhibit, however,  made it clear that my shameless self-promotion needs to escalate. I have decided on raising funds through Kickstarter and Indiegogo for a week's lease at a highly visible space in Insadong: Young Art Gallery. I am going to name the project Unknown Legend, and while the title packs enormous audacity with a healthy dollop of hubris, it fits my shameless self-promotion direction to a tee!



















* BK Gallery claims to host international as well as local artists, and while this may sound bitchy, the last couple of artist's works they've shown have been much closer to mediocre than interesting and several steps away from provocative or ground-breaking. 

A Word from The Author...

Young Salary Man Mask form the Modern Mask Series

Topolism is a term I came up after practicing the technique for more than three years. Although other mixed media artists have added surfaces to substrate and have used substrates other than conventional canvas or board, my approach has a "framework" that describes the techniques' practice. In short, it has a definition that resembles academe formality.  You can download my iBook for free from iTunes that talks about the evolution of the style which began with my son Winter and my desire to help him explore visual arts.

Detail from Young Salary Man Mask

I am in the process of authoring a comprehensive catalogue of my work to date that will include the eight works that comprise the "Modern Mask Dance" series and it's attendant plot.  I will make that available on my web site as a PDF download for free, I plan on  using the printed hard copies as part of a "reward tier" on Kickstarter and Indiegogo for my gallery funding initiative.

I don't have any immediate plans to quit my day job (consulting) but I have every intention of giving equal or greater attention to promoting my art, and the first really new style of the Twenty-first Century: Topolism.