ANOTHER ADDITION TO THE FORD CLAN

Here's my new roommate, Bob the Squab. He's a singing canary and boy does he have a healthy set of lungs. In fact, he sang all the way home in my new car. He seems happy with the new home and at the cost of singing canaries, I hope he stays happy and healthy for at least ten years.

Haven't been doing a lot of painting of late. I've spent entirely too much money this month and that always depresses me. I usually work harder in the studio when I'm depressed but that isn't the case this time. Money reminds me too much of the real world which keeps me from entering Planet Johann. So when things calm down a little around here I'll be able to take advantage of my depression. Of course, the cheerful chirping from upstairs makes it all the more difficult.

A GIANT COLLAGE

This monster was done back in 1990 while I was still trying to figure out which direction to take the positive/negative collage idea. I entitled this one the Tower of Babel for obvious reasons and also because it stands 5 feet tall. I tried to make it resemble a DNA model of sorts at the base and then the thing took a life of it's own. I would like to try mixing the 3M vinyl with photos from Nat'l Geo in one painting but haven't come up with a decent vehicle in which to present it. Something will come to mind, I'm sure.

The weather is terrible today. Still cold, wet and miserable. I'm only complaining because I now have a decent set of wheels to get around in and a new camera to take along for the ride and the weather just doesn't want to cooperate. The sun is supposed to come back in a couple of days, or so I hear.

LITERAL 3 DIMENSION

This was a fun piece I did in the mid 90s experimenting with my collage ideas. Once again, I used cut outs from National Geographic, baked clay forms, paint and wood to create this pyramid. It was another one of those fun ideas that didn't need repeating. I still have another pyramid cut-out in storage just in case I might change my mind and do another one. When I placed this work on exhibit it became the center of attention mostly for kids. They liked looking inside the plexiglass covering, following the many levels and layers to construct it. While working in the planning stages I initially wanted to use fibre optics to add to the illusion of depth and then thought it would be too cheesey and stuck with the materials now present in the work. Although you can't see it in this photo, my favorite part is on the bottom right, facing up. It's a trilobite from my collection of odd things. This was a good way to preserve the little fossil.

MY NEW FAMILY MEMBER

I haven't taken any pictures of my new car yet, this is a photo of it from the website where I found it. The color is more of a gold-ish than shown here. As I'm not really into cars all that much I won't bore anyone with specs and such, but will say that this is one nice ride.

BOUGHT A NEW "GAS CAN" TODAY

This is a favorite painting of mine, a cubist abstract of my favorite plant... the cosmic milkweed. I tried to get the atmosphere of what they'd appear as in the moonlight. These things take on the most odd and enchanting appearances, never looking the same twice.

The bottom picture is a photo I just took of a piece of throw together art I made with driftwood, a twig, and some milkweed pods. I like that the milkweed can take on a life of it's own, looking like a death's skull one moment, and then something extra-organic the next. I might have to do a photo exploratory of this cosmic creation.

And yes... I'm coming close to turning the odometer of my 11 year old car over to 27,000 miles. Have traded ol' faithful in for a newer and prettier car with no mileage. I am now the proud owner of a 2006 Ford Taurus and four years worth of payments.

FINALLY, AN AIR COMPRESSOR

This was one of my more enterprising works from when I was experimenting with the graffiti philosophy of Basquiat. There's a lot of symbols within the work, most of which are meaningless to me. That doesn't mean you can't find something personal in it for yourself. The concept was interesting but it played itself out very quickly for me. Still, it was a nice alternative to the other collages I was working with.

And that was the last photo I took from my vast amount of paintings stored up in the spare bedroom. When my studio time should find another lull again, I'll be taking more photos from the archives. As for now, I got my air compressor yesterday and have begun to be productive in that studio so the postings will return to it's former irregularity. Or maybe not... we'll see how it all goes.

OUT OF THE ID

This collage was done back in 1978 when my outlook on pretty much everything was about as bleak as it could get. I named it "Bald Mountain" and painted it as a means of exorcising the demons that were plaguing me at the time. It ended up as a nice little Halloween work, but for those very few people in my tiny circle of friends it said a whole lot more than trick or treat. I kept this as part of my own personal gallery to remind me where I've been and how far I've come since then. Just to show you how poor I was at that time, this painting was done on a piece of paper covered Styrofoam board given to me by a friend. I wish I could figure out a way to transfer the work onto a more sturdy backing... any ideas out there?

PETROUSHKA

I love classical music and my number one favorite to listen to for inspiration is Stravinsky's "Petroushka". It's the story of a sad puppet who is in love with the beautiful ballet dancer, but has terrible obstacles like a large moor and an evil puppet master who controls their lives. In the end poor Petroushka loses the love of his life to the moor and the puppet master ultimately thinks he destroys the little puppet. As the curtain goes down, you hear the puppet triumphantly rise from the dead to condemn the puppet master.

Well, maybe the music fits the story, but before I even learned the story I created my own ideas of what the music was saying. And that's what's so great about this piece of music... each time I listen to it another image emerges. But the painting is staying faithful to the original story where you see the puppets as children, the moor seducing the child ballerina with his trumpet. Don't look for poor Petroushka though, I've only attempted to capture his spirit in this 1992 version of the darker and more sinister goings on. And you'll have to forgive the dust as I didn't bother cleaning the painting before photographing it.

STILL NO AIR COMPRESSOR

The company I ordered my air compressor from for the airbrush wrote and said that it could take anywhere from 2 - 3 weeks to receive the new compressor. Which only leaves me to post some more old paintings from the past. This is another work from either '91 0r '92, I can't remember which. I was experimenting with mainly positives and negatives which gave more brilliance to the colors. The process is much like the geometric shapes found in my current 3m vinyl paintings only that I used cut out photos from National Geographics for my shapes.

Tomorrow's entry will be another one of the dark one's from my "mean" period. You'll have to look very closely at that work I've entitled "Petroushka".

THE OLD NEIGHBORHOOD

This was a sort of self portrait from my old place in Baltimore City. We have these street arabs that sell fruit and vegetables from a horse cart which has been a long standing tradition in Baltimore. Like myself when I was a little guy, the old horse commands a rural fascination over the pony-tailed girl. The old plug could very well have been a unicorn for all she knew.

The sky and the dark blue houses in the background had to be artificially colored because of the dreaded fading of the nonfading tissue paper I used. Never again. And in case you couldn't tell, that's a much younger version of me sitting on the stoop to the right, under the blue star.

ANOTHER DARK PAINTING

I named this one the "Neon Lights of Maya" with an attempt at an interpretation of neon signs in Mayan signscape. It's an interesting concept, but one I would rather let someone with a darker nature to explore. I was never comfortable with it even though it did spawn the upbeat version of Dante's Inferno.

Spring has finally come to Baltimore, with the warmer days in the low 70's and the nights a lovely 50. It should remain like this for another four or five weeks and then I turn on the central air. Of course the Baltimore Gas and Electric company are taking advantage of the gas crisis by charging us a 72% increase starting in July. This includes a price hike in our use of electricity. You'd think Maryland would find another source of energy to defeat this money grubbing, price gouging, monopoly of a company. Any body else out there feeling the crunch as badly as this? BTW, I spent over 35 dollars to fill my car up today.

Just thought I'd complain a little to get it out of my system. I'm sure many in the wastelands of Africa would trade an entire barrel of oil for a decent drink of water so who am I to complain?