distance, a knowing and a not-knowing

I'm obsessed with subtle expressions and realizing that so much can be translated even without features, in the spaces around them, the chin, cheeks and hollow of the cheeks, the forehead. I'm looking at my great-grandmother. I know one of her stories. She sailed to America at the turn of the twentieth century, only to return with her dying husband, bury him according to his wishes in the homeland, the current CZ, and find herself pregnant with my grandmother, in that order. My grandmother never met or had any photos of her father, but when asked was told to find him in the mirror.

the x's and arrows are my grandmother's

am carving them with her nail-grooming set

remembering

in studio playing pandora songs reminded of friends come and gone:

"we're going to be friends"- with Jason David
"save the last dance for me"- with Anitra Haendel
"angel from montgomery"- with Fletcher Boote

I realized this is more the studio work for tonight...

sketchbook

studies for 120 soaps

half of pg 3

touch is where thoughts are formed

you can't speak for anything else

no such thing as the world- your world

loose and shifting- play with it

playing with it

still there-unscrew all those things

wealth of material

how slowly ideas get formed and content coming in becomes part of the present

new model: thought [think] differently all along

everything is in the air

We sit here with all the images we have ever seen with all the experiences we have ever had, all the traumas, all the joys. Can we just leave them suspended? Unattached? Playful. 

Can we find connections?

Rose's Play

My favorite room in Karlstejn

In King Charles's bedroom of the Karlstejn castle we see his private chapel with a holy relic that he carried whenever he traveled (center) and a statue of Madonna and Child out of ivory. What I found most stunning was the partially renovated wall. There are these floating squares and rectangles beautifully spaced throughout. Each is labeled with a number and perhaps corresponds to preexisting frescoes of the chapel. I find this trace of such a distant past and the current attention to it (the edges of the fresco blend just right with the contemporary paint job,) gorgeous! I also loved the spacing of each rectangle and that amazing cross at the top of the arch. Just beautiful! What remains, has been a constant thought for me over this summer. What remains after we in current form do not? Here I found some answers.

dancing in the corner

In the bosco I found an old piece of aluminium foil rolled into a ball and tossed aside.

I started to unpeel the layers slowly working out the form. 

I'm thinking of forms like Muybridge's dancing woman. (Reviewing his work, as well as the figures of my family members, their stiff gestures, wanting to allow them to move from the sterile image into such a space as above.)

(I was similarly drawn to a patterned paper towel, which upon peeling, did not yield the same results.)

pg 2

what is your way? (just presence)

doesn't take effort or time

you hold up the corner

We sit here with all that is us, all that we know and don't, all that we have seen, all the images from art history, all the traumas and joy. What does one need to bring to light at this moment? What are the myriad of things, thoughts, no thought non-things that this moment connects to? (Diagram above)

I see a grid in everything, our underlying current. (It is not always in a grid form, it can be sounds, shapes of tyles under one's feet, a pattern stenciled on the wall of my grandparent's home now repainted, covered, but none-the less there.)

consider it- think it is a possibility

Referring here to one holding up their own corner, holding up whatever is blocking you.

who?- the present focus

who is thinking?

your own thinking

thinking

place,parents,cycles

the colonies-uniform (it doesn't matter)

Here I thought about Alenka and the uniform she wears to school, her delight and my revolt in the name individuality. We discussed the uniform, how for some it it creates a sense of outrage while for others it was a  comradery. 

span- distance to see something else

strong influence on thought

sensation - thinking is a practice, present always

now

memory or projection - no reality at all

your apprehension of the world

is limited to your senses

(concentrate) on what you can receive-

what it can receive

pg 1- notes on thinking from Just Forming Contect

Instability pleasant

thinking about thinking

(in relation to creativity,

in relation to making things

and making no things.)

I'm thinking about the objects we saw at dOCUMENTA13- in the area labeled the brain,  there were objects from art history, objects in relation to each other represented in contemporary context. Time was questioned, as we bring endless images/thoughts from the past into our present. 

It was interesting to see "stuff," tangible objects, as we are as a culture moving away from materiality. The question then remained what stuff was brought in and why? There was a beautiful display of Bactiran Princesses. The brain of the documenta warrants an entry on it's own...

understand what is already there.

everything is already present.

how do we begin? free your thinking,

get rid of obstacles 

practice thinking

thinking is not directional

image of a fishing rod- reviewing practice

continuing Moth, searching for installation space

I need to test out the light on a glass surface. I'm thinking it needs to be on the outside of a building as the colors read best with oncoming light, but will play with light coming through the piece as well. 

Moth

I've missed myself too- you know what I mean. I have been needing to 'prove' myself at work with the new job and little focus has been dedicated to my art. (There were many lovely moments..but...)

So not only am I so excited to have broken this trend this past week, but for me I am embarking on an awesome journey. I have always wanted to create canvas that curves, and as you know I have always used tape. I have now combined the two and many other two's in my life. (My left and right sides, etc.)

I am very happy to post these although the images of the work is pretty miserable but you will get an idea until the right light comes tomorrow.

I think I'm titling it 'moth' or 'moth effect.' (The lighting is best when one sees the work on the outside of a builging with natural light. There is however, a view of it from the inside as the ground is transparent.) It is roughly one meter by one meter and a blow up of one of my small figures. It is oils on contact paper!

NYFA MARK program this weekend

Tereza,
As I posted last week, I've been accepted to the NYFA MARK program, which is this weekend.

As I understand, it's designed to help artists with other aspects of their practice - things outside the studio...I'll keep you posted.

I'm interested and curious to meet other artists from the area, and hopefully get practical advice from a different pool of non-workshoppers. It will be a first for me, and I'm open. Perhaps something magical will happen, perhaps nothing will happen. I will let you know.

Please post pictures of your paintings - I will do the same. My exhibition just ended, and I'm going now to pick up the paintings. One is going to be lent on consignment to a friend; the other two will return to my studio.

I miss you!

Having such fun painting!(More playful than ever!) Pics to follow...

I took Ale to the Met for the first time today, to see one of Rembrandt's self portraits - on loan from Europe.
x

And this also happened

My first acceptance letter in a very long time:

Dear Angela,

I am very pleased to notify you that you have been accepted to participate in NYFA MARK Bootcamp, Mid-Capital/Hudson region. The New York Foundation for the Arts’ professional development program for artists living in New York State.

We are really excited to have such a talented group of artists joining us at our partner organizations in Woodstock and Hudson.

If you have any questions at all, please do not hesitate to get in touch with me.

Congratulations again and I look forward to meeting you in person soon!

Best wishes,

F

exhibition opening

Everything is changed and nothing has changed.

I am installing five of my most recent paintings in a group exhibition that opens on Saturday. The announcement is above. There are seven artists in the show, all of whom are women.

We've transformed an empty storefront in a historic district of Kingston, NY into a gallery that will be open for three weekends only. It's been interesting so far to work with the other artists on this project. All of our work is very different, and yet it exists quite well in relation to one another. As far as I can tell, everyone is excited about it.

On a personal note, I am relieved to be exhibiting again.

It's been a long time since I've felt like I've had anything of merit to share with the world.

This is inspiring me to continue working, to stay the course, to deepen my understanding of what I'm doing (or what I think I'm doing)

I will post images of the opening and the show as it unfolds.

xo

A

bits and pieces

New butterflies over Prague

studio, dinning room, living room

Revisiting old friends