Blame De Kooning

I just realized, in thinking how I'd not posted anything in quite some time, and of how exhausting it was trying (and failing) to post that perfect thing, that I'd lost track of the original idea of this blog: to have a conversation, if only with that special someone I greet everyday in the mirror.

Today I want to say that I've been painting, and I finally got back paintings I did years ago in a big box from out-of-state. I will post them all (except for those few I paint over), I've been touching them up. A 90% finished painting is the kiss of death, that last 10% is a quagmire, a pit swallowing all good sense, discernment, discrimination, restraint. Never 'fix'. Wait. Preferably ten years.

98% finished is even worse. Luckily I couldn't get my hands on these for the last year-and-a-half so they were safe. My latest work on the theme of Venus has me flummoxed. Unable to continue, I made a series of drawings on the subject of Woman, after De Kooning. I don't know if it quite worked for him, but you see a definite change over the years from the angry scary overwhelming women to the happy joyous overwhelming women. Women that are more like water.

My women hold pistols, ride nuclear bombs, entertain 'guests', call us from beyond the stars, and take part in theatrical productions (Pierrot Lunaire).

Oh what the hell here they are:

Marauder  8.5" x 5.5" mixed media on paper

Woman with Hat  2017  ink on paper  5.5" x 8.5"

Manhattan Apartment  5.5" x 8.5" mixed media on paper

3 Women  5.5" x 8.5" mixed media on paper

STAR-MA  8.5" x 5.5" mixed media on paper

Pierrot As A Girl  5.5" x 8.5" mixed media on paper

What is my problem? Hopeless romantic. I'm still in the position of not having conversations with anyone; the curse of the visually-oriented. On a drive I'll point out an interesting sight to someone. Silence. I was much relieved to read The Private Lives of the Impressionists, to know of men and women who went on at length about things they saw, as if their appearance was of great import! This is how I am. I could appeal to people's sense of Feng Shui, in that disagreeable appearances can cause illness, and agreeable ones health, or simply become an architect or a landscaper. Ha.

People don't care what effect their environment is having on them. They want relief, instant relief, as they don't feel there's any hope of improving their environment at any level. In cities it's all too true, in the country they can look out of doors although if born there, perhaps none too impressed.

Explaining to people why art matters is simple: it's exactly because you can't change your environment, your world, your politics, your (or their) situation, that art is important. It's all you've got left. Art you can change, create, revise, etc. to suit your needs, yourself, your heart.

But our (N. American) culture's not about that. This was considered worthless in the year 2000, but four people disagreed, and saved it. You can disagree too.

The background I first used for this blog:

(and thankfully stopped using as no one could read the text), is an old painting I did of Herbert Huncke, the first writer who was called, 'beat' (his own idea).
It's after this photo:

It seems I'll also have to do this one, and a bit better:

A compelling figure, no? You perhaps don't know him, one story here.

Art matters because of people like him.