Alice Neel...

 

Someone I have been looking at a lot in this moment of "what the f*** is Alice Neel.
I was so lucky and delighted to see that David Zwirner was having a show of her drawings in NYC when I was there last month.  So I dragged my not feeling well 4 year old to the gallery and it was so worth it.

I love the directness of her drawing style, her viewers direct gaze and her admittance to the domestic world that she lived and worked in. As a very real woman who married multiple times, had a handful of children and never ever stopped making her art. I am inspired by her perseverance and her ability to gaze in a way that few were doing at the time.

 

Of course I like her pregnant women series (none in the show) very much but also really found the images she drew of children powerful. The show is up until the end of the week and so worth it. I am really loving drawing work right now it is so simple and direct and raw. 

My problem comes with the fact that it then needs to be behind glass, I wish I could figure out a less permanent way to resolve mine in the gallery. But I will take Alice's work however they give it to me.

sharing...

I have so much to say and so much to share. The issue of life is that I do not have the time and energy to get to sharing it and saying it here. This winter has been such a weird one. Usually winter is when you can really get stuff done in the studio and sort of refresh but with the TERRIBLE weather and the unexpected solo show my winter was actually total chaos.

 

So at this point I am still just catching up and recovering. I am trying not to be too hard on myself about the fact that the weather, taxes, weird appts, and sickness has kept me from the studio as I was extremely prolific leading up to my show. But it is hard to give myself that space.  As an artist you always feel like you need to be in the studio to be doing anything. But instead I have been looking, reading, researching, questioning, talking, journaling, reviewing... really trying to figure out what is next for me. 

It has been a weird few months and I was frustrated with the end result of my show. I loved the work. I thought it looked great. But somehow it became too formal, less intimate and immediate then previous solo shows of mine, The frames though appropriate for the work pushed people back and away from the content.  The small space of the gallery behind a larger space and show changed the experience of the viewer in a way I have not dealt with before. All of these things are so important for me to know and think about as I moved forward in this new direction in my work and try to figure it out.

So since I have not been making much what I have been doing is updating my website. It is far from done but a new header pager and some new drawing galleries (more coming) new photo galleries and not yet but also coming new fiber works. So feel free to check it out as a work in progress.

I have been reading the book Letters to a Young Poet by Rilke. If you are an artist and have somehow missed this gem of a book like I did. Go get it now. Get a pen a big cup of tea and read.....

"For those who are near you are far away...and this shows that the space around you is begining to grow vast. And if what is near you is far away, then your vastness if already among the stars and is very great; be happy about your growth, in which of course you can't take anyone with you, and be gentle with those who stay behind..."

I am also really looking forward to being at NYU again teaching as a visiting artist (more time NOT in the studio though and Squam in early June.)