State Fair of Texas

The State Fair is a great yearly tradition in Texas. Located at the Art Deco Fair Park in East Dallas, the grounds were the site of the Texas Centennial celebration in 1936. Every October a new round of exhibits, concerts, wild food (besides the requisite Fletcher's Corny Dog, every year's "menu" features a fried version of something, such as beer, butter, Coke, ice cream, etc.), livestock shows, games and rides dominate the local population for three weeks.
In the past I've been commissioned to provide images for the Fair in a couple of different contexts. Here they are, with an oldie from my art school days.

Below was an illustration for Texas Monthly magazine, depicted the iconic figure of the Fair, Big Tex. He's a 52 feet tall statue that speaks to fairgoers in an appropriately big, booming voice. I concentrated on his head in this image, particularly on one feature, which has always intrigued me: his ventriloquist dummy style lower jaw that permits him to tell everybody about the latest happenings.

This one appeared in the Dallas Morning News. I wanted to take a different point of view on the Fair, celebrating an element that often gets overlooked. The livestock shows happen at the beginning of the fair. 4-H, FFA and professional livestock handlers compete in different venues for prizes and recognition. The winning animals are sometimes sold for tens of thousands of dollars, kicking off college funds for their proud owners.
In high school my farmer/rancher dad insisted I take part in FFA (Future Farmers of America; which did not at all apply in my case) and raise a show calf in all four of my high school years. This piece was based on an actual photo of my poor skinny self with my massive first show calf. I won't be reproducing that pic here.
The often distinctive patterns on calves inspired this big guy's Texas flag motif.

Finally, I created this piece for an illustration class at East Texas State University (now Texas A&M Commerce). The great Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame member Jack Unruh was the instructor.
The collage media was a departure for me, and something of an experiment. The piece went on to win First Place in its Illustration category at the Dallas Society of Visual Communications Student Show in 1977.

Business card

In thirty years of doing this thing professionally, I've never had a business card. Larger, 8.5 by 11 inches, promotional pieces and post cards, but no regular size business cards. So now I do.

This is one side. The idea is to turn the card over vertically and there's my name and contact info.

So this is the back. Sorry, I fuzzed out my phone numbers. If you're reading this and don't have that information, use the e-mail address. It's what I prefer anyway.

Turning over the card completes the image of the painting.
Next time you see me, tell me to give you one.

"Patches" and "Drops"

This is a recent rooster painting, "Eli". It's 18 by 14 inches and is the usual acrylic on canvas. A recent discussion about it brought up something I should address. That's the use of "patches" and "drops" on some of these pieces. Seeing the paintings in photographs without experiencing them "in person" (and sometimes then) can lead to confusion about what these things are and why they are there. So here's the explanation.
First, the "patches". They aren't literally "patches". I use that term because someone once, when I first began to use them, asked me if that's what they were; I suppose the questioner assumed they were covering some a mistake or something. No, if I make a mistake big enough that the only way to fix it is to cover it up with a piece of paper, then I just discard that work and start over. The function of the "patch" is more esoteric than that.
It is usually a piece of Arches watercolor paper, sometimes 300 lb to 140 lb, attached to the canvas before painting begins. The intention is to add a dimensional element as well as a geometric rectangular design device which provides contrast to the more "organic" freeform elements of the rooster's or the landscape's forms. It's also a subtle frame for some parts of the painting, usually the rooster's head area. Finally, it gives a texture that's different from the canvas texture, adding some variety to that visual experience.
"Drops" are just that, drops of paint, usually thick enough to have a dimensional quality of their own, which add circular geometric elements to the mix. On other pieces I've used circular marks for the same purpose.
These are design devices that make the work more interesting to me in the process. Some viewers like the effects, some prefer the imagery to be more "conservatively", for lack of a better word, represented. I add these elements when the spirit, if that's what it is, moves me.
Here are some other examples (click on any image to see it a little larger).

This is a rooster painting that has neither "patches" or "drops".

This landscape features a "patch" framing the red leaf tree in the lower center foreground.

"Afternoon Hill" is "patch" free.

A prominent "patch" shows up in this cow painting, while the one below goes patchless.

"Art in the Metroplex" - the show

Here I am, stiff as ever in front of a camera, with "Claudius" yesterday, Saturday, September 11, at the reception for Art in the Metroplex at TCU in Fort Worth, Texas. The juror, artist Polly Apfelbaum, gave a lecture and presentation of some of her own work, then showed and commented on the pieces she selected for the show.
About "Claudius", she said it made her smile, that it had a mix of Pop Art and folk qualities, and it reminded her of Wily Coyote and the Roadrunner. She also mentioned my signature, how signatures are a rare element in contemporary art, and how meticulous I was in painting it. And she said, "I loved all of that". Which is fine by me.

Below are some other photos from the reception. I don't know, in some cases don't remember, all of whose work is whose, so apologies to anybody uncredited. I did know and like a few pieces not shown here, but my photography was bad, out of focus, etc, so not everything in the show is depicted here.


Juror and artist Polly Apfelbaum.

A small crowd around "Claudius".

The Art Mob's out today.

Becky is talking with artists Susan Whitmer and Steven Miller. Steven's cool painting was one of the ones I photographed badly, so it's not shown here. It deserves a much better representation.

This interactive piece entertained the kids, who loved the permission to drop debris into this rubber mat.

A beautiful painting by Nancy L. Brown.

Charlotte Smith.







Jay Maggio.

Ricardo Paniagua

Yep, that's an upside down table.

Here's the official checklist of all artists and their work.
1. Paul Abbott – "03_Paul Abbott_U#10.6.22A1_20x40_Photo&Digital"
photo mounted on plexi

2. Bill Barter – "Xetuk"
monotype/collage

3. Bill Barter – "Zenuk"
monotype

4. Bill Barter – "Wituk"
monotype

5. Melissa Brown – "Toss and Gather"
rubber mats, cardboard boxes, stones, seeds, burrs

6. Nancy Brown – "untitled"
acrylic on canvas

7. Andrew Butler – "For Her"
latex on wood panel

8. Lou Chapman – "Venice Beach Roller Park"
archival inkjet print from Holga camera negative

9. Ray-Mel Cornelius – "Claudius"
acrylic on canvas

10. Laura Cummings – "Time’s Leftovers"
photography

11. Madelyn Edwards – "The Jar"
oil on cardboard

12. Laura Ehrich – "Echo"
digital painting on sheer fabric

13. Cassandra Emswiler – "El Charco del Ingenio"
ceramic tiles, rocks

14. Cassandra Emswiler – "Over the river and through the woods…"
inherited painting, marble tile

15. Ricardo Paniagua Garcia III – "Tall Man"
household/spraypaint on canvas

16. Nathaniel Glaspie – "42nd and Beach St."
aluminum, canvas, hardware, household paint, Plexiglas, stainless steel

17. Lee Albert Hill - "…Crap …Back to Work in the Morning…"
perma stable chrome print on aluminum plate

18. Alan Hofstad – "Roses, close up"
photography

19. Ronit Ilan – "Gathering"
digital photogaphy

20. Lance Jones – "Untitled (And There Was.)"
c-print

21. Lance Jones – "Untitled (And There Was.)"
c-print

22. Lance Jones – "Untitled (And There Was.)"
c-print

23. Patrick Lewis – "24 Hrs/10 Min. Ahead"
acrylic

24. Jay Maggio – "Red Fushia"
oil on canvas

25. Mike Mahler – "The Divine Wound"
acrylic on canvas

26. Leighton McWilliams – "Elvis/Riviera"
giclee print from plastic camera

27. Steven Miller – "Drag"
acrylic on panel

28. Mark Murphy– "Cloudy"
oil on canvas

29. Yuki Ogura – "This is a table"
birch

30. Yuul Paki – "(8 x 11 in.) 2"
paper

31. Joel Sampson – "Gypsum"
archival pigment on paper

32. Patrick Schneider – "Library of Babel"
graphite on panel

33. Libby Sloan – "Nature’s Kaleidoscope"
photography

34. Charlotte Smith – "Bovary’s Dream"
acrylic paint pile on wood shelf

35. Sally Warren – "Scrambled Denali"
inkjet on grafix film

36. Mike Whitaker – "Photo Contest 017"
photography

37. Hsiu Ching Yu – "Omphaloskepsis 65"
charcoal & graphite

Peaceable Kingdom, for now.

This is another "Neo-Retro" style sample. One of these days this will lead to something. I keep telling myself that, anyway. (Click the image to see it a little bigger.)

The idea originated with a logo (see below) I designed for my high school alma mater's alumni association. The school mascot is the Bulldog, and the Association wanted the dog to be a part of the design. It's simple and gets the job done.

I liked the drawing, so I decided to adapt it to another piece. The idea of a stack of supposedly at-odds animals came to mind, so I added the cat (which is either yawning or laughing, I don't know which) and the bird. I was going to incorporate an insect of some kind, to continue the food chain, or at least adversary, theme. I decided a pteradactyl gave the image an edge or oddity or something it needed.

Magentas

"Art in the Metroplex"

I'm happy to report that "Claudius" (36 by 36 inches, acrylic on canvas) has been selected for the 2010 "Art in the Metroplex" exhibition sponsored by TCU in Fort Worth, Tx and the Templeton Art Center.
The show is a survey of work in all kinds of media throughout the region. It was juried by New York artist Polly Apfelbaum, whose work is included in the Museum of Modern Art and the Whitney Museum.
The duration of the show is August 31 - September 30 at TCU's J.M. Moudy Art Gallery. Of course I'll post photos when the show is up.