I thought a good start might be to talk about the main project I’ve been doing, since May 2006. Our two year lease is up this May and we’ve decided not to renew, so as I’ve been thinking about it, I will be planning for the residency in the summer leading up to August, and planning to move, either going for something in Europe or moving to another city in the United States. So I will also be thinking of this summer, and the residency, as a way of synthesizing what I’ve been doing and figuring out where to go from there.

The Fort Grunt project was also a fairly intense collaboration that had some successes and some failures and I think could be good for everyone to think about, for how we want to do the folio in Belgium, and maybe more focus for this blog?

(that’s me on the right, ben on the left.)

After grad school I was in Venice, Italy for a year, teaching printmaking and getting some projects going but in general not too happy with my post-grad school work. I moved back to the states in October 2005 (after a month in Holland and a show in Berlin) with live with my fiance at the time, and I had several pending jobs- but the relationship and the internship/teaching positions all fizzled within a month of being back, and I was left with very little options. Ben and I had discussed doing a project together if we lived in the same city- and since I had no pending plans, I moved down here to Durham, NC and managed to find a studio. This took unexpectedly long, as Durham is a growing city that’s quickly turning out most of it’s warehouses and cigarette factories for lofts and upscale restaurants. Nicer to live in, sure, but not so easy to find cheap space to work in. So we did find a space in the newly formed Bull City Arts Collaborative, along with a letterpress printer, a video documentarian and a musician. The space is downtown, and our studio is in the front, with several large windows- this wasn’t something we planned on, but were happy to work with. We have turned the one large window into the Aquarium, where Marcus and Dustyn have shown work, and we’ve been open for the monthly art walks in Durham, and somewhat successful at selling work.

The location in a way influenced the work a lot more than I would have thought. The public location, and the number of random people who would come through, had us thinking of working on small, discrete objects that would be ready to hang and sold for reasonable amounts (between $10 and $60)… more about this in part two. Another, lesser factor, but a factor nonetheless, was being next to a local gallery, Branch, that is a really nice space and sometimes has good shows, but mostly has tasteful hipster-minimalism type work, which I think led us to move against that and make more crowded, rough/painterly work with garish colors. This may have in fact kept the sales low, but it felt way too easy to make the clean stuff..

The first 4 months or so (May to August 2006) was spent working up a random number of things, getting the name (chosen from a list of several hundred we came up with, for it’s military-ness and also for how dumb it sounded), and in general just working up a number of possible ideas. We settled on working with a series of characters and scenarios that drew on comics, biological creatures, invented characters and desolate scenes. We had two solo exhibitions early on, in November 2006 and February 2007, then there was a lull until this past winter- no solo shows but numerous group shows.

Things that worked really well were in the first year, working together figuring out how to build a body of work, getting sets of work to a finish, experimenting (the large 20 x 8 ft wall allowed for working on numerous pieces at once), and planning new projects. In the second part I’ll write more at length, but this arrangement didn’t last- something perhaps of more interest for this group.

So I think some of the positive things to take away from this project have been:

1. Working out a number of ways for conceptual and formal collaboration.

2. Having the opportunity to have a store-front studio, being able to bring in a wide variety of people into the space, get reactions, etc.

3. The freedom of having a finite body of work, that I can break from, mine for further projects, etc.

That’s all for now. Hope to get the next post up more quickly.

Happy Valentines day… Heres a quick shot of the new works in progress… somewhere around 60-70% towards completion. But everyday is a new day. Click on it for a bit larger view, I reduced it. 380 x 210 cm. Thats a bit over 12 x 7 feet

Well all, I am back to the blank canvas, today felt good working again. The museum asked me to keep working, thank god… so now I can create some new larger works. The space has effected my work in ways that are so simple and yet it has me wondering what will occur once the residency is over.

Basically I can get back from my work so I can see the whole work. Further just the ability to move around unhindered has me more relaxed, loose. As I was working I thought, “hey I take space for granted.”  Some of our production can be totally affected by studio space, working space in final installations, and thus creative space. Space is often the last thought when working, one thinks I just have to make do with what is here. Its a financial factor of course.

A friend in Holland started a project recently that is a “gallery” but it moves, it adopts spaces and presents projects.  Maybe its not too far to adapt that idea to form a global network that can share spaces for working. This space wont be mine much longer to trade. ; -)

Photo by Dordrechts Museum

Hey all:
I apoligize for neglecting to post on the blog. I like the going ons here. Mike, It was good to see your recent work as per Lou’s suggestion– I will follow suit and post some recent images/ work in progress. I have been continuing my experiments with pattern and surface. A few of these are etchings with plaid and patterning, I have a number of plates that I have that I can switch and recombine to explore color and layering.

These other two are fro a series of minimal relief prints (in progress). These black and white prints are floating relic-like shards with grid like patterning on them. In my work (unlike Mike) the “trash” is part of it. I recycle forms from found sources. I layer to build up a sort of history in the process. I am looking forward to working with all of you in the exchange. If you have commments,let me have it. –Dustyn

Today I was working and trying to push my work to another level. People who came into the studio were surprised that the work had changed so much. One thing I like in painting is that the possibilities are endless, and that goes for all plastic mediums. I thought I would start adding some studio notes to get more discussion going. Since process is on the table. So in art, can one move forward faster and faster propelled by ones momentum? Not just the speed of working, but the speed of the mind. I bring this up because I suspect why I am so destructive of much of my work is that the newer work progresses ahead of the existing work.

One big barrier apparently is imagination, how many ways can I move the paint, how many variations, surface, color, and mark making. Another is experience, the process begets new levels within a process. Things are learned, gained, and some things shed.

One thing I think is critical to this project and to our own production is increasing creative challenges in our own work, and being open to look at those open spaces that exist in production, whether it be material or in tempo. I was in an opening tonight at a poor show in Holland and one thing someone asked me was why the work was so dull.

It reminded me of a student I had once who brought in a drawing, he was very talented and knew it. The drawing was very strong but one part of it looked weak. I asked what happened, he said he was tired. I told him that if you want others to give a damn about what you make, you have to actually give a damn.

The work in the show here was like the person had barely worked, if your bored, we will be bored. Another artist there and I concluded that good artists challenge themselves. Amongst colleagues here, I like that I am called out on various issues, and made to think about them in the work. Nothing is solved with non-speaking.

To move forward we must have interaction, move to new levels, questions need to be asked, theories gutted, and established comfort zones abolished. This striving to new platforms can only help create value in the works.

New levels can demand more work. Love, Death, Life, Soul. They appear to be something like basic elements (LO/DET/LIF/SO) . Sometimes it appears that all the marketing, writing, showing, and ego become a big wet blanket that dulls vision and sound.

m