Layers upon layers

This image is all mouse. The Tablet PC is down.

Layers and layers
Larger Image.

I was thinking today about layers. There are heaps of layers in this image, as in most of what I do. The Earth Crosses are also to do with depth. The “vertical” line goes up and down. The life line in that direction is vastly different from that in the horizontal line. A line that goes “across” like that invariably is seen as the horizon, the earth edge.

In my work as a psychotherapist I always think “deep”. I want the work with my clients to go deep. But what is deep? My son once said, while pondering this with his fresh mind, it is “wide on its side”, nice! But it is not so. In the case of wide one end is equivalent qualitatively to the other. With the vertical line that is not so.

Deep means going into origins, not the past per se, though origins are usually in the past. Perhaps the future can draw us, and thus origins could be seen in the future as well.

Maori have a word: Whakapapa which is tied the notion of a layer, papa. Ah, a quote, from here, that expresses the exact idea I was looking for:

“Papa” is anything broad, flat and hard such as a flat rock, a slab or a board. “Whakapapa” is to place in layers, lay one upon another. Hence the term Whakapapa is used to describe both the recitation in proper order of genealogies, and also to name the genealogies. The visualisation is of building layer by layer upon the past towards the present, and on into the future. The whakapapa include not just the genealogies but the many spiritual, mythological and human stories that flesh out the genealogical backbone.

The layers of a painting give it its dept, they cover its origins, they influence the next layer, and the final layer is a relationship with a viewer. My Earth Crosses, flat and hung vertically I think of as a more transverse section with the top being the ether and the lower reaches the depths. The vertical line however is the yang to the yin of the earth. it is something only humans do, see into the depths of the soul and reach for the spirits of the sky.

Here is another Another version of this Earth Cross:

Layers and layers
Larger Image.

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Reflections: Blog & Gallery

Presenting my work is more on my mind right now than making it. Not as much fun, but presentation floats to the top, unbidden. I am thinking about both the world and online. I’ll focus on the latter.

I have changed the name of this blog to “Walter Logeman: Art” with the subtitle In this moment… My art Blog” the reason is clarity. It is still the same blog, I am still “In this moment…” and it is still, as it says on the About Page:

Nothing but art, artists, art talk, art history, art philosophy, pictures and projects. Most of my work and work-in-progress is on this blog.

The clarity seems right because I am working on a Gallery. If you go there now (as I write this) you will see it is heavily under construction.

With the Gallery I can post exhibits, and show work that is complete. Series. Simple. More stable. I sometimes refine an image I have already blogged as I present them to other sites. I will focus on quality.

You can sub to the Gallery in RSS and watch progress and then see updates as they happen including my fumblings. Better still sub to this blog’s RSS, I will announce all Gallery news here as well.

The first things to be shown there will be my Earth Crosses, of course. Next FLAX.

Art works formerly known as prints

I have removed the g word (giclée) from my vocabulary. Initially it seemed nice to have a word for what I do, but it has come to sound cheap & pretentious.

Print is a great word, fits. Etymology: Middle English prente, from Anglo-French, from preint, prient, past participle of priendre to press, from Latin premere

But there is a problem.

Print is associated with reproductions. My prints are productions. There is no original, other than the file on my disk, not even as visible as a photo’s negative. Once you see it, even online, it is a production!

I still call them prints, and even though they come in editions each one is an original!

(PS my title for this is post is not original, I saw it somewhere before, and it is around all over the net, a cligée)

Prints for sale

If you enjoy browsing here, watching me grapple with my art process, make new work most days, consider buying a print! The images, even though they are made digitally really come into their own on good quality archival paper in pigment inks.

I am sure you will be delighted when you see an image you like online presented as a high quality, signed print. My hope is too that you will experience a sense of participation, to have a connection with an unfolding process.

Ready for more information and prices?

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Some of my editions are available exclusive from galleries or other sites.

Have a look here on Felt, a rather wonderful New Zealand Art & craft site:

image felt art for sale site

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I am proud to have a selection of editions selling in the Allen Gallery in Chelsea New York:

Editions of these Prints are available exclusively at the Allen Gallery
image

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Questions? Send me an email.walter@psybernet.co.nz

I am working on an exhibition in Christchurch later this year, so watch this space!

Rauschenberg, dies at age 82

From an article in the WSJ by Barbara Rose

Robert Rauschenberg, whom many, including this writer, believe to be the biggest innovator in art after Jackson Pollock, died on Monday at age 82, an acknowledged hero of the avant garde. The passings of these two artists could not have been more different. Pollock careened to his death in a fatal 1956 car crash at age 44. Rauschenberg, to paraphrase Dylan Thomas, did not go gently into that good night. Paralyzed by a stroke, like his own hero de Kooning, he continued to work until the end of a long and productive life. From a wheelchair in his beachfront studio in Captiva, Fla., where he had retired from the New York art scene in the late 1960s, he selected images from the vast archive of his own photographs and, working with the aid of assistants, continued to turn out a steady stream of canvases and sculptures. Nor did he let the stroke keep him from attending openings and festivities.

Wikipedia

Trash suit

The Wikipedia entry as it read on Sunday, 18 May, 2008 and some images follow:

Continue reading “Rauschenberg, dies at age 82”