No Hassle At The Castle

Grid List, Center Galleries, Detroit, 1/28-3/3

2012-01-29T18:02:00.003-05:00

Grid List, Detroit, Friday, 1/27

2012-01-25T19:40:00.004-05:00

If you find yourself in Detroit, Michigan this Friday, 1/27, make sure to stop by The College for Creative Studies Center Galleries for the opening of "Grid List." The show contains work by various artists who are engaging with the grid. Many of the same artists from last year's "Saturation Point" in London are included. My contribution is pictured below.

A slightly smaller version of the show will be opening at Allegra LaViola Gallery in NYC in March.

Toga Tiger, 2009. Acrylic on canvas, 60" x 60."

Kids Agree: Two Thumbs Up For Mr. PC

2012-01-22T19:33:00.001-05:00

42" x 66"

2012-01-19T17:59:00.002-05:00

Another Hottie HoTY

2012-01-17T15:21:00.005-05:00

With all this talk about art of late, I forgot to mention that the winner of the 2011 Eclipse Award for Horse of the Year, announced this past Monday, is Havre de Grace, seen above winning the Woodward Stakes at Saratoga this past September. The girls have now won HoTY honors for three years running now, with Zenyatta winning in 2010 and Rachel Alexandra in 2009.

Havre de Grace is a nice horse for sure, but she seemed like at odd choice to me for best actress. But then when I really thought about it, I couldn't think of a logical candidate to replace her - it just wasn't a superstar year.

The Mad, Mysterious d richmond

2012-01-11T20:09:00.004-05:00

In Paintings I Like pt. 75, I linked to three excellent blog posts by d richmond of Immaterial Culture about the de Kooning retropspective at MoMA. He's since added some final thoughts gathered after visiting the show on the last day (this past Monday), along with some ruminations about the rewards and difficulties of a life in painting - click here, here, here, and here to read these posts.

And better still, mr. richmond got a very nice mention on for this series over at the marvelous Painters' Table blog. Nice work d!

No Hassle Recommends

2012-01-08T21:37:00.003-05:00

If you find yourself in Brooklyn this Friday (the 13!), make sure to stop in at Ventana244 for a group show that includes my good friends George Hofmann and Michael Zahn. Tell 'em Paulie sent ya!

Paintings I Like, pt. 76

2012-01-07T16:03:00.004-05:00

Willem de Kooning, Pirate (Untitled II), 1981. Oil on canvas, 88" x 77."

Untitled XIX, 1981. Oil on canvas, 77" x 88."

Rider (Untitled VII), 1981. Oil on canvas, 70" x 80."

In the Renaissance, a central debate in painting was whether colorito or designo should be the primary, organizing factor in a picture. Partisans of Michelangelo favored designo, and fans of Titian insisted colorito was the most important aspect. Late in his long career, Titian declared emphatically that he had found the grand bargain between both. Painters since then have, whether they did so consciously or not, generally favor one over the other. Matisse grappled with problem quite self-consciously as he tried to meld his advanced color sense with cubist innovation. In the Abstract expressionist period, Pollock, de Kooning, and Franz Kline clearly were the masters of designo, and Newman and Rothko were the exponents of colorito.

At least that's the way history has recorded Ab Ex output - but de Kooning, like Titian, lived a long time, and in the '80's, Titian-like, he found the golden mean between the two pillars of painting. He used saturated color as a structuring element and combined it with gesture without making mud-pies. This was in large measure owing to his discovery of white paint and slower gestures, but sometimes the most effective solutions to knotty problems turn out to be the simplest.

In the reviews of the current retrospective, the reception to the late paintings in print has been very good, and I'm glad about it - I've always felt that these were among De Kooning's strongest paintings. There was a terrific exhibition of those pictures in 1997 (the year the artist died), also at MoMA. I remember being bowled over, and also being quite surprised at the critical ambivalence the pictures received - there were lengthy, pointless debates about his mental health and whether or not the paintings could be viewed as authentic if he was not in his right mind. Who fucking cares?

There is an age-related factor that is entirely plausible in these pictures, however, and it relates more to the body and not the mind. As I mentioned above, the gesture in these paintings is palpably slower that the lightning sluices in his work from the '40's to the '60's. This approach makes sense given the artist's advanced age at this point, and if true also represents artistic ingenuity at its best - great artists have always found a way around extra-aesthetic limitations, whether they be financial, political, or if you're just too damned old to swing a paintbrush like a sword any more.

The show stays up until Jan. 9 - this Monday. If you haven't seen it yet, you have about 48 hours so try and get over there. And spend some time in that last room - de Kooning, like Titian, ended his career on a really high note, which is something we can all only hope for.

Paintings I Like, pt. 75

2012-01-03T16:37:00.007-05:00

Willem de Kooning, Dark Pond, 1948. Enamel on composition board, 47" x 56."

Black Untitled, 1948. Oil and enamel on paper, mounted on wood, 30" by 40."

Untitled, 1948-49. Oil and enamel on paper, mounted on composition board, 36" by 49."

This post is something of a reprise of P.IL. 61; there was only one of de Kooning's black paintings in the big Ab Ex show a year ago at MoMA, but there was a really nice group of them in the current retrospective, which I wanted to talk about a little more.

At the risk of laboring a point I already made (which is something my wife is quite tired of), these pictures really emphasize de Kooning's European-ness in contrast to Pollock's American-ness, in spite of the passing resemblance between the WdK black paintings and Pollock's drips. Pollock's process-driven arabesques and monumental scale represented the apogee of a certain strain of American post-war abstraction. The figuration expunged all vestiges of representation while still using the curve; the latter being a kind of bugbear for European painters who could only achieve that level of abstraction via the grid. Pollock's big scale famously paralleled the big American vista, but it more importantly wrapped it's arms around the intrinsic relationship between the size of paintings and the size of people. 8' by 18' is big, but not that big - if that was the size of your apartment, you'd probably be grumpy about it. But it's big in the sense that without mimetic references, you compare the scale of abstract pictures to your own body, which is considerably smaller than many Pollocks.

De Kooning's black paintings, made at precisely the same time as Pollock's monumental drips, were attacked by Clement Greenberg - the small scale and vestigial representation, CG thought, were symptoms of terminal Euro-old-fashioned-ness; a refusal to embrace the modern. The black pictures are full of references to intertwined bodies - Reubensesque group sex scenes captured in a kind of glimpsed photo-negative. But what Greenberg couldn't understand at the time was that for de Kooning, banishing all reference to sexy European Baroque easel painting couldn't possibly be considered a victory on any level. Abstraction for him was a way of expanding that already rich language, not rejecting it. Embedded in this approach was a refusal to be made a foot-soldier in a certain kind of aesthetic-cultural battle. And as I've been saying in previous posts, this is what makes him the really relevant role model for the contemporary painter - expansion and synthesis as opposed to reduction, and choices based on a personal vision as opposed to a historical agenda.

Also of interest - the shadowy d richmond of Immaterial-Culture has put up some very good posts on the de Kooning retrospective - click here, here, and here to read them.

No Hassle at huffingtonpost.com!

2012-01-02T17:39:00.002-05:00

Special thanks yet again to artist and thinker Brett Baker for giving No Hassle at the Castle a nice mention on the Huffington Post!

No Hassle on Painters' Table

2012-01-01T18:58:00.002-05:00

Paintings I Like #74 got a nice mention on Painters' Table, one of my hands-down favorite blogs. Painter Brett Baker is the owner and operator. Thanks, Brett!

Paintings I Like, pt. 74

2011-12-31T16:30:00.009-05:00

Willem de Kooning, Untitled V, 1982. Oil on canvas, 80" x 70."

I'm a little late to the party, I know, but I wanted to get in a few posts about the fabulous de Kooning retrospective at MoMA before it comes down on January 9th. Even if you're a hardcore painting-is-dead partisan, I think it would be pretty difficult to walk out of this show without feeling a at least a twinge of doubt about those convictions - the exhibition was dazzling and protean, and more than made up for the paucity of de Kooning canvases in the otherwise magnificent Ab Ex NY show at MoMA a year ago.

For a while now, I've felt that the crisis in painting (or the series of crises) since the late sixties has been something of a fiction. The real crisis as I see it was centered not in painting itself, but in the literature on painting. Fewer and fewer people had anything particularly penetrating to offer on the subject in print, and this was interpreted as a failing in the medium itself as opposed to the literature. The focus of art writing then shifted away from the visual and towards subject matter, often political of critique-driven - topics which exist much more naturally in essay form. As I've said many times, it's hard to come up with 1,000 compelling words about blue. But really, does this mean blue is dead?

I know it may seem that I'm digressing a bit from de Kooning, but give me a minute. The real problems painting faced after Ab Ex and Color Field were the same problems that painting has faced for about 700 years, the same problems face by the Ab Ex painters. Periodically, you have to change the way you do it - you can't go on painting the way that the previous generation painted. Paradoxically, the way that many painters have found a way forward was to look back; Manet found his patron saint in Velazquez and didn't try and hide it, yet he was able to build a truly modern style based on this precedent. The Ab Ex painters had a similar relationship to Picasso even as they sought to supersede him.

Clement Greenberg was dismissive of de Kooning because the latter refused to embrace pure abstraction; CG interpreted this as the same kind of conservatism displayed by Picasso when he turned away from Cubism and returned to the figure. At the time, this argument mattered, because abstract painting was fighting for an identity distinct from 19th century beaux-arts representational painting. But fast forward sixty or so years to now, and the idea of pure abstraction doesn't matter much, and now one can get a good look at de Koonings without the issues of his day muddying the the water. de Kooning, from an interview in 1951:

"I'm not interested in 'abstracting' or taking things out or reducing painting to design, form, line and color. I paint this way because I can keep putting more and more things in - drama, anger, pain, love, a figure, a horse, my ideas about space."

De Kooning understood the ideas that were in the air at the time. He chose the ones that were useful to him and rejected the ones he had no use for. He mixed these together with his influences from the the recent and distant past, and most importantly added the force of an intensely personal vision of how one should paint. I think that the contemporary painter, trying to figure out how to proceed in the impossibly complex art scene of the early twenty-first century, could learn a lot from this approach.

Plus, I like an abstract artist who isn't afraid to paint a horse. Look for a few more de Kooning posts before the show comes down.

42" x 66," Four Ways

2011-12-29T16:18:00.003-05:00

The Met, 12/24/11, pt. 5 of 5

2011-12-28T22:09:00.003-05:00

Photographs by Jdub.

Sam Rivers, 1923-2011

2011-12-27T21:57:00.000-05:00

The Met, 12/24/11, pt. 4 of 5

2011-12-27T07:31:00.002-05:00

Photographs by Jdub.

The Met, 12/24/11, pt. 3 of 5

2011-12-26T17:16:00.003-05:00

Photographs by Jdub.

The Met, 12/24/11, pt. 2 of 5

2011-12-25T07:08:00.002-05:00

Photographs by Jdub.

The Met, 12/24/11, pt. 1 of 5

2011-12-24T19:39:00.002-05:00

Photographs by Jdub.

Paintings I Like, pt. 73

2011-12-17T19:50:00.004-05:00

Pierre Bonnard, The Terrace at Vernonnet, 1939. Oil on canvas, 58" x 77"

Bonnard never tried his hand at abstraction, but helped himself to the motifs one might find in European abstract painting after Cubism and Mondrian. Look at the grid structure of this picture, built with blocks of complementary yellow and violet. I've seen this picture at the Met a hundred times and never tire of it.

Hue Circles

2011-12-11T16:12:00.001-05:00

Ows Posters: Collect 'em, Trade 'em With Your Friends!

2011-12-09T17:45:00.004-05:00

Click here for the whole enchilada.

Paintings I Like, pt. 72

2011-12-07T21:22:00.008-05:00

Top: James Rosenquist, The Swimmer in the Econo-mist (Painting 2), 1997. Oil on canvas, 138" x 48.' Bottom: Robert Ryman, Surface Veil II, 1970. Oil and blue chalk on canvas, 12' x 12."

This is a real odd couple, I know. But as I've said all along, the Paintings I Like series has no aspirations toward cohesion or grand narrative - the only hard rule is that I have to have seen the pictures live (not just in reproduction).

I recently found myself in the upper 80's by Central Park with a few hours to kill and did something I haven't done for years - went in to the Guggenheim. As I was circling the unbelievably stupid Maurizio Cattelan retrospective I quickly remembered why I'd sworn the place off. Awful building, motorcycles, Armani, Norman Rockwell, and now, soap-on-a-rope.

I was trying to think of a convincing reason to ask for my $18 back, but then I wandered in to some of the side galleries. Oh yes, I recalled, there was a time when you could go see art at this place, and they still had some pretty wonderful examples off to the sides.

A small exhibition called "Pop Icons" prominently featured the gigantic 48' Rosenquist pictured above, painted well after the Pop era. The conversation about Pop tends to be ruled by Warhol and Lichtenstein, but in my estimation Rosenquist is looking bigger and taller with each passing year. Like W. and L., he dealt with issues of beauty in banality and the banality of commercialism and commercial notions of beauty and any other combinations you might want to come up with. He added the big scale of advertising, not surprisingly, because he cut his teeth painting big scale ads in Time Square.

But for all his bright colors and big size, he brought a slyness and subtlty that I just don't find in Brillo boxes and comic book panels. In the Rosenquist, there's all kinds of painting stuff to enjoy as I slowly ingest whatever messages there are to be ingested about the nature of commercial imagery. And this sugar-coating is hardly besides the point, indeed, that's the way that real popular imagery works - the punchline with the latter being that you're supposed to buy something you don't need. Contrast this to the full-frontal didacticism of many Warhols and virtually all Lichtensteins.

Another special exhibition which was dedicated to monochromes included the Ryman pictured above (along with another from the same series). I have to say that Robert Ryman is an artist I find endlessly dull and never imagined including in P.IL. - I mean, I haven't gotten to Rembrandt or Vermeer yet. But I call 'em as I see 'em, and this picture kind of knocked me out. It was among the first Rymans I've encountered that was actually a painting as opposed to some kind of comment/critique/meditation on the subject.

It has a soft, atmospheric space, like a painterly version of Malevich' White on White and an exquisitely subtle framing element that gives it just enough structure and wholeness - it feels expansive and expanding, but at the same time complete within its boundaries. I consider Rothko to be the master of that last bit, but this Ryman can easily compete. I may be hard-headed and opinionated, but I really love it when a painting can change my opinion about a particular artist.

I also had a chance to catch up with some Cezanne and Manet pictures from the Guggenheim's permanent collection that I haven't seen since I stopped going. All in all, well worth $18 even if I had to corkscrew around hanging gardens of foolishness in order to see it.

Paintings I Like, pt. 71

2011-11-29T22:25:00.002-05:00

From the top: Homage to the Square: Young, 1951-52, Homage to the Square: Frontal – Forward, 1970, Homage to the Square: Precinct, 1951, Homage to the Square: Dilated, 1969, Homage to the Square: Enfolding, 1965, Homage to the Square: On Near Sky, 1963, Homage to the Square: Frontal Backing, 1970, Homage to the Square: Soft Spoken, 1969, Homage to the Square: Green Promise, 1956.

I was at the Met this past weekend, and saw this marvelous group of Josef Albers' "Homage to the Square" paintings. They were so beautiful, so poetic, so varied.

I know that in the harsh light of much art theory of the last 40 years, these paintings are considered the height of academic art. But history's wheel is constantly turning, and those who would consider these paintings academic have not spent much time in the academy of late. From my little perch in academia, the discussions I hear are about identity, relational aesthetics and democratization, sustainability, mapping, performance, video, and, most surprisingly, institutional critique. Mastery of color and scale is discussed very little.

These pictures are not about color theory, they're about the belief that color can convey varied emotional content, and can do so in a more fundamental and profound way than text, narrative or representation ever could.

Oh, Well...

2011-11-27T19:01:00.002-05:00

Click on owsposters.tumblr.com for more.

owsposters.tumblr.com

2011-11-24T07:50:00.002-05:00

For more great stuff, click on owsposters.tumblr.com.

Crowd Control

2011-11-23T12:11:00.003-05:00

Paul Motian, 1931-2011

2011-11-22T17:27:00.001-05:00

Saturation Point, London, November 2011

2011-11-21T21:13:00.002-05:00

Execution-Style

2011-11-19T22:25:00.000-05:00

Sopa Sucks

2011-11-16T13:20:00.004-05:00

Apparently, placing sensible restrictions on Wall Street activities counts as big government, but using Chinese-style censorship tactics on the internet does not. Click here to learn about and to protest this especially egregious example of "it ain't fascism if we do it."

OWS Evicted from Zuccotti Park

2011-11-15T06:42:00.006-05:00

Tuesday, 11/15/11, at Zuccotti Park:

3:36 a.m: Kitchen tent reported teargassed. Police moving in with zip cuffs.
3:33 a.m: Bulldozers moving in
3:16 a.m: Occupiers linking arms around riot police
3:15 a.m: NYPD destroying personal items. Occupiers prevented from leaving with their possessions.
3:13 a.m: NYPD deploying sound cannon
3:08 a.m: Heard on livestream: "they're bringing in the hoses."
3:05 a.m: NYPD cutting down trees in Liberty Square
2:55 a.m: NYC council-member Ydanis Rodríguez arrested and bleeding from head.
2:44 a.m: Defiant occupiers barricaded Liberty Square kitchen
2:44 a.m: NYPD destroys OWS Library. 5,000 donated books in dumpster.
2:42 a.m: Brooklyn Bridge confirmed closed
2:38 a.m: 400-500 marching north to Foley Square
2:32 a.m: All subways but R shut down
2:29 a.m: Press helicopters evicted from airspace. NYTimes reporter arrested.
2:22 a.m: Frontpage coverage from New York Times
2:15 a.m: Occupiers who have been dispersed are regrouping at Foley Square
2:10 a.m: Press barred from entering Liberty Square
2:07 a.m: Pepper spray deployed -- reports of at least one reporter sprayed
2:03 a.m: Massive Police Presence at Canal and Broadway
1:43 a.m: Helicopters overhead.
1:38 a.m: Unconfirmed reports of snipers on rooftops.
1:34 a.m: CBS News Helicopter Livestream
1:27 a.m: Unconfirmed reports that police are planning to sweep everyone.
1:20 a.m: Subway stops are closed.
1:20 a.m: Brooklyn bridge is closed.
1:20 a.m: Occupiers chanting "This is what a police state looks like."
1:20 a.m: Police are in riot gear.
1:20 a.m: Police are bringing in bulldozers.

Saturation Point, London, Nov. 14-26

2011-11-13T18:12:00.003-05:00

If you find yourself in London, next week, make sure to visit a group exhibition called "Saturation Point" at The Gallery on the Corner (click the invitation above for a hi-res version). "Big Stick, pictured below, is included in the show.

Click here to see the e-catalog in pdf format.

60" x 48"

2011-11-12T19:51:00.002-05:00

Oops

2011-11-10T18:06:00.000-05:00

The 99% Have Spoken

2011-11-09T22:09:00.005-05:00

From today's New York Times:

Voters Defeat Many G.O.P.-Sponsored Measures

Voters turned a skeptical eye toward conservative-backed measures across the country Tuesday, rejecting an anti-labor law in Ohio, an anti-abortion measure in Mississippi and a tightening of voting rights in Maine.

Even in Arizona, voters turned out of office the chief architect of that state’s controversial anti-immigration law. State Senator Russell Pearce, a Republican power broker and a former sheriff’s deputy known for his uncompromising style, was a hero to the Tea Party Movement and apart from his anti-immigration efforts, he had introduced numerous bills to nullify federal laws.

Click here to read the full text and click here to read to read about the defeat of the anti-union law in Ohio.

Take that, motherfuckers! The 99% are too real!

OWS: NYC to DC

2011-11-08T22:13:00.006-05:00

Occupy Wall St. is hitting the road tomorrow for a two week march from NYC to Washington, DC. They hope to arrive just in time for the Congressional Super-Committee's deadline for a deficit reduction plan. The Republicans are adament about keeping Bush's millionaire tax cuts in place, and the Democrats seem likely to cave on the issue - Obama signed them back in to law just in time for the holidays last year.

Drosselmeyer!

2011-11-06T19:53:00.001-05:00

Paulie's Picks, The BC Classic, 11/5/11

2011-11-04T17:37:00.003-04:00

With all of this talk about Occupying Wall St., I've been sorely ignoring my favorite game. This weekend the Breeder's Cup is at Churchill Downs again, and the big event, the G1 Breeder's Cup Classic at a mile-and-a-quarter, will go off tomorrow night at 7:00 EST (last year's BC Classic is shown above).

It's a wide open affair, with Uncle Mo installed as the morning line favorite. He still has his backers, but to me that horse has the look of a money burner; his victory over three other shaky starters in the Kelso at Belmont on Oct. 10 did little to raise my opinion of him. He's marooned way out in the number 12 slot, too, which does little to increase my confidence. So where does one put one's dough?

There's no shortage of speed in this particular contest - Uncle Mo, Game on Dude, and To Honor and Serve will jump out to the front end and might be joined up there by Prayer for Relief and Stay Thirsty. I see most of these fellas wilting in the stretch run. If this were a claimer or mid-level allowance race, I'd be looking for a longshot closer to capitalize on a pace meltdown. But I don't see that happening here - there are some very classy looking mid-pack stalkers involved, some at better prices than others. For example:

Havre de Grace is tough-looking filly with the right running style and a hot rider in Ramon Dominguez. She showed the boys a thing or two in the Woodward at Saratoga this summer, but at 3-1 the risk/reward ratio doesn't really do it for me.

2010 Belmont Stakes winner Drosselmeyer is kind of an outsider here, but a repeat of his Belmont close, or even a reprise of his game close for second in the 2011 Jockey Club Gold Cup is just the kind of run that could win this for him. At 15-1, you're getting a nice price for the large-ish risk.

Flat Out is a powerful closer (who beat Drosselmeyer in JC Gold Cup) but he might find himself a little too far back and stuck in traffic when it's time to make his move. Still, 6-1 is a good price.

The afore-mentioned Stay Thirsty can stalk or run out to the front. His big G1 win in the Travers came on the front end and if he tries that here I think he's cooked. But if the jock handles him correctly he's a legit threat at 12-1.

The horse that I'm finding most interesting is So You Think from New Zealand. Yes, he's a turf horse, but his running style is perfect, and he ships incredibly well - he's won big races right off a plane or truck in several countries over the last year or so. And 5-1 is a good price; if that drops too much I might skip, but I suspect people will be scared off by the turf thing and I might be able to catch him at 6-1 or even a little better.

So how about this for the big money trifecta in the BC Classic?:

5 - So You Think
10 - Havre de Grace
9 - Stay Thirsty

Tune in tomorrow night for video.

Amen, Sister, Amen

2011-11-03T20:04:00.002-04:00

Keith Olbermann on Oakland

2011-11-02T19:53:00.001-04:00

Bill Maher on OWS

2011-11-01T17:35:00.001-04:00

The Return of Mr. PC

2011-10-28T19:09:00.001-04:00

Julian Stanczak on Geoform

2011-10-27T18:37:00.003-04:00

Julian Stanczak, Line-Up, 1978. Acrylic on canvas, 50" x 70."

Julie Karabenick of Geoform.net has just put up a marvelous interview with the great and generally under-appreciated Julian Stanczak. The illustrations alone make it worth a visit, but don't just look at the pictures - his biography is as interesting as his work and insights about painting. Nice work Julie!

Occupy Oakland

2011-10-26T18:53:00.004-04:00

Oakland police attached a group of Occupy protestors last night, fracturing the skull of an Iraq War veteran who was apparently struck in the head with a tear-gas canister.

The most recent updates indicate that the former marine is under sedation in a Bay Area hospital awaiting treatment.

Geraldo Slinks Away

2011-10-25T18:16:00.000-04:00

OWS, Times Square Edition

2011-10-24T14:04:00.002-04:00

Studio, 9/15/11, pt. 3 of 3

2011-10-23T20:09:00.002-04:00

Studio, 9/15/11, pt. 2 of 3

2011-10-22T19:41:00.002-04:00

Now Back to Our Regularly Scheduled Programming

2011-10-21T19:43:00.005-04:00

We dropped everything here at No Hassle at the Castle in recent weeks to give daily coverage to the Occupy Wall St. protests. The rationale was that if big media was going to ignore the the protests, as it did for the first two weeks, then small media had to lend a hand - if every blog, Twitter account, Facebook page, and so on was talking about the protests, and more importantly, showing the pictures and video, then big media would start to look pretty silly pretending nothing was happening.

Well now the protests are too big to fail. They're nationwide and global, and big media has grudgingly realized it can't go on covering Kate Middleton's new royal responsibilities and other equally pressing stories at the expense of OWS. So here at the Castle, we can go back back to mixing in some of the other subjects that the title of the blog alludes to.

Here are a series of studio snaps I intended to put up in September before regularly scheduled programming was preempted:

Michael Moore on OWS

2011-10-20T23:20:00.001-04:00

Disciplinary Action for Tony Baloney

2011-10-19T19:54:00.002-04:00

Tony Baloney, the NYPD deputy inspector who liberally applied pepper spray in order to neutralize the threat posed by two unarmed young girls who were just standing around, is now facing harsh disciplinary action from within the department. He might actually lose ten vacation days!

If I were one of those internal affairs guys, I would be looking over my shoulder and covering my eyes - Inspector Baloney knows who you are!

An Excellent Point

2011-10-18T17:41:00.001-04:00

White Shirt Brutality, 10/14/11

2011-10-17T08:52:00.001-04:00

Occupy Times Square, 10/15/11

2011-10-16T20:29:00.001-04:00

Eviction Postponed!

2011-10-14T08:40:00.002-04:00

The Bloomberg administration has canceled the eviction of the Occupy Wall St. Protestors from Zuccotti Park, which was scheduled to begin at 7:00 am today. Too big to fail indeed! Another victory for OWS!

Bernie on Occupy WS, pt. 2

2011-10-13T17:11:00.002-04:00

In other news, President Obama and the house and senate republicans had a rare love-in, agreeing overwhelingly that what America needs right now are three more Nafta-like trade agreements - with Panama, Columbia, and South Korea. Apparently the only way to repair our economy is to send even more manufacturing jobs abroad.

Bernie Sanders on Occupy Wall St.

2011-10-11T17:27:00.002-04:00

Bernie Sanders is thankfully getting some airtime on behalf of Occupy Wall St. (click here for the Wolf Blitzer segment). His recent Op-Ed in the Huffington Post cuts right to the heart of the matter - a financial entity that is too big to fail is too big to exist. The piece is a must-read, and here's an excerpt:

"If a financial institution is too big to fail, it is too big to exist. Today, the six largest financial institutions have assets equal to more than 60 percent of GDP. The four largest banks in this country issue two thirds of all credit cards, half of all mortgages, and hold nearly 40 percent of all bank deposits. Incredibly, after we bailed out these big banks because they were "too big to fail," three out of the four largest are now even bigger than they were before the financial crisis began. It is time to take a page from Teddy Roosevelt and break up these behemoths so that their failure will no longer lead to economic catastrophe and to create competition in our financial system."

Zuccotti Park by Jdub, 10/7/11, pt. 2 of 2

2011-10-09T21:24:00.004-04:00

Zuccotti Park by Jdub, 10/7/11, pt. 1 of 2

2011-10-08T17:56:00.004-04:00

More Police Brutality, 10/5/11

2011-10-07T16:35:00.001-04:00

Occupy Wall St., 10/5/11, As Shot By Mr. DB

2011-10-06T21:39:00.002-04:00

Occupation Blues

2011-10-05T20:00:00.001-04:00

Occupy Wall St. Crushes Fox

2011-10-04T22:15:00.000-04:00

Hopeless

2011-10-03T22:03:00.004-04:00

We interrupt our coverage of the Occupy Wall St. protests to draw attention to a related story. Many of my friends and readers know that I like to say unkind things about Republicans, particularly their economic policies. But I consistently draw the ire and frustration of many of my liberal friends for pointing out that the Democrats are not much better.

I'm not a big fan of Bill Clinton for a variety of reasons (none having to do with Monica Lewinsky), but the big one is definitely NAFTA. Thousands of factories fled the country as soon as they were presented with the option to relocate to a place with no EPA, no unions and no minimum wage. We have nearly 10% unemployment, and will continue to see joblessness at those levels because the domestic manufacturing base has been systematically decimated by public policy that made it legal and preferable to relocate factories abroad. Those jobs are never coming back to America. Ever.

Well guess what? The Obama administration is trying to ram through three more trade agreements - with South Korea, Colombia, and Panama - that will result in even fewer jobs in domestic manufacturing. And here's the kicker: He's counting on Republican support because congressional democrats are against it.

Spare some change?

Occupy Wall St., 10/2/11

2011-10-03T13:51:00.004-04:00

Occupywallst.org

2011-10-02T08:04:00.005-04:00

The peaceful but resolute Wall Street protests have been going on for about two weeks now, with thousands or participants. But if you watch or read major media, you'll see barely a mention. The most persistent mainstream coverage of the thoroughly shocking incident involving a big fat cop spraying young women with mace was on the Jon Stewart show.

If Sarah Palin addresses 250 people at an Elks lodge in Paduca, major news outlets show up with cameras and analysts. But with the Wall St. protests, the silence has been eerie. If big media will not disseminate this information, it's up to small media, so No Hassle at the Castle will be showing the latest video from protests daily until it ends.

For up to the minute info, log on to occupywallst.org. For more video, go to Youtube and search occupy wall street.

Flat Out!

2011-10-02T06:42:00.001-04:00

Paulie's Picks, Belmont, 10/1/11

2011-09-30T19:24:00.006-04:00

It's been a rough go of late for New York, for America, and for the west generally. Policies which cater to wealthy individuals, corporations, banks, and insurance companies, pursued strenuously and without interruption for over 30 years, have left a staggering number of Americans jobless, impoverished, homeless, hopeless. A tiny fraction of the population lives in luxury beyond its wildest dreams, with wealth not generated from innovation and ingenuity, but from institutionalized gambling in which losing bets are covered by taxpayers. The Tea Party is rabidly pursuing an intensification of these draconian policies, even though most of its membership is victimized by them. When unarmed college students dare to engage in peaceful protests, they are corralled with nets like animals, and sprayed with mace. Obama's promise for a fairer society has turned out to be another Clintonian center-right sophistry. New York City now has a staggering 20% poverty rate. The official national unemployment figures are nearly 10%, but these numbers do not include people who have stopped looking for work, or work part-time. One-third of American homeowners owe more on their homes than the homes are worth, and the people who engineered the policies that led to this disaster were not jailed, but paid bonuses. Even more surprisingly, many had and still have jobs in the Obama Administration! Iraq and Afghanistan drone on, Guantanamo is still open for business. The U.S. recently sent arms aid to Bahrain, even as the Bahraini courts handed out lengthy prison sentences to doctors for treating protestors shot by police. The entire European Union is being dragged down by the debt crises of its weakest members. America is dwindling, withering, slowly rotting from within, like Rome and so many other empires before.

I guess I'll go to the track. Tomorrow is the Jockey Club Gold Cup at Belmont, and Stay Thirsty, coming off a strong victory in the Travers at Saratoga (shown above), looks good. Still, three G1 victories in a row is a lot to ask, so I'm going to vote for the number two choice in the morning line; Flat Out, who had a couple of close seconds in big races at Saratoga this summer.

And remember, when things seem their darkest, you should try and think about something else. Here are Paulie's Picks for tomorrow's card at Belmont Park:

1st race:
3 - Mississippi Duel
12 - Unbridled Command
11 - Parachute Coney

2nd race:
5 - Indy Sea
2 - Two Months Rent
7 - Dendrite

3rd race -
5 - Love to Run
6 - Teeth of the Dog
2 - How Do I Win

4th race:
7 - Twojohnsandajack
6 - Quick Recovery
4 - Dahess

5th race, The Flower Bowl Invitational, G1:
8 - Stacelita
4 - Aruna
2 - Dynaslew

6th race, The Joe Hirsch Turf Classic Invitational, G1:
1 - Cape Blanco
5 - Winchester
2 - Teaks North

7th race, The Vosburgh Invitational, G1:
8 - Trappe Shot
6 - Big Drama
4 - Euroears

8th race, The Kelso Handicap, G2:
2 - Jackson Bend
3 - Uncle Mo
1 - Jersey Town

9th race, The Beldame Invitational, G1:
5 - Havre de Grace
2 - Royal Delta
1 - Life At Ten

10th race, The Jockey Club Gold Cup, G1:
1 - Flat Out
4 - Stay Thirsty
5 - Drosselmeyer

11th race:
6 - Knock Quietly
1 - Polaris Dream
4 - Windafull

Tune in tomorrow night for video and results.

Protestors Pepper Sprayed on Wall St.

2011-09-29T17:07:00.000-04:00

Santorum on Gay Soldiers

2011-09-24T22:20:00.001-04:00

Paul on Henri Mag

2011-09-17T20:10:00.002-04:00

My good friend, the painter, blogger, thinker, and generally swell guy Mark Stone put up an extremely kind profile of my work on his consistently compelling Henri Art Magazine.

Thanks so much, Mark!

Smart Cyber-People Rule

2011-09-17T19:57:00.002-04:00

As I said in my last post, Blogger added a feature that I hate: pictures now load in "Lightbox" format (like on Facebook) and there's no way to disable it. I've spent a lot of today deciding where to move my blog, and haven't ruled this out. But in the meantime, a smart blogger came up with an html tag that defeats this dreaded feature, so No Hassle will be able to stay put for a little while longer.

If you need the tag for you blog, click here or click the image on top of this post.

A New Castle, Suggestions Please!

2011-09-17T06:53:00.005-04:00

Blogger.com has recently made some updates, one of which I'm very unhappy about. If you click a picture now, it pops up in "lightbox" format (very similar to Facebook). It seems that they're not going to allow users to opt out of this feature.

I'm pretty sure I'm going to move the Castle, and I'd really like some suggestions from the bloggers out there - which hosts do you use and how do you like them? I think Wordpress is a no-go for me because of their strict limits on html tags. But what about Tumblr, or Typepad, or...?

Please either leave a comment, or contact me at the e-mail link on the right, or send me a Facebook message with your thoughts.

Thanks!

p

What's Paulie Thinking?

2011-09-11T20:47:00.003-04:00

Sorry for the lack of posts lately - school's back in session. Here are some things I've been thinking about, and hope to elaborate on in the not too distant future:

1. As mentioned in Paintings I Like #70, I've been very preoccupied with 20th century painters who weren't specifically adhering to Modernism (this does not include painters who were merely doing a parody of it). I think the upcoming DeKooning retrospective at MoMA will be a great time to pick this discussion up. I've also been thinking about the '80's painters, Morandi, and the Germans.

2. In 1984, Lyotard pointed out that the easiest way to simulate an avant-garde gesture is to make something that no one can understand. I've seen this strategy quite a lot in the last ten or fifteen years. It's also sparked a secondary industry of mediator-interpreters to help explain all this turgid art to a bewildered viewing public.

3. In 1790, Kant pointed out that the easiest way to simulate originality is to do something strange (pretty prescient for 1790, yes?). This is another strategy I've seen employed quite a lot since the '90's. If I were to sculpt genitals out of Velveeta, it would be fairly original in the strictest sense, but really, who fucking cares?

Two Paintings

2011-09-05T14:54:00.002-04:00

Joe Henderson, "Ask Me Now," 1993

2011-09-03T22:01:00.000-04:00

George Hofmann on artcritical.com

2011-08-31T20:16:00.003-04:00

My friend and teacher, George Hofmann, wrote a nice piece for artcritical.com about the blogs he reads. No Hassle at the Castle was featured, along with Henri Art Magazine, Immaterial-Culture, Two Coats of Paint, and Joanne Matera's Art Blog.

Special thanks to George and David Cohen at Artcritical!

34" x 48"

2011-08-30T16:44:00.002-04:00

Stay Thirsty!

2011-08-28T06:21:00.001-04:00

Paulie's Picks, The Travers Stakes, 8/27/11

2011-08-26T18:23:00.003-04:00

Here in NYC, Mayor Bloomberg is outlining his evacuation plans in case we get really beat up by Hurricane Irene this weekend. But up in Saratoga Springs tomorrow, the forecast is 82 degrees and mostly sunny, a perfect day for the Travers Stakes! My biggest concern for the impending storm is that power and/or cable will be knocked out, preventing me from watching the race, and more importantly, getting my bets in.

The Travers looks competitive this year, and there are some square prices to had in the morning line. I like Coil, who won the Haskell Stakes at Monmouth from off the pace, but can also win on the front end - that kind of versatility is rare. Speed has been playing well at Saratoga this summer, though, and the one pure speed horse is Shackleford (shown above winning the 2011 Preakness). He's opening at a very generous 9-2; I'm assuming that the track handicapper gave him those odds because he's marooned in the outside post, but if Castanon can pilot him over to a nice spot nearer the rail in the early strides, he could run off with this. If he gets bet down to 5-2 or less, I might change my vote, but he's my horse tomorrow. I think Coil will place, and as much as I'd like to round out the Trifecta with a longshot, it's hard to ignore Stay Thirsty's graded stakes resume - he's a narrow favorite, and that's not a bad call (even though I'm not playing him to win). So my trifecta looks like this:

10 - Shackleford
7 - Coil
9 - Stay Thirsty

Also of interest is the return of Uncle Mo in the G1 King's Bishop at 7 furlongs . The colt was the presumed favorite in the 2011 Kentucky Derby, but was sidelined with liver problems after a disappointing third-place finish in the Wood Memorial. The fact that his connections decided to bring him back in this race as opposed to the main attraction seems odd - Uncle Mo is not known as a sprinter and has no graded stakes experience in sprints. I guess they know more about horses than me, but I'm still going to bet the speedy Flashpoint who has a nice spot on the rail and a reasonably generous opening line of 5-2.

Providing I have cable, electricity, and an apartment, I will post results and video tomorrow night.

Paintings I Like, pt. 70

2011-08-24T20:38:00.003-04:00

Cy Twombly, Academy, 1955. Oil-based house paint, lead pencil, colored pencil, and crayon on canvas, 75" x 95."

Cy Twombly, Tiznit, 1953. White lead, oil-based house paint, wax crayon, and lead pencil on canvas, 54" x 75."

Cy Twombly died this past July, and he belonged to a somewhat special category of 20th-century painters that I've been thinking about quite a bit of late: painters who used the language of abstraction, but were not making Modernist paintings.

Taken as a group, they're styles were all over the map, but the common thread (at least in my mind) were refusals, either conscious or unconscious, to abide by one or more of the dogmatic aspects of Modernisn: purity, flatness, pictorial autonomy, utter abstraction, and so on. Feeling weighted down by these things doesn't seem like much of an issue today, but after Cubism and throughout much of the twentieth century, you were risking permanent obscurity with such an approach. Many artists who reached the end of their rope with Kantian purity either dropped abstraction, like Guston, or more commonly dropped painting altogether - many of the early minimalists, and video and performance artists started off as painters.

In Twombly, the language of Ab Ex is still plainly visible, but it's clear even on the most cursory examination that it's not Ab Ex - the calligraphic loops punctuated by bits of actual writing and bathroom graffiti, the strong reference to children's art, the chalkboards, the later flowers, and so on. It's a language not based on rejection of existing norms, but on the personalization of those norms.

Not surprisingly, many of the artists I'm thinking about either didn't live in New York, or, like Twombly, chose not to. In terms of advanced art in the middle of the twentieth Century, Italy (where Twombly spent much of his adult life) was tantamount to Gilligan's Island. But away from the chatter of the New York art community, he was able to develop this highly personal approach.

My roster and thesis for this special list of painters is still a developing entity, but rather that prepare a lengthy essay, I think I'm going to flesh it out a little at a time in the P.IL. series - check back for more.

2011 Spa Recap

2011-08-21T21:18:00.003-04:00

I'm sad to say that I didn't get my annual pilgrimage to Saratoga this year, but thank heavens for internet gambling! I'll still be able to play next Saturday's Travers Stakes, the famous Mid-Summer Derby, from the comfort of home. Tune in for a race analysis later this week.

This seemed like a good time to do a recap of a few of the big stakes races that have taken place at the Spa so far this summer:

On Saturday, July 30, trainer Chad Brown scored his first Grade 1 win as Zagora took down the Diana Stakes at a mile-and-an-eighth on the turf. She loped through a slow pace in mid-pack before unleashing her girl power in the stretch. Javier Castellano was aboard.

The very next race was the Grade 2 Jim Dandy Stakes, and Javier Castellano jumped off Zagora, hopped on to Stay Thirsty, and won in nearly identical style. This puts Stay Thirsty squarely on the Travers hopeful list.

On Saturday, August 6, filly Turbulent Descent made it look easy, winning the Grade 1 Test Stakes by open lengths. The fractions were soft, but she wasn't. David Flores was the pilot.

In the next race, 2011 Met Mile winner Tizway took advantage of a speed duel and cruised to victory in the Grade 1 Whitney Handicap, winning by three-and-a-half lengths. Rajiv Maragh was in the saddle.

And on Saturday, August 13th, Winchester took down the Grade 1 mile-and-a-half Sword Dancer Stakes with true grit, going from last to first in the lane (shown above). Cornelio Velazquez was aboard.

Wow, so much racing! Just typing it all up has me exhausted!

Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, "The Egyptian," 1966

2011-08-20T22:21:00.000-04:00

Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers, "Buhaina's Delight," 1966

2011-08-18T18:30:00.000-04:00

Our Next President?

2011-08-14T15:35:00.003-04:00

Corporations Are People, My Friend

2011-08-11T15:45:00.002-04:00

Magenta for Mr. MZ

2011-08-10T16:07:00.001-04:00

Corio Interview on NY Arts

2011-08-09T16:47:00.004-04:00

There's a short interview with Paul over on NY Arts Magazine. Special thanks to John F. Moore and Jason Stopa for making this happen!

Two German Philosophers Walk Into a Bar...

2011-08-08T21:32:00.002-04:00

Yesterday's post about Kant and the sublime would tend to advance the myth that Kant was an overly serious guy. Not so! At the end of the "Analytic of the Sublime" in the Critique of Judgment (1790), he explains in Kantian detail how jokes work, and provides a few examples from his personal arsenal:

"In the case of jokes (the art of which, just like music, should rather be reckoned as pleasant than beautiful), the play begins with the thoughts which together occupy the body, so far as they admit of sensible expression; and as the understanding stops suddenly short at this presentment, in which it does not find what it expected, we feel the effect of this slackening in the body by the oscillation of the organs, which promotes the restoration of equilibrium and has a favorable influence upon health.

[...]

Suppose this story to be told: An Indian at the table of an Englishman in Surat, when he saw a bottle of Ale opened and all the beer turned into froth and overflowing, testified his great astonishment with many exclamations, When the Englishman asked him, "What is there in this to astonish you so much?" he answered, "I am not at all astonished that it should flow out, but I do wonder how you ever got it in." At this story we laugh, and it gives us hearty pleasure, not because we deem ourselves cleverer than this ignorant man or because of anything in it that we note as satisfactory to the understanding, but because our expectation was strained and then was suddenly dissipated into nothing. Again: The heir of a rich relative wished to arrange for an imposing funeral, but he lamented that he could not properly succeed, "for (said he) the more money I give my mourners to look sad, the more cheerful they look!" When we hear this story we laugh loud, and the reason is that an expectation is suddenly transformed into nothing."

Kant and the Sublime

2011-08-07T18:34:00.004-04:00

At the end of the 18th century, Kant, like Edmund Burke shortly before him, determined that poetry was the greatest art because it had the best ability to evoke a sense of the sublime. Both philosophers reasoned that painting was at a disadvantage in this regard because of the need to faithfully depict real objects in the world. Burke: "To represent an angel in a picture, you can only draw a beautiful young man winged [...]."

Neither could predict abstract painting, though. In his "Analytic of the Sublime" from the Critique of Judgment (1790), Kant's explanation as to why poetry was the greatest art can easily be applied to the best abstract painting:

"It expands the mind by setting the imagination at liberty and by offering, with the limits of a given concept, amid the unbounded variety of possible forms accordant therewith, that which unites the presentment of this concept with a wealth of thought to which no verbal expression is completely adequate, and so rising aesthetically to ideas. It strengthens the mind by making it feel its faculty - free, spontaneous, and independent of natural determination - of considering and judging nature as a phenomenon in accordance with aspects which it does not present in experience either for sense or understanding, and therefore of using it on behalf of, and as a sort of schema for, the supersensible. It plays with illusion, which it produces at pleasure, but without deceiving by it; for it declares its exercise to be mere play, which however can be purposively used by the understanding."

Even Marked Up, Luxury Good Fly Off Shelves

2011-08-05T07:48:00.010-04:00

Nordstrom has a waiting list for a Chanel sequined tweed coat with a $9,010 price. Neiman Marcus has sold out in almost every size of Christian Louboutin “Bianca” platform pumps, at $775 a pair. Mercedes-Benz said it sold more cars last month in the United States than it had in any July in five years.

Even with the economy in a funk and many Americans pulling back on spending, the rich are again buying designer clothing, luxury cars and about anything that catches their fancy. Luxury goods stores, which fared much worse than other retailers in the recession, are more than recovering — they are zooming. Many high-end businesses are even able to mark up, rather than discount, items to attract customers who equate quality with price.

“If a designer shoe goes up from $800 to $860, who notices?” said Arnold Aronson, managing director of retail strategies at the consulting firm Kurt Salmon, and the former chairman and chief executive of Saks.

The above, including the headline, is from a story in the New York Times which ran two days ago, on August 3, 2011.

Since Reagan's first term, U.S. economic policy has aggressively catered to rich people, corporations (with a strong emphasis on defense, pharma, and energy), banks (with a strong emphasis on investment banks) and insurers. Tax cuts and deregulation topped the list of priorities, but direct subsidies, lucrative government contracts, union-busting, and the privatization of drug and space technologies which were researched with public money have also been part of the program.

The rationale has always been that prosperity at the top would result in greater opportunity below. It was called "trickle-down" during Reagan's campaign and presidency, but it was also called "voodoo economics" by George Bush, Sr. while he was still running against Reagan for the 1980 Republican nomination. Neither of these terms (especially the latter) are in use now, but the trickle-down argument was the exact same one that John Boehner and the senate Republicans used during the recent debt ceiling debate.

To be clear: trickle-down had no historical precedent. It was implemented based on a purely theoretical model starting in Reagan's first term and continued relentlessly through Bush Sr.'s presidency. There were few rollbacks in the Clinton years - yes, he raised marginal tax rates, but he also signed Nafta and the overturning of Glass Steagall, paving the way for the mortgage mess. Bush Jr. picked up deregulation and tax reduction like a man possessed, and much to the distress of the political left, Obama has done little to stop the bleeding.

An economic theory with no precedent was sold to America thirty-one years, and what has been the result? Four major stock market convulsions, each resulting in massive job losses and devastated retirement accounts. Real wages at historic lows. Massive unemployment. A systematic destruction of the nation's manufacturing base and export of jobs to countries where wages are even lower. The Tea Party, who think they can improve the situation with more tax cuts and deregulation. And, for a fortunate few, $860 shoes.

I started writing this before the stock market began yesterday's plunge. If this turns out to be more than just a correction, it will be the fifth stock market panic since Reagan's first term, and the resulting pain will, as always, be felt most acutely by the middle class and the poor.

Obama, can you spare some hope and change?

Grey, 48" x 48"

2011-08-03T14:45:00.001-04:00

Broke?

2011-07-31T07:55:00.008-04:00

The wrangling over the debt ceiling is still dragging on in Washington, but the Democrats and Republicans are much closer than they care to admit in this pitched battle - the GOP wants to end all social spending, and the Democrats just want to end lots of it.

The lion's share of the deficit that the Republicans are screaming about comes mainly from the loss of revenue caused by the Bush tax cuts - not profligate federal spending, and not even from the bailout. Obama, of course, can't point this out with any zeal, because he signed an extension of the Bush tax cuts just in time for Christmas last year.

And the mainstream media are like magpies, repeating the same stale lines coming from congressional leadership as though it represented the full spectrum of the debate. Well it don't.

The Progressive Caucus in the House presented a sensible budget that wouldn't strangle the elderly, school kids, and working people, and which chip away at the deficit over the next ten years. This received essentially no coverage in the mainstream media (including the NY Times), and did not even come close to a floor vote in the House. Are you surprised?

Click here to read "The People's Budget" in pdf format (and click here to read a summary from the CPC web site). In spite of the name, it's not a crazy commie tract - it just put's the concerns of working people ahead of millionaires, corporations, and wars. That doesn't sound so bad, does it?

We're Back Live

2011-07-27T17:03:00.001-04:00

George Hofmann on Fractured Space, pt. 2

2011-07-18T18:20:00.004-04:00

George Hofmann, Duccio Fragment #8 (left) and Duccio Fragment #9 (right), 2011. Both acrylic on board, 30" x 24."

For a number of years now, painter George Hofmann has perceived a new kind of pictorial space beginning to crystallize in painting which he refers to as "Fractured Space." He published his first description of Fractured Space here on No Hassle at the Castle in the fall of 2010, and has since fielded many questions about the differences between Fractured Space and the faceted space of Cubism. I received the following reflections on the subject in an e-mail from George last month:

I am forwarding something I wrote to Arthur Yanoff, who was asked by Ken Moffett why Fractured Space was different than Cubism. And I got kick started by Mark Stone's Courbet article, which I thought was really excellent!

I think the main thing about what has changed is the centrality of Cubism – the point of view of the artist, and ergo, the viewer - versus the diffusion and increasingly all-over, up and down, in and out quality of FS. Clearly, to me, Pollock was the precursor here, as were Newman and others, and clearly, again to me, why Jules Olitski and Ken Noland especially were so important in the development of this.

The other point is a more elusive one: the prettiness that was a legacy of 19th century painting still echoes in painting today - the desire for harmony in composition (Renaissance) and even the appeal, through the everyday-ness of the subject in Impressionism, still hangs on as a guiding idea and an unspoken foundation of art. People still make paintings that appeal, that are composed to balance, to be attractive, etc. We all do!

But to shift the base of composition away from this is difficult, because it involves going against a long tide of what we believe to be right. I still find that wish resonating within me, and know that it is so ingrained as to be almost unerasable.

I think the Cubists still had the old idea about Appeal (only the Expressionists and a few others didn't quite) but, because this idea is so deeply ingrained, it is a very hard one to shake, and we only see it loosening, somewhat, in FS, in part because of the diffusion in images - and this is all to the good.

But it takes a fundamental, psychological shift, I think, to really change - and as I also said to Arthur, I think we are seeing a lot of shifting point-of-view in Installation, because it is a kind of proving ground for art. The much more serious painting and sculpture are bedrock, and slower to change, because when they do it is seismic. I think it is in the nature of sculpture and painting - the two mainstays of art - to seek great themes or subjects; after all, what befits bedrock?

A good example of a seismic shift was the development of genre painting in the Netherlands. What brought this about is a bit of a mystery. Was it just competition, or the desire to bring in a new theme, or was it the result of different experiences – not the high-flown Italian experience of the religious deeply embedded in the historical. Add to this the new-found wealth and power in the North. Who knows what alchemy was at work? But it brought about something new in painting, an intensity and a focus, and a physical sensuality quite different from that of the Italians.

These things take a long time to cook up - decades, at least. But I think there is sufficient generation for real momentum in society now. I am seeing the recent past much more historically myself, and see, increasingly, how very different now is from then. You have only to look at a Noland to know it is not possible now.

You Have Nothing to Lose But Your Chains

2011-07-16T19:38:00.006-04:00

Regular readers of "No Hassle at the Castle" may have noticed the small number of posts so far in July. I'm teaching every day until the end of the month, and I basically only have the energy to fall down when I get home. Things will be back on track soon.

In the meantime, I stumbled across this conception of the capitalist layer cake, published in 1911 by the Industrial Worker - please dig it. Little has changed in 100 years, except for the obvious fact that there is very little industrial production in the U.S.A. anymore.

John Coltrane w/Eric Dolphy, "Impressions," 1961

2011-07-10T15:17:00.001-04:00

Cy Twombly, 1928-2011

2011-07-06T07:44:00.003-04:00

Sunday, 6/26/11, pt. 3 of 3

2011-06-29T17:48:00.003-04:00