There is something about blue. What is it? A whole lotta something. Yes, even in this era of Bluetooth® and Blu-Ray™, I realized this as I spun a latent mix of New Order’s Blue Monday (I’ll never forget the 12″ wax cover art resembling a floppy disc or something neo-geo retro-futuristic). There was Miles Davis‘ indellible classic Kind of Blue, the Jet of choice, the toilet paper toting Blue Man Group, Yves Klein’s (IKB) inventive use of color, songs about the moon, G.I.s, a bayou, and suede shows, and of course the whole genre called the blues. And that obscure last film by Derek Jarman, as a filmmaker who had literally lost his vision. It makes me think about the lil’ dashed lines of DNA testing, and how it crept effortlessly and ambiguously into new drawing work (as in Species I and II), or like color bars in tones rather than primaries. It makes me think of the primaries (the red and the blue, if you know what I mean).

I GOT THE BLUES AGAIN
wav.2 (2007) has found a home. This large-scale photographic work (60×42) and particular favorite, went to a private collector this week. It’s a unique image (I am not much for editions, yeah - one of “those” photographers).The work in various shades of blue distinctively abstracts advertising campaigns of major corporations, in a montage using the power of nature (water). Of course the work is not about this blatant bastardization, rather it shifts the intent/focus of the original to simplify the subliminal macro of the everyday, focusing instead on a curvature of lines with an almost decorative mirror effect. Its title integrates my larger field interest in how sound and image are often experientially seamless, even when absent from each others’ sources, retaining a certain ambience. The two pieces I shipped to Artists Space, Plexus 8.0 and 8.1 use various shades of layered blue inks and gouache to dissect a supercollider in space. The work I am donating to the Portland Art Center in its time of need (you can do your part through a special WWeek promotion) is called The Forest (for the trees) and also employs the blues in a field of white and repetitious criss-crossing circles.

WHAT’S IN A COLOR?
You tell me. In this season of colors (”Blue Christmas” comes to mind), is it just another primary color? Huh? What do you think?

“This is only a test…” (testing the waters so to speak)

wave_test (image taken from Cracked Compass, w/Gallery Homeland)

This entry was posted on Monday, November 19th, 2007 at 6:11 am and is filed under Sights. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.