SABATO, EL VEINTIUNO DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
The new City Centre casino has plenty of art around the building, also you can get a guide from Centerpiece Gallery just down by the Mandarin Oriental, to the south of City Centre.
By the Elvis Theatre is a huge painting by Julian Schnabel, titled Zeus, 1992. Because of it's size, there aren't too many places to put it so it's a bit cramped where it is, but great to see, nonetheless. Also in the collection is a large canoe sculpture by Nancy Graves, a fantastic Frank Stella mid sixties geometric shaped canvas in at the reservatino desk and three Tony Cragg sculptures in the atrium.

VIERNES, EL VEINTE DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Yesterday, JK and I went to the new City Centre on the strip to look at part of their art collection. City Centre is pretty new, with parts of it still in completion. The two man high-rises instantly reminded me of walking into the town square of Bologna in 2004. I'll post other pics of some of the art tomorrow.

JUEVES, EL DEICINUEVE DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
An installation shot of part of the Calendar Girls set at the Rayner Brothers Gallery in Whanganui, New Zealand. You can view all twelve calendar artworks on their website here and see the rest of the installation photographs here.
From left to right: Maiangi Waitai, Anthony Behrens, JK Russ, Peter Ireland, Mark Rayner, Matt Couper, Andrea Gardner, Paul Maseyk and Mark Braunias.
Each work is for sale and calendars are available for purchase at NZD$19.95 each.

MARTES, EL DIECISIETE DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ

I received an email yesterday informing me that my painting, 'Half and Half' has been accepted as a finalist for the 19th Annual Wallace Art Awards 2010. Although a 'finalist', the works are sent up to Auckland for a second judging round, where a selection is made to decide which works go in the touring exhibition, which is shown in Auckland at the Pah homstead, then at The New Dowse in Lower Hutt, near Wellington. The other works go into a Salon des Refuses, also at the PAh homestead. Over the past 12 years, my work have alternated between being rejected, being in the touring show and the Salon des Refuses. I even won a runner-up prize in 2008, which was a great surprise.
We'll just have to wait and see what happens this time.

LUNES, EL DIECISEIS DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
One blog I look at religiously every morning is Anonymous Works. Anonymous by name and nature, this mysterious blogger posts quirky object every day, gleaned from past and present auction, web-based antiques stores. Highly recommended!

DOMINGO, EL DIECICINCO DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Here's a link to a Radio New Zealand mp3 interview with US/Christchurch-based artist, writer and teacher, Roger Boyce (you can view his blog here). I don't know Boyce, nor have met him, but have a couple of friends that have been taught by him.
I do like the way the paintings set up quirky narratives individually and as a whole and I'm always drawn to works that talk of painting and the artworld and what it is to be a painter.

VIERNES, EL TRECE DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ

a photograph of new Rob McLeod paintings straight from the studio: (L to R) 'Constructed Chief, Collaged Cowboy and Bandit Tweety' oil on corrugated cardboard and plywood, articulated pieces. To see more of Rob's work: http://www.paulnache.com/artists/rob-mcleod.aspx

JUEVES, EL DOCE DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
My drawing of Mike J Hex (featured here in this post) has been put up on the Phantom Billboards website.
Thanks Jim, Robin and Brett!

MIERCOLES, EL ONCE DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
J K Russ' Calendar Girl, Miss January, now on show at the Rayner Brothers Gallery in Whanganui, New Zealand.
More information on the work can be found by clicking on the link above. This work shows the development of Jo's work from some of the collage works exhibited in 2008. But they also pick up on earlier monochromatic collage works developed in Auckland in 1998.

MARTES, EL DIEZ DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
The official invitation for Nautical at Thermostat Art Gallery, opening this Friday.
Click on the image to see the other artists in the exhibition.

LUNES, EL NUEVE DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Hello All,

Just to let you know I have two new scrimshaw works featured in a new group exhibition, NAUTICAL at Thermostat Art Gallery in Palmerston North, New Zealand.
The opening is this Saturday the 14th of August, 5.30 - 7pm, and runs until the 2nd of September 2010
The two works can be viewed in 3D at my website, click on the titles below to view them:
'Bathysphere'
'Coast to Coast'

If you'd like any more information on the featured works, you can contact me here

Hasta pronto
Matthew

DOMINGO, EL OCHO DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Thinking about New Zealand today, especially Whanganui. It is our friend Al's memorial service at 9.30pm (USA time) today. Miss you Al.

SABATO, EL SIETE DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
A drawing of Michael Brassell, aka Mike J. Hex of Squirm and Hiss Explosion. He passed away in 2004 from complications with pneumonia.
There's a very good interview with him from 2004 here.

VIERNES, EL SEIS DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
An ex-voto from 2008. This was the first ex-voto I painted in USA. I broke my rule of 'painting-on-the-day' as it was a bit hard to paint in a small hotel room, so I did the drawings in my sketchbook and completed an almost day-by-day account of our time in LA when we arrived in Las Vegas. I feels odd and cool to be sitting at the same table I painted this ex-voto over two years ago.
I'm going to have to get painting again and complete some back-dated ex-votos of our life so far in USA: looking for a car, catching up with old friends, travelling, life on the road, looking after pets, attempting to transport artworks internationally, working out the best health, car and life insurance. This is where the ex-votos become quite cathartic for me, a stress relief and a good way to look back on the trials we faced to get our lives sorted.
This ex-voto features St. Christopher, patron saint of travellers. I'll have to reconfigure this idea as we're not really travellers anymore.

MIERCOLES, EL CUATRO DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
This Thursday night is the opening of The Morris Graves Centenary Invitation Art Exhibition. I have a small framed drawing in the exhibition and am heading up to Seattle later in the month to see the show and catch up with friends.The exhibition features works from artists such as Charles Krafft, Stephen Rock, Tony Bennett, George Condo, Matthew Barney, Stan Lee, Susan Rothenberg, Eric Nelson, Mya Lin, Don Ed Hardy, Grace Slick and Charlie Manson, More details about the exhibition here.

MARTES, EL TRES DE AGOSTO DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Another Philip Guston panorama, this time it's the works in the Fischer collection at SFMOMA.

LUNES, EL DOS DE AGOSTO, VEINTE-DIEZ
I've posted this image before, but here's a photo of it with the frame included.
This painting, Miss April, will be exhibited as part of Calendar Girls, opening this Friday night at the Rayner Brothers Gallery in Whanganui, New Zealand. Twelve artists were asked to respond and portray a specific month of the year visually. For April, I used the symbols of April - the diamond, the sweetpea and then added the star sign, Taurus and Numa, carrying the sweetpea in a cart (he was the Roman Emperor who added January and February to the calendar, moving April to the forth month). Miss April is based on the androgynous figure that has the protection of a pater, yet the nurturing of a mater.

DOMINGO, EL UNO DE AGOSTO DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
I just received an invitation to Calendar Girls at the Rayner Brothers Gallery in NZ via email:

Rayner Brothers Gallery warmly invites you to the exhibition opening of 'Calendar Girls' and 2011 calendar launch this Friday at 5.30pm

The exhibition and calendar features works by:
JK Russ, Anthony Behrens, Mark Rayner, Matthew Couper, Rosalie Gwilliam, Maiangi Waitai, Ben Pearce, Peter Ireland, Mark Braunias, Paul Rayner, Paul Maseyk, and Andrea Gardner.

The limited edition calendar is only (NZD)$19.99 - so get your copy A.S.A.P.

It's going to be disappointing not to be able to make it to the opening, but I can't wait to see what the other artists have come up with. My calendar girl (Miss April) can be seen here, all framed up ready for the exhibition.
I'll post some installation shots once I get some via email.

SABATO, EL TRIENTE Y UNO DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
First day in Las Vegas - we got here late last night and from previous experience living here, we'll need a couple of days to acclimatize to the weather. I'm going to get to an Aaron Brothers framing shop and take advantage of their two-for-the-price-of-one framing deal for the small drawings I've been doing. I want to use the same moulding as in the image below - it's called Nantucket and is a gesso-surfaced, black or white, step-frame and I'll be float-mounting the drawings, as the step-recession lends itself to acting like a matte. I've now framed two drawings with this moulding and am really happy with it - one is the Morris Graves portrait that will be exhibited in Seattle for a month over August and also New Cornerstone that is now in a private collection in Berkeley, CA.

VIERNES, EL TRIENTE DE JULIO, VEINTE-DEIZ

Today is our last day in San Fran. I walked out to the antiques district to check out the new Colonial Arts premises at 1616 16th St. I was a bit to preoccupied with looking at all the retablos, I forgot to take any photos, but here's a stitched together photo of Townsend St where there are some of the big computer software companies including Adobe. There was a big sign on the opposite side of the road threatening 'CS 5 IS HERE'

JUEVES, EL VEINTINUEVE DE JULIO, VENITE-DIEZ

Missed a post yesterday, sorry. Tuesday - I looked around Downtown Oakland and attempted to get out to St. Elizabeth parish in Fruitvale, but it was closed in the afternoon. More luck yesterday and got some 'raw material' photos (see below). More info on El Cristo Negro here. Yesterday was also clean-up-the-house-and-wash-O day, before M, D, X and F get back from Spain.

MARTES, EL VEINTISEITE DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Here is a link to an animation on my website of a ceramic head on a platter I made, based on St. John the Baptist.
Paul Maseyk formed the platter for me as my throwing skill had a lot left to be desired.
More information here and here.

LUNES, EL VIENTISEIS DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
A stunning Rodin marble carving of St John the Baptist at the Palace of the Legion of Honor. The head, lying in its side, gives me another idea for another St. John the Baptist ceramic piece.

DOMINGO, EL VEINTICINCO DE JULIO, VENITE-DIEZ
A beautifully painted hollow-trunked tree from Edward Hicks' The Peaceable Kingdom. This painting is part of the De Young collection in San Francisco.

SABATO, EL VEINTICUATRO DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ

After seeing the Ter Borch painting (in yesterday's post) it reminded me of a sketch that I roughed out after seeing this painting, first in 2003, then again in 2008. It was a quick doodle of the Ter Borch, but with Johnny Cash's face - you know, the Man in Black...
At present, I only have my most recent sketchbook with me, started in May this year, as all the rest are packed away in our storage unit in Whanganui, NZ. It's a hassle not having my resource sketchbooks on hand, but it's all part of the transitition of moving, I guess - we had no choice but to travel light! BUT, it's great when things like revisiting a place spark off memories. So I completed the drawing yesterday of Johnny Cash, after Ter Borch's Portrait of a Gentleman in Black c.1639, twenty-eight months after its inception.

'Johnny Cash (after Gerard ter Borch's 'Portrait of a Gentleman in Black', c. 1639. Coll. of The Palace of the Legion of Honor, San Francisco)'. Pencil on paper, 149 x 210mm. The image is full scale when clicked.

VIERNES, EL VEINTITRES DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Yesterday I went to the Palace of the Legion of Honor and got to revisit (again) some paintings that have been very influential on my practice. Probably the most enigmatic for me is a small oil painting on brass by Gerard ter Broch titled Portrait of A Gentleman in Black, c.1639. I painted an ex-voto of the painting in 2008, when I was last in San Francisco (scroll down to the 18th of June). I think it impressed me as it reminded me of the Dou copper painting of the Physician in the Christchurch Art Gallery.

JUEVES, EL VEINTIDOS DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
A new drawing, Neo Self-Portrait, 2010, pencil on paper, 188mm x 147mm (7.4"x5.8")
Full scale when clicked.

MIERCOLES, EL VEINTIUNO DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Well, we got to the game last night and the A's won over the Rd Sox 5-4. There was some great hits, some surreptitous bases stolen and a good time had by all. Now it's the AM, am feeling a bit seedy, but, Hell, I'd definitely do it again!
For a gratuitous fan shot of us (Matt, Lisa, Dennis, Jo & Matt C) on the Oakland A's website, click here.

(these photos by JK Russ)

MARTES, EL VEINTE DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
A frustrating day yesterday, trying to tick of things on a big list of stuff to get done, but failing miserably due to not knowing protocols at the post office (and getting yelled at for it), not having the right change for the bus, walking to the local art shop to discover they've just run out of the paper I wanted. Then to top it off, losing my shopping list somewhere at Kinkos while having some business cards laminated. Ugh. BUT at least I managed to finish another drawing and have been sketching for possible paintings. Oh! and took Senor O to the park for a walk after Jo got back from San Fran. Time to perk up though, we're heading out to watch the A's play the Red Sox tonight.

New Cornerstone, 2010, pencil on paper, 140 x 200mm

LUNES , EL DIECINUEVE DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ

Yesterday we met up with our friends Jesse and Sarah and went for lunch out at Louis' Diner by the Pacific Ocean, overlooking the riuns of the Sutro Baths, then walked around the Presidio, visiting the pet cemetery and the old airstrip, Crissy Field. Below are a selection of photos of pet headstones from the cemetery. R.I.P.

DOMINGO, EL DIECIOCHO DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Alcatraz Ave, Oakland, near Adeline, where we walk to catch the BART. The two shop windows are fancy dress-costume shops. I feel a Popeye scrimshaw coming on ... especially after recently painting Swee'pea in a painting to be exhibited at the Rayner Brothers Gallery soon.

SABATO, EL DIECISIETE DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Yesterday went finally got into San Francisco. I did the Geary St. galleries and then SFMOMA. They've got a great collection show on at present - Calder to Warhol and photographs from their permanent collection. Highlight was the room of late Guston paintings (four post-'69 late works and one '65 black blob paintings). The weird thing about it was receiving a text from a friend from NZ who has a common interest in Guston - spooky.
I also got to see 'A Life Lived', a doco on Guston and his painting filmed in the early 1970's then again in 1980 during his retrospective at SFMOMA just before he passed away. I missed screenings of this doco in 2003, when I visited the retrospective in San Fran, then again in london in 2004 when the retrospective was at the Royal Academy, then again at the Drawings exhibition at the Morgan Library, NYC in 2008, so I'm now glad that I've seen it. The funniest part of the documentary is that he's 'demonstrating' how he paints a painting - a klan hangover painting - all the techniques and brushstroke styles are whisked up on the linen - a total performance, then at the end of the movie, the painting is destroyed and erased out (obviously when the cameramen are out of the studio) so all we see is a faux-act of painting, a performance for the camera - nothing is really gained by the viewer watching it. He was obviously very aware of the camera during the whole filming process over the ten year span - he's constantly spiking the lens. The most interesting aspect of the film is Guston's demeanor. In the earlier filming, he's confident in his performance, yet in interviews from 1980, he's quite anxious, unsure and hesitant. In a floor-talk, he's asked by an British woman, what would he like to leave behind, as in a legacy, to which he states he's never thought about it, but that he wants to end up in the same place as Goya and a simple pat on the back from the members of his pantheon and a "good work, sonny" comment would do him just fine.

VIERNES, EL DIECISEIS DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
A new drawing finished and framed-up today. The drawing is of Morris Graves, a Seattle artist who died in 2001. I found his work through a book called Villa Delirium, about the ceramics of Charles Krafft. Krafft started the Mystic Sons Of Morris Graves, Seattle Lodge No. 93 in 1991 to establish the importance of the artist's role of Northwest mystic painters. It is said that he possessed an acute awareness of perfect pitch for color and line from his infancy.

JUEVES, EL QUINCE DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Before leaving New Zealand, I got one of Paul Rayner's 'Jesus Saves' money-box crucifixes. It's an excellent to my crucifix collection, now numbering just over one-hundred.
The current Rayner Brothers exhibition, Cheesy Moulds is an exceptionally good show with a mix of mould works, teapots, photographs and money-boxes. A must-see if you're in Whanganui, New Zealand.

MIERCOLES, EL CATORCE DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
A sign on the way back from Sth Berkeley down Shattuck Ave, nearby is the Berkeley Bowl, a great place for fresh bread, great produce and a stunning collection of beers including Scrimshaw Pilsner.

MARTES, EL TRECE DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Two pets that we've been looking after over the past few weeks. On the left is Tiny, who we looked after in Putiki in Whanganui, New Zealand. She's a feisty number but happy to chat after you get to know her. Now we're looking after Senor O, a brilliant dog, originally from Barcelona, Spain, now residing in Oakland, California. Belly scratches mandatory.

LUNES, EL DOCE DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Bye bye New Zealand, especially Whanganui.
(Photo by JK Russ at 'Eye of Night' (RIP) circa Nov, 2009)

DOMINGO, EL ONCE DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
The final state of my palette, Putiki, Whanganui

SABATO, EL DIEZ DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Below are the final three works I'll finish in New Zealand. They are intended as a triptych and read as a narrative. From left to right they are titled Creator, Nurturer and Lifegiver. The are all oil on metal and framed in a Mexican Colonial style. The photo was taken at Paul Maseyk's studio in Putiki, Whanganui.

VIERNES, EL NUEVE DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Tonight is the opening of the Carey, Smith and Co Whanganui Arts Review at the Sarjeant Gallery. It's always a huge turn-out and a good chance to catch up with locals.
I've got the alien painting below in the exhibition and Jo has one of her new, framed collages.
Might see you there....

JUEVES, EL OCHO DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Meta-redux/revisit to San Marco Convent in Florence.
I'm holding up my catalogue from my exhibition, The Museum of Inherent Vice from 2007. In the catalogue is a photo I took during my first visit to San Marco in 2004, featuring a conservator painting a fresco in one of the exterior apses in the courtyard. I returned in 2008 and decided to re-photograph the same scene but with the finished fresco. I also did this at the Brancacci Chapel in Santa Del Carmine with Masaccio's Tribute Money fresco cycle (I'd used the disciples from the fresco in a painting of mine) and also in the Vatican with Raphael's School of Athens, of which I'd used the swastika-decorated arch that frames the fresco.

MIERCOLES, EL SIETE DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
I've just finished a couple of new scrimshaw (which I'll post here soon) and while I was looking through my archives, I found images of a scrimshaw object in the North Otago Museum in Oamaru (bottom, right).
After returning from a trip around the South Island in 2005, I made the Oamaru Altar (top and bottom, left; 2006, 380 x 300 x 310mm, oil on found wooden bowls, scrimshaw, wire and thirty New Zealand five-cent coins). I wanted to add something in the centre of the scrimshaw as they look like an archway so I painted a small wooden bowl that was kicking around.
The photograph of Christ I took at St. Patrick's basilica in Oamaru. I was pretty close to deleting this image, until I uploaded it onto my computer was stuck by its Cubist or Futurist-type aura or penumbra.

This work is part of a private collection in Petone.

EL SEIS DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Philip Guston paintings at MOMA from the Edward R. Broida bequest, 2008. (Click on the image to enlarge it)

LUNES, EL CINCO DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Las Vegas, Fourth of July, 2008 (sans fireworks)

FELIZ CUATRO DE JULIO!
Bath Salts, (recto) 2005, oil on two canvases, 480mm x 330mm
(John Trumbull vs. Marcus King)

SABATO, EL TRES DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
A mighty-fine day today, doing domestic duties while psycho-dog looks on.

photo: JK Russ

VIERNES, EL DOS DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ

I'm often trawling the internet for retablos for sale and I came across the one on the left (excuse the poor quality of image) of San Jose or Saint Joseph. It interested me because it very well could be by the same artist who painted a San Jose retablo that I own (right). Often, the attributes of each saint were replicated by many artists so that there was a continuity of symbolism of the saint, so sometimes what you think is a retablo by Geronimo de Leon or the Beestung Lip painter is a copy of them, or possibly both the artists had drawn from the same source, such as a Spanish Colonial painting or a hand-coloured print. In this case, I feel pretty certain that both these retablo are painted from the same hand or at least from the same production studio. Even though the retablo on the left is more loosely painted, it's a bigger retablo than the one on the left, so usually the artist would have kept his concentration of detail for the smaller scale retablos. Another giveaway is the way the isometric or orthographically formed structures (such as a the table on the left and the bible on the right) are constructed and painted. These objects are like they've been copied from a fish-eye lens image of the form. A strong indicator of the artist's hand is the way the faces were painted, but because of the low resolution of the image on the left and the damage to the paint surface on the retablo on the right, it's too hard to assertain the similarities AND of course the colours - which was the first thing that piqued my interest.

JUEVES, EL UNO DE JULIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
I've just been sorting out my box of oil paints, to see which ones to store (you can't travel with oil-paints because they're flammable ... I found that out the hard way at LAX in 2003) and I found this very small and very old tube of Windsor & Newton cadmium scarlet. It was given to me by Rob McLeod in about 2002 and there was a point where I was mixing a brush-hair-worth of it through every colour I used to paint with. It gave the colours a beautiful smoky, hazy quality to them, which was needed for the paintings I was painting around 2004 - 2006 that had primarily white, neutral backdrops.
I've bought newer tubes of this exact brand and colour, for exorbitant amounts of money, but none of them have matched the pigment quality of this tiny tube.
Thanks Rob!

MIERCOLES, EL TRIENTE DE JUNIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
ANOTHER WORK I'M MISSING LOOKING AT: Helm Ruifrok's The Virgin and St Anne (after Da Vinci), (1999, conte on paper, acquired 1999). We always have this hanging in our bedroom, except for it's brief stint in a friends lounge while we were overseas in 2008.

MARTES, EL VEINTINUEVE DE JUNIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
Now that we're unofficially in transit, I'm really starting to miss the 'familiar' things that we used to look at everyday, notably many of our artworks. One of the works I seem to be missing the most is a set of glazed ceramic tiles by Scott McFarlane that used hang on an adjacent wall to the stove in our kitchen. While cooking, these works would keep me company and I'd be drawn into their individual symbolism.
Jo and I selected these particular works one night after dinner and several beers with Scott. I'm really pleased with our selection as it seems to balance symbols of abstraction, parochial New Zealand, Western art history and contentious contemporary events and paranoia.

LUNES, EL VEINTIOCHO DE JUNIO, VEINTE-DIEZ
The image below arrived in my inbox last week - a nice surprise to see one of my Whiteworld drawings framed up and hanging on the wall at my friend's house in the Wairarapa. The drawing is a profile of Joseph Merrick, aka 'The Elephant Man' (you need to scroll about 3/4th's down the page and he's in the left-hand column).
He's probably one of the original '27 Club' although he wasn't a musician, but an amazing model-maker and a Freak-Show curiosity.
I do like the casio-tone on the floor - Obviously a photographer has taken this image.