MIERCOLES, EL VEINTISIETE DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE
Below is the invitation to my upcoming show at PAULNACHE in New Zealand, the gallery already has the works online to view here. All the paintings have been executed while living in the USA and are a selection of direct reactions to, or mulled-over meditations of living in the USA.
The image below, 'Vision in the Meadows' (2011, Oil on metal, 200 x 270mm/ 8" x 10 1/2") depicts a devil on a toilet, an image that appears on Mexican black velvet painting, doing the devil's work, painting, in the outskirts of 'the fertile meadows/plains', which is the English translation of Las Vegas, named after the Artesian springs discovered in the valley of the area in 1829.
He has symbols of studio practice around him, the ever-pressing notion of time, the divine eye, art materials (the reversed canvas), cheese for subconscious inspiration and the egotistical notion of the need to feed something into society.

LUNES, EL DIECIOCHO DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE
finally stretched up and ready to go. Am leaving this one in the USA for now. I think it's more apt here than in NZ. I was painting this way back here.

Trickle-Down Theory', 2011, oil on canvas, 58" x 46

DOMINGO, EL DIECISIETE DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE
Schemes, 2011, oil on metal, framed.

VIERNES, EL QUINCE DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE
detail from Bosch's 'Death of the Miser' in the Nat. Gal. Washington DC.
I've seen this work before in the flesh, but hadn't studied it long enough to notice the pencil marks outlining unpainted forms on the shelf depicting part of the miser's material wealth. The rest of the painting has many initial sketchmarks, showing a longer arrow as held by death, the volumous toning for the curtains and some minor compositional changes. I haven't read much about the 'plastic' aspects of the painting, but it's quite odd to see so much sketching and thin paint layers remaining on a 'finished' Bosch painting, especially in comparison to his impasto paintwork on the works I've seen in the Prado. Anyway, what was interesting was that I started noticing pencil marks in a few other paintings, most noticeable in Raphael's small Cowper Madonna, where he's redrawn the position of the shoulder and veil.

MIERCOLES, EL TRECE DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE

LUNES, EL ONCE DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE

DOMINGO, EL DIEZ DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE

SABATO, EL NUEVE DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE

VIERNES, EL OCHO DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE

JUEVES, EL SIETE DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE
in Washington DC:

MARTES, EL CINCO DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE
Helvi Sipilä
2011
pencil on paper
5" x 7"

LUNES, EL CUATRO DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE
Carlo Urbani
2011
pencil on paper
5" x 7"

DOMINGO, EL TRES DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE
Graça Machel
2011
pencil on paper
5" x 7"

SABATO, EL DOS DE ABRIL, VEINTE-ONCE
Eleanor Roosevelt
2011
pencil on paper
5" x 7"

EL DÍA DEL TONTO DE ABRIL, EL UNO, VEINTE-ONCE
Sérgio Vieira de Mello
2011
pencil on paper
5" x 7"

JUEVES, EL TREINTE Y UNO DE MARZO, VEINTE-ONCE
Nadia Younes
2011
pencil on paper
5" x 7"

MIERCOLES, EL TREINTA DE MARZO, VEINTE-ONCE
Angela King
2011
pencil on paper
5" x 7"

MARTES, EL VEINTINUEVE DE MARZO, VEINTE-ONCE
Dag Hammarskjold
2004
pencil on paper
private collection, Wellington, NZ

SABATO, EL VEINTISEIS DE MARZO, VEINTE-ONCE
A great little ex-voto that piqued my interest in Albuquerque at John Isaac's Antiques store in the historical area. It's got everything, aesthetically, that I like in an ex-voto, the pinky/cadmium scarlet floor, the soft blue sky and the beautifully crafted vision of Christ.
Things have been a bit hectic at my end due to several things need attending too, so that explains the lack of posts. Once cleared, I'll post the offending pieces here on the blog to catch you all up!

SABATO, EL DIECINUEVE DE MARZO, VEINTI-ONCE
The photo, top-left, is a corpus-arm of a Crucified Christ statue that used to hang in the east chapel of the San Xavier Mission in Tucson, AZ. This is all that is left. It interested me as the rough wood skeleton is covered in canvas, then gessoed and polychromed. I knew that this was part of the process of making santos, but it's hard to see on complete forms. The saggy, torn canvas brought back memories of the skin surface of one of those bodies found in the bogs in a museum in the the UK. I also remembered a sketchbook drawing and a failed sculpture that I had made in preparation for my show at the Sarjeant in Whanganui in 2007. I had tried to recreate an arm out of cardboard and hot glue, nailed to wood with an ex-voto hanging off it. It didn't work, so I moved to casting in plaster, and the bottom left photo was the outcome. With molds, you can cast and recast, so I did a few variations on the dissected hand, looking at galvanisation, the power of the symbol of the hand. All these pics besides the San Xavier arm can be seen on the MOIV website here:
http://moiv.mattcouper.com/graveyore.html