News

So I’m working on a new book. I know, I know… too many books at once! But this is different because this one I’m making. This is not a book that a publisher is making for me. This is going to be a very small edition of 5 handmade artist’s books. Very fine. Very involved. They will all be slightly different because they will all be somewhat original works of art.

It’s called Houses, based on a poem of the same title. It’s a poem I wrote a long time ago and it’s basically chopped up amongst the pages. The pages are french folds, some are letterpressed, some have etchings, some are original watercolor paintings, one has a block print, some are digital prints. The covers are cereal boxes. 2 of the pages will be embroidered. That’s going to be tricky, but I’ll do it. It’s gonna be expensive. It’ll be a Japanese stab binding and have some nice handmade, flower-pressed paper in it. 6 x 9 inches. You’ll see.

I’ve only made the dummy books so far. And just got the plates for the etchings. I haven’t even filed the edges yet. I was gonna do that today if I don’t fall asleep soon. I’m going to etch them myself in the garage with hard ground, then in a tupperware bin with ferric chloride. Then I’ll print them with Poli Marichal at Self Help Graphics. I’m gonna have Bill Roberts do the letterpress work, and I’m going to “die-cut” the covers by hand. I just have to eat a lot of cereal now.

I don’t know what else is going on. I’ve written a 5-year plan, but I haven’t done much in the way of any artwork. I’ve just been planning out this new art book, signing and drawing on the Monsters on Jasmine St. book, and just taking a break, waiting for the well to fill back up. I have ideas roaming around in my head and I’ve been trying to decipher which plans to execute and which to trash. I have a couple lingering projects that need finishing up, namely my Ethereal Research Labs Project. That will be finished this year for sure – without a doubt. That’s been a long time in the making. It involves launching the first 7 editions and a virtual domain. The one that’s been parked there for a couple years now is just a taste.

I looked back on my 2010 plan and I got most of the things done, minus a couple things. I feel pretty accomplished, but I would have liked to have finished the above mentioned project and built a large paper sculpture I have been planning for years. I suppose I will try for that in 2011. I also wanted to do a big embroidery on a hospital gown. Everything else I wanted to do got done thanks to circumstances I don’t think were all in my control really. Well, maybe a little bit.

I spent the day with artist Rochelle Botello the other day. I wrote a thing about her in the Huffington Post a little while back. She rocks. I haven’t been feeling social, but do I ever? We had a good time. We met at Buster’s for coffee and came back to my place and I showed her what I used to look like before I put on weight. Ha! Overall, we talked about some good stuff, like art and how important the moment is. She opened my eyes a bit about that. I needed reminding about how important the little moments are. I suffer from depression and I don’t focus on these little happinesses as much as I need to. Luckily, I’m about to start seeing a therapist again. Something I haven’t done in a long, long time. Not really since my parents died, so it will probably be good for me. Am I getting too personal? Too bad for you!

I’m so tired, but today I finally finished up a couple logo designs – I don’t usually do such thing, but it is for a very special organization that means a lot to me and they asked me to submit something, so I gave them a couple options. They may or may not use them. We’ll see. I’ll know by next week or so. I’m also waiting on a couple things I applied to, like the special print residency at the Lower East Side Print Shop in NY. I don’t think I will hear back from them until February though. Can’t get my hopes up. I always say that, but my hopes are always up. Who am I fooling. I think it’s funny when people say they aren’t going to get their hopes up about this stuff because when the rejection comes, we are going to be just as disappointed whether we acted like our hopes were up or not. So why not live with our hopes high? It’s all a big fucking let down in the end, or it’s not. Such is the roller-coaster of being an artist. It’s mostly rejection – we know that going in.

December I think I got 4 rejections, 2 on the same day. January I didn’t win the West Prize. (Big surprise!) But I am always applying for shit anyway. I’ve applied for the Guggenheim twice. And as for the Pollock-Krasner: the 8th time’s a charm! Last week I put in my application for CCF. I probably shouldn’t have put it in so early, but I don’t have anything coming up on the horizon to add to the resume, so I figured, why not? I want to apply for the CCI thing, but I want funding for my novel. I’m stuck not knowing how to submit my materials. Do I submit my past artwork, or do I submit parts of the manuscript? See? Who knows. I wrote them to ask and they would not give me an answer, but they encouraged me to apply for a change-up in my medium. Great, but what work sample do I submit??? I don’t even know if I’m past the deadline by now.

The novel is daunting. I work on it like a leaky sink: drip-drip-drip. Meanwhile, Michael pounds out 9000 words at a time. I’m lucky if I can write 1000 in a sitting. I have my toe in too many ponds, or whatever the saying is. If I’m going to be a writer, you’d think I’d know my metaphors!

I have a group show opening this Sunday. Do you want to drive all the way out to West Hills? I don’t even know if I do! The work is simple, but it’s all new and it’s in Hebrew.

I think it has finally stopped raining. I’m afraid to carve that in stone however. We have had record-breaking rain here lately. yesterday, I thought my roof was going to cave in, but it didn’t. I still haven’t check my studio. I’m a little scared to go in there honestly. I am mostly in fear for my friends that live in the hills, particularly my friend Lisa Teasley. Her house is situated so that it scares me the most, so I’ve been thinking about her a lot. I must give her a call.

This rainfall reminds me of a time when I was a kid and it rained so hard that the coffins buried at Beth Olam, (now called Hollywood Forever) were resurrected out of the ground and began floating out of the park and onto Santa Monica Blvd. You think I’m kidding? It’s a true story! It was appalling. Luckily my great grandmother is buried there in a wall tomb near Valentino, so there wasn’t any fear of my family floating down the street, but can you imagine what that was like for the loves ones of the people who were??? Sheesh! What a sight that was.

I got so lucky yesterday, as I drove out to the West side from Pasadena and back before noon and not a drop of water hit my car. In fact, when I got to Bergamot Station, I had to break out my sunglasses. It was blue skies and sunny. I warned a few galleries I visited that they needed to batten down the hatches by 1pm because the Wrath of God was coming, and it did. I pulled up in my driveway at 1:05 and the skies opened up.

While I was at Bergamo, I saw a great show at Luis de Jesus. Very worth checking out. Exciting, funny, interesting, thought-provoking, colorful, and in some ways intense. The artist is Seth Augustine and he went to Asia without knowing the language at all and has come back with quite a wonderful Mash-up, as the exhibition is called.

Today is the last day you can see my solo show on the gallery’s regular hours, otherwise, you’ll need an appointment until the 30th. I must warn you however, not all of the work is displayed, as they have hung a lot of gallery artists for a salon-style holiday show where some of my key pieces were. I am going to post the pieces you’ll miss here if you have not yet seen the show. If you want to see them in real life, just ask the gallery staff and they will gladly pull them out for you…

All the dolls:

And these paintings:

In other news, I just finished all my illustrations for my new book of poetry, Monsters on Jasmine St. and the book is now being produced! There will be 50 soft covers and 26 hardcovers. I don’t know what the price will be, but they will be available soon from Bottle of Smoke Press. I can’t wait. I have seen the prototype and they are bitchen as all hell!

I finally finished up all the pieces for the Finegood Gallery show. I took crappy pictures of them and posted them here. The light was all fucked up, but at least they’re documented. I drop those off and install them on the 21st and the show opens on the 27th of December.

I just sent out a Newsletter with all my little shows and holidays special goings on, so if you are interested in receiving that, get signed up! The only thing I’ll mention here is the new little 16 Dans print. The rest of it will have to stay a mystery sandwich, unless you sign up to get the emails. I don’t send them out but 4 times a year, so don’t think I’m a heavy spammer or anything.

Now I’m working on those illustrations for my book of poems for Bottle of Smoke Press. I am nearly done and I’m happy with how they are turning out. I won’t be showing them until after the book release in early 2011, and not all of them either, just a peak.

Last night I went to the Soft opening and it’s a great little show. Lots of really cool work. I almost bight something from Charlene Roth that I absolutely loved, but I can’t spend anything right now. I am so bummed. The curator, Edith Abeyta has a lot of pictures of the work on her Flickr page. The show is up until December 30th at Future Studio in Highland Park.

Some good news is that my solo show got recommended in the December issue of ArtScene by Jody Zellen. I am hoping that will bring some new lookers in. If you haven’t seen my show yet, it’s up until the end of the year, but the gallery is only open by appointment only after December 23rd.