I’ve renewed some of my paintings up at Timothys on Church. Go see them and pee your pants laughing! The owner said that my paintings were the only ones that have directly sold from the cafe. I feel all puffy chested about that.
Dead Robot
The space between gay and straight, stupid and smart.
10 thoughts on “Yeah, That’s my *Bleep*”
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And for all: I welcome you to create a banner for Deadrobot.com. Right click (Apple click for Mac!) over the banner and save the image to your hard drive. Take special note of the area that has html text links and areas where you can fill up with your filthy drawings. Send them in to deadrobot ate gmail dot calm.
squire: Thanks! Yours looks informative! I like your thoughts on digital cameras. I use to work as a goldfish processor (ie: the guy in the glass bowl, one hour photo machines at malls) and I can imagine that thousands of low paid photoprinters are thanking the digital gods they dont have to mix vats of developer anymore, thanks to digital.
andrew: you mention dumbing-down and I absolutely agree. I think that with the barrage of images and information we (collective, human) are exposed to it’s only natural that art goes down that road. Look at the upsurgance of “lowbrow” art hand in hand with the rise of the internet.
Nice site
tedley: i somewhat disagree, in that there are always new concepts in art to explore and appreciate (though some art just ends up being 26 feet of shit), but painting and other two-dimensional graphic work will forever have people commenting on the derivative nature of pieces. i like that your work is obviously commentary and not masquerading as utterly original and singular: that’s honest and i don’t dismiss your paintings simply because all the characters weren’t born in your head. homage, too, has an honourable history, and anyone grumpy about the concept probably just needs a better education about our traditional art ‘masters’.
i don’t want you to ditch the commentary pieces, but you’re talented enough to pose some of the same questions you’re asking of viewers without the popculture references (and yes, you love them, we know). sometimes i wonder (not specifically with your work, but with all artists who use such an approach) if this isn’t too much dumbing-down of the subject to reach an audience beyond the stereotypical gallery crowd. the dialogue between you and your audience need not be structured in reference to popculture, but if that’s terribly important to your message and the audience you seek, don’t change it. you have a much kinder opinion of humans and society than i do, which i try to keep in mind when i see your work.
as for the banner: oh, yes. i’d love to bludgeon the eyes of your readership, if i could possibly make something decent enough to meet your specs. pass along your requirements and i’ll do my best to creep you out.
Send me the dimensions, I’d love to make you a banner.
andrew and Furface: I am moving away from full-on lifting panels from comics. The first painting to sell last month was a canvas of a robot, on the roof of a car, surfing (sorry no pic yet). While the character was all mine (same robot as the tattoo on my back) the composition wasn’t 100% mine. My last two paintings, Bitchfight and Onset Diabetes, are similar but in reverse. Someone else’s characters but entirely my own composition. I have a couple more canvases I want to do in this vein but then… who knows? Lichtenstein, who is like a god to me, is still doing pop, but he’s broken down the elements into shards. (Irony warning! Link forces you to agree not to steal his work!)
I will fall back on the old reliable argument that in art, nothing is new and everything is a copy or hommage or comment to something else (much like the web, no?). Since I was trained as an animator to copy the style and art of someone else, I thought it fitting I use other people’s characters, but (and this is a big but), you can see my style peek through in each canvas.
I can’t say what my future as a “painter” will bring. Its a road I have no clue where it leads. Most likely a dead end. Hell, I’m only showing stuff at a gay coffee shop.
With regards to my site, I would not put Dom’s work on the portfolio side of things, that would be just wrong. Furface, I thought of you when I was digging around the old files when the site went down last month. I found at least 15 different banners I had used (including an entirely different site design! Anyone remember Mytorontoapartment.com?) so letting Dom do a “guest spot” was a break for me and exposed you to some new art. I will probably ask him to do more. I offer all of you to make me a banner (just ask, I’ll send you the dimentions). I see this section, the blog, as a communal area. If other people’s stuff leaks over into other sections of the site, you can bitchslap me.
EP: Done. Exiles is 1ft by 1ft and is much easier to ship!
If Ben Grimm sells, Exiles would make a very nice replacement.
That was kind of my point with the whole banner statement – not that I didn’t like Dom’s work (or whomever it was) but how about some more original originals – and I’m not trying to be rude it usually just comes out that way.
i like bugchasin’ 1 and 2 quite a bit. i’ll just look at them here, though, as i’m allergic to church street.
a question (and i’m not trying to be rude, honestly): do you ever want to paint your own characters, not those created by others (and yes, i understand the whole subversion of pop culture thing)?