Piano #2

Sometimes, time should escape you.

Control Room

Thomas Demand is known for making photographs of three-dimensional models that look like real images of rooms and other spaces. Art critic Michael Kimmelman writes of his work: "the reconstructions were meant to be close to, but never perfectly realistic, so that the gap between truth and fiction would always subtly show."

Special thanks to my friend Alexandra for sharing his work with me on one of our computers at work when it wasn't being used as a cash register.

I've just found my new Internet fascination for the next few weeks.  

Rozalina Burkova

"Road Trip" by Rozalina Burkova

Spilled Milk: Issue Five

www.spilledmilkmagazine.com

Happy New Week

Now that the holiday detritus has finally settled after the slow rain of confetti that was December, the first week of January has come like a great broom to sweep it all to the side to make room for new work to be done in this new year of ours.

One such new piece of work is the image above. I was fortunate to be asked by Vidiots Foundation of Santa Monica to create their end-of-the-year postcard as a way of thanking their donors to their successful Indiegogo campaign. Initiated to raise funds for their efforts to promote the cinematic arts through preservation, education and community engagement through public screenings, I felt a strong connection to their mission. I was raised on VHS, and the memories I have of watching tapes with my family still warms my heart when I think about it. 

I normally don't celebrate the New Year. I didn't really feel the need for it this time around, added to fact that the construct of time seems more and more arbitrary to me the older I get. Or maybe I'm just grumpy because I have a little bit of a cold right now. But staring at this mirrorball VHS tape suspended above a sherbet sunset in colored pencil, I find myself reflecting on 2016, and how thankful I was to have family & friends to get my through it. On Christmas Eve, my mom, sister, brother-in-law & I all watched Scrooged. And although it wasn't on VHS like last time, this time, we were together.  

As we head into this new year of ours, and if I may offer one piece of unsolicited advice that hopefully won't sound too cloying, it's this: Focus on creating as much happiness as you can for yourself and those you love. Don't base your idea happiness or success on someone else's life. That's their journey, sacred to only them. You'll never follow the same path they do, and you'll never end up being them in the end anyway. Most importantly, they'll never be you. There will never be another you, so be the best version of you that you can be. If you're not where you want to be, then start moving and keep it up. Each step forward counts, regardless of the size.

Happy new year.

Desktop Background of the Month

For every month to come in 2017, I will be releasing a "Desktop Background of the Month," an original piece of art to splash across your desktop or laptop computer if you so choose. An aperitief to this new endeavor is the image you see above. I was in a "A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte" kind-of-a-mood, but with a larger bristle. And less people.   

Click on the link above in the navigation tab to download yours today!

"Memory" by Amelia Chen

Written & Directed by Amelia Chen                                                                                      http://www.ameliachen.net/

Little (Cartoon) Edie

My friend, the wonderful and impishly clever Tonya Glanz, immortalized as Little (Cartoon) Edie from Grey Gardens. A staunch character if there ever was one.

Meredith Axelrod

The picture above you depicts two versions of the profoundly gifted folk singer/songwriter Meredith Axelrod. I drew "Blue Meredith" at what must've been two o'clock in the morning after a fitful night of sleep, as if it woke me up to roar itself into existence. 

Trapped like a firefly in a jar, the original picture from which the illustration is based, illuminates my mind intermittently, and has done so in the five and a half years since I first saw it. Truly, it is one of my favorite photographs of all time, and keeps my drifting thoughts company at the most wonderfully inopportune times.

When I showed it to Meredith, she said, "You captured what I meant to convey by the photo."

I don't know what either is supposed to convey, but I captured it. Whatever it is. And that's something to be proud of.

Meredith Axelrod's evocative, stirring Americana folk music can be heard on Soundcloud.