Friday, January 27, 2012

John Murray classes week of Jan. 30, 2012



Nam June Paik's "Requiem for the 20th Century" is my favorite piece at the deCordova sculpture park in Lincoln.

Last week before my class I wandered up and enjoyed the piece again. Nam June Paik was the father of modern video art, and the piece merges art, music and technology in a poignant way for me.

The 1936 Chrysler painted flat silver seems a ghost of a lost era, while also evoking the modernist design and hubris of the 1930's. Hitler's relentless march to power and inhumanity as well as the world-wide economic depression seem to be embodied in the form of the car. Mozart's unfinished and final work "Requiem Mass in D Minor" quietly plays from the cars stripped interior as a modern dance performance shows through the partially blocked windows.

If you have a chance go to the deCordova and see if the piece affects you as it did me. Or find another work of art (sculptural) to use as muse for a painting or assemblage.

See you next week, john.

Friday, January 20, 2012

John murray classes week of Jan. 23, 2012







This week lets try a self portrait.

After a few weeks of thinking black and white and gray try a personal self image either in color with attachments or a 3-d paper-mache mask-like version with or without color.

I've posted an intaglio Jasper Johns face with an attached watch and a paper mache sculptural form by the European sculptor, Vincent Fecteau.

Push the limits of representation whichever medium you chose. If you try the paper-mache please bring a small bag of flour, a small box to work around and newspapers.

Remember all artistic images of power are eccentric and self-absorbed and personal. It's your Universe! see you next week, john.

Thursday, January 12, 2012

Supercharged painting Jan. 17 and 18, 2012



Tuesday deCordova and wed. New Art Center.

There is no class mon. the 16th (MLK national holiday).


Keeping with the black, white and gray concept consider Whister's painting of his mother that he called "Composition in Black and Gray"and the beautiful use of flesh tone in the face and hands as the only use of warm color.

This 1871 masterpiece shows how dramatic limited color use can be. Cy Twombly also uses limited color in most of his (but not all) of his work. The old Bauhaus saw "All emphasis is no emphasis" really holds true in this instance.

This week try a more figurative black, white and shades of gray painting using a small amount of color as a focal center. See you next week, john.

Thursday, January 5, 2012

John Murray classes week of Jan. 9, 2012



All classes this week:

Happy New Year!

During the holiday break I had a chance to get to New York and see the dekooning retrospective at MOMA. What a treat! The earlier work seemed a little too indebted to Picasso and European

Modernism, but then in the early 50's he broke through and exploded into his brilliant and raw female nude series. He worked and scraped and wiped the paint into an amazing display of painterly language and psychlogical evidence of mid-twentieth-century angst and pleasure.

I have the catalogue and would love to discuss the work with any artist in the class.

On the floor below at MOMA, I encounted this great Cy Twombly painting, "Leda and the Swan" and found it an interesting antidote for an overdose of deKooning. It gave me an idea for an assignment, if you are interested in trying one: do a painting, drawing, assemblage or any combination of those in black white and gray.

See you next week, john.