John Murray classes week of September 30, 2013

Next week let's work on corrugated cardboard and see how that effects our vision.

A cheap and beautiful surface for experimental painting, many artists have used it with strong results.

Robert Rauschenberg's  work on cardboard used the material with logos, stamps and tape very unprocessed and fresh...others have applied paint, cut, folded and sprayed. 

What will you do? Please bring in boxes and pieces of any and all cardboard that you like.

Also, we will assemble the right-brain, non-dominant hand paintings and drawings that we did last week and see what was created and what we can make of it all. 

See you next week, john.

John Murray classes week of September 23, 2013

Second week of the Autumn Term!
Last week was exciting for me: new artists in class, fresh ideas and approaches.
NEXT WEEK: I would like to try a series of drawing/paintings on paper by every member of the class, which can be assembled into a single work the following week.
Every piece should be done with the artist's non-dominant hand!
Let's see what the collective unconscious of a class of artists looks like.

See you next week, john.

John Murray classes week of September 16, 2013

WELCOME TO OIL AND ACRYLIC WORKSHOP, POSTMODERN ASSEMBLAGE & PAINTING AND SUPERCHARGED PAINTING!

I appreciate your interest in my classes and passion for Art.

The Autumn 2013 term offers an opportunity to struggle with the daunting task of self-expression and plastic

investigation: you must have both to truly become an artist. If one had to ignore one of these however; I  would say skip the self -expression for awhile and pour yourself into material investigation. 

With that in mind I would like to offer an assignment for the first few classes: bring in a substance that you have never worked with before and see where it leads you (or doesn't).

See you next week, John

John Murray classes week of August 26, 2013

End of Summer session.

Next week is the last two nights of Supercharged Painting/Summer.

It went by so fast.

I saw a lot of good work this season and had a chance to explore some ideas

of my own as well.

The sadness that comes with the turning of the Earth away from the Sun is an ancient human

feeling. Our childhood memories of Summer and the seeming endlessness of long hot days is with us 

still.

I hope you join the class this Autumn and continue to paint and think for yourself.

See you next week, John. 

John Murray classes week of August 19, 2013

Art is an improvisational exploration. 
Like dancing or boxing, art is a study that in the moment of creation is forgotten.
Read, think, then forget and act.
See you next week, John.

John Murray classes week of August 12, 2013

The figure/ground dicotomy.

I have been thinking a lot about figure/ground issues and felt it would be a

good time to have the class consider and investigate the strange and illusionistic

world of this phenomena.

As the critic, Clement Greenberg said; “All painting is flat”.

Meanwhile he went on to ceaselessly promote the, at times highly

layered and spacially complex work, of Jackson Pollack. 

As soon as one makes a mark on a canvas the mind begins to see a hollow space

behind and around the gesture.

The only way around this phenomenon is to coat the canvas in a thick flat layer of paint.

This is essentially what color field painters do.

The cost of truth to the flatness of the picture plane requires one to give up most spacial play.

Modernism and its true believers aside, I feel that the illusion of space generally adds to the

power of a picture, as long as that is not its only conceit, I say let it rip!

Think about what you're doing a bit. One must have awareness to be a good artist.

Here is a picture I did last week that investigates these issues for me.

See you next week, John.

John Murray classes week of August 5, 2013

Dressed in rough bags

of burlap the prince sees

the future

turning to his valet

he farts loudly and quickly

leaves the meadow

after that life

stopped being one

ceremony after all

began to find mice in the

fields to talk to and cry with

tell about his death at the hands of his

right hand 

-John Murray 2013

Mid-Summer largess finds the artist in need of inspiration!

Next week scour your mind and heart for new forms of expression.

See you next week. john.