Speed of Life

This upcoming weekend Phil and I will be presenting the second in a series of exploratory workshops at the Esalen Institute. Gregg Chadwick "Immersed in Silence" 60"x48" oil on linen 2006 Upcoming Workshop at Esalen,Big Sur Phil Cousineau & Gregg Chadwick DEC 22-24, 2006 AT ESALEN INSTITUTE "Genius is the power for lighting your own fire." -- Emerson For thousands, one of the profound mysteries of human adventure has been the creative impulse. The irrepressible urge to leave our mark, to express ourselves, is an essential part of what makes us human. But while creativity is as natural as breathing, it is also notoriously elusive, challenging, and riddled with ordeals--like any grand adventure. This workshop will use a three-stage model of the Creative Journey -- Inspiration, Process, Realization-- to explore what it means to harness our imagination and tend our creative fires over the course of a lifetime. To explore this possibility, the course wi...

Ruth Bernhard "In the Box" gelatin silver print 1962 "My aim is to transform the complexities of the figure into harmonies of simplified forms revealing the innate reality, the life force, the spirit, the inherent symbolism and the underlying remarkable structure – to isolate and give emphasis to form with the greatest clarity." -Ruth Bernhard The San Francisco Chronicle reports that the photographer Ruth Bernhard died yesterday in San Francisco. Ruth Bernhard was a vital presence in the Bay Area art world. I remember running into her at a gallery opening south of Market a few years ago. Her eyes were like open lenses. She seemed to embody Christopher Isherwood's phrase - "I am a Camera." In "Goodbye to Berlin" (published in 1939), Isherwood writes: "I am a camera with its shutter open, quite passive, recording, not thinking. Recording the man shaving at the window opposite and the woman in the kimono washing her hair. Someday, all t...

The Philadelphia Museum of Art is making an effort to keep Eakins' "The Gross Clinic" in Philadelphia. Please note that everyone who supports this cause can help by making a donation to a fund specifically set up to purchase the painting: Save "The Gross Clinic" Your donations will contribute to the $68 million needed and will send a powerful message that the American public wants to stop the plundering of America's libraries and collections. More at: Save "The Gross Clinic" Keep "The Gross Clinic" in Philadelphia

Barack Obama I have been reading Barack Obama's new book, "The Audacity of Hope" on this Thanksgiving. Obama's astute words on Abraham Lincoln brought to mind the ongoing need for healing, thanks and humility in the United States. On October 3, 1863 as the Civil War raged, President Lincoln proclaimed a national Thanksgiving Day on the last Thursday in November: "I do therefore invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise... for deliverances and blessings, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, and commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged, and fervently implore the interposition of the Almighty Hand to heal the wounds of the nation a...

Thomas Eakins "Gross Clinic" 96"x78" oil on canvas 1875 -image courtesy Thomas Jefferson University The Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, founded by the Wal-Mart heiress Alice L. Walton and under construction in Bentonville, Arkansas, is trying to pry away another important painting from its longstanding home. Carol Vogel in the New York Times reports that Thomas Jefferson University - a medical school in Philadelphia - has decided to sell the work which was purchased for $200 by University alumni in 1878. The proposed sale price is $68 million and the painting would be shared between the National Gallery of Art in Washington and the not yet completed Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. Crystal Bridges' recent plunder of Asher B. Durand's "Kindred Spirits" from the New York Public Library set a poor precedent. Asher B. Durand "Kindred Spirits" 44"x36" oil on canvas 1849 formerly in the collection of the New York Publi...

Gregg Chadwick "Ghost of New Orleans" 48"X36" oil on linen 2006 We were in my studio Saturday night mourning the loss of our country to Karl Rove, George Bush and Donald Rumsfeld. Enough is enough. Vote tomorrow and vote for a House and Senate of the future. Thomas L. Friedman said it well in the New York Times: "Everyone says that Karl Rove is a genius. Yeah, right. So are cigarette companies. They get you to buy cigarettes even though we know they cause cancer. That is the kind of genius Karl Rove is. He is not a man who has designed a strategy to reunite our country around an agenda of renewal for the 21st century -- to bring out the best in us. His "genius" is taking some irrelevant aside by John Kerry and twisting it to bring out the worst in us, so you will ignore the mess that the Bush team has visited on this country. And Karl Rove has succeeded at that in the past because he was sure that he could sell just enough Bush cigarettes, even though...

Gregg Chadwick "The Angel of History" 28.5" x 73" sumi and oil on screen 2006 "This is how one pictures the angel of history. His face is turned toward the past. Where we perceive a chain of events, he sees one single catastrophe which keeps piling wreckage and hurls it in front of his feet. The angel would like to stay, awaken the dead, and make whole what has been smashed. But a storm is blowing in from Paradise; it has got caught in his wings with such a violence that the angel can no longer close them. The storm irresistibly propels him into the future to which his back is turned, while the pile of debris before him grows skyward." - Walter Benjamin, "Theses on the Philosophy of History," IX More at:  https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Painting-The-Angel-of-History/25560/4677196/view

Darren Waterston Interior (Green), 2001 The San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art (SJICA) has moved into its own building just down the block on South First Street from its former site. Recently, SJICA's director Cathy Kimball , gave me a tour of the former warehouse. SJICA is in the model of a European Kunsthaus, a space dedicated to museum worthy exhibitions but without a permanent collection of its own. Gregg Chadwick Buddha of the Future (In Memory of Uri Grossman), 2006 The current exhibition, art destined for SJICA's 26th Annual Fall Auction, provides an overview of contemporary art practice in the Bay Area and beyond. Including works by Darren Waterston, Binh Danh, Judy Dater, Naomie Kremer, Gustavo Ramos Rivera, Robin McCloskey, Gregg Chadwick, Bruce Conner, Kim Frohsin, Manuel Neri, Hung Liu, Michael Kenna, Jamie Brunson, Kyoko Fischer, Enrique Chagoya and others - the exhibit is visually and intellectually astute. The group show opened on October 6th and runs until...

photo by Lance Cpl. Brandon L.Roach USMC The Medical Consequences Of The Iraq War: Health Challenges Beyond The Battlefield A Symposium To Present The Issues Behind the Headlines WHAT: Physicians for Social Responsibility, along with UCLA Extension and UCLA, School of Public Health, will hold a one-day symposium on the medical consequences of the war in Iraq. WHY: Health effects of the war have been grossly underreported. According to public health studies, three years of war has resulted in the deaths of over 200,000 Iraqi civilians. To date, 2,685 American soldiers have been killed with 19,945 soldiers wounded. US and Iraqi war soldiers are being diagnosed with mental disease in shockingly high numbers – portending an avalanche in veteran mental health needs in the coming years. Ten authoritative physicians and social scientists will present their findings and testimonies, including: Dahlia Wasfi, MD The War ...

From September 27th to October 1st at the Munch Museum in Oslo, Norway, the newly returned paintings "The Scream" and "Madonna" will be exhibited before restoration. Both paintings will be laid out flat in glass display cases like aenesthesized patients bearing scars from their saga of theft and return. More at: Munch Museum

Tai, a 38 year old Indian elephant gets painted for Banksy's exhibition in Los Angeles (Photo by Marissa Roth for The New York Times) Banksy, the mischievous, witty and at times sophomoric intervention artist, has picked a thirty-eight year old Indian elephant named Tai to intervene upon. At his current and very brief Los Angeles exhibition, it opened on Thursday and closes on Sunday, Banksy has created a literal depiction of the metaphor – “There is an elephant in the room and nobody talks about it.” It seems that moving from public spaces to private elephants has created a justified uproar in Los Angeles: "I think it sends a very wrong message that abusing animals is not only OK, it's an art form," said Ed Boks, general manager of Los Angeles Animal Services, to the Los Angeles Times. "We find it no longer acceptable to dye baby chicks at Easter, but it's OK to dye an elephant?" It seems only fitting that the anonymous Banksy out his identity in a ti...

My current paintings are filtered through my experience of September 11th, 2001. I was visiting my family in Thailand and had spent the morning in Chiang Mai following the saffron robed monks on their small morning pilgrimages. I hopped a flight for Bangkok and while waiting for a connecting flight to San Francisco I watched in horror as the planes hit the World Trade Center. On my return to the U.S. later that week I began to paint Buddhist monks, privately at first - as a form of meditation. Only later did I grasp the dharmic sense of responsibility inherit in this new body of work. I needed to paint these paintings. And I found that the audience I had developed over the years felt the need to see them also. They have given me their trust that I will create paintings that speak of our times but also provide clues to a future path away from the darkness. More from: Edward Winkleman Franklin Einspruch Moby and NY'ers tell GW to go home

Gregg Chadwick Screen Memories (Fin de Cinema) 60"x60" oil on linen 2002 A new poem by Kent Chadwick about the experience of leaving a theater after watching a film: Exiting the dream, the dark left behind, done sipping our coke, done suckling on the Big Nipple of Hollywood, christened so by Bertolucci at the Oscars, the credits rolling as the lights come up, stumbling from our shared, climactic dream, fantasy experienced in common, back to the foyer of reality, the cacophony of unscripted sound, shock of daylight after the matinee, the third act’s satisfaction rippling within us, but lessening so quickly that we try to prolong it conversing: What have we learned? What truth? What lies? We learn lies too: pseudo-ideas that bond with what we think we know but catalyze wrong conclusions. The lies in question here are facts refined beyond reality, simplified so as to produce more powerful pure emotion (while complexity fosters more nuanced and reflective thought). The troika of...

The Norwegian police are reporting that Munch's paintings - "Scream" and "Madonna" , stolen from the Munch Museum in Oslo in 2004, have been recovered. Munch's "Scream" and his numerous variations in different media have inspired a host of references, homages and parodies. The Munch Museum, before the theft, hosted an exhibition of contemporary works influenced by Munch's proto-existential painting. Gilbert & George "Street" 121 x 100cm photomontage 1983 The museum provides a concise description of "Scream's" genesis: "In his writings, Munch connects "Scream" (1893) with a specific event - a walk with some friends from a vantage point high up on Ekeberg at sunset. Munch paints the subjective experience of "the scream in nature" as an expression of universal angst rooted in existential uncertainty. Mankind is on the threshold of a new and frightening century, abandoned by God, whom Nietzsche...

Gregg Chadwick "An Intimate Grammar" (In Memory of Uri Grossman) 30"x24" oil on linen 2006 I paint Buddhas when the world seems to call for them. As a father I can barely begin to understand the loss of a son. The death of David Grossman's son Uri during the recent fighting between Hezbollah and the Israeli Army in Lebanon clearly shows the costs of war. I paint Buddhas in the hope that courageous men like the writer David Grossman will continue to seek peace through dialogue and understanding. It is much more difficult to sit down at a negotiating table and hammer out differences than it is to lob missiles over the border or to drop bombs in retaliation. A world without prejudice, brutality or war is a world which I wish to leave for my son. The goal seems naive or laughable to some but the non-violence of Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. bore great fruit.

Uri Grossman Photo: IDF Spokesperson's Unit The New York Times reports that Uri Grossman - "the son of Israeli novelist and peace activist David Grossman has been killed in southern Lebanon ... just days after the author urged the government to end the war with Hezbollah guerrillas." David Grossman Photo: Shai Rosenzweig Uri Grossman's family released a statement: "Uri Grossman was born on August 27, 1985. He was supposed to celebrate his 21st birthday in two weeks. Uri studied at the experimental school in Jerusalem. He reached the armored corps and fulfilled his aspiration to be a tank commander. He was about to be released (from the army) in November, travel the world, and then study theater. Friday evening he spoke, from Lebanon, with his parents and sister. He was glad that a decision on a ceasefire was taken. Uri promised that he will be eating the next Shabbat dinner at home. Uri, son to David and Michal and brother to Yonatan and Ruthie, had a fabulo...

"Die Blechtrommel (The Tin Drum)" Günter Grass lithograph (Grass' first novel -''The Tin Drum''- is a magnificent attempt to portray the horror and stupidity of the Nazi years.) In an interview with the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , German Nobel Laureate Günter Grass admits that, between 1944-45, he was a member of Hitler's Weapons SS. Günter Grass says the shame of his youthful naivety has long haunted him and that it will now be his "Scarlet Letter." Der Spiegel reports that Ralph Giordano, a leading German-Jewish writer, said he would not condemn Grass and praised his belated confession: "It's good what Günter Grass has now done,'' Giordano said. ''What's worse than making a mistake is not coming to terms with it. His example also shows how seducible young people can be.'' One of the most powerful organizations in Nazi Germany, the SS played a key role in the Holocaust, operating the death camps in ...

The Jameel Gallery of Islamic Art at the Victoria & Albert Museum, London "Yet political turmoil in Israel, Gaza, Lebanon, Iraq and beyond only underlines the challenge of using the past to illuminate the present. Put differently, can 400 carefully chosen objects, some dating to the 11th century, provide us with any fresh insight into what is happening in the Middle East today?" -Alan Riding in the New York Times The Jameel Gallery of Islamic Art at the Victoria & Albert Museum, London is a long overdue re-installation of the Islamic collection at the V&A. Students and instructors at the nearby Royal College of Art often stop by the V&A for lunch. Maybe this collection of beautiful and politically charged artwork will inspire the artists of London and beyond to delve deeply into the connections and ideas found in these objects rather than repeat the tired diatribe coming from the talking heads in the Middle East, Europe and America. The Ardabil Carpet (detail)...

A Picture Kill notice has been sent out by the by the Reuters News Service and Beirut based freelance photographer Adnan Hajj has been dropped by the agency for Photoshopping news photographs of the Israeli-Hezbollah conflict. The Reuters Website reports that they received "more than 2,000 reader e-mails on this issue over the weekend." The agency issued a kill on the photo in question: Doctored Photo of Beirut by Adnan Hajj and sent out an unaltered version: Unaltered Photo of Beirut by Adnan Hajj Reuters also reports that they have "withdrawn all photographs taken by the Beirut-based freelancer after establishing that he had altered two images since the start of the conflict between Israel and the Lebanese Hezbollah group." "There is no graver breach of Reuters standards for our photographers than the deliberate manipulation of an image", said Tom Szlukovenyi, Reuters Global Picture Editor. "Reuters has zero tolerance for any doctoring of pictures...

Arshile Gorky "The Artist and His Mother" 1926-36 oil on canvas 60 x 50 in. Whitney Museum of American Art, New York Gift of Julien Levy for Maro and Natasha Gorky in memory of their father © 2000 Estate of Arshile Gorky/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York Today's New York Times reports that a new study by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum suggests that "learning about paintings and sculpture helps children become better students in other areas." The study cites "improvements in a range of literacy skills among students who took part in a program in which the Guggenheim sends artists into schools. The study, now in its second year, interviewed hundreds of New York City third graders, some of whom had participated in the Guggenheim program, called Learning Through Art, and others who did not." "The study found that students in the program performed better in six categories of literacy and critical thinking skills — including thorough descripti...

From the Los Angeles Times : "On Thursday, attorneys representing artist Kent Twitchell filed a claim against the U.S. Department of Labor in connection with Twitchell's large-scale mural "Ed Ruscha Monument" — a six-story portrait of fellow artist Ruscha on a building owned by the federal agency — being painted over in early June. Twitchell said he received no notice, as required by law, that the paint-over would take place."

Underwater Display: Terminal 1 San Francisco International Airport Summer - Lots of traveling in the heat and lots of time in airport departure lounges. The San Francisco International Airport has an interesting program of curated exhibitions. Terminal 1's current display concerns the sea - "Aquarium: Underwater Planet" The exhibition is presented in conjunction with the Steinhart Aquarium from the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco. (All the current exhibits at SFO are listed at sfoarts.org. ) Specimens gathered long ago float in amber colored jars bringing to mind Doc Ricketts' Lab in Monterey or even the mutated human/sea creatures who serve Davy Jones and torment Johnny Depp in “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest." I found A O Scott's review of the reviewers- "Avast, Me Critics!" - in the New York Times to be an entertaining take on the role of critics in contemporary American society: "Are we out of touch with the aud...

Matthew Barney sweeps up at SFMOMA There is an amusing article in today's San Francisco Chronicle about the installation of Matthew Barney's "Drawing Restraint" exhibition at SFMOMA - Petroleum Jelly, Barney dressed as Gen. Douglas MacArthur, Tennessee trucker Jim McKinney, future Bjork sightings. This exhibit, which opens today, is going to be fun. Matthew Barney's "Drawing Restraint" Exhibition has its own comment space on the web: "Drawing Restraint:What's Your Opinion?" Trucker Jim McKinney with coffeee and pastry watches his tankload of petroleum jelly ooze forth at SFMOMA Matthew Barney Podcast: "Drawing Restraint:Podcast" Podcaster at SFMOMA'S Chuck Close Exhibition