Slow Looking With Peter Clothier

by Gregg Chadwick

Peter Clothier Leads A One Hour/ One Painting Session
photo by Joanne Warfield

Peter Clothier's important new book Slow Looking: The Art of Looking at Art guides the reader seamlessly through the history, process, and ideas behind his One Hour/One Painting sessions.  Clothier's development of One Hour/One Painting  began with the realization that along with most museum or gallery visitors, he increasingly spent more time looking at the information label on the wall than at the artwork itself. To combat this habit, Peter began to spend an hour silently and inquisitively gazing at one work of art. Much influenced in recent years by Buddhist thought and practice, Clothier combined elements of meditation and contemplation in these sessions and found more profound and rewarding experiences.  

In a One Hour/One Painting session, Peter Clothier invites small groups of participants to sit in front of a single artwork for a full hour in a gallery, museum, or studio environment.

Clothier recently hosted One Hour/ One Painting sessions during the Diebenkorn: The Ocean Park Series exhibit at the Orange County Museum of Art and at the LA Louver Gallery. Peter, also, held a session (see video below) in my Santa Monica Airport studio. Clothier began as he usually does with a brief introduction describing the hour to take place and then gently guided the participants by explaining the principles of closed-eye breath meditation,  how to relax and refresh the eyes, and provided encouragement to rid the mind of expectations and pre-judgments. For me and most of the participants that evening, the hour moved quickly as Peter led us through alternate closed and open-eyed moments. As Clothier explained, "this was individual work without initial discussion or interaction and allowed each participant to experience the artwork as fully as possible, without interruption." At the end of the hour, however, Peter invited responses and a rich discussion of the experience followed. 

Peter Clothier's Slow Looking: The Art of Looking at Art is written in clear, supportive language that illuminates art and meditation.  Clothier seeks to achieve a harmony of mind, heart, and body in his life and writing and Slow Looking provides rich examples for us to learn from and follow. In the book, we are encouraged to seek a pure visual experience with art through a beneficial process of contemplation, stillness, and serenity. Slow Looking also provides access to an audio and a video demonstration of a One Hour/One Painting session that invites readers to try it out for themselves.  Highly recommended!

Video Demonstration

Made along with participants at Gregg Chadwick's studio in Santa Monica, this video was filmed live by David Lowther.  It provides a full length example of Peter Clothier's One Hour/One Painting sessions and demonstrates the techniques involved in this guided meditation and contemplation.

Past venues & subjects for Peter Clothier's  One Hour/One Painting events :

1. Pasadena Museum of California Art—“The Matterhorn from Zermatt,” Edgar Payne

2. LA Louver—“ Echo Home,” Joe Goode

3. Laguna Art Museum—“Spring Day,” Clarence Hinkle

4. Lora Schlesinger Gallery—“I’ve Been Dating Recently,” Michael Beck

5. William Turner Gallery—“Sun Biscuit,” Ned Evans

6. Gregg Chadwick Studio—“ A Balance of Shadows,” Gregg Chadwick

7. LACMA—“Montauk Highway,” by DeKooning

8. MOCA—“Untitled,” Mark Rothko

9. The Getty—“Christ Entering Brussels,” James Ensor

10. OCMA—“Untitled Works,” Richard Diebenkorn

11. Hammer Museum—“Dr. Pozzi at Home,” John Singer Sargent; “Trees in the Garden,” Van Gogh

About Peter Clothier:

Peter Clothier has a long and distinguished career as an an internationally-known art writer, novelist and poet and describes himself as "an aspiring Buddhist who looks at art, books, and the vicissitudes of life." Clothier enjoys a world-wide following for his blog, The Buddha Diaries and is a contributing blogger in The Huffington Post. He lives and works in Southern California. His work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Artscene, ARTNews and other publications. He also hosts a monthly podcast entitled "The Art of Outrage," on ArtScene Visual Radio.

Peter Clothier's latest books are Persist, Mind Work, and Slow Looking.

More:

What Can Be Seen by Deborah Barlow

Peter Clothier's "The Buddha Diaries"

Peter Clothier's Website

David Bowie's New Berlin Elegy: Where Are We Now?

Early this morning David Bowie celebrated his 66th Birthday with the release of his first single in a decade. This song Where Are We Now?, taken from Bowie's forthcoming album The Next Day, is accompanied by an artful video directed by the contemporary artist Tony Oursler. Set in a black and white Berlin of memory and dream, Oursler's video combines with Bowie's voice and lyrics to question the themes of human bondage, release, freedom,  doubt, ageing, and death. 

 The video opens with a shot of a crystal skull on a table. Reminiscent of Gerhard Richter's evocative paintings of human skulls, this visual entrance to Bowie's musical memento mori,  reminds us that in Berlin we wrestle with the dead as we walk through a haunted and enchanted city. After the fall of the wall, Berlin has come to embody the future while at the same time carrying the scars of the past. 

Bowie sings:

Had to get the train
From Potsdamer Platz
You never knew
That I could do that
Just walking the dead

Gerhard Richter
 Skull (Schadel) (1983)

Where Are We Now? is as much a painting in soft greys as it is a song. A quiet rhythm of drums and synth warp and weft with minor key 
piano chords and Bowie's plaintive, elegiac voice. 

Bowie lived in West Berlin between 1976 and 1979 in the Schöneberg district in a house with Iggy Pop while Brian Eno and Tony Visconti were helping record Bowie's Berlin trilogy of albums Low, Heroes, and Lodger in the now legendary Hansa Studios.

In an interview on a French radio program, Bowie said, “Berlin has the strange ability to make you write only the important things. Anything else you don’t mention.” 

In Where Are We Now?, Bowie guides us through his former haunts:

Sitting in the Dschungel
On Nürnberger Straße
A man lost in time
Near KaDeWe
Just walking the dead

The Dschungel was a Schöneberg club frequented by Bowie, Iggy Pop, Frank Zappa, and  Nina Hagen. KaDaWe is a historical Berlin department store that originally opened in 1907. In a divided city, from its reopening in 1950 until 1989, KaDaWe was a beacon for the East and drew massive crowds after the fall of the Berlin Wall.  

In an informative piece on the creation of the cover for the upcoming album The Next Day, designer Johnathan Barnbrook writes that "the song Where Are We Now? is a comparison between Berlin when the wall fell and Berlin today. Most people know of Bowie’s heritage in Berlin and we want people to think about the time when the original album was produced and now."

Twenty thousand people
Cross Bösebrücke
Fingers are crossed
Just in case
Walking the dead

 The Bösebrücke was the bridge on which the first border crossing was opened to Eastern Berliners in November 1989 as the Berlin Wall began to fall. In Berlin, David Bowie challenged societal bondages in his art and his life. Later, the city itself broke free from the bondage of the wall. Now, years later, Bowie looks back and wonders if all the chains have been broken.

Gregg Chadwick
Berlin Noir
30"x22" monotype on paper 2011

There are hints of personal loss in Where Are We Now? as well. Does the mysterious woman who appears with David throughout the video refer to Bowie's incredibly brave and influential first wife Angela? Or is she a reference to the classical muses? Or perhaps an angel briefly freed from the the towering Siegessäule which flickers in the video behind Bowie and his partner. The political and the personal merge in Where Are We Now?. We are left with existential questions and are reminded that bodies age, marriages end, friendships dissolve and memories fade. But Bowie's quietly defiant voice does not give in to any dying of the light:

As long as there’s sun
As long as there’s sun
As long as there’s rain
As long as there’s rain
As long as there’s fire
As long as there’s fire
As long as there’s me
As long as there’s you

 Where Are We Now?
 by David Bowie
 produced by Tony Visconti 

Had to get the train
From Potsdamer Platz
You never knew
That I could do that
Just walking the dead

Sitting in the Dschungel
On Nürnberger Straße
A man lost in time
Near KaDeWe
Just walking the dead

Where are we now?
Where are we now?
The moment you know
You know you know

Twenty thousand people
Cross Bösebrücke
Fingers are crossed
Just in case
Walking the dead

Where are we now?
Where are we now?
The moment you know
You know you know

As long as there’s sun
As long as there’s sun
As long as there’s rain
As long as there’s rain
As long as there’s fire
As long as there’s fire
As long as there’s me
As long as there’s you

In March, David Bowie will release The Next Day, an album of his first new music in a decade and a reunion with longtime producer Tony Visconti. Where Are We Now? was released today on Bowie's 66th birthday. A note from his label Columbia explained this was "a timely moment for such a treasure to appear as if out of nowhere." 


Available from iTunes


More at:
Die Zeit: Nächste Abfahrt Potsdamer Platz

David Bowie: The Next Day. That album cover design

 What is the font you used for the main title?:

It is a new font that we are working on called Doctrine – this is the first major use of it. Doctrine will be released in the coming weeks at VirusFonts.

Rufus and Martha Wainwright's Christmas 101 at Royce Hall: A Holiday Tribute

by Gregg Chadwick

If this was the way the world ended on 12 21 12, those of us gathered at UCLA's Royce Hall for the second night of Rufus and Martha Wainwright's Christmas 101 were being ushered into eternity with heavenly voices. 

Rufus and Martha Wainwright, the son and daughter of  Loudon Wainwright III and Kate McGarrigle - who passed away in 2010 from a rare sarcoma cancer, both possess extraordinary voices and mesmerizing stage presence. Their combined talents bolstered by musical kin and comrades, including Emmylou Harris, folk singer Maria Muldaur's daughter Jenni Muldaur, the legendary Van Dyke Parks, former Eels drummer Butch Norton, Sloan Wainwright, Lucy Wainwright Roche, Carrie Fisher, Rufus' husband Jorn Weisbrodt, and more, brought holiday cheer and at times poignant retrospection to last night's concert.

Christmas 101 continues a concert tradition begun in 2005 by Kate McGarrigle and her sister Anna. As well as being musical events, the shows are star splashed fundraisers for the Kate McGarrigle Fund which supports cancer care and research at the McGill University Cancer Centre and the renowned teaching hospitals of McGill University in Montreal, including the McGill University Health Centre and the Jewish General Hospital. 

The evening opened with the traditional Christmas carol God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, as vocalists and musicians stretched across the stage beneath a bright blue scrim dusted with images of snowflakes. The hall overflowed with family history as if we had stepped into a McGarrigle/Wainwright Christmas reunion.  

Moving from tradition to contemporaneity, Rufus next crooned his searing ode to unconditional love - Spotlight on Christmas. Rufus' richly crafted lyrics use the Christmas story as a vehicle to examine inequality and consumerism:


People love the working man
Who does the best that he can
But don't forget all the horses and toys
Never could fix the poor little rich boys
People say they love the maid
Who sweats and toils just like a slave
But don't forget all the diamonds and pearls
Never could fix the poor little rich girls

You can measure it in blood
You can measure it in mud
Let us say for these twelve days
Put the measuring away

Cause it's Christmas
And the spotlight's shining on Christmas
And the spotlight's shining on us

People love and people hate
People go and people wait
But, don't forget Jesus, Mary, and Joseph
Once were a family poor but rich in hope, yeah
Don't forget Jesus, Mary, and Joseph
Running from the law, King Herod had imposeth
And they were each one quite odd
And mensch, a virgin, and a God
But don't forget that what kept them aflow
Floating through the desert doesnt take a boat no
Don't forget that what kept them above
Is unconditional love

And, you can measure it in blood
You can measure it in mud
Let us say for these twelve days
Put the measuring away

Cause it's Christmas
And the spotlight's shining on Christmas
And the spotlight's shining on us
And the spotlight's shining on Christmas
And the spotlight's shining on

People love the working man
Who does the best that he can
But, don't forget all the horses and toys
Never could fix the poor little rich boys


The mood shifted, as it would all night in what seemed a conscious reflection of holiday tensions amidst a world soaked in violence and injustice, as Rufus and Jenni Muldaur played wolf and mouse in Frank Loesser's seductive standard Baby, It's Cold Outside. 

Van Dyke Parks appeared almost as a white haired saint throughout the evening. His passion and musicianship lifted the music and took it into another realm, particularly when he strolled into the audience to play Royce Hall's thundering organ. 

Rufus and Martha Wainwright Perform at Christmas 101
Royce Hall, UCLA
December 21, 2012
photo courtesy @christmas_101

Lucy Wainwright Roche brought the house to tears with her poignant version of Joni Mitchell's River. Many of us remarked at intermission that Lucy's singing brought the haunting lyrics to the forefront:


It's coming on Christmas
They're cutting down trees
They're putting up reindeer
And singing songs of joy and peace
Oh I wish I had a river 
I could skate away on
But it don't snow here
It stays pretty green
I'm going to make a lot of money
Then I'm going to quit this crazy scene
I wish I had a river
I could skate away on
I wish I had a river so long
I would teach my feet to fly
Oh I wish I had a river
I could skate away on
I made my baby cry

He tried hard to help me
You know, he put me at ease
And he loved me so naughty
Made me weak in the knees
Oh I wish I had a river 
I could skate away on
I'm so hard to handle
I'm selfish and I'm sad
Now I've gone and lost the best baby
That I ever had
Oh I wish I had a river
I could skate away on
I wish I had a river so long
I would teach my feet to fly
Oh I wish I had a river
I made my baby say goodbye

It's coming on Christmas
They're cutting down trees
They're putting up reindeer
And singing songs of joy and peace
I wish I had a river
I could skate away on

Van Dyke Parks and @WainBright killing it: Trois Anges
photo courtesy @christmas_101

Near the close of the first half of the night, Carrie Fisher delivered a hilariously ribald spoken word routine that LA Underground thought could have been titled “A Very Fisher Christmas.” Suffice to say, it included a riff on self pleasuring Christmas gifts for Grandma and daughter as well as memories of Fisher's childhood yule-tide holidays in Vegas.

Soon after, Rufus and Martha's aunt Sloan Wainwright shook Royce Hall with her gospel fueled Thank God It's Christmas, revving the evening into a communal celebration of birth, life, death and everything in between. 

Before the break, Rufus, Martha, family and friends gathered for a lovely rendition of  White Christmas, which smartly added a nod to the absence of African-Americans in the song's lyrics and the culture itself that many of the holiday tunes rose from.

Gigi warming up Royce Hall
photo courtesy @christmas_101

After intermission, three songs in particular commanded rapt attention. Emmylou Harris dedicated her rendition of O Little Town of Bethlehem to the children and the teachers gunned down in Newtown, Connecticut one week before. Harris' voice  quietly conveyed the fragility inherit in all our lives. She screamed "Enough!" in a whisper.

Later, Rufus asked for the mics and monitors to be turned off before he wafted into an a cappella rendition of the lovely Cantique de Noël - the original French version of O Holy Night. Wainwright's voice carried and echoed around Royce Hall, reminding me of the countless students, educators, politicians, and performers whose voices had also echoed in this room. 

Echoes of Royce Hall - 2008
photo by Gregg Chadwick

Martha Wainwright, brought the entire night home with her haunting singing of her mother's song Proserpina. This musical retelling of the Roman goddess Proserpina's tale was the last song Kate McGarrigle wrote. 

The myth recounts the abduction of the goddess Proserpina (or Persephone in Greek) by Pluto, the master of the underworld. Proserpina's mother Ceres, the goddess or mother of the earth, searched in vain for her daughter. Ceres lamented her vanished girl. Where had she gone? In time Ceres found a clue - a small belt dropped by her daughter in the abduction, but the fate of her daughter remained unknown. In anger, Ceres halted nature's growth. Plants withered and the world touched by her footprints turned to desert. Finally, to end Ceres wrath, Pluto who had hidden Proserpina in his underworld was forced by the other gods to set his abducted bride free. But a price was set. Proserpina could return for six months each year to her mother - Spring and Summer. But each year when the seasons change to Fall and Winter, Proserpina must return underground. 

Dante Gabriel Rossetti
Proserpina

Before Martha sang Proserpina she remarked that she once thought that her mother, Kate, had written the song about her. That she was the lost daughter. But instead, Martha said that she has come to realize that the song was written by her mother about herself as she prepared to return to meet her own mother - Martha's Grandma. 

Martha carried the song last night in a rich plaintive voice. We were honored to hear her sing and be in the presence of such a remarkable musical family. 

The entire ensemble joined in on John Lennon and Yoko Ono's Happy Xmas (War Is Over) to provide a fitting ending to an inspirational evening.

Christmas 101 concludes with a final performance at Royce Hall tonight. I urge you to drop everything and attend. For me, this concert series perfectly embodies what the holidays should be all about.

Martha Wainwright and Van Dyke Parks at Royce Hall
photo courtesy @christmas_101

More:

Rufus & Martha Wainwright's Christmas 101   

Rufus and Martha Wainwright Host 'Christmas 101' in Oakland

The Luminist for Ana Grace

The Luminist

GreggChadwick 

  My condolences and thoughts to jazz player Jimmy Greene and his wife Nelba as they bear the senseless loss of their beautiful little girl Ana Grace who was a victim of the Sandy Hook Elementary School mass shooting in Connecticut.

Jimmy Greene, the American saxophonist who recently taught at the University of Manitoba, has written a brief message following the death of his daughter.  Greene wrote:

"Thank you for all of your prayers and kind words of support. As we work through this nightmare, we’re reminded how much we’re loved and supported on this earth and by our Father in heaven. As much as she’s needed here and missed by her mother, brother and me, Ana beat us all to paradise. I love you sweetie girl. "

Our Nation Cries for the Children of Newtown, Connecticut

by Gregg Chadwick

 GreggChadwick

As I write this, an impromptu vigil is forming in front of the White House in Washington DC to mourn the victims of another senseless mass shooting and to call for much needed gun regulation. Today, a quiet school in Newtown, Connecticut was violated by a gun wielding murderer packing semi-automatic weapons with a back up assault rifle in his car.

The shooting was horrific and preventable. This is a national tragedy that needs a national response. Our glorification of weapons and our embrace of the use of violent force to resolve conflicts has led us to a crisis point. Do we continue to let our children be slaughtered in schools and theaters? Will we continue to allow almost unfettered access to military grade high powered weapons? Will we continue to cut funding for preventive mental health care?

Today, we make a decision as a nation. Twenty children and six adults were killed today at a Newtown, Connecticut school. I refuse to allow their memories to be forgotten and will not let this horror continue unabated across the nation. 

Because of their strict regulation of firearms, last year in Japan there were only 8 murders committed with guns in a country of 120 million. The year before there were 6 and during the previous year 11. Today, during one horrific attack in one school, one American gunned down more fellow citizens than the last 3 years of gun deaths in Japan combined.  Over 100 rounds of ammo were fired into children today. According to the FBI, we average 20 similar mass shootings in the US each year. Don't let the NRA fool you the Second Amendment is not unlimited. As recently as the 2008 Heller decision, the US Supreme Court has held that:

Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose: For example, concealed weapons prohibitions have been upheld under the Amendment or state analogues. The Court’s opinion should not be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms. Miller’s holding that the sorts of weapons protected are those “in common use at the time” finds support in the historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons.

Today is the day to begin the long delayed discussion of gun control and lay the foundation for the implementation of sensible gun regulations across the United States.

President Obama Wipes Away A Tear During His Address to the Nation Concerning Today's Shooting in Newtown

More at:

A Land Without Guns: How Japan Has Virtually Eliminated Shooting Deaths
Mayors Against Illegal Guns
Fatal Gaps: Can Dangerous People Buy Guns In Your State?

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The Azure Hour

The Azure Hour,

GreggChadwick 

40" x 30" oil on linen 2012

I'm excited to announce that my work has been featured in today's Saatchi newsletter. Here is a link to share with all:
http://eepurl.com/sJ8y9

What a perfect time of the day...."The Azure Hour." Painting by Saatchi Online artist Gregg Chadwick (LA). Learn more about this wonderful piece and view Gregg's portfolio here: http://saatol.us/UHezq1

Happy Holidays !

Study for The City Dreams

Study for The City Dreams, 
GreggChadwick 
12"x12" oil on linen 2012

Will be exhibited at the Sandra Lee Gallery in San Francisco, California during the upcoming Holiday Group Show which runs from December 4th through the 29th.

Opening Reception:

Saturday, Dec 8, 2012 from 4pm to 6pm

at the Sandra Lee Gallery
 251 Post Street, Suite 310
San Francisco, CA 94108
 415.291.8000
art@sandraleegallery.com