Speed of Life

Opening Event tonight at LACMA for the Tim Burton exhibition. Jane's Addiction is slated to perform. Much more to follow... Tim Burton Untitled (Edward Scissorhands) 1990, private collection Edward Scissorhands © Twentieth Century Fox, © 2011 Tim Burton More at: Tim Burton at LACMA

Gregg Chadwick The Wound Dresser - Walt Whitman - Washington DC 1865 30” X 24” oil on linen 2011 "The eyes transcend the medium." -R.B. Morris (Songwriter, Performer, Poet, Playwright) I have created an ongoing series of paintings that explores the history of nursing for National Nurses Week and the birthday of Florence Nightingale. Three of these paintings were exhibited at the recent UCLA symposium: The Image of Nursing. The artworks were then auctioned at a gala event (Nurse: 21) to help fund scholarships for UCLA School of Nursing students. The paintings adopt a look as viewed through the lens of time similar to the art of a period film. In my artistic practice, I create dream like images with space for the viewer to imagine their own paths to meaning. At times these openings may be found in the doorway of a subject’s eyes. Walt Whitman's poetry is a continual source of inspiration for me. Whitman's life as a nurse, helping wounded soldiers during th...

Nemesis-Ai Weiwei: The Elusiveness of Being. By Geandy Pavon "The concept of the project is to impose the face of the victim on buildings walls that house government offices … The light on the wall is a symbol of revelation." -Geandy Pavon Provocative work by Cuban-American artist Geandy Pavon as he projects a billboard sized portrait of Ai Weiwei onto the Chinese consulate in New York City. More at: Geandy Pavon Website Video: Imprisoned Artist Ai Weiwei's Face Projected On Chinese Consulate

by Gregg Chadwick Gregg Chadwick Study for Kamakura 14"x11" oil on linen 2011 " The most precious thing in life is its uncertainty." - Kenko, from Essays in Idleness (Tsurezuregusa), circa 1330 I am always honored to support the Venice Family Clinic with my art. My donation this year reflects my interests in Southern California and Japan with Study for Kamakura . Kamakura is both a beach town and a center of Japanese culture. In my painting, grey beach haze seems to mask the distance between east and west. Kamakura is home to the great statue of Buddha, the Daibutsu , pictured on countless postcards and books on Japan. Two years ago, I finally made my pilgimage to Kamakura and stood in awe beneath the great statue. A great wave washed away the building housing the Daibutsu in the 15th century. Since that time the statue has been seated in meditation beneath the sun and the stars. After surviving great tsunamis and political upheavals, the Daibutsu provides pers...

Gregg Chadwick Hanuman's Dream 72"x96" oil on linen 1996 NEC Collection And the dust clears and we are still here. How then shall we live? Photo Credit: Spencer Platt/Getty Images Make My Bed? But You Say the World’s Ending

by Gregg Chadwick The First Grader , a new film directed by Justin Chadwick and produced by Richard Harding and Sam Feuer, opens today May 13, 2011 in Los Angeles and New York. Since I wrote the following review in March, I have seen the film again and attended a marvelous question and answer session with Justin Chadwick, Naomie Harris, Richard Harding and Sam Feuer. I met Justin at that event and he mentioned that people were asking him if his brother had written a review of the film. Justin and I are not knowingly related but I am sure if you follow the genetic path you will find that there is a connection somewhere in the distant past. In honor of my artistic brothers and sisters and their beautiful film, The First Grader , I am posting my thoughts on the film below. I recently attended a pre-release screening of this poignant and numinous movie set in the Rift Valley in the mountains of Kenya. The First Grader, like Wim Wenders' Wings of Desire, seamlessly combines st...

Gregg Chadwick Cassiel by Computer Light 40"x18" oil on linen 2008

Roman Ruins at Leptis Magna, Libya Photo: ALAMY As the fighting continues to rage in Libya, the gaze of the West seems to have turned to Abbottabad. The dedication of artists like Sam Brookes turns our heads back to this story of pain, heroism and ultimately triumph. More at: The Music of Sam Brookes .

Gregg Chadwick Belle Ville 11"x11" oil on linen 2005

"Performing in Madison, Wisconsin and seeing 100,000 people in the streets demanding justice inspired me to record an album of union fighting songs. I've been a proud union man for 22 years and my mom was a union public high school teacher, so for me this fight is very personal. Unions are a crucial counterweight to the raw corporate greed that torpedoed our economy, threatens our environment and wants to strip away decades of social progress. From Cairo to Madison, workers are pushing back and tyrants are falling. Here's a soundtrack for our fight." -Tom Morello The full length UNION TOWN EP will be released digitally May 17th with all proceeds going towards pro-union struggles. On February 21st of this year, Tom Morello performed at the Capitol Square in Madison, Wisconsin in protest to an anti-union bill put forward by Governor Scott Walker. Morello explains in his editorial about the experience, “Frostbite and Freedom: Tom Morello on the Battle of Madison...

A Berlin Museum Calls for China to Free Ai Weiwei Last week, Salman Rushdie in the New York Times , wrote an important piece on the plight of Chinese artist Ai Weiwei. Excerpts below: "The great Turbine Hall at London’s Tate Modern, a former power station, is a notoriously difficult space for an artist to fill with authority. Its immensity can dwarf the imaginations of all but a select tribe of modern artists who understand the mysteries of scale, of how to say something interesting when you also have to say something really big. Louise Bourgeois’s giant spider once stood menacingly in this hall; Anish Kapoor’s “Marsyas,” a huge, hollow trumpet-like shape made of a stretched substance that hinted at flayed skin, triumphed over it majestically." Chinese Artist Ai Weiwei at the Tate Modern in London - October 2010 "Last October the Chinese artist Ai Weiwei covered the floor with his “Sunflower Seeds”: 100 million tiny porcelain objects, each handmade by a master craftsman,...

Photo by Robert Ray/Associated Press Francine Rollins and Rondroka Long sat amid the rubble of their neighborhood in Tuscaloosa, Alabama Daybreak in Alabama by Langston Hughes When I get to be a composer I’m gonna write me some music about Daybreak in Alabama And I’m gonna put the purtiest songs in it Rising out of the ground like a swamp mist And falling out of heaven like soft dew. I’m gonna put some tall tall trees in it And the scent of pine needles And the smell of red clay after rain And long red necks And poppy colored faces And big brown arms And the field daisy eyes Of black and white black white black people And I’m gonna put white hands And black hands and brown and yellow hands And red clay earth hands in it Touching everybody with kind fingers And touching each other natural as dew In that dawn of music when I Get to be a composer And write about daybreak In Alabama. Please donate to tornado relief for the South at: American Red Cross And please buy the poem here: Knopf

Ai Weiwei with musician Zuoxiao Zuzhou in the elevator when taken in custody by the police, Sichuan, China, August 2009 100 cm x 130 cm color photograph Courtesy Ai Weiwei and Christine König Galerie, Vienna “We can perhaps bet on art to win over tyrants. It is the world’s artists, particularly those courageous enough to stand up against authoritarianism, for whom we need to be concerned, and for whose safety we must fight.” - Salman Rushdie On April 3, 2011, the internationally recognized Chinese artist Ai Weiwei was detained by Chinese officials at the Beijing airport while en route to Hong Kong, and his papers and computers were seized from his studio compound. The international arts community has rallied around Ai Weiwei's unjust incarceration and an online petition is being sponsored by museum directors and cultural figures across the globe: 'By using Ai Weiwei’s favored medium of “social sculpture,” we hope to hasten the release of our visionary friend." Please ta...

Gregg Chadwick A Body of Sound 30"x22" monotype on paper Courtesy the Julie Nester Gallery The writer Farouq Salloum recently sent me a poem inspired by my artwork The Body of Sound . Mr. Salloum's lilting words swirl and fix a passing image. The poem is posted below in the original arabic version and is followed by the english translation by Farouq Salloum. Thank you Farouq! من اسئلة الجسد والوساوس من زهرة الشهوات على وسادة السرير من زخارف الكلمات على رنين هواتفك حيث اتوهم انك تحتويني .. اتوهم انني احتويك انثى هابطه من جحيم اللذائذ وآدم حائر في ندم ايامه على الأرض هو عطرك الذي يملأ المكان كأنك هنا دائما نعيد ترف وحدتنا بالفصول .. بالجسد الحاني .. وبالغناء * A body of sound جسد الصوت لوحة Gregg Chadwick By: Farouq Salloum A Body of Sound -by Farouq Salloum You spring up from the magic space of my forest from the Questions of body and whispers from the flower of desires on the pillow from the ornementation of words on your phones calls as an Illusion where you comprise me ...

Moby's new video for The Day features Heather Graham as an angelic being. Enjoy!

Obama ~ Biden 2012

by Gregg Chadwick The First Grader , a new film directed by Justin Chadwick and produced by Richard Harding and Sam Feuer, has been gathering cinema festival awards as it moves towards a May 2011 release. This week The First Grader won the award for best feature film at the Palm Beach Film Festival. I recently attended a pre-release screening of this poignant and numinous movie set in the Rift Valley in the mountains of Kenya. The First Grader, like Wim Wenders' Wings of Desire, seamlessly combines story and place to create an illuminating beacon for our time. The First Grader portrays the story of Kimani Maruge, an 84 year old Mau Mau veteran who helped liberate Kenya from the British. After the Kenyan government announced in 2003 that free schooling would be offered for all, Maruge, played marvelously by Kenyan actor Oliver Litondo, arrives at a primary school to finally get his chance at an education - long denied under oppressive colonial rule and unavailable to him since ...

Spend some time at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam today: Van Gogh Museum Online

On Saturday, March 26, 2011 the Torrance Art Museum held a fundraiser for the Japanese Red Cross to help with the humanitarian needs of post-tsunami Japan. I donated my painting Illume for the cause. This oil painting of a young Buddhist monk, seemingly caught in the glow of prayer candles, resonates hope in mourning, acceptance and rebirth. Gregg Chadwick Illume 16"x20" oil on linen 2011 Ongoing until April 30, 2011 at the Torrance Museum of Art is the exhibition Gateway Japan curated by Yuko Wakaume, Ei Kibukawa, and Max Presneill. More at: Torrance Art Museum

Gregg Chadwick The Sheltering Sky 218cm x 163cm oil on linen 2010 In honor of the brave people of Libya and in memory of the brave Libyan journalist Mohammed Nabbous.

Live Stream of United Nations Security Council Meeting on Libya March 17, 2011

"At times like this, we are all Japanese" -George Takei Gregg Chadwick Beauty and Sadness ( 美しさと哀しみと) Utsukushisa to Kanashimi to 57"x103" oil and collage on Japanese screen Live video chat by Ustream NHK Live Stream from Japan with Updates on the Earthquake, Tsunami, and Nuclear Crisis

Buddha, Japanese National Museum, Tokyo Gregg Chadwick "A Balance of Shadows" My thoughts and prayers are with the people of Japan. Video from Shinjuku,Tokyo showing skyscrapers swaying with the force of the March 11, 2011 earthquake centered off of northeastern Japan. Buildings in Japan are engineered to meet extraordinarily high governmental standards to help prevent earthquake damage. (Video by escot2008) " Friday’s quake was centered off the coast of Honshu, the most populous of the Japanese islands, at a point about 230 miles northeast of Tokyo and a depth of about 17 miles below the earth’s surface.The quake occurred at 2:46 p.m. Tokyo time, and was so powerful that buildings in central Tokyo, designed to withstand major earthquakes, swayed." -United States Geological Survey globalgiving has set up a well organized webpage for donations at Japan Earthquake And Tsunami Relief Fund More at: Earthquake in Japan

Watch live streaming video from theuptake at livestream.com Gregg Chadwick Engine Company 48"x36" oil on canvas 2011 Dedicated to the brave Union workers across the globe: firefighters, nurses, teachers, steelworkers, bricklayers, SAG members, screenwriters, police officers, custodians, musicians, and company. Especially those fighting for their futures in Madison, Wisconsin. Madison, Wisconsin Protests set to the Dropkick Murphys' pro-union song "Take 'em Down"

Watch live streaming video from theuptake at livestream.com Solidarity with the Workers! On Wisconsin! Archive Below: Ustream is now down. But brandzel currently has live mobile video from inside the rotunda at : brandzel at qik.com in the Capitol building

John Wooden (1910 - 2010) Photo by Gregg Chadwick at Pauley Pavilion, November 2006 John Wooden's Great-Grandson Tyler Trapani Makes Last Bruin Points at Pauley Pavilion Bruins - Great Final Game at Wooden's Pauley Pavilion! UCLA 71 - Arizona 49 #ucla #ncaa #reevesnelson #bball #tylertrapani #jrw #wooden

To Public Service Workers in the State of Wisconsin Dear Sisters and Brothers, On behalf of the 700,000 members of the Polish Trade Union NSZZ “Solidarnosc” (Solidarity) I wish to express our solidarity and support for your struggle against the recent assault on trade unions and trade union rights unleashed by Governor Scott Walker. We are witnessing yet another attempt of transferring the costs of the economic crisis and of the failed financial policies to working people and their families. As much as some adjustments are necessary, we can not and must not agree that the austerity measures are synonymous with union-busting practices, the elimination of bargaining rights and the reduction of social benefits and wages. Dear friends, please rest assured that our thoughts are with you during your protest, as we truly do hope that your just fight for decent working and living conditions, for the workers’ rights will be successful. Your victory is our victory as well. In Solidarity, Piotr D...

We Are Wisconsin from Finn Ryan on Vimeo . We Are Wisconsin by Finn Ryan Since the Wisconsin Uprising of 2011, when hundreds of thousands of workers rallied on behalf of labor rights, support for unions has surged. History will record the fight by Wisconsinites and allies across the country as the critical juncture where labor’s march began anew! pic.twitter.com/qFGb3EJtkI — John Nichols (@NicholsUprising) August 30, 2022