your house

TV trays
Stacked in front of the
microwave
We watched a comedy on
Saturday

We became
Disappointed with
Bill Murry
About halfway through the
movie

After that
Tried a little bit of
caffeine
Started bouncing off the
ceiling
At the corner cafe

2 a.m.
Stopped at the curb in my
hatchback
Put the movie in the
moviebox
Put you at your house

What I really want to know is
How can I phrase this
I'm looking forward to next weekend

-- Your House, 24x24", $300

we are the stars

I stayed up too late
last night counting all the stars
I could not find one
out of place, no not anywhere

I prayed for you, hope you find
your way back home again
I could not hope for someplace
more precious, no not anywhere

we are the stars
look at how spectacular we can be
look at us shine
even as we fall
we are
the stars

We are the Stars, 23x35", $400 

waiting for spring

In the summer
you wore your hair long
In the winter
you were more than a little
scared of your first day
on the job in a town
you knew nothing about
and no one to talk to
waiting for spring

Waiting for Spring, 30x40", $800 

paintings with poetry

I've had this idea for years now but have only now gotten around to it: juxtaposing my paintings with short clips of poetry, or poetic-like prose [call it what you want]. The idea being that viewing one might add something to the other and vice versa. Our paradigms - how we see the world - are hardwired into our lives, and I think this combination of words and images has the tasty potential of adding deeper layers to the simple act of viewing a painting.

Appearing high in my scattershot list of hobbies - almost as high as painting - is songwriting, accompanied by passable guitar chords. A few of these recent song lyrics have made for a nice grab-bag of sorts for these first "paintings-with-poetry"s I'll be posting over the next week or two. These "lyrics" are not meant to be great literary masterpiecs, mind you - quite the contrary, they are not meant to stand on their own at all but simply add another layer to the painting being viewed.

Enjoy, and please leave a comment!

art is about the art

Sometimes it's okay to create something because you like it - that's all - you just like it. There is no deeper meaning, no heartfelt emotional or philosophical underpinnings; none of that. You just like it. And that's perfectly okay.

I've heard it said that some artwork is harder to view than other artwork, and I guess I agree with that. I can see that in movies for instance. There are some movies, though violent and perhaps bloody [i.e. hard to view], that still manage to draw me in as a viewer because of the craftmanship of the art . . . be it the scripting, the acting or directing. Whatever that something is, I perceive those movies as art. And that's what it is: perception. Art, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder.

Art is about the art. And in creating that art, an artist puts some of himself there on the canvas. And that part is not necessarily a logical process. Sometimes it just happens.

"Any artist should be grateful for a naive grace which puts him beyond the need to reason elaborately." - Saul Bellow

Robot Graveyard #3 - Disassembly

This one has a tenuous link to the robot graveyard series, namely the coffin-like shape in the lower right corner, the geometric shapes throughout and the cartoonish color scheme. I look at it as a disassembly of the various parts of the robot graveyard world. A serious work of art if you ask me [snicker-snicker].

"Robot Graveyard #3, Disassembly" is painted in acrylic and, as best I can recall, weighs in at around 24x24" [I was too lazy to run out to the garage/studio to measure it just now].

tuxedo dance

Admittedly, I spent no time naming this painting; tuxedo dance may be as good a name as anything but it sounds a little weak. Any help?

I painted this from a photo taken at my brother's wedding reception [my brother is the one in the suit, dancing with his new bride]. Size: 30x48", acrylic and oil.

[it's been so long since my last post - just under a month - I'll try to do better!]

Reading Van Gogh

I've begun reading from "Theories of Modern Art" in order to broaden my knowledge of artists and the major art movements of history. The book is a six-hundred-plus page Juggernaut used as textbooks in college art classes apparently [I may have had a class that required this book, but that's beyond my memory - and was undoubtedly beyond my interest to read at the time].

Anyway, it has been interesting reading letters from [the now-famous artist] Vincent van Gogh writing about his artwork and thoughts on art in general. The letters - written mostly to his brother Theo after leaving the bustling art scene of Paris for the solitude of Arles - create a sort of diary of creative investigation. Amid his rants on subject matter and the specific color choices he's made in paintings as well as his admiration of Japanese painting. I see the same electric yearning of creativity that I often experience when I delve into my own artwork and discover this simple but elusive thing called style.

"When the thing represented is, in point of character, absolutely in agreement and one with manner of representing it, isn't it just that which gives a work of art its quality?" - Vincent van Gogh

Spring Cleaning Sale!

These are older paintings I got back from the Louisiana Furniture Gallery - it's spring - time for a little spring cleaning - everything must go! hehe. Seriously though, think of this as a garage sale - I'll give you a suggested price but feel free to offer a lower or higher amount; if you want it either say so in a comment to this post or email me at wess@wessforeman.com. The proceeds will be put to good use - paint supplies! Anything unsold will be primed over and re-used. All are unframed unless noted - oh, and shipping cost not included, and I reserve the right to sell to the highest bidder! On to the paintings:

"Island Paradise" [left] is an oil, 18x24", sugg: $40

"West Texas Sprawl" [right] is an oil, 18x24", sold

"Untitled Crowd 2", acrylic and oil, 16.5x39.5", sugg: $60

This one never left my studio [garage] - in fact I just signed it today. It's painted on slightly wavy hardboard.

"Desert Landscape", oil, 11x14", sugg: $25

[left] "Crabbing", acrylic, 36x24" framed, sugg: $150

[right] "Invisible Dan", acrylic, 36x24" framed, painted over and gone forever :)

Robot Graveyard #2

Robot Graveyard #2, 24x30", $400

The second in the robot graveyard series came on fast, over before it began. This is basically a re-imagining of the first one. I like it a lot. That's about all there is to say about out it. I hope you like it too!

Robot Graveyard #1

Robot Graveyard #1, 18x24", $350

This painting started the same way as "30 Minute Commute" with the same idea in mind. But something happened early on: a robot graveyard was conceived, and this idea took over [I couldn't help myself]. I love the color combination here, reminds me of early cartoons. I'm looking forward to exploring this robot graveyard theme in future paintings.

30 Minute Commute

30 Minute Commute, 30x30", $425

This was a fun painting to make, and I like the finished product. It evolved over a period of two weeks [I even messed with it in Photoshop once to see what it would look like after a few changes]. It is definitely a further departure from realism but is still in the realm of objectivism.

Pandora

Those with broadband who like to listen to music from your computer should check out pandora. It's a customizable streaming radio station. You can create "stations" based on songs or musical artists - just put in your favorite song and pandora will create a station of musically equivilent songs. It's very impressive. And it's free.

Newest Painting

This is one turned out well. Doesn't have a title yet but it is 30x48", $900 and very colorful. This is the sort of painting I've been concentrating on lately -- colorful, confetti-scapes that shout out, "Fresh & Interesting!" - or maybe something more spontaneous like, "Whoot! Woot! W-sup!"

At any rate, this painting style just makes me smile.

Sketchbook - shoes

Unnamed Landscape

I struggled a while before I was satisfied with the composition and color palette of this one . . . I suppose struggled is a bit much, it simply took longer than expected. The color combination is at best quirky . . . or it could be considered whimsical, I guess, which sounds much better than quirky to me.

Anyway, let me know what you think. Also, if you have the time, please help me think of a name. Preferably something . . . whimsical. Like say, "The Circus Moves On," or "Confetti Landscape" perhaps.

Oh yeah, and it is 30x40" and $800 [unless the new name adds value to it] . . .

School Yard

This Painting is called School Yard. It is 24x48" [that's two feet tall by four feet wide] and it's price is $600.

For some reason this makes me think of a time long ago [just a reoccuring dream of mine, now] when recess lasted for years and the girls made necklaces out of clover flowers while the boys were pulling the stingers out of honey bees . . . well, I was anyway.

Starvation

Dieting is not complicated: eat less calories than you can burn in a day and then repeat daily. Counting calories, though not very hard with all the prepackaged/properly labeled foods available, always seemed to me too much of a hassle to contemplate. I am now, however, counting calories with the best of them and loving every minute of it. It's the logical [aka nerdly] part of my brain that loves keeping track of numbers, and when I serindipitously stumbled upon "The Hacker's Diet" online book I was hooked. Here's the premise: eat less calories than you can burn in a day and then repeat daily . . . and keep track of it all . . . "Programmer, hack thyself."

Some people will not like this diet: there's no tricks or taboo foods or 8 step process. If you're the type of person who loves keeping track of things [as in experiment data], this diet will motivate you to keep going . . . because you're keeping track of yourself.

Side note: the salad pictured is what I had for lunch today - I was pretty proud of it because of the great food to calorie ratio and general enjoyment I had in eating it - here's how I made it:

• create tortilla bowl in microwave [two minutes or so]


• add lettuce


• sauerkraut, 4 Tbls


• a little salsa


• homus


• and top with yogurt

Yummy. And only 246 calories! [that's a pretty low calorie count]

Sketchbook - view from my house

The is a quick sketch of the view looking to my left, out the window, when I'm "working" at my computer. [I get my mail soon after the postman delivers it.]

Sketchbook - extra gum