mens agitat molem
"Mind Moves Matter"
Endless Coupling...Light-dark, emptiness-form, visible-invisible, sound-silence, figure-ground, presence-absence, mind-matter, chaos-order, yin-yang, masculine-feminine, spontaneous-intentional, individual-universal, heaven-earth, open-closed, love-fear, nirvana-samsara, one-many, formally we usually like patterns of multiple mirror relationships of variations on a theme (Jazz). Teepee-house, there is a large transparent cathedral behind our wooden one there. Can you see it? You can sleep in there, in that wooden temple. Seriously, shrines and churches in Japan become huts, tents, teepees, refuges, to keep you warm and alive at night. I've slept in one of these well kept communal forest shrines and've had wonderful dreams,... I miss them so. And who out there dreamed of living in a teepee? I think I had a small teepee growing up as a kid. I actually used to think I was an Indian, I remember. On top of my nanny being half black half cherokee, the tribe I belonged to with my father was called
Indian Guides. I'm Golden Eagle, son of Bald Eagle (we chose our own names). I recently heard Indian Guides will become "Adventure Guides," Princesses (girl version) will be "Explorers" and "tribes" will be known as "circles," as the YMCA programs "curriculum" shifts to a more generalized one "based on nature." I'm also a native American in that i was born here, from Kansas, the "Wind tribe". Aquarius is an air sign too, interstingly. The "Water Carrier" is the air? Here is the Indian Guides pledge: "
We, Father and son, through friendly service to each other, to our family, to this tribe, to our community, seek a world pleasing to the eye of the Great Spirit.”
I'm almost done with this painting. "Endless Coupling" comes from the Noguchi sculpture of the same name living at the Nelson Museum in Kansas City. I visited there last weekend and ended up taking about fifty photos of human hands found in the classical paintings--stunning drawings and powerful mudras each and every hand. I'll post more of those pics soon. I also spent a lot of time in the Noguchi section--Ends, Energy Void, Endless Coupling, Avatar.
Noguchi was half Japanese you know, and was the only person to voluntarily enter a Japanese internment camp during the war; he wanted to help make art, gardens, and build parks for the prisoners. What an artist! He studied under the great mystic
Brancusi, who studied under Rodin, who changed the way the world looks at realism and sculpture. (See my article
Reexamining Realism for more.) In a famous interview Rodin got so angry with the reporter because he though he abstracted the figure in some way. "You are mistaken. I do reproduce it exactly as it is."
"Are you not compelled to change it slightly?"
"Under no circumstances. I would have cursed myself if I had to do it!" Rodin then explains that the
life of the model--the soul, anxiety, breath, and the movement of the model has to be included! "I see the whole truth, not only its surface." Anyway Noguchi's work is a big inspiration for me, im not sure why.
Anish Kapoor and
James Turrell as well. Those two guys blow my mind. I seriously dig what they do.
Terri said
"Ahhhhhmen. Each of these artists move beauty into space like fingers making mudras."
I miss you!
My Japanese friends came over and made us all okonomiyaki for dinner. Leigh made inarizushi,手作り. 
Here we are eating breakfast with Michael Garfield. I was so thrilled he stopped by. We stayed up all night chatting in my studio with Lauren, who was visiting from Chicago. Best best best.
And the new painting in progress. Can you tell what it is? 
Here we are eating breakfast with Michael Garfield. I was so thrilled he stopped by. We stayed up all night chatting in my studio with Lauren, who was visiting from Chicago. Best best best.
And the new painting in progress. Can you tell what it is? 
