Frozen Flamingos...

You can take the boy out of Florida, but its sure another thing to take Florida out of the boy... I spent most my life in the sun drenched state of Florida soaking up the heat and hanging out on the beach. Inundated with tourist kitsch at every turn, I absorbed and incorporated these cheap mementos into my repertoire of kitsch appreciation. Knick-knacks in every shape and form inhabit our daily lives so thoroughly that they seep into important and/or personally, valuable places inside our heads and hearts. Upon great research, I have found it is difficult to ignore the fact that kitsch is a gold mine of reference... personal and shared memory...human sentiment...nostalgia theories...how and why value is placed.
So,being a connoisseur of kitsch I decided to photographically visit my collection of plastic pink flamingos that populate my deck, potted plants and flower beds around my yard. Also, being it is the dead of winter here in PA, I thought it would be fun to see how they were weathering the bitter cold and snow....

Enjoy this homage to Florida and better weather...a parade of pink, plastic, frozen, flamingos patiently waiting for the thaw.

PS...GO STEELERS!

Got Keramiekon...

I got some good news the other day that I would like to blab about...my piece, Got Milk Rock Machine got into an international exhibition in Croatia called "Ceramica Multiplex" or "Keramiekon" or...
"THE INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL OF POSTMODERN CERAMICS 2009 - "The exhibition CERAMICA MULTIPLEX"...with a possible subtitle, "Nature as Adventure"...ok, its something like that...I think I am missing something in translation but anyways there are a bunch of countries participating in this event..."The greatest and most important ceramic manifestation in Croatia will take place from April 18 till May 17 2009 in the City Museum of Varazdin and other places in the town.It will be held under the patronage of the Croatian Ministry of Culture and the Varazdin City Council"...uh huh, uh huh...straight from their website...anyways I am one of 14 Americans involved, maybe only 15 applied to be in, I don't know...Funny thing is that a colleague, the ceramics professor, Kevin Turner, here at IUP also got two of his pieces juried into the show...go figure, 14 people out of this entire country and one works with me.

I am happy this piece is getting some love. I made this piece a year or so back and it did not fit into the body of work I was producing at the time, but I still liked it and felt it had some strange merit to it...it fits into my current obsession of nature/synthetic...of man's manipulation of the landscape and its replacement with objects from our interior life. How realities are formed around kitsch objects as well as an exploration of materials and surfaces.

So here are 2 more shots of Got Milk Rock Machine...this piece is comprised of two parts, both are mid range stoneware...hand built and thrown parts...translucent green glaze, gumball like surface-opaque white, commercial decals and black,rubbery tool dip... about 12"x10"x8".

Toot Toot...

Landscape #1: Tubors and Corms...

Yes. Thank You.
January 9, 2009 - February 6, 2009
Opening Reception
January 16, 7:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m.
The Brew House Space 101 Gallery is located
at the corner of 21st and Mary Street,
South Side, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15203.

An affirmation in a time of crisis.
Free market economics has triggered the onset of The Great Depression 2.0. The planet is getting so hot you could light a cigarette just by holding it outside your car window. The Large Hadron Collideris on the verge of creating a Black Hole that could swallow up the Earth. As we dive headlong into the Apocalypse, let's take a moment to breathe, relax and engage in contemporary Art!

...and that gentle readers is the curator's statement for this show...I am happy to be included in this very promising exhibition of wildly diverse and edgy art works. I feel like I am in good company here...colleagues and others whom I think highly of are included in this show. Pittsburgh based artist, Tom Estlack, put the whole thing together and has been great about communicating all the details via emails. The space is very Pittsburgh, it is an actual old brewery that has been reborn into gallery space, theatre space, and artist co-op studios up above. Heck, Estlack is even putting out a small catalog that will accompany the show.

I am happy to be showing brand spankin' new work...what I feel is the beginning of a series of "paintings". The "paintings" are all ceramic forms combined with materials like astro turf and flocking. The series is based on the concept of a landscape but swerves deeply into the realm of fictionalized space...space that is populated by elements related to the idea of a garden, all the while entangled in memory, both shared and personal...grandma's kitschy ceramics grow roots and take over the world.

I have posted a few crappy images I shot quickly after installing today...I promise I will have better images of this work next time...hey, if you are in the Pittsburgh area stop by and check out the show for yourself.

Gallery Hours
Wed, Thurs 6-9pm Saturdays 12-6pm By Appointment
Phone: 412-381-7767
http://imail.iup.edu/Redirect/www.brew-house.org/http://imail.iup.edu/Redirect/www.myspace.com/the_brew_housefindout@brew-house.orgNeed directions? Click for Google Map