Yes, my friends… The time has come again to clear out the stacks of paintings in my studio to make room for new work to be made. Below are most of the works that I’m willing to let go of for $50 or less. Buy them now, for they are in danger of being painted over if left in my studio much longer. And that would break my heart just a little bit– for I have deeply loved all of these paintings, but I’ve moved beyond them in style and subject matter, and they may never again see the light of an art show…

But you can change the life of a little painting… if you see one that touches your heart, leave a comment or send me a message on Facebook. It’s that easy.

masquerade 20×16…… oil& canvas cutouts on canvas…… $50

something is about to happen 20×16……. oil on canvas……. $35

an unnecessary stain on silence & nothingness 16×20……. oil & collage on canvas……. $50

beneath the surface 16×20…… oil and collage on canvas…… $35

wanderer between red worlds 16×20……. oil and gel transfer on canvas……$50

i wish you would, but i know you won’t 11×14….. mixed media collage on canvas……. $45

il cavallo blu (the blue horse) 12×12…… paper, aluminum & paint on canvas….. $40

between now and then 8×10………. mixed media collage on canvas…….. $35

nothing left to do now but fly 11×14………mixed media on canvas……….. $45

gone daddy, gone 20×16………. oil, graphite, paper, coffee…… $50

idea 5×7……….. oil, graphite, paper, wire, gel medium………… $35

existing, then, even if 20×16………. oil, graphite, paper, ink on canvas…………. $45

cold and delicate 16×20 ……….oil on canvas……… $40

this one hides behind his jokes……….. polymer clay sculpture, oil on canvas……. $35
this one has 2 companions: “this one builds walls” and “this one wasn’t real” $35 each or $75 for the set of 3

You can see more of my work at www.galacticbloom.com (give it a few seconds to load, it’s flash-based), or find me at the following upcoming events, with work so new it hasn’t been photographed yet:

Thursday, June 2nd, Jimbo’s Rock Lounge in West Ashley, where’ll i’ll be creating art onsite with a gaggle of other talented folks

Friday, June 3rd, LOCALES, another Eyeball Art Event at The Meeting Place in North Charleston, where my newest piece will debut: “the emporer’s new clothes: made in china”

Saturday, June 18th, Through the Looking Glass at Mama Q’s on John’s Island, where I’ll show an as yet untitled mixed media piece on a 3′x5′ glass

HOPE TO SEE YOU THERE!

Dear Chiquita, Get your greedy little brands off my fruit. Is nothing sacred? Now the little stickers on my bananas that used to just say “Chiquita” now advertise for a freakin movie, Rio– from the creators of Ice Age. This displeases me.

DO. NOT. advertise on my food. Thank you. Just for that, I’m not going to see your damn movie.

Paul and I went for a walk Sunday, in the industrial wasteland of North Charleston’s old navy yard. That place is a veritable goldmine of visual riches. See here:

an inexplicably festive balloon

the new sculptures are up at Riverside Park. this year’s show is better than last year’s.

this one makes noise. the wind hits the vertical steel poles & makes a bongy bell-type song.

the cattlegate. employees only, single-file, no pushing.

i ain’t got time for this mess.

So that is my latest photo essay about the post-industrial world of North Charleston. I’m working on a new photo book through blurb.com. That’s on my list of Things I Should’ve Done, But I Just Painted Instead.

Hanging on the back wall (with some degree of reluctance, as the adhesive gave up periodically throughout the evening), is the following 4-page spread that I created earlier this semester as part of my anti-advertising campaign.

And this brings me to my current rant. Buckle up.

I love clothes and fashion, but I abhor the sweatshop economy and the low-wage humiliation of the retail job sector. I love fashion magazines, but I loathe the beauty industry and the propensity toward eating disorders that it creates in the female population and the objectification of women by the male population. I hate the advertising industry’s attempt to sell everything from jeans to cola with sex and scantily clad women… I despise the consumerism and out-of-control capitalism that has wrecked our natural environment and our economy… and yet I work in marketing as a graphic designer. I am a maker of advertising.

I comfort myself that I am not selling a product, but a service– and a service that the world needs. The law firm I work for champions human rights, prosecutes terrorists and the financiers of terror, and is a big proponent of whistleblowers for consumer fraud and the manufacturers of unsafe products, as well as many other causes that I can rally behind and feel good about participating in.

But still… I see what’s going on the world and I’m ashamed that I, personally, haven’t done more. The activist awakens. Ten years ago I dropped out of graphic design school due largely in part to a recurring dream in which I found myself painting over insidiously consumerist billboards at night with large colorful paintings of wisdom and beauty… and upon waking I reacted against the proverbial Corporation by removing myself from the ranks of up-and-coming participators, only to find myself laboring in the gritty belly of the capitalist beast-machine at a retail counter.

…Not the wisest move ever. So now, after having resigned myself to gaining a formal education and on the verge of accepting the seal of institutional approval (i.e. a diploma), having grown accustomed to the steady bi-weekly paycheck from The Man, I am hungry to activate in my suddenly ample free time.

But I don’t know how. Stage a protest? Vandalize a billboard? Print up some inflammatory flyers, pamphlets, leaflets? Nah, that doesn’t sound like me. I bought a sewing machine instead. And by god, I will learn to use it.

Please don’t make fun of what I’m wearing. At least it wasn’t made in a sweatshop.

resources:
www.cleanclothes.org

www.organicconsumers.org

www.greenamerica.org

www.naomiklein.org

how not to behave in a museum. while the black-jacketed security people of Charlotte know the proper way to behave in a museum and did not threaten us with bodily harm nor follow us about the galleries offering their boorish viewpoints of the art, other museum patrons certainly needed a lesson on proper museum etiquette. A crowd of senior citizens wandered about talking shouting loudly across the galleries, posing with the artwork for photographs, parking themselves in the middle of traffic flow to have irrelevant conversations and generally pissing me off. It is my contention that museums are like libraries- and one should whisper reverently, if at all, so as to not disturb other visitors’ experiences. hmphf!

accommodations. If you’re staying in the NoDa area, I highly recommend the Continental Inn on Sugar Creek Pkwy. The rates are cheap ($46/night including tax) and the sanitation rating is 96.5 (as opposed to the shameful 83 of the Crosslands Economy Suites in Winston-Salem.) The Continental also offers a free breakfast in the lobby, including a do-it-yourself waffle-making get-up. awesome! I had never made a waffle before. Now I can check that off my list. check.

notable arts. The Mint had a sculpture by one of my favorite contemporaries, Sergei Isupov, who is awesome. I love his style, his imagination, his subject matter, his fine detail and exquisite rendering ability. He is by far my favorite ceramicist and one of the most interesting contemporary artists still alive.

this image courtesy of

unrelated to Charlottian travels. During my wanderings about the vast and labyrinthine internets of late, I have discovered James Jean, an artist originally from Taiwan, now apparently living in California. I googled “seamstress” and came across the painting behind that link, which I love to the point of wishing I had done it. I am currently working on a piece which may or may not turn out to be about the plight of sweatshop seamstresses in Asia and Indonesia who, for 13 cents a day, produce the designer garments which retail clerks, making $8/hr, sell to trust fund darlings for $100+ a pop. I am on chapter 10 of No Logo by Naomi Klein, and hoo-boy, am i pissed! Pissed enough to do something about it– but what? I’m hoping Naomi will give me some ideas in Chapter 14, as she keeps alluding. Otherwise, I plan to buy a sewing machine and start making my own clothes. yah. take that, corporate america!

My phone, however, take very crappy photos. Apologies, but it was all we had betwixt the 2 of us.

Actual people looking at my work- yay!

These two paintings were created especially for the requirements of this show- 12″ square, black and white. above: threehundredsixty below: for about 6 days|scegliere

The following Saturday, Paul and I made our way to the two art museums in uptown Charlotte– the Mint Museum and the neighboring Bechtler Museum of Modern Art. Both were fabulous, containing a myriad of treasures, as well as a few snicker-worthy bombs. We didn’t care for the featured exhibit at the Bechtler- Niki de St. Phalle. I find her work garish and simple, and her forms are crude and unrefined. She certainly has pop appeal though, which is for me another tick on the ‘con’ side.

this is the statue outside by St. Phalle. its shininess is its redemption.

We also saw the work of many greats- Tinguely (the aforementioned Niki de St. Phalle’s more talented husband), Picasso, Ernst, Miro, Rauschenburg, etc… and we were exhausted & a bit art saturated afterward. The museums offered great views of the surrounding streets and were architecturally interesting themselves.

interior of the Mint. (Paul took this shot.)

lobby of the Mint. Chihuly sculpture in the background.

creeper in the stairwell at the Bechtler.

Charlotte’s inner city has several great modern buildings and an aesthetic not to be overlooked. She is too new of a city to have a fully defined personality like Charleston, but she’s interesting nevertheless, and seems to have many more cultural options to offer.

We tried to go for a walk to get photos of the Queen City- I do love my urban vignettes… but I had unfortunately left my camera at home (facepalm). Paul had his new (recently gifted, previously-Angie-owned camera) though- and in a nice little role reversal, was kind enough to let me borrow it for a few shots.

(Paul took this one)

from the backside of the Latta Arcade- an historic group of buildings around the corner from the museums

The wind was also against us and our plan for a walk. Aye, thar was a cold wind a-blowin, and mighty hard. We had to walk at an angle on some streets, and my hair would’ve been whipped off my head, had it not been firmly attached to my scalp by the roots.

These poor poppies were taking a beating, and were probably rendered completely petal-less shortly after this photo was taken.

I am also fascinated by Charlotte’s public transit system, the Light Rail… or whatever it’s called. We got stopped several times during our pilgrimage from uptown to Manifest Records (a.k.a. Paul’s Vinyl Mecca) by the short (2-3 car) passenger trains. Being from a city which barely has a bus system (which I have never ridden) I am enthralled by the trains of the larger cities and Europe. Subways and elevated rails are like alien constructs to me, providing hours of delightful window-watching and hands-free travel opportunities. Themselves worthy of being photographed, with all their tracks and stations and associated accoutrements, the culture of rail travel is exotic and captivating. Crossing trains also provide opportunities for erstwhile auto travelers to photograph other roadside interestingness whilst being stopped…

I wanna ride that train at some point. I also have several other things to do on my Charlotte list, and I look forward to returning at the end of the month to claim my unsold work (if any)  from the Baku Gallery.

now really. Does it get more charming? The cherry/apple/pear trees a-blooming, the mornin’ sun a-shining, the whole place smelling like old mashed grapes… ’twas a fine Saturday to be at Westbend Vineyards in Lewisville, NC, just 20 minutes from Winston-Salem. We arrived just 5 minutes after they opened the doors, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and ready for our first real wine-tasting. And it was perfect…

Paul and I were the only guests, aside from the seasoned gentleman with a preference for sweet white dessert wines at the end of the counter. We had the tour guide all to ourselves. Unfortunately, I have forgotten his name, as I am prone to do, but my drinkinbuddy Joel, after having viewed my slideshow of the trip, has ceremoniously dubbed him “Bob Normandy”. Bob Normandy was kind and personable, an of-the-people sort of guy, and answered all of our questions as if they were both interesting and brilliant.

The wine-making process was fascinating, and all the tubes and barrels and tanks were cool.

I especially like the visual pun here- (hint: that’s a photo-mural on the back wall.) Westbend is a small operation, a true mom&pop place. The “mom” actually rang up our purchase on the register. I think her name was Evelyn or Edie or something. She and her husband started the vineyard back in 1972, as the first vineyard to plant French varietals in North Carolina. (Everyone else was doing the sweet muscadine wine at the time.)

The wine was good- we especially liked the cab and bought the magnum bottle. It was a bit smoky, oaky, robust, but well-balanced. I liked it more than Paul, but he’s a Malbec guy.

After Westbend, we drove north-ish for about 45 minutes to Shelton Vineyards for a drastically different experience. Shelton is large and corporate, inhuman and insincere. We didn’t care much for the wines either, but maybe the flavor of the atmosphere tainted the flavor of the wines. The grounds were expansive, heavily landscaped toward the picturesque, and touristy all around. Half the interior was taken up by gift shop merchandise sprawl.

We did not tour the winery, and were unimpressed by the tasting. All the reds pretty much tasted the same- a single note played again and again. Perhaps it’s that we’re not fans of the cab franc. I do like this shot though- just wish I’d taken it at Westbend…

and the scenery was really nice…

I got pretty close to that bird, before he freaked out and flew to the other side of the pond…

And then we drove back to ol’ Winston-Salem to wander the streets a bit before nightfall. We found the old cigarette factory, now closed and hulking against the sky, still steel and cold. An entire city block, we circled it and then found our way to the top of an adjacent parking garage for eye-level views. Paul was beside himself with visual glee. He loves pipes and tubes and industrial what-nots…

Our second date–nearly six months ago– was an afternoon photo safari in the industrial wasteland of North Charleston’s Navy Yard. I must admit, I do love to photograph the wasted and decadent beauty of industry gone cold… There’s a sad irony to the twisted pipes of progress that ruined everything… and then left town.

I’ve noticed a trend in my photography of abandoned gloves. I have at least half a dozen by now. Perhaps I’ll do a series…

That’s a car on the sidewalk. Is that art?

A closed Goodwill. Not a good sign. Beautiful light though…

And my favoritest photo of the 298 we took… Eery, ain’t it?

and that’s all I’ve got for this week… up next… well, it’s a mystery… Tune in to find out.

But now, with Europe impossibly far away for my bank account, I find myself wishing I still had my tent and sleeping bag. Especially after our experience with the hotel in Winston-Salem, NC…

For my latest birthday, and the first of many future road trips, Paul and I went to the nearest wine country to tour a couple of vineyards and check out other points of interest in and around Winston-Salem, NC.

Our first stop was SECCA, the SouthEastern Center for Contemporary Art, featuring an exhibit by Oscar Munoz, a highly conceptual artist who deals with the transience of life and the imminence of death, and how identity is impermanent. His work was thoughtful and thought-provoking, and engendered a quiet sense of carpe diem tempered with futility.

The whole experience was very nearly ruined, however, by an incredibly insufferable security guard who bodily blocked our entry to the gallery and told us that if we so much breathed on the delicate artworks, he’d “kick both our butts”. Rude. I did take one creepy little photo of a window of a storage room:

Creepy leaf people, aaaaugh! The window shopping continued into Winston-Salem proper, where we wandered around until nightfall, trying to figure out why it’s called “the City of the Arts”.

she didn’t know either.

What we found instead was an industrial wasteland left ravaged by JR Reynolds Co., the tobacco magnate, and a lot of closed mills.

But even industrial wastelands have their charms and unique flavor of beauty… we discovered more of that the following day. Our biggest find of Friday was on the “Avenue of the Arts”, the 4 block strip of cutesy shops, galleries, bars and restaurants that serves as the cultural center of W-S.

There, near the intersection of 6th and Liberty, we discovered the Bank of Obama:

We had dinner at a little place called 6th and Vine where the food was beautiful and delicious. I drank a cab called “Irony” in honor of my entire experience that day.

Coming up next: roadtrip, part duex! wherein Paul & I tour 2 wineries vastly different in nature & explore the ruins of the tobacco empire…

First, some background. The transvaginal mesh is a medical device, sometimes called a patch, tape, or sling, and it is used to repair Pelvic Organ Prolapse and Stress Urinary Incontinence. POP is a condition occurring after childbirth, when the pelvic floor collapses and the internal organs fall out of place. SUI can also occur due to childbirth, as well as aging and other factors, and involves the loss of urinary control. Both conditions are treatable in a number of ways, including a procedure called sacral colpopexy, which involves rearranging the patient’s own ligaments to shore up the weakened pelvic muscles.

But the option in question here, the transvaginal mesh, is implanted in the urethra or near the vaginal wall, and is sometimes made of polypropylene– a plastic that erodes and degrades when it comes in contact with bodily fluids, such as urine & something an attorney referred to as “vaginal flora”. ya don’t say?! Maybe I should invent a raincoat made of toilet paper, because that’s an equally sound idea.

More than 1,000 injuries were reported from meshes made by nine different manufacturers. And so in 2008, the FDA issued a warning, saying this polypropylene mesh thing might be a bad idea for certain uses. Healthcare providers were instructed to warn their patients of risks like sexual discomfort, pain, and narrowing of the vaginal wall. Other complications include perforation of the bowels and other internal organs, and erosion– when the mesh bulges and becomes so misshapen that it splits the skin, causing infection… possibly requiring further surgeries to remove the mesh, blood transfusions, draining of hematomas and abscesses, etc.

In 2009, an independent study was halted early due to 15% complication rate within the first 3 months post-op. Those findings were published in medical journal in late 2010, and covered by the New York Times. Some of the products have been recalled. But I wondered how they got on the market in the first place. I asked the attorney in charge of the mesh cases, and he explained that it was a 510 k process, which means that a product that is “substantially equivalent” to something already tested and legally sold doesn’t have to go through the same rigorous trials to pass FDA approval. Generic drugs are also put on the shelves this way.

However– and here’s the kicker– this mesh was riding the 510 k coattails of an older product that was recalled in 1997.  Put that in your thinker and let it stew.

Conclusion:  The system is seriously flawed. I think at the very least, the FDA needs to examine what they mean by “substantially equivalent”. Consumers need to be a bit more critical of the pharmaceutical industry, and ask questions  before accepting a prescription or having a procedure– do some research. Now that pharmaceutical companies are allowed to market directly to the consumer, we must be ever more vigilant about cutting through the greedy opportunism of the big corporations and dig deeper for the truth.

I’d love to have a physician’s point of view on all of this. Are you caught in the middle? And do the sexy young drug reps still come around offering expensive lunches and gifts in exchange for pushing their drugs to your patients? Or has all of that (corruption) finally been outlawed?

So. First things first. The weekend began early with the blooming of my still-unidentified-mystery-plant-that-blooms-only-one-day-a-year. If anyone has any information as to the identity of this plant, please fill me in, as it sometimes keeps me up at night, tossing and turning with the burning mystery of its elusive taxonomy. I brought a baby shoot of this plant home from someone’s house in Colorado sometime before 2003…

Nextly, my BFF Maddie + la fam came to town, for one night only. We ate dinner at the Glass Onion in West Ashley (the green bean amandine was pretty tasty, but all the entrees were fried), and then we had breakfast at Saffron downtown. I’ll definitely go back to Saffron- the pastries were amazing, the menu had several mouth-watering choices, and the lighting apparatuses were nifty.

So all that food and talk of food made me want to get in the kitchen… so I did.

I know it doesn’t look as tasty… and I apologize about that. But Acorn Squash & Apple Puree just ain’t photogenic. Neither is the Tofu & Oyster Mushroom Stirfry… Also… I burned the toast. le sigh. I always burn the toast. Recipes at the end of the post.

And then Sunday… Sunday we discovered Mixson, a weird little experiment of a neighborhood in the not-so-gentrified part of North Charleston. I participated in a student art show/contest there with about 4 or 5 other artists. There was something for everybody… a broad range of aesthetics and technical abilities. And I learned a valuable lesson about art contests: the one with the most friends wins! Silly me, it seems I’ve spent all my time making art, and not enough time making friends. shucks.

So anyway- Mixson. You gotta see this place. It looks like a European village at Disneyland, or the set of a Tim Burton movie. It’s all green and sustainable and low-impact… which is really cool and it certainly has character. The neighborhood seems like it’d lend itself to being a close-knit community of like-minded folksy-types. I found it equal parts charming and creepy. But there was free-flowing wine, so eventually the former outweighed the latter and I grew rather fond of the courtyard where the dj and the bar were set up.

We also visited the nearby Tanger Outlet Mall, because I was in dire need of a pair of sunglasses having two arms, since I have the two ears and all. Tanger is even more surreally Disneyland, so much so that Paul begged to be taken back to the real world after about 15 minutes.

It was a little much for me too. All that corporate logo branding and consumerism-as-entertainment is enough to make one want to drop out of society altogether… or at least spraypaint a billboard or two, and maybe streak a public gathering. I did, however, fall in love with this superfluous bit of shiny:

a spice ferris wheel! it spins! Now I totally want a circus-themed kitchen. seriously.

Oyster Mushroom Saute

Originally from Bobby Flay, modified

Ingredients

• 3 green onions, white and green parts, chopped
• 2 teaspoons canola oil
• 1/2 cup wine (white is better, but red works too)
• 3 or 4 sweet peppers, chopped
• 1 quart fresh oyster mushrooms, chopped
• 1/2 package extra firm tofu
• dash of Bragg’s liquid aminos
• Grated hard cheese, such as Parmesean, Dry Jack, or Romano, optional

Directions

Heat oil in wok, add onions when hot, and saute for about a minute. Add a splash of wine if onions begin to stick to the pan. Add tofu to pan, splash of wine, and cook for a few minutes, then add the mushrooms, followed a few minutes later by the pepper. Add wine as needed. In last few minutes, and the Bragg’s. Serve over rice, sprinkled with hard cheese.

Acorn Squash and Apple Puree

Originally from Emeril Lagasse, modified

Ingredients

2 1/4 pounds acorn squash (2 medium to large), halved and
seeded
3 spoons of Earth Balance, Smart Balance or unsalted butter
canola oil
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/3 cup finely chopped shallots
2 Fuji or Gala apples, peeled, cored, and diced
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground white pepper
1 cup water

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Place the squash halves, cut sides up, in a large baking dish. Place 1 teaspoon of the
butter in the center of each squash. Sprinkle the insides lightly with the cinnamon and
nutmeg. Add enough water to cover the bottom of the pan by about 1/4-inch (about 1/2 cup),
cover tightly with aluminum foil, and roast until the squash is tender, 50 minutes to 1
hour.

Remove the squash from the oven, uncover, and let sit until cool enough to handle. Using a
spoon, scoop the flesh from the squash into the bowl of a food processor..

Add canola oil to a medium skillet over medium-high heat. When
hot, add the shallots and cook, stirring, until soft and fragrant, 45
seconds to 1 minute. Add the apples, salt, and pepper and cook, stirring occasionally, for
3 minutes. Add the water and cook, stirring occasionally, until the apples are very
tender, 8 to 10 minutes.

Remove the pan from the heat and transfer the apple mixture to a food processor with the
squash. Puree the mixture on high speed until smooth. Adjust the seasoning, to taste, and
serve warm.

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