Long Time No Post

OK OK, I have been meaning to make about 10 million posts but where does the time go I ask you in the most rhetorical fashion?

A few weeks ago, I went to NYC via the Megabus, and frankly, meh is my pronouncement on this cheap way to get down there. But when it comes to New York City, unlike much of life, it is not the journey but the destination that matters so don't worry about the crappy bus ride, devoid of the much promised free Wi-Fi and electricity.

No, its more about going to the Neue Galerie on the edge of Central Park, the German art centre which has Klimt, Schiele and Kokoschka paintings and a traveling Otto Dix show which will be in Montreal soon.



Otto Dix's series of prints made from his harrowing experiences in WW1 are as terrifying as they are hilarious and sad.

This is where the paintings purchased from the Bloch-Bauer heirs now live. The Adele Bloch-Bauer portrait and some of Klimt's last paintings are here.

check out the Gallery here



This a little sketch from an Egon Schiele painting that was so simple and utter perfect in it's sense of contour.



I sat in the cafe Sabarsky, named after the Klimt art expert who curated a Klimt show I saw 1991 in Florence, it kinda blew me away- you know all about the finished paintings, but it was the sketches that were so simple and stunning. The show was in the massive Fortezza della Basso, which is sort of on the edge of the city.

It is also on a ring road where tranny hookers ply their trade. As students, we had to walk past here every day to get to school, which was fine in the day as we could navigate the insane "Italian Job" Style driving, dog shit and used hypodermic needles which were part of the everyday (Florence, in the early 1990s was apparently the Heroin capital of Western Europe). At Night, however, Fiat Puntos would slow to a crawl, looking for just the right combo of white fur coat, black wig and shiny fuck me boots that made that irresistible Tranny. We would walk past it all in amazement.

May 8th, 2010 at TCAF

Image from Buenos Aires

This is a Holga photo I took in Buenos Aires, Recoleta cemetery. The place is full of all sorts pomp and circumstance, proclaiming the glory of blah blah blah.

Ideas of honour and sacrifice, it would be great if it was just about sculptures.

But sadly, it is about young people dying. I really felt this feeling staring at this monument to the glorious dead over here. The young face of this boy soldier was quite sad and quiet and unlike the people who were nearby laughing and trying to get pictures of Eva Peron's crypt.

I took this series of shots to have this young face flanked and penned in on all sides by this older soldier with a ceremonial helmet.

A view of the my exhibition, Remnants.

Well first thing, I changed the name of the show at Jet Fuel, no biggie really.

It communicates more about what these things are and how the relate to a life. Here is an excerpt of the diatribe:


These pieces evoke a sense of nostalgia: perhaps not for the items themselves but for the time and place that they come from and for the way the user viewed themselves at that time.

They had some sense of importance for a period of time, and entered a repository for that which we could not part with: at that time and after wards, each had some vague sense of personal value. In short, these items represent a time in a life.

If we place the artifacts that represent a short period of a life in the right order, can we recreate a life?

What remains of that life when the life itself has ended?

The wall reads left to right: Childhood, Teenager, burgeoning Sexuality, Adulthood and Senior.

I want to say thanks to the photographer Norm Betts who took this terrific photo in segments and pieced it all together, and brought me a print for the opening, that was Rad.

Please click on the photo to blow it up and check out all the goodies, my personal fav may be the poem entitled "US" my brother's first girlfriend wrote for him (or is that them?), man it is terrible.

Blog Blogged.

Well the show went up, and nothing has crashed on anyone's head which is terrific.

We had a grand opening, despite someone nicking my bottle of Gin and my friends trying to get a beer for nephew who is obviously a minor.

Yup, there was some press even, well ok, a blog guy. He does a blog on people's fashion, figures I was wearing my brother's Valentino jacket, now I can hear about how great that jacket is- I know its a great jacket.

Actually, the sweater in this picture was a gift from a friend, on my 16th birthday, 23 years ago...ack, at least it fits. Sarah made me this scarf which I love as it is half her wool and half this ancient wool that had sat in with my mom's wool bins for 40+ years. The colours are so similar, unless you look closely.

here is the website

http://www.torontoverve.org/

Have a look at this bloated picture of me and laugh at the review which characterizes my project as " an explosion of Geekdom"

egad.

Collective Memory II

Collective Memory was a show I had in 2006, images of my personal and work spaces were mirrored with my family's penchant for collecting and saving items of dubious beauty.

Starting in February, I will be building a new installation, at the Jet Fuel. This will be using the "stuff' that has always sat in the basement at the family home and constitutes a life. This idea stems from a series of conversations I have had over the past few years with Daniel Garber, who with his site, culturalmining.com has an interest in aspects of cultural and its language. We have been exchanging ideas ever since I started to take papers, bills and flyers from our basement and posting them to the wall at Jet Fuel. He catches all the subtle nuances of the visual elements and printing quirks of these old documents. Daniel Garber ladies and gentlemen, a real gem.

The large obstacles are how to re-create something that lives on shelves in a basement while being visually interesting and faithful to these objects, how they came to be together and what they mean to those who stored them rather than threw them out.

So, it is an exercise in limiting your ego and letting the wonder of a commodore 64, AFX race tracks and about 3000 other interesting things play off each other.

Collective Memory II, at the Jet Fuel (519 Parliament ST) for the month of February, please come check it out if you are not claustrophobic.

Please check out Daniel's site, culturalmining.com

Compare New and Old

Well, as promised, here are a few more watercolours from my recent trip to Buenos Aires coupled with a year old series I did on the beaches of Cuba.



This above image was done in the Plaza de Mayo, the red haired guy on the left was Federico, I think he was the producer of aforementioned TV series, he seemed to be a bit of a ring leader. As an aside, you see a great deal of people with red hair in Argentina, that may seem odd or perhaps a skewed result based on the fact that they stand out but hey, ponder this, my cousin is really a red head and her mom is from Argentina....I know!

Anyways, the couple on the right were from Calgary and I think had just arrived in town. I hit my stride with the simple and if i may say elegant profile of the lady's face (i don't remember their names) the guy seemed to like the portrayal of his special lady friend and took a photo and then stood beside her to watch the actor, well, act. I then included him into this painting which I guess looks a bit like a inflated image. He saw himself pictured like Mr. Macho and guffawed, which I think is a great reaction.



So here are some sketches I did on my birthday a year ago on the beach in Cuba, surrounded by rotund Quebec-ers who have zero desire to use a skin cream with a SPF factor. It was lobsterville, for serious. Anyways, this is what got me started on portraying people in this simple style versus using pencil or ink pen sketches. The large block forms and shapes of painting worked more for me, with hints of line drawing.

Plaza de Mayo

With my days in Buenos Aires winding down, I headed to the main square to do some painting. This place is known for protests but not much was going on this day, I think it was a Sunday? Anyways, instead of a protest there were a group of people shooting some sort of revolutionary recreation type thing for TV. Go figure.



If you look on the left hand side of the image, you see the television crew: far left in red is the make-up girl who asked me about immigrating to Canada and if she should go to Montreal; some crew members; the actor is the guy with the outstretched arm and beard; to the right of that the camera person with a 5D and an old lens and sound.

To the right of all that is a group of American tourists who were sitting in the park (actually my starting point, worked the other way across the page) the tourists were de rigueur annoying in the way you expect people to be, lame comments about the city and a insane allegiance to an overuse of the words 'like' and 'dude'.

As an aside, I have to admit that the Moleskine Watercolor Sketchbook has been really terrific for me for the past year: Cuba, Morocco and now Buenos Aires, the paper is great which has been what has been lacking with other Moleskine products for 'arty' pursuits. At some point I will upload these really crude (read rudimentary) paintings I did in Cuba which sort of got me started on this style of character depiction with watercolours.

Buenos Aires - Watercolour

These are a few of some recent watercolour sketches I made while in Buenos Aires over the holidays. We went to the horse track, the Hippodromo to be exact. These Jockeys had incredible satin outfits and I had about a minute to paint them before they go on their horses and took off. I was taking a picture of these Jockeys and guards stopped me-saying no photos. I pulled out my watercolour set and started to work.



This is one of the riders as they prepared for a race. This guy is the second person in on the watercolour above- with one minute to work with, they are more of a suggestion than a painting. This was Dec 31st, it was 20 +C in Buenos Aires, just a great day, not to mention we bet on the last race of the day and won!



I sat in a little coffee shop near the Once district and watched people go about their week day, slowly painting this over the course of probably an hour, watching the changes in the end of day traffic.

The girl who is in the lower right corner of this painting is part of a group of people who collect all the cardboard and bottles in Buenos Aires, they go by the name cartoneros,. Mostly it is gruff weathered bachelors who push these immense nylon bags on rollers around town but this girl was part of a family who were scavenging. She stopped for a moment and looked around. I would have liked to follow these groups of people around and get to know who their life is, and I'm sure it ain't easy. There story is I'm sure about the suffering lower income people have suffered since the economic collapse.

Anyways, more paintings to follow.

Warhol can still wow

Well, I guess I should not be surprised but that old windbag Andy would still be pretty amazing over time. Here in Buenos Aires, there is a show of his work and the museum has these raws screen tests that were made over a period of years. Sure they are fascinating because you have people like Bob Dylan, Lou Reed, Salvador Dali, Allen Ginsberg, Nico, Yoko Ono and Marcel Duchamp (and more) staring at the camera for a period of 4 silent minutes. But really, it is interesting, even amazing as people stare at the camera. The ones where people move around are not as engaging. Personally I found Susan Sontag's to be downright creepy as she shifted in her chair miming the word "CHEESE!" over and over again. Some of the ones I have put up have added music, just ignore that part.



The most compelling was Ann Buchanan, who barely moves but does not blink, she cries looking at the viewer, emotionless in her face, like French novel. Of course I can't find this one online to post.

Experiments

After a long delay, I decided to finally sit down and write an entry. I have been thinking about making a blog entry for weeks, beyond a month for sure but, well, anyways...

I scanned this old negative the other month, this picture of Allen Gardens was shot in the spring of 2004-2005? I guess it kind of surprised me as it made me start thinking about constructing panoramas as a multiple exposure image. Having said all that, I cannot remember if took this picture or not. My friend Christie had shown me some old family camera and we were trying to figure out if it was usable, 620 camera. Anyhoo, did she take these pics? Did I? I don't remember, but I do like the effect.

Of course it also nice to note an image like this, all lush and green in the current cold conditions of Toronto.

Cabbagetown Nuit Blanche

The Cabbagetown Nuit Blanche will be here on the evening of October 3rd, where all should come to the park and help us find the fabled Cabbagetown Monster- not seen since 1979. Last seen, Ernest said he had glowing red eyes...who is Ernest? come to Riverdale farm and check us out, we have torches to help find the critter.

here is some places for more info:


Cabbagetown Nuit Blanche

Main Scotia Bank Nuit Blanche Info

Mushroom Paintings and High Style

Hey if you have a second, check out November's copy of Style at Home magazine. In the High/Low section, you'll see two of my paintings, of mushrooms....what do you want from me, it pulled the room together.

I'll put some images of that up soon.

Edward Kennedy passes

Well, Teddy is gone. His image both young and old is all over the television. These paintings are some sketches from various points in his life.

Automatic Television Portraits

While staying in this hotel room, i actually have a TV for once. To clarify- there is nothing on TV worth watch, NOTHING.


Having said that, I noticed these two southerners being interviewed last night. On the right, Jimmy Carter who was on the CBC show, The Hour with George. Still articulate, he talked about a bunch of other things. On the left, Dolly Parton, who was on this show that has not changed since the 80s and has these weird production values- i thought it was from the 80s (Dolly does not age) till they started talking about Julie&Julia with Meryl Streep. . These sketches were made from the moving images while lying in a king size bed.

Cabbagetown Festival

Ok, well with the Yoga Festival wrapped up, that means its time to get ready for the Cabbagetown Art and Crafts sale. My work will not be in the park, mind you, but I think I will put up some of my prints in front of my house for sale as the entrance to my place is a natural red brick walled gallery.

With an ice cream shoppe nearby, an added dimension.

So, if you are in the hood around Sept 11-13th, grab a coffee from Jet Fuel, stop by and say hello.

Oh, also, I am gonna try daily posts for this week which should prove to be interesting as I hope to create new work and exercise every day.

Dream big I guess.

William Kentridge

This is a South African artist who is I guess a draughtsman who films his ever changing charcoal drawings and creates incredible films from them (shot on the same sheet of paper). I believe I watched this one in Chicago in 1997 and since I was just there, here is that film. Much of Kentridge's work relates to Apartheid and the treatment of people, there are always modern articles in his work (telephones and other office objects figure prominently) and the stripe suited businessman is always a main character. The fragility of the human is seen again and again.

Obviously the title is taken from the bible's story of Belshazzar's Feast, the hand writes these words on the wall of his palace and Belshazzar is dead by morning.

There is a beautiful painting of this in the National Gallery in London, UK. The Rembrandt painting is just a literal visual of this biblical tale-although it is a fantastic portrayal of these events.



To be honest though, when I am in the Rembrandt room, I look at his young self portrait: haughty, full of expectation and then you walk into the other room where one of his last self portraits hangs- he looks absolutely at the viewer with honesty and no pretensions.





please check out the National Gallery and the Art Institute of Chicago

Some More Older Paintings...

This is some older paintings that I found in the back of the hard drive-this was when I was obsessed with GIJoes of the 1970s.

At the time, I was just taken by the way these toys all looked similar but maintained an individuality due to what 'life' had exposed them to, despite having come from the same mold.

Incidently, for those who are unfamiliar with my work or not equally obsessed with GIJoes or Action Man figures of the 60s and 70s,you may find this stuff unlike the GIJoes you know. Yes, this bears no resemblance to the 80s, GIJoes and the real american hero schtick. In fact, as a kid, i did not understand how my figures disappeared, these amazing adventure team guys who would capture the pygmy gorilla, or the albino tiger, or discover the mummy- yes, those adventure team members! How did they disappear during the OPEC oil crisis and re-emerge, a few years later as 3" characters who all appeared to have been rejected from a village people toy tie in.



If you want to see more of these images please go to ericfarache.com and click on tickle trunk, you'll see plenty of images both painting and sculpture. My GIJOE studies are in the sketchbook area.

Old Painting 1995?

I was going through some old emails and found this picture my brother sent me of a painting I did for him in like 1995 or 1996. Part of the fun with this image was that I had to mail it from Toronto to San Diego and went to my local post office which, at the time, was the oldest post office of Toronto, the office of old York.

Anyways, they do not have anything modern there, that is part of their schtick, so I had to apply $60 of small denomination stamps to the painting to send it down. Years later, I think 2000, I was staying in SD and decided to heavily rework the background elements. I was more satisfied with the appearance of the woman, her look is more ambiguous and she appears to glance to the male and the viewer simultaneously. The guy from the left side with his back turned was a new addition as well. My brother? Well he wanted to be more monochromatic in blacks and grays.

And if you are curious about the old post office, it is still going strong, check it out here. You can even get sealing wax!

Art-Yoga Art through Yoga 2009

Later this month, August 21st-23rd to be exact, there will be a Yoga throw down in Toronto. A yoga art throw down to be exact. My friend, Maggie O'Connor, yoga lady cabbagetown maven and the Union powerhouse, asked me to contribute art which would aid in contemplation-ish like practices, I chose this Holga image from Cuba from January of this year. I was standing on the beach after a storm and these clouds were there, as if to roll back time. It was intense and amazing relaxing.

Care to know about the Yoga festival? Click here. Maybe you can figure out the angry cobra move.

August 2009

August 2009

Long Time Comin'...

I thought I would log in an entry while the workers next door bash the crap out of the adjacent apartment, ...serenity now.

I decided to put this picture up on the blog, I drew it in 1994 0r 95. I say drew as it is oil stick on top of oil pastels on paper. I suppose it was to be a study for a another piece but it was rather large and the other drawing/painting was never completed- instead this is what started my 'urban architecture' series of that era which continued until I re-entered college in 1998.

(wow, 19__ really looks good and carries more weight than 20__. so take that 2012 and shove it)

This drawing/painting was severely damaged and I recently restored it, something I am very happy to have accomplished, so now it sits on the wall next to my computer.

The news as they see it

Its great to be in a town where you can pick up a copy of the Onion, I admit it is like Vice magazine for people who read, but hey, once and awhile right?

There were no copies in this box just a hand drawn note that said "Shut your Fuck...Please"

See, grandma was right- politeness goes along way.

Chicago 2009

While Toronto kids had no outdoor services due to the strike, Chicagoan kids in this water park were having the time of their lives!

This massive glass monolith had projection screens in-bedded into the glass brick and would display video images of children smiling and eventually "geysering" water onto fellow children...that sounds weird now that I look at it.

Old Farm House

We were on a shoot in the town of Jordan. You may know Jordan as the town you pass by that old abandoned rusted masted boat enroute to Niagra Falls via the QEW. We went to this old farm and spotted this 1948 scrawled in the concrete and the abandoned house.
I liked the way the cement scrawl worked together from one entry to the next.

Sidewalk

I saw this today outside of where we were shooting in Leslieville. It made me remember all the scarred pieces of concrete from childhood, initials, one that said "terry blackwood' by my junior highschool.

More Guns

This is a simple little ink painting I did after the firing range of some of the characters I encountered there.This target was my best one, not as good as the old guys who were expert shots though. The guy more to the left with the hat, well he called me a "millerite" and treated me with suspicion as I may want to take his guns away.

The big guy on the right was, as the drawing states, a Zeus of a man- a great mane of hair and massive form in a dirty khaki shirt stuffed inside of some pants. He was talking about running for the mayor's office I kid you not!

We always hear about how people who shoot guns are just like you but every time I have met one, I am convinced they are crazy. Perhaps we are all just crazy, but these guys have firearms- that is the kicker.

I have a gub!!!

Well it was a strange invitation that I could not say no to- "do you want to shoot some guns with me?"

SO we went to this rather non descript office building in the west end, where, sure enough, guns can be fired.

In looking at this little clip, I noticed more my hair thinning than anything else.

Loop Gallery

Just a small plug here for Loop gallery, an artist collective on Queen west. I have recently been accepted to become a member so expect to see the flag of the International Art monkey fly over the gallery n the next 18 months or so, very excited over here.

Go to the Gallery's site, find out more- they are moving soon, check it out for those who care to know more about Loop Gallery click here

For those who care to know more about Lupins click here

sketches from London-Rubens to Paula Rego

When I was in London a few months ago, I had to go a few times to the National gallery in Trafalgar Square to see one of my favorite paintings, this lion hunt by Rubens. It is unfinished but I would like to think that he saw it as finished as it is- really bold and anticipates the romantics like Gericault and Delacroix by about 100 years.

It is a really fun piece to look at- the energy in this painting.

Below is a little sketch i did in my notebook, normally I just look at this painting for a long time.





In the nice restaurant at the gallery, there is this fantastic almost graffiti like piece that Paula Rego painted, based on the collection in the National Gallery. Her work incorporated the few images of females in the paintings. It is a long beautiful piece but you cannot get a postcard or anything, these are just a few sketches. It rifts off of Spanish/Portuguese painted tiles and always makes me think of that imaginary Synagogue that Salman Rushdie describes in The Moor's Last Sigh where the main character's mother is interpreting the tiles and telling the future.

Anyways, she is a fascinating artist (to me at least) and her paintings deal with childhood taboos, story telling she does a bit of it all.

click this link to see a minute or two of Paula talking about here studio and how she works

Then tambourine man slides all over the place

Note, images that were on the wall were Stacey Brandford's Roller girls.

Practice continues

things start to get sloppy

Guitar wielding man

Edge of his seat

Last minute studies during band practice

Vintage Polynesian Bride.

Yup, the band that was. Here they are in a practice gig at Jet fuel one night with Mike Bell on drums at the extreme right and Tim in the back.

June 07, 2009