The Woman Behind The Curtain

Continuing on the theme of combining language with image…

Woman Behind A Curtain, 44" x 32", oil on paper on canvas.

Here is a detail:

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A Little Cuckoo

When the technician puts conductant on McMurphy's temples, and the irons get close enough, light arcs across, stiffens him, bridges him up off the table till nothing is down but his wrists and ankles. . . and he's frosted over completely with sparks. Then it is Chief Broom's turn. The machine hunches on him, and he takes us through the air raid in his head. . .



Cuckoo, 32" x 44", oil and paper on canvas, 2014.

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Horrorshow, Most Recent Painting

"When we got outside of the Duke of New York we viddied, by the main bar's long lighted window, a burbling old pyahnitsa or drunkie, howling away at the filthy songs of his fathers and going blerp bleep in between as it might be a filthy old orchestra in his stinking rotten guts..."

Horrorshow, 44" x 32", oil and paper on canvas, 2014.

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Wrath

Similar to my law paintings series, this is larger scale, 40" x 31", and incorporates an iconic page from one of the greatest American novels. Where language is inherently limited and painting is confined to specific dimensions on a flat space, I find the integration of the two can create a higher aesthetic experience, like two candles coming together -- fire feeding on fire. 

Wrath, 40" x 31", oil and paper on canvas, 2014.

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Fair Use: Gagosian's Prince

"Prince's bad faith is evident," concluded the judge for the United States District Court, Southern District of New York in 2011. Returning to the law paintings series, this painting is another reference to the contemporary lawsuit, Cariou v. Prince, et al., in which internationally acclaimed artist, Richard Prince, was sued for copyright infringement. Prince appropriated Patrick Cariou's photographs without permission, altered them slightly, and sold them through Gagosian Gallery.

This painting incorporates a portion of the Court's opinion and facts of the case; for example: "Gagosian Gallery sold eight of the Canal Zone Paintings for a total of $10,480,000.00, 60% of which went to Prince and 40% of which went to Gagosian Gallery." While Prince was sued for appropriating Cariou's work, I have appropriated one of Prince's famous nurse paintings here. I do believe, however, that the "fair use" defense to copyright infringement better applies to my work than it does to Prince's in the Cariou lawsuit.

Bad Faith, 10" x 8", oil and paper on wood panel, 2013.

Prince Gagosian

Returning to the law paintings series, this painting is a reference to the contemporary lawsuit, Cariou v. Prince, et al., in which Lawrence Gagosian (international art dealer) is also a defendant sued for copyright infringement.

Affixed to the wood panel is a portion of the published opinion from the United States District Court, Southern District of New York, containing stinging language in its holdings, including "the Gagosian Defendants were well aware of (and capitalized on) Prince's reputation as an appropriation artist who rejects the constricts of copyright law, but they never inquired into the propriety of Prince's use of the Photos."

Prince Gagosian, 10" x 8", oil and paper on wood panel, 2013.

While Cariou earned practically nothing for his photographs, Richard Prince was the artist who appropriated them without any permission, altered them slightly, and sold about $10 million worth through Gagosian Gallery. Hence the lawsuit.

The District Court held both Prince and Gagosian liable for copyright infringement. The case remains on appeal.

Lucas v. City of Long Beach

This is the newest addition to my Law Paintings series. While "citing" a famous painting of the past and its application in today's society, the painting also serves as a personal expression based on my experiences.

This is not to say, however, that the painting should be interpreted. I am not attempting to illustrate a specific point by creating a pictorial metaphor. Although certain words and phrases from this Court opinion are both presented and omitted, the painting (and others in the series) is not a connect-the-dots game intended to lead the viewer to reach a specific answer.

Rather, while certain words, phrases, and images are purposefully presented, certainty is eliminated. Unlike the Court opinion itself, there is no literal, rational narrative. But there is ambiguity and an open range of views.

Stonebreaker, 8" x 6", oil, acrylic, and vintage paper on panel.

Thank you for following the paintings, creations, sculpture, drawings, works in progress, Doodle of the Day, and other art by Los Angeles artist Lucas Aardvark :) To see older blog posts click HERE.

Two New Paintings Of The Past

These two new small paintings reference big paintings of the past by Fuseli (1871) and Rubens (1602), in a continuation of my law painting series:

Left: The Nightmare, 8" x 6", oil, acrylic, and vintage paper on panel, 2011.

Right: The Rubens Deposition, 8" x 6", oil, acrylic, and vintage paper on panel, 2011.

My "law paintings" incorporate the text from California Court rulings. As internet research has displaced traditional book research, the books themselves have become obsolete, even though the rulings remain good law. I have thus torn out the pages from the vintage books and incorporated interesting writings into the paintings by sealing in the pages and painting over top them.

In certain areas I put a layer of glaze over the text to add color, or I scrape away paint to reveal certain words. For example, the words "People v.", "Supreme", "Homicide", and many others can be found strategically placed:


Thank you for following the paintings, creations, sculpture, drawings, works in progress, Doodle of the Day, and other art by Los Angeles artist Lucas Aardvark :) To see older blog posts click HERE.

Fish v. Purse Net (unfin-ished)

Fish v. Purse Net (unfin-ished), 8" x 6", oil and vintage paper on wood panel, 2011.

Usually in painting, I am more interested in the way paint is applied, the juxtaposition of color, contrast, subtleties, and how the art was created. This is normally more important than what the subject matter is, why it was created or the story behind the work because art should be interesting in itself and exist independently of written material or an explanation from the artist.
Nonetheless, the subject matter of this painting indeed was the driving force. This deliberately unfinished painting represents an unfinished issue.

The oceans are huge and it is easy to assume the fish numbers are infinite. But those of us on the Pacific coast are familiar with the collapse of salmon populations, and those on the Atlantic know about the collapse of the cod. Overfishing continues to destroy big fish populations at an exponential rate, and some species, such as tuna may not be able to recover once their breeding populations, are gone in just a few years, unless we, as a global society, are willing and able to join forces to implement strategies for their recovery, along with legal consequences for violations. Certainly the biggest obstacle is enforcement of these laws on the open seas. However, there are also alternative ways to maintaining sustainable fish populations.

As millions of people rely on the oceans as their principle food source, the health of the oceans' ecosystems directly affects to the health of the human race. For more information about how to contribute to sustaining fish populations, visit Greenpeace.

Thank you for following the chronology of the paintings, drawings, sculpture, and art of Los Angeles artist Lucas Aardvark.

Obscene Art - Why Painting Must Have More Artistic Value Than Film

Obscenity, 8" x 6", oil and vintage paper on wood panel, 2011.

Artists are constantly questioning what art is. There is no satisfactory definition. Art could arguably be the juxtaposition of someone's roadkill on the highway. So what the heck is the definition of art in the law?

The newest edition to my "obsolete law book" series, this painting incorporates a Court of Appeal decision from 1976, People v. Kuhns, about the criminal prosecution of a man selling obscene material at his adult video store, in violation of California Penal Code. The obscene material was discovered through law enforcement investigation, when police officers in Santa Cruz entered the store and purchased it.

But the obscenity statute is vague because it inevitably must be balanced against the First Amendment right of free speech. The courts have attempted to define obscene material as applying to: "works which, taken as a whole, appeal to the prurient interest in sex, which portray sexual conduct in a patently offensive way, and which, taken as a whole, do not have serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value."

So based on the definition, a work is obscene if it lacks “serious artistic value”. On the other hand, it is not obscene if it has some serious artistic value. How can a jury decide what has serious artistic value and what does not? It seems impossible.

Pressing the idea that anything the artist produces is art, the past hundred years have embraced a broader, more inclusive assessment, where just about anything has been accepted as art. This concept developed with the Dada Art Movement beginning around 1915. It involved probing the boundaries of art and taunting artistic conventions, and it was one of the primary goals of Dada to avoid the labeling and legitimizing of the artistic establishments. André Breton said, "Dada is a state of mind... Dada is artistic free thinking... Dada gives itself to nothing.” Probably the most notorious artwork associated with this idea is The Fountain by Marcel Duchamp, a readymade urinal he signed, dated, and called "art".

If Duchamp could place a readymade urinal in a gallery in 1917 and pass it off as art, imagine how far artists have explored this idea since then: a naked doll is wrapped in barbed wire and placed in an art gallery; a man films himself tumbling off a roof; a woman paints a portrait of herself performing sex acts with an animal.

If the woman had filmed herself instead of painted, would her work then lack “serious artistic value”? If so, wouldn’t that mean that painting has inherently more artistic value than film? I know many people who would take issue with that!

Obsolete Books and Vintage Paper

When an appeals court issues an opinion (ruling), sometimes the case is "published", meaning it may be cited as a rule of law. Over the decades, thousands of published opinions have filled volumes of books. Naturally, finding the right case to cite to takes research. Traditionally, this research was done in large libraries teeming with law books.

Only recently, however, online research has displaced traditional book research. Online research has proven to be more efficient, not only in time, but in eliminating the large amount of physical space necessary to hold the books and bookshelves.

The books themselves have become obsolete.

So what happens to the books? They become garbage. Or art!

My new series of work incorporates the vintage paper from these old books, still holding good law. For example, The School Girl, seen above, is a piece incorporating a California Court of Appeal decision from 1940. This was back when Earl Warren was the Attorney General of California, before he became one of the most renown and admired Supreme Court Justices in the history of the United States.

Here are some others:


People v. Guerrero, 8" x 6", oil and vintage paper on wood, 2011



Ex Parte Basuino, 8" x 6", oil and vintage paper on wood, 2011



Gump's Estate, 8" x 6", oil and vintage paper on wood, 2011