Bill Radawec
April 6, 2009
Not FLW
Bill Radawec
Not FLW
2008
Mixed Media
5 x 5 inches
www.billradawec.com
I am currently working on building connections utilizing the themes of Frank Lloyd Wright and Lincoln Logs. The inspiration for Slightly Altered work started when I discovered Frank Lloyd WrightÕs real middle name is Lincoln and his son John invented the Lincoln Logs toy. In contemplation of what is real and what is fake, I am pushing the envelope to find kinship between the real artifacts and my replications. For example, I am purchasing vintage Lincoln Toys from the 20Õs and combining them with my work of replicating various autographs like John Lloyd Wright, Frank Lloyd Wright, and even good old Abe. The ideas for the signature pieces are my connections to the famous autographs at the Mann Chinese Theatre in LA.
This work will be shown at Suburban in Chicago next month.
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
April 5, 2009
"When I look up in the sky, it is like viewing my work on a daily basis." --- Bill Radawec
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Acrylic on masonite
12 x 9 inches
www.billradawec.com
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
April 4, 2009
Overhead
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2007
Acylic on canvas
25 x 12 inches
www.billradawec.com
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
April 3, 2009
I see you
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Acylic on canvas with fake security camera
24 x 24 inches
www.billradawec.com
On September 11, 2001, United Flight 93 was hijacked, turned from its original flight plan to San Francisco, and subsequently crashed near Shanksville, PA. The plane was above Cleveland when it drastically changed directions. I consider this moment in my series, Out of the Blue, the Turn Around, in which I portray a vibrant blue sky stippled with a line of sparse white clouds. Read in context, this line represents the vapor trail of United Flight 93 as it turned toward Washington D. C. The functioning fake video security camera that flashes its red light accompanies the painting adds to its political implications and protection.
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
April 2, 2009
It's the end of the world as we know it
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Acylic on canvas
14 x 11 inches
www.billradawec.com
My acrylic paintings titled "Out of the Blue, the Turn Around" depict the cloud trails of United Flight 93. It attempts to capture the fleeting marks of the doomed plane as it turned around over in Parma, Ohio, my hometown. During exhibitions, fake surveillance cameras are placed at navel heights angled downward and at eye level. This juxtaposition suggests the heightened surveillance and loss of privacy since 9/11.
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
April 1, 2009
What is Real?
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Acylic on canvas
24 x 24 inches
www.billradawec.com
On September 11, 2001, four airplanes were hijacked and two of them were crashed into the Twin Towers in New York, the third into the Pentagon. The fourth crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, after passengers attempted to retake the plane. Popular mythology surrounding the event says that the plane turned around in the Cleveland area from its intended flight to the Capital, possibly over Ridge Road in Parma, my hometown.
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
March 31, 2009
Special nod to Barnett Newman
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2006
Acylic on canvas
18 x 24 inches
www.billradawec.com
With a special nod to Barnett Newman, the Out of the Blue series culminates on a grand scale, the ideas of loss, death, and what is truly real. Flight 93 flew over my house in Ohio, on a clear beautiful day. I took my personal connections to the subject matter, seeing all the contrails, and the experience of death to pay homage to the historic theme, and remind us all of the universality of it all. In all my work I used humor to dilute strong subjects, which are respectfully absent, and the power of the contrails called Out of the Blue, the Turn Around series, is more focused. Like the earthquake series called the Crack-Ups, I see the contrails as automatic paintings and drawings against a blue screen background. When I look up in the sky, it is like viewing my work on a daily basis.
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
March 30, 2009
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Colored pencil on paper
11 x 14 inches
www.billradawec.com
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
March 29, 2009
U-Turn
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2009
Pencil on paper
11 x 14 inches
www.billradawec.com
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
March 26, 2009
Are you feeling blue?
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Colored pencil on paper
11 x 14 inches
www.billradawec.com
March 25, 2009
Nose Dive
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Acrylic on canvas
12 x 9 inches
www.billradawec.com
March 20, 2009
Two Cool Cats
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
March 19, 2009
Bluescreen/Contrail
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Acrylic on canvas
24 x 23 inches
www.billradawec.com
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
March 18, 2009
TRA watching President Barack Obama at town hall meeting in Costa Mesa, CA
TRA better known as t--t, (my little Siamese cat) watching President Obama's town hall meeting on MSNBC news.
Hello my name is TRA and I enjoyed listening to President Obama's town hall meeting. And you are invited to come back to view more of Bill's paintings.
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
February 12, 2009
Happy Birthday Abe
2009 Lincoln Cents
Birth and Early Childhood Lincoln Cent Design
February 12, 2009
2009lincolncents.com
100th Anniversary of the Lincoln Cent
2009 Lincoln Cent2009 will mark the 200th Anniversary of the birth of Abraham Lincoln and the 100th Anniversary of the Lincoln Cent. There are a number of things planned to mark this important occasion.
The 2009 Lincoln Cents will feature four new reverse designs. Each design will be released approximately every three months. The four designs will represent different stages from the life of Abraham Lincoln, from his humble beginnings in Kentucky to his Presidency in Washington, DC. Additionally, special versions of each coin will be released in the original Lincoln Cent composition of 95% copper.
The first design is scheduled for release on LincolnÕs 200th birthday, February 12, 2009.
Learn more about the 2009 Lincoln Cent Designs.
February 3, 2009
Coming Soon To California
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Acrylic on canvas mounted on museum board
10 x 8 inches
www.billradawec.com
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
January 11, 2009
Ohio to Pennsylvania, 9/11
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Acrylic on canvas
8 x 8 inches
www.billradawec.com
Scene
Out of the Blue
By Zachary Lewis
Out of the Blue -- A bright, cloudless blue sky marred only by a faint white curving contrail. Clevelanders gazing upward on 9-11 might have seen something like that, if it's true that the fourth hijacked plane did indeed turn around over Northeast Ohio on its way toward Washington. Launching into another completely new line of work, Parma artist Bill Radawec here imagines how that patch of sky might have looked in a size and shape vary considerably, from notebook- and poster-sized to narrow horizontal strips. The rest is nothing but white pencil, depicting various arcing jet exhausts from different perspectives. There are 30 examples here and many more in storage. Most hang near the ceiling, forcing viewers to participate vicariously by looking up. Simple, perhaps, but the overtones are complex, and the interpretive potential is as boundless as the possibilities a blue screen represents. It's a strange exercise, pondering Cleveland's oblique relationship to such a momentous event. And Radawec himself has long been fascinated by these sort-of-close encounters with tragedy (the first being the suicide of his artistic idol). More important, no one who noticed one of these contrails that day would have suspected the horrible reality. In fact, they may even have smiled, assuming they'd seen a stunt plane. How wrong they would have been.
Email your comments to bill@billradawec.com
December 12, 2008
Asterisk Gallery Benefit
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Acrylic on canvas
10 x 8 inches
www.billradawec.com
Asterisk Gallery
2393 Professor Ave (Tremont)
Cleveland, Ohio
www.asteriskgallery.com
330 304 8528
Support Asterisk Gallery in Cleveland by bidding on great works of art . All proceeds from this event go directly to keeping the gallery open to the public and to help subsidize future events.
Silent Bidding begins on Friday Dec 12, 5-10 pm through Sat Dec 13, 6-11pm
Email your comments to bill@billradawec.com
December 6, 2008
Postcards From the Edge: A Benefit for Visual AIDS
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Colored pencil on paper
4 x 6 inches
www.billradawec.com
Visual AIDS
Postcards From the Edge: A Benefit for Visual AIDS
Hosted by Metro Pictures
January 9-10, 2009
visualaids.com
Q: What is Visual AIDS?
A: Postcards From the Edge benefits Visual AIDS. Founded in 1988 by arts professionals as a response to the effects of AIDS on the arts community and as a way of organizing artists, arts institutions, and arts audiences towards direct action, Visual AIDS has evolved into an arts organization with a two-part mission.
The first part, through the Frank Moore Archive Project, the largest slide library of work by artists living with HIV and the estates of artists who have died of AIDS, Visual AIDS historicizes the contributions of visual artists with HIV while supporting their ability to continue making art and furthering their professional careers. The second part, in collaboration with museums, galleries, artists, schools, and AIDS service organizations, Visual AIDS produces exhibitions, publications, and events utilizing visual art to spread the message "AIDS IS NOT OVER."
Email your comments to bill@billradawec.com
November 27, 2008
Happy Thanksgiving
Bill Radawec
Wired, (Another Basket Case) from the Birds series
1996
Steel, chain, hardware, epoxy chrome, wood
Dimensions variable
billradawec.com
Email your comments to bill@billradawec.com
November 20, 2008
For Pete's Sake, the Sequal
Bill Radawec
For Pete's Sake, the Sequel from the Birds series
1992
Wood
30"x 22"
billradawec.com
Wikipedia
Cross of St. Peter
wikipedia.org
The Cross of St. Peter (officially known as the Petrine Cross or colloquially Peter's Cross) is an inverted Latin cross. The origin of this symbol comes from the Catholic tradition that St. Peter was crucified upside down, as he felt he was unworthy to be crucified in the same manner that Christ died (upright). It is often used with two keys, symbolizing the keys of heaven.
The Alexandrian scholar Origen is the first to report that St. Peter was crucified head downward, for he had asked that he might suffer in this way. Some Catholics use this cross as a symbol of humility and unworthiness in comparison to Christ.
It is also often associated with Satanism and anti-religious attitudes, as it is seen to represent the opposite of Christianity by inverting its primary symbol, the Latin Cross. As a result, this symbol has become very popular within anti-religion groups and among some black metal musicians.
During the late Pope John Paul II's visit to Israel, a picture of him with a backdrop of St. Peter's cross was widely circulated on the Internet, propagating the belief of some that the Catholic Church is associated with Satanism. In fact the photograph is related to the Catholic tradition that St. Peter was martyred in Rome (and as Catholic tradition views the Pope as the successor of Peter, it is a logical symbol for the Roman Pontiff). The inverted cross is also one of the traditional symbols used by Petrine Orthodox Sebomenoi.
November 14, 2008
For Pete's Sake
Bill Radawec
For Pete's Sake from the Birds series
1992
Wood
26" x 19" x 3"
Sculpture Magazine
Bill Radawec
By Jarrell
March/April 1994
William Radawec also presented compelling works of artificial nature at AMO Contemporary Art in Hollywood. His bird-like figures are recognizable as such, but without identities or personalities, they reveal to us situation which are both oddly humorous and intensely tragic, One's beak is permanently stuck in a protruding wooden tube (Stuck,1992), another seems unable to recover from a nasty fall, lying beak down in an artificial turf mat ( Grass, 1993), and unattainable, at once separated from and engulfed by the nothingness into which it peers (Bird at Ellipse, 1993). Hovering between realism and minimal abstraction, each bird form is alone in a quirky and profoundly existential universe.
Email your comments to bill@billradawec.com
November 2, 2008
U - Turn
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around Installation
2008
Installation with security camera
www.billradawec.com
Free Times
Turning Point: Bill Radawec Remembers Flight 93
By Doug Max Utter
www.billradawec.com
Movement is identity. Each twitch, every decision and reaction leaves a trace, a track inscribed - If only in the molecules of the air - as a stroke in the universe's ongoing self-portrait. We all do our part. Interpretation is harder, though, like the recent NASA photos of a "mudslide" on Mars that may be evidence of subsurface water, or may just look like that. The dots we connect sometimes are a match only in our imagination.
For instance, when United Flight 93 was hijacked on that fateful September morning, it was somewhere in the airspace over Parma, Ohio, perhaps directly over the artist Bill Radawec's house. On that lovely, clear, late-summer morning, the sky was blue and the 757 jet would have left a huge curving contrail as it abruptly turned and headed toward its doom, ultimately falling to earth in a strip mine near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.
In the 30 small paintings and drawings that make up his solo show Out ofthe Blue, Radawec imagines walking out his door not far from Ridge Road and looking up, just at that moment of turning, forming a line-of-sight connection with history. The paintings are hung at different heights around exit's two galleries; some are less than five feet up from the floor, others hover near the ceiling, and all are spaced fairly far apart, conjuring the wide expanse of open sky. In the paintings the blue is rendered in acrylic, but the contrails themselves are meticulously drawn in dense accumulations of white-colored pencil marks. The illusion is nearly perfect. Radawec has depicted straight sections of vapor, heading right toward the ceiling, and strong, thick ones that cut boldly across the canvas like one of abstract expressionist Barnett Newman's famous "zip" paintings. Others are seen as if at a greater height, sharp and clear ending with ominous abruptness. It's as if the mystery of 9/11 and its decisive events were written on the sky. Extrapolating from Radawec's reverie, every contrail since has been commentary on that day's tragic text.
Over the past two decades Radawec has engaged in various projects that sketched a relationship between mark-making a deliberate expressive activity, and accidental aesthetics that time and nature inscribe. It's worth mentioning that these are by no means his only concerns. Speaking to a group of students recently, he came up with a list of words and subjects that sample his own interests. Running from "atomic bomb" and "cooking" through "fireman" and "stand - comedy," it also mentions growing up in the 1960's, Hieronymous Bosch and Vermeer. There are 72 entries, all of which have been part of his thinking and process at one time or another, and no doubt he could easily add as many more. Probably that's not unusual for an artist in these intellectually engaged, polymorphic times, but the list does serve to remind us that everything we do and make is constructed from layer upon layer of intention and experience.
Also known as a curator here and in Los Angeles, Radawec pioneers informal exhibition spaces with a highly innovative exhibition style, like the series of shows he mounted in friends' homes in the Los Angeles area. Collectively called Domestic Setting, those exhibits garnered some national interest, Art News, Art Forum, Flash Art,and Art in America. Later, in the fall of 2002, a couple of years after his return from a decade on the West Coast, the artist/curator began to put together exhibits in a gallery the size of a child's bedroom, built for him by Cleveland artist Matt Dibble in a corner of "superior, a gallery space," it offered Cleveland audience in art communities and university departments around the country.
During these past seven years he also mounted several shows of his own work, first at Shaheen Contemporary and Moderndowntown, and later at Per Knutas' raw & co in Tremont. Crack - ups at Shaheen showed elaborate pencil and paper reconstructions of sections of Radawec's apartment walls in Venice, California. Each was an exact replica of damage caused by the Northridge earthquake, which shook Radawec and a few million other Californians awake early in 1994. As in Out of the Blue, the artist is obsessively reliving a moment in time over and over again, like a diamond stylus running in the same groove on an old LP. It's hard to tell whether the analogue experience he generates is intended to close a cognitive gap caused by a catastrophic moment in time, when everything suddenly veered, damaged, toward a different destiny; or perhaps these works aim to put themselves between the wound and the weapon, reconfiguring the real.
Either way, Radawec proposes a hall of mirrors to the mind. A post - minimalist/conceptualist in orientation, he seeks the essence of things, but with an autobiographical slant that usually accompanies a more expressive manner; post - minimalists tend to park the personal at the gallery door. The late Fred Sandback, for instance, whose work would figure prominently on any list of Radawec's influences and mentors, become famous over the past 40 years for his deceptively simple geometric constructions made with strands of string and yarn, transforming the way audiences perceive interior space. Those extraordinary sculptures steadfastly refuse to be either two or three - dimensional, instead suggesting the pure volumes of a transcendent realm, magically translated to real space and time. The constructions at Crackups and the paintings at Out of the Blue do something similar as they recollect the subjects - death - and the sort of transcendent space that death occupies in relation to ordinary, daily life.
Another of Radawec's themes is what he calls "fake nature" and the way that nature imitates art when it invades man-made structures. Much of the landscape of Los Angeles is notably a conversation of that kind, between cosmos and cosmetics - but of course that could be said of any contemporary city, even Cleveland. Things like the contrails of modern jets, which are nothing if not fake clouds, are another case in point. That the coin of art is always forged is half of Radawec's ongoing thesis; the other half is the disturbing fact that the reality we buy with it is death.
Email your comments to bill@billradawec.com
November 1, 2008
like a feather out of a cap
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Acrylic on masonite
12 x 9 inches
www.billradawec.com
West Side Leader
Sky's the limit
By Roger Durbin
www.billradawec.com
As the Akron Art Museum is set to reopen its doors after its expansion and remodeling project, its neighbor, Summit Artspace, is doffing its artistic hat with the exhibit Kiss the Sky, which will be on view through Aug. 4. The title of the exhibition nods to Akron Art Museum's architectural firm, Coop Himmelb(l)au, where in German "himmel" means heaven or sky and "blau" means blue. As curator Laura Ruth Bidwell said, the new museum "building soars off into the sky as well." Artist Radawec reads the sky altogether differently. His seemingly evenly divided drawings on paper and acrylic works on canvas are arranged in an arcing pattern around three walls in a separate room in the Summit Artspace facility. Each image in the series "Out of the Blue, the Turn Around" has a background of clear sky blue from edge to to edge on which he dipicts through meticulously crafted pencil marks the wisps of vapor (or contrails) that trail back from high - flying aircraft. As inspiration for this collection, Radawec wondered about the fateful day of Sept. 11, 2001, When Flight93 (which ended up destroyed in a field in Pennsylvania) turned its course somewhere above his house before it headed back toward Washington D.C. He imagines in his art that he walked out his door that day, looked up and saw the 757 jet leaving a huge contrail as it veered its course. It would have been for him "a line-of- sight connection with history" in the making. The idea perhaps gains most moment in one work where the white line of smoke looks as though it is plummeting directly toward the ground. Sept. 11, 2001 aside, the images can lead a viewer who knew nothing of that day into all sorts of imaginings. Many things come to us "Out of the Blue" and amount to a great "Turn Around" in our lives.
Email your comments to bill@billradawec.com
October 31, 2008
a nice view...
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around Installation
2008
Installation view
www.billradawec.com
Scene
Out of the Blue
By Zachary Lewis
www.billradawec.com
Out of the Blue -- A bright, cloudless blue sky marred only by a faint white curving contrail. Clevelanders gazing upward on 9-11 might have seen something like that, if it's true that the fourth hijacked plane did indeed turn around over Northeast Ohio on its way toward Washington. Launching into another completely new line of work, Parma artist Bill Radawec here imagines how that patch of sky might have looked in a size and shape vary considerably, from notebook- and poster-sized to narrow horizontal strips. The rest is nothing but white pencil, depicting various arcing jet exhausts from different perspectives. There are 30 examples here and many more in storage. Most hang near the ceiling, forcing viewers to participate vicariously by looking up. Simple, perhaps, but the overtones are complex, and the interpretive potential is as boundless as the possibilities a blue screen represents. It's a strange exercise, pondering Cleveland's oblique relationship to such a momentous event. And Radawec himself has long been fascinated by these sort-of-close encounters with tragedy (the first being the suicide of his artistic idol). More important, no one who noticed one of these contrails that day would have suspected the horrible reality. In fact, they may even have smiled, assuming they'd seen a stunt plane. How wrong they would have been. billradawec.com
Email your comments to bill@billradawec.com
October 28, 2008
Bill Radawec's Out of the Blue
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Acrylic on masonite
8 x 10 inches
www.billradawec.com
Scene
Out of the Blue
By Zachary Lewis
www.billradawec.com
Out of the Blue -- A bright, cloudless blue sky marred only by a faint white curving contrail. Clevelanders gazing upward on 9-11 might have seen something like that, if it's true that the fourth hijacked plane did indeed turn around over Northeast Ohio on its way toward Washington. Launching into another completely new line of work, Parma artist Bill Radawec here imagines how that patch of sky might have looked in a size and shape vary considerably, from notebook- and poster-sized to narrow horizontal strips. The rest is nothing but white pencil, depicting various arcing jet exhausts from different perspectives. There are 30 examples here and many more in storage. Most hang near the ceiling, forcing viewers to participate vicariously by looking up. Simple, perhaps, but the overtones are complex, and the interpretive potential is as boundless as the possibilities a blue screen represents. It's a strange exercise, pondering Cleveland's oblique relationship to such a momentous event. And Radawec himself has long been fascinated by these sort-of-close encounters with tragedy (the first being the suicide of his artistic idol). More important, no one who noticed one of these contrails that day would have suspected the horrible reality. In fact, they may even have smiled, assuming they'd seen a stunt plane. How wrong they would have been. billradawec.com
Email your comments to bill@billradawec.com
October 24, 2008
Red, green, yellow, and out of the blue...
Bill Radawec
A Study
2008
wood, latex paint, HO scale figures, contrail print
Photograph by IM Toth
Story time with Uncle Bill
by Lyz Bly
www.billradawec.com
Radawec's Study sculptures were inspired by Munchkin orgies. Cleveland's visual arts community is peppered with unconventional characters who devotedly attend art openings throughout the city. It doesn't matter how far east, west or south the event is located, they are there. Artist Bill Radawec is one such person; his affable presence gives openings a feeling that is not unlike a family reunion. He is the uncle who always has a story to tell about his adventures in faraway places. The escapades Radawec most likes to recount are about his days in Los Angeles, where he weathered earthquakes and a stormy relationship, crossed paths with art and movie stars, and Ñ perhaps most important to his art career Ñ immersed himself in L.A.'s art scene. Read full story at www.billradawec.com
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
October 7, 2008
Bill Radawec's Contrail series, Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Acrylic on canvas mounted on museum board
10 x 8 inches
www.billradawec.com
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
September 25, 2008
a little to the left...
Bill Radawec
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
2008
Acrylic on canvas
24 x 24 inches
www.billradawec.com
Email your comments to bill@billradawec.com
September 11, 2008
9/11
The Out the Blue, the Turn Around, 2008, painting was donated by Bill Radawec to MOCA's 40th Anniversary Art Auction. www.billradawec.com
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
September 6, 2008
The fake crack makes it into Art in America
Art in America
Bill Radawec at Shaheen Contemporary - Cleveland
Thomas McEvilley
Bill Radawec was living in Los Angeles when the big earthquake of 1994 hit. His apartment developed cracks in the walls at about 40 places. He decided to make an art work of the earthquake damage. Ascending a ladder, carrying a drawing board, he drew each of the cracks in detail and measured the depths of the various parts of each fissure, which were between one and five millimeters deep. He marked the corresponding parts of each drawing with a number, 1 through 5, to indicate the depth of the fissure at that exact point. Then he took sheets of paper one millimeter thick. On the first one he drew the uppermost layer of a crack and cut it out with an X-acto knife. Putting another sheet underneath that one, he drew the parts that were one millimeter deep, and cut them out. Then, with another sheet, he drew the parts that were two millimeters deep, cut them out, and so on. The drawing was done with pen, pencil and Wite-Out. Finally each crack was represented by a stack of five sheets that replicated it in three dimensions. In each case the uppermost sheet was painted the color of his walls at the time, a pale tan. The 40 or so obsessive drawings were then framed. The result is a series of trompe I'oeil representations of earthquake damage rendered so precisely and convincingly that, upon seeing them, one at first thinks the artist removed the sections of plaster and framed them. Even upon close inspection they do not reveal themselves as representations, but seem real. The glimpses of damage are esthetically appealing. Each drawing turns out to have a particular allure that is unique. Yet, despite their credibility and charm as drawings, they clearly partake of the spirit of conceptual art. In fact, they treat a classical theme of conceptual art that might be called the problem of the wall. In the 1960s and early `70s, conceptual artists in general regarded the wall with suspicion, as the site of painting, which seemed polluted by its long-standing complicity with the market system. Earlier, Duchamp had responded to this feeling by placing his works on the floor or hanging them from the ceiling, avoiding the ideologically saturated wall. In the early conceptualist period many variations on this theme were rung, by William Anastasi, Lawrence Weiner and others. Radawec has produced an elegant variation on this theme 30 years later, when many of the concerns of classical conceptualism are being reinvestigated. His version has traits that show the passage of years and the softening of the austere, earlier principles. Radawec's works, for example, are made by hand rather than by a mechanical method; being drawings, they represent the most traditional of art-school disciplines; they are framed like more traditional art works, although they show only the wall itself; and so on. This elegant and intelligent show encapsulated a good swath of recent art history. The fact that the works show earthquake damage--and in fact enshrine it - suggests the deep damage that the quake of conceptualism wrought to the tradition of the artist's hand and its touch. Yet, with an ironic circularity that is another classical conceptual theme, they represent this deep fissure in art history through the very qualities of drawing, hand and touch that the original conceptualists hoped to destroy forever.
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
September 5, 2008
David Letterman - Northridge Earthquake in Los Angeles
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
September 4, 2008
Real or Fake?
Crack-Up (Kitchen, left of outside door)
1997
Latex gloss Navajo paint, pencil, colored pencil, correction ink on paper
21" x 16 1/4"
www.billradawec.com
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
September 3, 2008
Coming soon on shaky grounds...
Bill Radawec
Crack-Up (bathroom, below window)
1997
Latex gloss Navajo paint, correction ink on paper
21" x 15"
www.billradawec.com
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
September 2, 2008
History of the city of Sawtelle
A streetcar on Santa Monica Boulevard in Sawtelle, 1890. At the time, Sawtelle was an independent city midway between Los Angeles and Santa Monica.
Sawtelle existed as a separate city for many years up to 1922. According to "Police Seizure of City Hall Starts Sawtelle on Exit Path" by reporter George Garrigues in the Los Angeles Times (Westside section) of January 10, 1963, the following events took place:
In 1918, the voters of Sawtelle decided by a margin of three votes to merge their city with Los Angeles. The vote was 519-516. But the Board of Trustees, equivalent to a city council, refused to accept the decision and "ordered a challenge in the courts."
The city of Los Angeles, however, did not wait for a court decision but instead "rounded up a squad of policemen and 'swooped' down upon the Sawtelle City Hall, as one account put it at the time."
Sawtelle city officials were locked out of the City Hall and L.A. people took over all the municipal and school activities.
In the meantime, the ousted Sawtelle trustees continued their case in the courts, and on September 15, 1921, the California Supreme Court decided the consolidation had indeed been illegal because the voters "had not been told on their ballots that they would have to pay a proportionate share of all Los Angeles debts for bonds."
"Thirty-two days later the city of Los Angeles moved out of Sawtelle as quickly as it had moved in. Nine policemen packed up the records and left; eight firemen abandoned the fire engine and reported for work elsewhere." The city of Sawtelle was back in operation.
In 1922 another election was held, and once again Sawtelle voters decided to join Los Angeles. This time the merger was permanent. Sawtelle was the fourth city to be merged with Los Angeles, after Wilmington and San Pedro in 1909 and Hollywood in 1910.
Since the early 1950s, members of the street youth gang Sotel 13 appeared at Stoner Park in Sawtelle. The gang members, who appeared at the park around 3 P.M. every weekday, had very few members in 2002 due to gentrification of West Los Angeles. Many West Los Angeles gang members moved to the city of Inglewood. More at http://en.wikipedia.org
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September 1, 2008
Sawtelle Boulevard
Sawtelle Blvd. Los Angeles, 90025
Sawtelle Boulevard is a north/south street in Los Angeles of important cultural significance. Sawtelle Blvd's northern end is at Ohio Avenue adjacent to the Veteran Administration, and its southern end is at Overland Avenue, a few blocks past Sepulveda Boulevard. Sawtelle Blvd is the major thoroughfare for the West Los Angeles neighborhood of Sawtelle.
The portion of Sawtelle Blvd from Santa Monica Boulevard to Olympic Boulevard is a trendy spot for the newer Japanese American community in Los Angeles,[1]. Often called simply "Sawtelle," this neighborhood is occasionally called "Little Osaka" - not to be confused with downtown Los Angeles' older Little Tokyo, or the larger Japantown, San Francisco, California (which has also been called Little Osaka)[2]. Sawtelle is relatively near UCLA, Santa Monica, and Culver City. Twenty years ago, Japanese immigrants operated botanical nurseries here. Today, businesses found on this street include Japanese fast food (curry and ramen), upscale sushi bars, hair salons, neighborhood Japanese grocery stores, three Boba tea shops, anime, Japanese artisan stores, temples, and a few historic nurseries. One interesting site is the consulate of Saudi Arabia, located next to a ramen restaurant and an esoteric Japanese magazine store.
Homes south of this portion of Sawtelle Blvd are inhabited by a large Japanese American population. Many of the homes exhibit gardens and landscapes true to Japanese tradition.
After passing Olympic Blvd, Sawtelle Blvd continues as a four lane boulevard running parallel to the San Diego Freeway and Sepulveda Boulevard. After entering Culver City, Sawtelle Blvd swerves east, crosses Sepulveda Boulevard and ends at Overland Avenue in Culver City. More at http://en.wikipedia.org
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August 31, 2008
Bill Radawec's Soul Patch Series
Bill Radawec
Soul Patch, the Sequel
1998
Colored pencil, paper mounted on wood
8 7/8"x 8 7/8" detail and angle views
www.billradawec.com
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August 30, 2008
Bill Radawec's Soul Patch Series
Bill Radawec
small soul patch
1999
Colored pencil, paper mounted on wood
6 7/8" x 6 7/8" detail and angle view
www.billradawec.com
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August 29, 2008
Soul Patch can be defined as the hair under the lip or on top of a grave...
The soul patch is a small patch of facial hair just below the lower lip and above the chin. It came to prominence in the 1950s and 1960s, when it was a style of beard common among jazzmen. It became popular with beatniks, artists, and those who frequented the jazz scene and moved in literary and artistic circles. Jazz trumpeters in particular preferred the soul patch for the comfort it provided when using a trumpet mouthpiece also made famous by Frank Zappa. Wikipedia
In addition to to the small patch of beard common to jazzmen, my ÒSoul PatchesÓ series were inspired by fondness of cemeteries and the many walks through them. Although MarilynÕs grave could easily be found, it was always a frustrating experience when I could never find Natalie WoodÕs grave. As a result, of looking at the grass for long periods of time inspired me to create the Soul Patch paintings and then bury it under fake grass. Playing with the idea that painting is dead, I thought it should have a proper burial. By Bill Radawec
Bill Radawec
Soul Patch
1996
Fake grass, acrylic on wood
10 13/16" x 10 13/16" detail and side view
www.billradawec.com
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August 28, 2008
How do you define the hair under the lip?
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August 27, 2008
It's time for a fall walk but don't fall...
Bill Radawec
Walking Stick
2000
Fake tree, fake grass, wood, and acrylic
42 1/2" x 6" x 5 1/2"
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August 26, 2008
Not FDR but Roosevelt Wilkerson
Dallas artist Roosevelt Wilkerson recently made a walking stick for President Bush, who presented it Saturday to Pope Benedict XVI. The stick is inscribed with the Ten Commandments.
The Dallas Morning News
Dallas artist's carved stick presented to pope
By Ed Housewright
"I'm just dumbfounded," said Wilkerson, 62. "It's a big honor to me. I don't know what to say." Bush, who owns two of the sticks, included one of Wilkerson's creations in a gift exchange with the pope. Reporters covering the meeting heard Bush describe the stick as " a piece of art by a former homeless man from Texas ... Dallas." "The Ten Commandments?" the pope asked. "The Ten Commandments, yes, sir," the president replied. Wilkerson briefly caught a TV news report Saturday on the president's visit, but he didn't hear the exchange about his stick. "This is the biggest step I've made in my life," said Wilkerson, who attends St. Paul United Methodist Church in Dallas. "God does things in mysterious ways." Bush received his first stick from Wilkerson a decade ago when he was Texas governor.
Susan Nowlin, of Dallas, who attended SMU with Laura Bush, gave it to him. After he became president, Nowlin presented him with a second stick. Nowlin has befriended Wilkerson, a ninth-grade dropout who was homeless until a few years ago. Today, she ships Wilkerson's 5-foot-long sticks to people around the country. They sell for $75 each. Nowlin told Wilkerson about three weeks ago that the U.S. State Department had called, saying President Bush wanted to present the pope with one of his sticks. "He was very calm about it," Nowlin said. "He's very calm about everything." Wilkerson, who grew up in Dallas and attended Booker T. Washington High School, said he has carved his entire life. He began inscribing the Ten Commandments on ash and cedar walking sticks about 15 years ago. The first five commandments are carved lengthwise around the top of the stick. The second five are carved on the bottom half. He paints the letters red, black or green, but the stick remains a natural off-white color.
"God gave me this gift," Wilkerson said. "He put the gift in my hand." He said he can create two sticks a day -- sometimes more. And he derives his only income from their sales. Wilkerson collects wood for his sticks from the Trinity River banks in Dallas. He shears off the bark with a paring knife, then sands the wood to a smooth surface. Next, he painstakingly carves the letters of the Ten Commandments, in block style, using a 6-inch carving tool that resembles a screwdriver. He has a well-worn photo album with pictures of some of his famous clients, including former Cowboys quarterback Roger Staubach, Texas Gov. Rick Perry and former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk. "They're all over the place," Wilkerson said.
Bill Radawec
Walking Stick, the sequel
2000
Colored Pencil and Wood on Paper
30 5/8" x 3"
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August 25, 2008
Just a walking stick with the Ten Commandments created by a former homeless Texas man.
Bill Radawec
Walking Stick
1998
Fake Tree, Fake Grass, Wood and Acrylic
43" x 41/2" x 5 1/2"
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August 24, 2008
What did President Bush give to Pope Benedict XVI?
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August 21, 2008
Shroud of Turin
The Shroud of Turin is a linen cloth bearing the image of a man who appears to have been physically traumatized in a manner consistent with crucifixion. It is kept in the royal chapel of the Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist in Turin, Italy. It is believed by many to be the cloth placed on Jesus of Nazareth at the time of his burial.
The shroud is the subject of intense debate among some scientists, people of faith, historians, and writers regarding where, when, and how the shroud and its images were created. From a religious standpoint, in 1958 Pope Pius XII approved of the image in association with the Roman Catholic devotion to the Holy Face of Jesus, celebrated every year on Shrove Tuesday. Some believe the shroud is the cloth that covered Jesus when he was placed in his tomb and that his image was recorded on its fibers at or near the time of his alleged resurrection. Skeptics, on the other hand, contend the shroud is a medieval forgery; others attribute the forming of the image to chemical reactions or other natural processes.
Various tests have been performed on the shroud, yet the debates about its origin continue. Radiocarbon dating in 1988 by three independent teams of scientists yielded results published in Nature indicating that the shroud was made during the Middle Ages, approximately 1300 years after Jesus lived. Claims of bias and error in the testing were raised almost immediately, and were answered by Harry E. Gove or others. Yet the dating controversy has continued. Follow-up analysis published in 2005, for example, claimed that the sample dated by the teams was taken from an area of the shroud that was not a part of the original cloth. The shroud was also damaged by a fire in the Late Middle Ages which could have added carbon material to the cloth, resulting in a higher radiocarbon content and a later calculated age. This analysis itself is questioned by skeptics such as Joe Nickell, who reason that the conclusions of the author, Raymond Rogers, result from "starting with the desired conclusion and working backward to the evidence". Former Nature editor Philip Ball has said that the idea that Rogers steered his study to a preconceived conclusion is "unfair" and Rogers "has a history of respectable work".
However, the 2008 research at the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit may revise the 1260Ð1390 dating toward which it originally contributed, leading its director Christopher Ramsey to call the scientific community to probe anew the authenticity of the Shroud. "With the radiocarbon measurements and with all of the other evidence which we have about the Shroud, there does seem to be a conflict in the interpretation of the different evidence" Christopher Ramsey said to BBC News in 2008, after the new research emerged. Despite keeping an open mind, Ramsey has stressed that he would be surprised if the 1988 tests were shown to be far off, let alone "a thousand years wrong."
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August 20, 2008
Into the Light
Shroud of Turin
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August 19, 2008
Light Lite
Dan Flavin
" One might not think of light as a matter of fact, but I do. And it is, as I said, as plain and open and direct an art as you will ever find."
Dan Flavin, 1987
Dan Flavin: A Retrospective at the National Gallery of Art
For more than three decades, Dan Flavin (1933-1996) vigorously pursued the artistic possibilities of fluorescent light. The artist radically limited his materials to commercially available fluorescent tubing in standard sizes, shapes, and colors, extracting banal hardware from its utilitarian context and inserting it into the world of high art. The resulting body of work at once possesses a straightforward simplicity and a deep sophistication. More at National Gallery of Art
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August 18, 2008
History of Magic
BBC - History of Magic - Close Up Magic (Part 1 of 6)
Magic (illusion)
Magic is a performing art that entertains an audience by creating illusions of impossible or supernatural feats, using purely natural means. These feats are called magic tricks, effects or illusions.
An artist who performs illusions is called a magician. Some performers may also be referred to by names reflecting the type of magical effects they present, such as prestidigitators, conjurors, illusionists, mentalists, and escape artists. wikipedia.org
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August 17, 2008
Better Than Dan Flavin, My God It is Magic
LATIMER the world champion of magic
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August 16, 2008
Sideburn Burnside
Ambrose Everett Burnside (May 23, 1824 Ð September 13, 1881) was an American soldier, railroad executive, inventor, industrialist, and politician from Rhode Island, serving as governor and a U.S. Senator. As a Union Army general in the American Civil War, he conducted successful campaigns in North Carolina and East Tennessee but was defeated in the disastrous Battle of Fredericksburg and Battle of the Crater. His distinctive style of facial hair is now known as sideburns, derived from his last name.
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August 15, 2008
Do I look familiar? My sideburns are considered a fashion statement.
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August 14, 2008
How to Trim Sideburns
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August 13, 2008
I am the Hooker... My name is Joseph Hooker
Joseph Hooker (November 13, 1814 Ð October 31, 1879) was a career U.S. Army officer, fought in the Mexican-American War, and was a major general in the Union Army during the American Civil War.
Despite Hooker's reputation as a hard-drinking ladies' man, there is no basis for the popular legend that the slang term for prostitutes is derived from his last name because of parties and a lack of military discipline at his headquarters. Some versions of the legend claim that the band of prostitutes that followed his division were derisively referred to as "General Hooker's Army" or "Hooker's Brigade." However, the term "hooker" was used in print as early as 1845, years before Hooker was a public figure. The prevalence of the Hooker legend may have been at least partly responsible for the popularity of the term. From Wikipedia
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What Kind of Hooker Looks Like This?
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August 12, 2008
Frank Lloyd Wright called the 1939 Lincoln Continental Òthe most beautiful car ever made.Ó
http://www.ultimatecarpage.com
Lincoln Continental
Article by Wouter Melissen
After the Lincoln Zephyr's successful launch, Edsel and his chief designer began work on a new Zephyr-based model. As legend has it, Edsel was on a tour of Paris in 1939 when he became enamored with the elegant sophistication of European cars. Upon his return to the United States, Edsel commissioned Lincoln design chief E.T. 'Bob' Gregorie to build a car for his personal use - one that would have a 'continental' style and be ready in time for him to drive it to Hobe Sound, Fla., during his 1939 winter vacation. The car created by Ford and Gregorie so impressed the social elite of Hobe Sound that Edsel returned to Michigan with nearly 200 orders in hand and the conviction to produce the car.
The Continental is now considered as one of the best looking American cars ever built. In 1951 it was exhibited with just seven other cars in the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Production stopped in 1942 as the US and the Lincoln factories concentrated on the second world war. The Continental had a second production run after the war with a slightly different front. Production finally ceased in 1948 and with the Continental production of the V12 engine stopped as well.
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August 11, 2008
Who brought us the Lincoln and Cadillac?
History News Network
The Man Who Brought Us the Cadillac and Lincoln
By Yankek Mieczkowski
Few Americans know the name of Henry Leland. But they know the two automobile companies he founded, Cadillac and Lincoln. The high quality and standards that Leland demanded of his cars still resonate today, as Detroit faces stiff competition from automakers around the world.
The importance of Cadillac and Lincoln in upholding the reputation of American automakers was driven home in July 2003, when marketing research firm J. D. Power and Associates released the results of two surveys. In its Vehicle Dependability Study, a yardstick for quality and reliability, only four American nameplates made the list's top ten (in order of placement: Buick, Cadillac, Lincoln, and Mercury; a Japanese brand, Lexus, came in first). In its Customer Service Index Study, which measured consumer satisfaction with dealers, again, just four American brands ranked in the top ten (in order: Saturn, Lincoln, Cadillac, and Buick; another Japanese company, Infiniti, topped the list).
1939 Lincoln Zephyr toy model
1938 Cadillac V16 Fleetwood toy model
Cadillac and Lincoln made the top ten in both surveys. The quality of these two renowned American lines can be traced to Henry Leland. Perhaps the country's most underrated automaker, Leland focused on precision manufacturing and put American automobiles on the world stage.
Leland's early work as a machinist introduced him to the idea of precision manufacturing. Born in 1843 in Vermont, he made guns during the Civil War at a federal arsenal in Springfield, Massachusetts, and then at a Colt factory in Connecticut. Later, he found work at a Rhode Island company that made machine tools and micrometers. "Tolerance" is a machinist's term meaning the variation that part sizes will permit, and Leland's jobs involved using extremely low tolerances, just fractions of an inch.
Restless, Leland wanted to strike out on his own and start a factory. He moved to Chicago to chase his dream, but in a twist of fate, he arrived there on what became one of the city's most notorious days, May 4, 1886. It was a time when workers bristled against the power of industrialists, and on that day, a labor demonstration in Chicago's Haymarket Square turned violent. Someone threw a bomb into police ranks; officers fired into the crowd, and when the smoke cleared, policemen and civilians lay dead. Alarmed by the riot, Leland packed his bags and left. The bloody day may have cost Chicago a place as a prime site for automobile manufacturing, as Leland's companies later became formidable forces in the field.
Leland decided to settle in Detroit, and he founded a firm to make gears, machine tools, and gasoline engines. His company's products had tolerances as low as 1/2,000th of an inch, a spectacular achievement for the time. Word spread of Leland's high-quality products, and his customers grew, among them early automobile manufacturer Ransom E. Olds, who used Leland's gears and engines in his cars.
Henry Leland and his 1905 Cadillac
The Cadillac Automobile Company recruited Leland, and two years later he took over the company and reorganized it as the Cadillac Motor Company, becoming its first president. By 1905, Cadillac was one of the world's leading car makers.
Cadillacs became known for their innovations. They sheltered passengers from the elements with closed sedans--in contrast to the open, window-less bodies that were standard at the time--and also featured self-starting motors. (Tragedy inspired the latter, as one of Leland's friends had died from injuries sustained while cranking a car.) Moreover, Cadillacs were revered for their quality, all the more remarkable because they used mass-produced parts. Henry Ford's assembly line was several years away, and cars were still built manually. Workers also used hand-made parts with gross tolerances, employing a tedious process of filing and grinding pieces to make them fit together. Such hand-made parts carried a talisman of refinement and precision, or so many people believed. Leland knew better. He felt that manually built components lacked the precision of mass-produced, standardized parts, and he wanted to prove it.
In 1908, Leland got his chance. England's Royal Automobile Club challenged automakers to test the precision of standardized parts during a special competition. Three Cadillacs, the only cars that entered the contest, were shipped to England, and officials completely disassembled them, mixed up their parts, and then reassembled the cars. All three ran perfectly. On the strength of this performance, Cadillac became the first American company to win the prestigious Dewar Trophy, awarded to the company that introduced the year's greatest automotive innovation. Leland helped to dispel the notion that machine-made components lacked the quality of their hand-made counterparts. After triumphing in England, Cadillac adopted the proud advertising slogan, "Standard of the World."
Henry Leland and son Wilfred C.
In 1909, the General Motors Company bought Cadillac for almost $6 million, and GM President Walter Durant asked Leland and his son, Wilfred, to stay and run the division. Cadillac soon became GM's prestige brand, and its reputation loomed larger in 1912 when it became the only company ever to win a second Dewar Trophy, this time for its electric starting and ignition system.
In 1917, when the U.S. entered World War I, Leland wanted Cadillac to produce airplane engines, and when Durant refused, Leland left. But at 73 years old, he stood on the cusp of another great achievement.
Leland formed a new company, and friends urged him to name it after himself. Had he done so, the name "Leland" would probably be a familiar one today. Instead, Leland decided to honor one of his idols. Since the Civil War, he had deeply admired Abraham Lincoln; his personal library was stocked with books on the sixteenth president, and a portrait of Lincoln graced his office.
Henry Leland's Lincoln Motor Company
In 1917, the Lincoln Motor Company was born, and for the rest of the war the firm produced airplane engines.
After the war, Leland turned again to car manufacturing, unveiling a new Lincoln automobile with a powerful V-8 engine. His new company, however, stumbled on financial difficulties, as Leland struggled to repay loans; the Treasury Department also wrongly sued him for owing more than $5 million in war profits taxes (it later dropped the charges). Henry Ford provided a way out for Leland when he bought Lincoln at the fire-sale price of $8 million. But Leland never got along with Ford, whose leadership he considered truculent and intrusive. In 1923, he left Lincoln and automobile manufacturing for good. By the time Leland died in 1932, Lincoln was firmly ensconced as Ford's luxury division.
Leland remains a little-known yet crucial pioneer in automaking, a man who parlayed his experience in tool casting into luxury automobile manufacturing. At a time when American car makers yearned to establish themselves against European manufacturers, Leland won international acclaim and championed innovations and precision engineering. Today, at a time when the domestic automakers face even more worldwide competition, the companies that Leland founded still attract attention for quality. hnn.us/articles
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August 10, 2008
"An architect's most useful tools are an eraser at the drafting board, and a wrecking bar at the site." By Frank Lloyd Wright
August 9, 2008
Marion Mahony Griffin and not FLW
A Virtual Tour - The "Residence"
http://www.henryfordestate.org/tour.htm
The tale of how Fair Lane came to be is a complex one. In late 1909, Henry Ford approached Frank Lloyd Wright to discuss a commission for the design of a new country house. The home was to be built on a dramatic 1300-acre site Ford had acquired alongside the Rouge River, just two miles from where he had been born.
Marion Mahony Griffin's original "Prairie School" design.
A few days after meeting with Henry Ford, Frank Lloyd Wright eloped to Europe with the wife of one of his clients. Fair Lane's design was taken over by Marion Mahony Griffin, a former student of Wright who was with the Chicago architectural firm of Van Holst & Fyfe. Griffin's plans closely embodied Wright's "Prairie School" design philosophy.
As the story goes, Mr. Ford noticed that the Van Holst people were being quite extravagant with the use of materials in the construction of Fair Lane's footings and foundation. It has also been said that Clara Ford and Griffin were at odds over certain aspects of Fair Lane's design. In 1912, the Fords returned from their first trip to Europe with a new found appreciation for English manor houses. Henry Ford soon dismissed the Van Holst & Fyfe firm and hired the Pittsburgh concern of William H. Van Tine. Under Van Tine, Fair Lane's design was greatly modified. The result was an eclectic mixture of English castle elements juxtaposed with Wright-Midwestern prairie features.
Constructed of Ohio Marblehead limestone the "Residence," as Mr. Ford liked to call it, contained over 31,000 square feet divided into 56 rooms. Its outer walls were from 18 to 24 inches thick. They surrounded seven bedrooms, fifteen baths, a kitchen, service and storage rooms, a "field "room, an indoor swimming pool, a bowling alley and a billiard room. Rare roseleaf mahogany paneling graced the homeÕs Palladian dining room, while heavy carved oak adorned its 25 foot tall main entry staircase. Light and airy sun porches extended the living spaces into the outdoors.
Fair Lane's design, in many ways, reflects the complex personality that was Henry Ford. In truth, the stately mansion and its gardens were the province and passion of Clara Ford. It was at the Powerhouse that Mr. Ford reined ...
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August 8, 2008
Touched is from my Birds series that is part of the Susan and Michael Hort collection
Bill Radawec
1994
Touched
cast iron, steel
3" x 3 1/2" x 4 1/2"
http://www.newarttv.com
Producer: NewArtTV
New York collectors Susan and Michael Hort share a passion for contemporary art and discovering new talents. Over twenty years they've assembled a collection focused on emerging artists that now numbers over 2,000 works. Every year during the New York art fairs, they make a selection of newly acquired works, install them in their 10,000 square-foot, downtown triplex, and invite hundreds of friends and art-world people over for a brunchtime viewing. In this first episode of the NewArtTV profile of the Horts, we drop in as Susan and Michael and their curator Simon Watson put together the installation and share their thoughts on the pleasures of collecting, and how they turned to art to make "something good" out of the untimely death of their daughter Rema.
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August 4, 2008
Which is Abraham Lincoln's original deathbed?
Bed in Petersen House
Bed in Chicago History Museum
Abraham Lincoln Deathbed
On April 14, 1865, President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated while watching a play at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. Doctors who attended him recognized he was dying and moved him across the street to a boarding house owned by William and Anna Petersen. He was placed in a bedroom rented by William T. Clark, a Union soldier who was out for the evening.
Lincoln's Last Moments
Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles entered the rear bedroom of the Petersen house soon after Lincoln arrived and saw "the President lay extended on a bed, breathing heavily." The doctors explained to Welles that Lincoln could not recover but might linger for several hours.
In his diary Welles wrote, "The giant sufferer lay extended diagonally across the bed, which was not long enough for him. He had been stripped of his clothes. His large arms, which were occasionally exposed, were of a size which one would scarce have expected from his spare appearance. His slow, full respiration lifted the clothes with each breath that he took. His features were calm and striking. I had never seen them appear to better advantage than for the first hour, perhaps, that I was there."
Early on April 15 Welles stepped out for a walk, but returned in time to see Lincoln die. He watched Lincoln's wife and oldest son struggle with sorrow. "Robert, his son, stood with several others at the head of the bed. He bore himself well, but on two occasions gave way to overpowering grief and sobbed aloud, turning his head and leaning on the shoulder of Senator Sumner. The respiration of the President became suspended at intervals, and at last entirely ceased at twenty-two minutes past seven."
After Lincoln's body was removed and visitors to the Petersen House left, an upstairs boarder set up a camera and photographed the bedroom. This evocative image, now part of the famed Meserve Collection, shows a woven coverlet strewn across the bed and a pillow soaked with Lincoln's blood. The picture was taken by Julius Ulke, who had furnished hot water to the doctors throughout the night. Abraham Lincoln Online
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August 3, 2008
Quote of the day by Abraham Lincoln
"Allow the president to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such a purpose - and you allow him to make war at pleasure." Abraham Lincoln
August 2, 2008
Review: Tree Service
by Sasha Lee
Tree Service at domestic setting
Co-curated by Michael Gold and Jeanne Patterson
Installation views of domestic setting
ÒTree Service,Ó which opened July 12th and runs until August 9th, is a refreshing look at a motley crue of emerging contemporary artists who examine trees as ongoing aspects of their visual iconography. Turning towards the tree, an iconic popular culture symbol for nature as a whole or the environment (that oft-sited repository of hippie hugging) seems a particularly apt subject of investigation in the concrete, strip mall parking lot that is Los Angeles. Turning to this archaic, ancient symbol and the myriad ways it has been interpreted and employed within visual culture was an interesting thematic thread.
Installation views of domestic setting
For those unfamiliar with domestic setting, the space, as the name implies, is an alternative live/work space directed by Jeanne Patterson. The more casual approach to exhibiting art work contrasts the ice blast formality of standard stiffly staffed institutional spaces. Rather than being greeted by an indifferent gallerina and made to shuffle through the space in reverent, hushed tones, the brightly lit domestic setting is as comfortable as visiting a neighbor. A neighbor who happens to have great artwork on the walls, anyway. I am instantly reminded of the ModernistÕs seminal experimental museum of the Societe Anonyme, that brownstone on East 47th street that housed work from the late greats of art history, Duchamp, Man Ray, Paul Klee. Patterson is definitely on to somethingÑbeing able to feel at ease while perusing works is a definite boon.
As far as the works exhibited, there was a wide net of media exhibited and breadth of expression. Standouts included Eric BeltzÕs beautifully rendered Òhigh definitionÓ drawings that ironically recontextualize and complicate a motley crue of symbols, histories, texts, icons and ideas. His visual language spans everything from the aesthetics of graphic novels and Audobon botanical illustrations, re-appropriated historical figures such as George Washington and Benjamin Franklin, astral new age iconography, texts relating to visions and dreams, and a cascade of quirky and fascinating self-invented philosophies and realizations.
Also compelling was Jessica SwansonÕs abstracted environments that presented micro/cosmic fantastical realms. Her fabricated realities were one part fairy tale illustration and evoked a sincere sense of play and imagination. Upon further inspection these self-contained worlds are dotted with tiny detail; miniature pine trees, howling wolves, almost indistinguishable plants.
Samantha Fields created small-scale square paintings that document natural catastrophesÑstorms, fires, and the like. Fields daringly seeks out these feats of nature and airbrushes her impressions of the events. Her Turner-esque interpetations appear almost as soft focus photographs and demonstrate a beautiful sense of light and color.
Drew Dominick created a hilariously performative video piece entitled ÒMaine.Ó The artist dressed in camouflage fatigues and postured in a tall tree, shooting bows and arrows at the camera. The act was sort of a balletic, ridiculous little boy fantasy turned reality.
Jared Pankin created wondrously off-kilter creations, fusing sculptural precedents with more craft-oriented fabricated skills, ranging from modeling to set decoration. Appearing as school project dioramas blown up to bizarre proportions, his creations evoke the ramshackle charm of houses built by hand.
There were a number of other outstanding worksÑalso included in the show was Nick Agid, Joe Biel, Portia Hein, Wendy Heldmann, Laura Hull, Siobhan McClure & Greg Rose, Timothy Nolan, Stas Orlovski, Pam Posey, Bill Radawec, Lucas Reiner, Sharon Ryan, Rena Small, Joel Tauber, Daniel Wheeler, Megan Williams and Andre Yi. Be sure to check out this show before it comes down.
Domestic setting is open Fridays and Saturdays from 12 to 5pm and by appointment.
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August 1, 2008
Review: SPACE exhibit shows artists' depictions of sense of place
By Kurt Shaw
TRIBUNE-REVIEW ART CRITIC
Thursday, July 31, 2008
As the title implies, the exhibit "You Are Here," at the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust's Downtown gallery SPACE, features the work of 11 artists addressing the concept of place.
Through a variety of media and approaches, the work on display presents places, real or imagined, and includes various forms of representation from the literal to more expressive interpretations.
The exhibition was organized by guest curator Robert Raczka, art professor emeritus of Allegheny College, Meadville, who says he chose the theme of "art that addresses place, real or imagined," for the exhibition because "I wished to capture the significance of place and the various means by which artists addressed and represented place through literal depiction, expressive interpretation, symbolic mark-making and other approaches."
To that end, Raczka's work is on view and proves to be a fitting example. Being photographic, his work leans toward literal depiction, though still interpretive. Featuring a series of photographs all taken the evening of March 13, 2007, in Meadville, his photographic sequence of a walk at night offers a rare glimpse at small-town America that is so literal it's palpable, providing the viewer with an apt sense of place and time all at once.
Like Raczka, other artists also chose to depict real places. Melissa Kuntz's paintings are based on photographs she shot as studies of amusement parks and hotels at the New Jersey shore; Carlos Rosas' untitled Web-based piece intermingles footage shot in Pittsburgh with live video captured in the gallery.
Bill Radawec
2008
Out of the Blue, the Turn Around
Acrylic on Masonite
Others are based on memory, as in Prajna Parasher's altered photographs of her native India; Clayton Merrell's abstract, mixed-media paintings, which are modified versions of the Southwestern landscape where he lived for a while; and Bill Radawec's drawings of the jet trails of Flight 93 over Cleveland, where he lives.
Then there are works that are purely imagined, such as Carin Mincemoyer's tiny artificial landscapes made inside disposable bottles, containers and other consumer materials packaging. Equally artificial, Michael Sherwin's time-lapsed videos from the Internet create highly interpretive experiences while depicting natural environments. Even though these artists' pieces are conceptual in nature, they nonetheless engage with the ideas of place and our shifting conceptions of nature.
One piece that encompasses all three concepts -- literal, remembered and imagined -- is Nayda Collazo-Llorens' "Restructured Topography," a mixed-media wall/window installation that is clearly visible from the sidewalk, looking into the gallery.
Composed of a series of interconnected lines, patterns, marks and text panels, the piece is the artist's version of a mapping system based on the Bermuda Triangle, which is near the artist's homeland of San Juan, Puerto Rico.
With lines and text panels visible from inside and outside the gallery, the piece invites the viewer to navigate through it. For example, the text panels are placed throughout the mapping system as if following a nonlinear timeline. The texts combine personal references, context and data pertaining to the triangle that can be followed from one element to the next.
Taking up the triangular area near the southern end of the gallery's expansive front windows, the piece allows for a single vantage point inside the gallery in which the viewer can reconstruct an anamorphic image triggering a perceptual shift. Surrounded by the work, the viewer experiences the space from a different perspective and context than that of the viewer on the street. The piece is an obvious homage to the Bermuda Triangle, a place of real and imagined proportions, not to mention relative predicaments both real and imagined.
A number of the works on display employ fragmented images, disorienting information or distortions of memory. But in all cases, the artwork functions as a cohesive whole.
Thus, the artists in this exhibit represent place as both complex and fundamental, with the characteristics and qualities of place eliciting our perceptions and shaping our experience in the world. Making for a compelling visual experience that viewers no doubt will relate to, no matter what their place in our world.
Email your comments to Bill Radawec at bill@billradawec.com
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