And this. Soft Launch. We're still in beta. Hello Smack Handy!

http://www.smackhandyfilms.com

It's been a productive month or two. As an artist, it always seems like it's considered taboo to talk about things such as work, as in earning money for hire, but I for one, like the idea of combining work and pleasure; art and life; money and food. 

This past April marked the one year anniversary of my secret or not so secret investment into refreshing some tech skills, upgrading my equipment, and putting together a modest edit suite. I still have a few more items on my wish list, and thanks to planned obsolescence, I'll always be learning something new, but after returning from the residency (oh snap, I did mention the residency again) I felt the time was right to roll out the new site. 

Running a business is not easy. Running two businesses is twice as not easy, but I can't think of anything I'd rather do than work in the studio figuring out this soup called life and and work on films and video helping others doing the same. Take a look if you'd like and if you need an editor or have a story to tell, let me know. 

And if you're wondering where the name, Smack Handy came from, you'll have to visit the site and look for the clues.* 

Openings Round 1: Faculty Exhibition at Watkins College of Art, Design & Film

Monuments, Hotel Soap and Linear Progressions 
Sept. 4- 26, 2014
Brownlee O. Currey Jr. Gallery at Watkins College of Art, Design and Film

Critic's Pick in the Nashville Scene

Anywhere But Here up at ShoeboxLA

1968. It Was a Beautiful Cake. No Moths, 2014

A couple of years ago, I carted a suitcase full of small paintings back to LA for a huge all-painting  group show/event I had been invited to be in. Being on the fence about where I was actually living, I was maintaining the cover that I was still an LA artist. I didn't quite feel like a move across country for reasons other than art made me a "Nashville artist" anymore than living 2 months in Holland made me a Rotterdam artist. Long story short, as the result of that work and my comrades in the City of Angels, I was recently invited to take part in a project on spot relevant to my current work.

My contribution to the ShoeboxLA's curatorial project went live on Friday.
For the full post including the essay and image, please visit,  Anywhere But Here. 

Many thanks, ShoeboxLA!

Mary Addison Hackett: "Acts of Moral Turpentine"

"Intervention," 2011 ©m.a.hackett

oil on linen

10 x 8 inches

Community Arts Program

at Cummins Station presents 

MARY ADDISON HACKETT

Acts of Moral Turpentine

Nov 5-Dec 4, 2011

Opening Reception

Saturday, November 5, 6-9pm

Artist Talk 5:30pm in the gallery, prior to the reception

wine and hors d'oeuvres

Cummins Station, Track 13 Gallery

209 10th Avenue South, First Floor

Showing by appointment

DZL management at 615. 259.0999

and Saturdays, Noon-4pm (310.463.9101)

Validated parking in Lot A

Welcome Brooklyn and Thank you

Tonight ZieherSmith, a Brooklyn gallery will open a pop-up gallery in Nashville, TN. The exhibition, BNA: Brooklyn to Nashville, will present a selection of top emerging artists who work out of the borough of Brooklyn, home to the largest and most diverse concentration of art studios in the world. Though young, these artists have already been acquired by top museums and collections across the globe. They work in a variety of mediums and styles.

Featured artists include: Samuel T. Adams, Caroline Allison, Patrick Brennan, Andy Coolquit, John Copeland, Jess Fuller, Kate Gilmore, Denise Kupferschmidt, Liz Markus, Eddie Martinez, Sam Moyer, Rachel Owens, Javier Piñón, Matthew Porter, Sara Greenberger Rafferty, Mariah Robertson, Vadis Turner, Sara VanDerBeek, Chuck Webster, Wendy White.

-press release, BNA: Brooklyn to Nashville.

It's as if my message in a bottle drifted to the shores of Manhattan and an exhibition of 21st century work appeared here in Nashville.

I don't mean to whine, which is what I've secretly been doing since I landed here last summer after living the life of an expat for two decades, but it's reassuring to know that I'm not the only one that thought something was missing from the contemporary art scene in Nashville. There's been a serious void, to the point where I was beginning to worry that maybe it was the rest of the art world that was behind, so I am freaking elated that ZieherSmith has delivered a slice of the current art scene with their pop-up gallery at Icon in the Gulch. I'm also just a little dismayed that it's taken a Brooklyn (Manhattan, actually) gallery to bring this type of work to Nashville. Although most of the works in the show date 2011, some go back to 2008, but that's just to say this type of work has been showing in NYC, LA, et al., for at least a few years.

Eddie Martinez, Untitled, 2011 (photo credit: ZieherSmith)

Liz Markus, American Scream, 2011, (photo credit: ZieherSmith)

John Copeland, "Wake Me When It's Over, 2011 (photo credit: John Copeland)

Wendy White, Burger FF, 2010 (photo credit: ZieherSmith)

André Pretorius, Rich Girl Undercover  (photo credit: andrepretorius.com. This one was not in the show.)

My current favorites are John Copeland's, gushy and stoically funny portrait, Wake Me When It's Over; André Pretorius's untitled figurative paintings of skateboarders caught in a sort of filmic time-slice effect of calamity and bedazzlement; Wendy's White's airbrushed and graffiti like abstractions with hard-edged lettering on subtly-shaped canvasses, and Eddie Martinez's raw and quirky painting of what looked to be a pawn/gumball dispenser of personal iconography staring me down. The show contains over 40 works by about 20 artists, runs through the end of August, and is walking distance to my studio, and across the street from my new BFF coffee, Drew's Gravel Springs French Roast at the Turnip Truck in the Gulch, which means I'll be having coffee and taking a closer look at the show's salon wall this month.

I'll stop short of hawking The Icon's condo loft living, but I admit, I eyeball them on my way home and the vacant ground floor space would make a fabulous gallery for someone with a vision.  And thank you again ZieherSmith for bringing some contemporary art to town, especially painting. 

ZieherSmith
BNA: Brooklyn to Nashville
Pop-up show at Icon at the Gulch
Nashville

For my next trick, post I will deconstruct the regional art world in one paragraph causing both my social and professional life to disappear. 

Nashville Downtown Arts Crawl. August 6th. Collector's Night

I've been in Nashville a little over a year now. I don't know if artists actually go to art crawls. I try not to. In my experience art crawls are for the civvies. Collector's Night thins down the swarm of urban hipsters to a smaller crowd interested in hearing the artist discussing their work in brief. This is more my speed. I like hearing artists discuss their work. Sometimes I've even been persuaded to change my mind about a work after hearing an artist talk about it. 

The Rymer Gallery presented works by Charles Clary, Jason Worsham and Natalie Andrews. I'm not certain, but I believe all three have southern connections and are fairly recent MFA graduates. 

Charles Clary with his meticulously cut paper concoctions at The Rymer Gallery

Jason Worsham works with found objects at The Rymer Gallery

Natalie Andrews at The Rymer Gallery

The 5th Avenue of the Arts celebrates it's 5th birthday this weekend. Susan Tinney of Tinney Contemporary mentioned the five year anniversary as she presented Claire B Cotts, a San Francisco based artist. Déjà vu. I was one of the artists exhibiting at the gallery's Grand Opening show five years ago when it was part of a partnership with TAG gallery (Note: no connection to the Santa Monica TAG gallery). I had actually forgotten this as I silently did the math and retraced my last 5 years in a flash. I was an Los Angeles-based artist then. How time flies. 

Claire B Cotts at Tinney Contemporary

Claire has been working as an artist for about 25 years. The show consisted of abstract works with one representational work in the atrium. She talked about the abstract works, citing gardens, fireflies, and a host of other influences. She mentioned evoking feelings about the work rather than intellectualizing the work. I would have liked to have heard more about her figurative works since my head's been wrapped around that in my own practice lately. 

Claire B Cotts

This painting was not in the show, but I like it. This being a blog, not a critical review, I feel it's acceptable to speak about works I didn't see in the show. She also has a blog though we didn't connect about that. I think when I try to be social I come across as someone who's never picked up a pen or a paint brush, much less articulated a sentence. My social skills are painfully awkward.

Unfortunately my driving skills are not painfully awkward. I was pulled over on the way home for going 11 miles over the speed limit on a hill. I was pretty sure I was keeping up with traffic but Metro's finest pointed out that the car in front of me moved out of my way. No one goes 35 mph here. It was a bogus bust.

The next post in queue will be about the pop-up show presented by ZieherSmith, a Brooklyn gallery importing works into the local art scene this month. According to the press release, "Though young, these artists have already been acquired by top museums and collections across the globe. They work in a variety of mediums and styles."

Being a Collector's Night post, I felt that an apropriate sentence to end on.

Picture Theory: I'm also a sucker for the mundane.

Changeling (Shake-a-Pudding)

oil on linen/wood panel

We, not the royal 'we,' but the nuclear family, 'we,' had a plant that was over 100 years old. It was once in a conservatory at my grandmother's house. When NaNa came to live with us, the plant came too. At the time I recall my mom saying the plant was about 75 years old. It sat around in a large pot looking awkward and ancient. It was about 5 feet tall and spindly. Toward the end of my mother's life she neglected to water it. At one point she had been the president of her garden club. The plant always looked on the verge of death, but it usually pulled through. Finally though, it died. I was sad. For the plant, but also because my mother had let it die. Somehow she managed to save a clipping from it. A bail-out option I suppose. It sat in the Shake-a-Pudding cup for the last few years. No soil, just water. I finally repotted it. It's a nightblooming cereus. Supposedly it blooms once a year. I will care for it.

***

I once again stumbled upon this link- 1000 painters.  And once again, became overwhelmed at the copious amounts of fantastical painterly abstraction being produced today. And then thanks to my RSS feed, I came across a passage, well actually the whole post, from Henri Art Mag  that resonated with me as I continue to question my own motives more than occasionally. 

After 2 years of working small, unleashing my inner giant on large canvases felt right, though I went too far with the first one, so I backed it down and let gut instinct and inner apathy take over. I don't mean this to sound as negative and dysfunctional as it sounds. Nor when I refer to them as a Abject Abstractions am I trying to be clever and coin a sub-genre of Slacker Abstraction. It's merely a representation of how things were progressing and abject came to mind as being apropos. Indicative Abstraction might also be a useful term. Perhaps I am coining terms. 

In a recent review over at Temporary Art Review, the writer, Sarrita Hunn, makes some insightful connections to Vitamin P as a source for this type of abstract painting-which if you're an abstract painter with an internet connection it seems almost viral- and goes on to ask, "But then one must ask: Is ‘newness’ an inherently desirable trait?" She goes on to quote Barry Schwabsky for some possible answers.

Which leads me, or takes me back to the post at Henri Art Mag in which Mark Stone discusses what he's missing or not missing: "...the thing is not like the others. It may not be exemplary in the sense of the unique, it may not be “One of a Kind”, but it will be dissimilar, unfamiliar maybe. And for the moment I want to see and experience what isn’t if that makes any sense to any of you."

It does make sense which is why I keep struggling to mediate my imaginary battle with painting. New vs. Old. Old vs. New. Picture vs. Theory.

I'm still mulling over titles for these. All are 2011 and are of the 54" x 43" scale. 

Working titles include:

Card Game

Bridge 

and something having to do with a floating spirits or presence. Maybe that it's-

The Presences

Oh and a little self-promo- The Art in the Embassy Program catalog is online now as is the archive of the exhibition.  

And yes, the rumors are true, The Thack is back for a rare showing of 15 miniature paintings at the June 4th art crawl, Cummins Station, 6-9pm. And a few pieces by me as well. I hung it today and went back tonight to do lighting and sweep. Found some silver spray paint in an totally unrelated sentence and started a new painting. It's so past my bedtime. 

4.4.11 UPDATE : Oh wow. The subconscious rises. The painting in the Art in the Embassy exhibition was actually the first pool painting. I completely forgot about that. Fascinating. I should look through the archives to see what else was happening back then. No. Maybe not. It's easier than re-reading journals, but only because I think I'm the only one who knows what they say. Good times or not, it's still a document and conjures up the past. Maybe that's why painting persists. Enigmatic code embedded in a bunch of brushstrokes. No wonder many collectors don't want to know anything about the artist or what a painting means. No wonder painting sometimes strives to be meaningless.

"Swim," 2006. Mixed media on canvas. 

I am so into brushstrokes right now, I can hardly contain myself.

But so far, it's all in my head, because remember, I'm in quiet time/research mode. I went to see the Birth of Impressionism show at the Frist Center yesterday, a collection of masterpieces from the Museé d'Orsay. When I first started thinking about flowers about a year or so ago, my friend Cole pointed me to Manet's flowers. According to Google, it seemed as though many of Manet's flowers were located in the Museé d'Orsay, and I wasn't sure I'd ever see one in person. Not only does the Frist not allow photography of any kind, but they have guards that look like they'll take you down just for thinking about sneaking a pic. I have been stealth in the past, but this would require an elaborate ruse, such as switching out my cell phone with the audio tour gear, and considering I wanted a close-up of the brushstrokes, I went with  Plan B: mentally recording all the brushstrokes in the exhibit. I got about two square inches of a Cézanne and an inch or two of a Pissarro locked in my brain before coming inundated with painterly information. At that point, I had to move along, telling myself I'd come back. Some highlights:

Bazille, "Bazille's Studio"

I liked this Bazille primarily because I liked Bazille's studio. He has a wood burning stove. I, too, have a wood burning stove in my studio, but my insurance agent nearly had a conniption when I mentioned I may try and hook it up for heat. Bazille also has much better lighting than I do thanks to the frigging ginormous window. We also have similar furniture. I could do this look on a smaller scale, but so far, I'm still rocking the Pollock rustic barn look.

I added another light in the studio today and installed a work table. I don't know if I want a couch in the studio-seems like it would be a big party house for spiders.

Manet, "Flowers in a Crystal Vase" 

Even museums Photoshop their paintings. In person, this painting of Manet's flowers is much more faded, less contrasty, and the vase is almost as impressive, if not more so, than the flowers.

Cézanne, "The Hanged Man's House"

Totally caked-up, gunky paint. Go Cézanne.

Pissaro, "Path through the Woods, Summer"

Again, totally caked-up, gunky paint. Go Pissarro. When I go back, I'm going to scrutinize for dog or cat hairs.

Cézanne, "Self-Portrait with pink Background"

I feel a self-portrait coming on.

I am not a flower painter.

I usually don't like to share my low moods, but I am waiting for my fingers to unshrivel and I'm feeling a bit Cinderella-ish. I have committed to having a yard sale next weekend, one where I will be selling off 18 large boxes of kitchen items and a eye-popping assortment of other things. The 18 large boxes of kitchen items have been stored in cabinets undisturbed for 40+ years. At some point the exhaust fan in the kitchen became a decorative fixture. I still do not know if it works. All I know is that there are 18 boxes of grimy dishes and glassware needing a good washing before my yard sale. I have no dishwasher. No, actually I do, but it is also a decorative object as far as I know. Hence the shriveled fingers. I should wear gloves.

I am not a flower painter.
I'm sinking into oblivion here. Or perhaps, further, I should say. I sense a gap, a small crack if you will. One where I believe I have fallen. In reply to a question, (and I'll be very vague) the answer was, "I can't see such and such showing flower paintings."

My first thought was Allison Schulnik who shows at Mark Moore in Santa Monica. I've never met Alison, but I've seen quite a bit of her work and wouldn't call her a flower painter, yet, below I give you a flower painting.

Allison Schulnik, Red Flowers #2, 2008, o/c, 20 x16"

Here is another of Allison's images:

Allison Schulnik, Jimmy, 2009

, oil on linen

16 x 26"

I wouldn't call her a clown painter either. 

Below are most of my flower paintings to date. I've posted them before, so just move along if you're tired of seeing them. One looks suspiciously like a pool painting, but it's really a hybrid; the background is the filler you would find in a flower arrangement.

Carnation

Comic Relief

Art Deco Chinese Rug

January

Night Swim

Slight of Hand

I don't think my friend was insulting me when they made the flower painting remark, but it made me rethink how people, including artists or dealers, think about certain imagery and assume there to be certain baggage with said imagery.  Let's take barns, for instance. I read a comment from someone who jokingly, but probably not by much, wished there would never be another landscape with barn painting exhibited in Tennessee. After reading that, of course, I want to make dysfunctional barn paintings as a subversive activity. Then what? I'd be a crappy barn painter, too? (Note: I really do have soft spot for good barn paintings- I juried one into a watercolor show, based on the sentimental factor.)

The good news is that I said fuck it and bought a new liner for my motorcycle helmet. I was convinced the old one was a minefield of urushiol and no amount of washing was going to make it go away. So for 29 bucks, it's like I have a new helmet. Cool. The guy at the motorcycle shop even gave me the spare face visor from his personal helmet, noting that mine was seriously trashed. He told me he was a father-to-be and therefore was giving up riding for awhile. I admit to worrying if Otto could find food and water if God forbid I didn't make it home one day, but I suspect he would fill up on base molding and find a toilet before perishing, and so I still ride.

At some point, I promptly went out to the studio and de-representationalized 2 paintings, once again setting into motion the evil pendulum from which I now swing. After that, I began the humble task of dish washing about 400 dishes and glasses. 

My first real fall in almost 23 years.

I feel like I just fell off the turnip truck. It's like I've never seen bare trees, leaves fall, or afternoon sunlight through a cloudy sky. 

Tree, View from Utility Room, 8" x 5," watercolor and gouache on paper

It was chilly yesterday. I cheated and stayed inside for yesterday's plein air painting. I double cheated, because I worked some more on it today. A plein aire purist, I am not. I was simultaneously doing laundry. Below the shutters is my washer and dryer. My goal is to paint every tree in my yard. If I can figure out accurate GPS coordinates, I think I will title them by their GPS coordinates. In the likely event I lose interest in such an elaborate titling ruse, I'll just name them something obvious.

Plein air Saturday afternoon. Gallery hopping Nashville evening.

From my favorite watercolor site, Handprint:
Instead I found that commercial plastic spaghetti containers, the kind available in many kitchen supply stores, make superb brush containers (shown at right is my preference, The Click Clack. Three or four cardboard cylinders (from toilet paper or paper towels) cut to the right length will hold the brushes upright, and no bug can ever get in. Pasta containers can hold almost any brush, even the leggy Winsor & Newton Series 7 #10's.

I spent one hour pacing the house looking for my watercolor brushes. The ones I use all the time. The nice ones. They were rolled up in in a bamboo mat. I was positive I had seen them and unpacked them within the last 3 months, but I have not done any watercolor since arriving, so I was racking my brain for where I had seen them last. I was prepared to take the plein air challenge and decided to ease into it again with watercolors, my plein air medium of choice.
Finally, leaving no stone unturned, I looked under a box of contractor bags in the dining room studio. Voilá.

I grabbed my canvas tote, sketchbook, paints and mason jar of water,  and picked a nice spot I had scoped out 1.5 hours earlier. I spent about an hour outside painting a treescape. A neighbor stopped by while walking her dog and said hello. I'll shave 15 minutes off painting time for convo and maybe another 5 minutes for set-up. I prefer to sit on a blanket and paint. I have a french half easel, but I prefer the blanket. I'll tweak the painting a bit more later. The thing with watercolor is you only have a small window of working time before you make it muddy or dull from overworking it. As soon as it's about halfway dry you have to cut your losses and pull out.

I went to the downtown art crawl this evening. Parking downtown is $10. That's a bit pricey if you ask me, but I just moved from a bankrupt state, so what do I know.

Whitney Wood Bailey at The Rymer Gallery

Whitney Wood Bailey at The Rymer Gallery

Carol Es at Tinney Contemporary

Carol Es and MJP

Inside the Arcade

Live painting in the Arcade

Sound Crawl 

Ron Buffington at Twist annex, curated by Jerry Dale McFadden

Mark Bradley-Shoup at Twist annex, curated by Jerry Dale McFadden

Joseph Lupo at Twist

A masked, Beth Gilmore at Twist

Once again, I surprised myself by stepping out, seeing some friendly faces and having a pleasant time. I need to figure out the parking thing though. I got used to free and easy parking for almost 10 years. Don't harsh my mellow, Nashville. I'm also riding my motorcycle for errands now, especially grocery shopping. Not too crazy about riding at night. Much darker here, and natch, I think no one here can drive. Twice I've seen a car veer into my lane and swerve back barely avoiding a head-on collision with me. I wish cell phones could be mysteriously sucked out of people's idiot little hands while they drive. Like maybe there's a sensor built into the steering wheel that will shoot a death ray beam to a cell phone when it senses the driver loses eye contact with the road. Just think about it. I'm sure it's feasible.

Mary Addison Hackett on The Front Yard