“Alabaster Bottle of Ointment that Heals all Things Lame in the Art Community, Surrounded by Random Objects and a Quarter Round of Gouda Cheese”

Semi Abstract Tube

The title is “Alabaster Bottle of Ointment that Heals all Things Lame in the Art Community, Surrounded by Random Objects and a Quarter Round of Gouda Cheese”. So, this painting is rare in that it has multimedia on it, which is super unusual for me. The label on the wider bottle to the left is the label off a random oil paint tube I picked up off the streets of Tashkent, Uzbekistan.

I was in the Army right in the middle of the aftermath of 911. I had the opportunity to spend a week in Tashkent. I got a driver that took me around and showed me all sorts of art stuff. He took me to a wide downtown street where they were having like a street sale, kind of like mini garage sales for each brownstone.

I am sure they are not called brownstones but that is what they looked like. Well, there was a table that was selling these old Russian oil paint tubes.  I picked up 10 of them, in bad condition, but the paint was still good.  I still have a few tubes.

One tube I finished got the label taken off and applied to this canvas.  It was random and just happened one day during the months I spent living with Fred Smith in my first studio/gallery. It’s a cool painting with some dope history. The alabaster bottle, the decorated bottle on the right, is where the ointment that heels all things lame in the art community is. Consider how powerful that ointment must be, only to be used in emergency situations.

Most art communities are legitimized only by the gatekeepers, who happen to be mostly people all about themselves, and their tastes. The idea that people judge art detests me, juried shows, group shows, and any sort of organized academic endeavors are a farce.

Art is more than a pretty face these days, bigger than your likes, your followers, and much larger than your own life…if its good art. I see a lot crap for sale, sold with tits, short skirts, flashy gimmicks, and just down right lameness. I want my work to hang in Chicago Institute of Art, next to a de Chirico, not sitting next to plastic images of sonic the hedgehog, or some anime bullshit looking fad. Fine art stands alone, and always will, it is the footings in the foundation of true aesthetic value.