Rocket Fuel

The Critic Zart

Escalator in the Mall

Art Magic continued

My plan to record all my lesson plans for the Art Magic sessions quickly met the roadblocks of not enough time or energy but the lessons went ahead. Two I record here as especially enjoyable:

White Wax/Black Ink Drawings

The technique here is simple (see samples of my own wax resist drawings) and one I first picked up after seeing the work of Victor Brauner in the show "Aftermath" at the Barbican Art Gallery in 1982.
I provided a collection of white wax crayons of all brands, along with a collection of plain white wax candles, and had the students draw on their white paper, a sturdy paper that can take a beating. I then inked over their drawings as working with young kids and india ink is hazardous on the laundry front.
The initial exitement is easily come by. Seeing those wax forms emerge is fun. What I hoped to do was take this to a further level. By working from light ink washes to dark one can create incredible depth in an image. by repeating the steps of inking then applying wax, then scratching into wax or removing excess wax the variations of light and dark are endless. Incised lines fill with black and scraped off areas lighten.

26 Poems by Kenneth Patchen

Here is another beautiful jacket this time for a http://jacketmagazine.com/12/patch-smith.html Kenneth Patchen book. To say he is a much overlooked and under appreciated pre-beat poet (who was called "a man of anger and light" by Henry Miller and was amongst the first to read his poems to Jazz) is putting it lightly.

Art in Them Thar Books

Bernard Williams

I encountered Bernard Williams through the internet so I have not seen these in person (and he hasn't encountered me). He is part of a show at Rupert Ravens Fine Arts in Newark that features 24 Solo Projects. For more of his work go to Ethan Cohen Fine Arts from where I picked the image shown. I respond to his work for obvious reasons (if you know my work) but in efforts to go deeper can find little press about him as of yet. I'm guessing he uses cut out cardboard, ply and so forth, and clearly, given the title, is willing to tackle the big themes which he does from an approach that shows the influence of Basquiat amongst many others.