ya

In the beginning of the video “Uptown to Metairie,” I traveled along Carrollton Avenue in Uptown New Orleans. One building, that shows up briefly at the 27 second mark, is the original
Ye Olde College Inn. Before the flood, that followed Hurricane Katrina, the owners had purchased a building that was adjacent to the restaurant property. After the flood, they decided to demolish the original building and turn the other building into Ye Olde College Inn. This restaurant has been a favorite of my family’s for years – especially the Fried Oyster Loaves. Well, naturally I decided I should do a painting of the new incarnation of Ye Olde College Inn.



The front façade with all the lights caught my attention. One of the ongoing inspirations for my dot artwork has been the pattern of lights at night. I adapted a night photo I took into dots. Controlling color on a dark background proved difficult. Anyway, check out the photos from a visit to Ye Olde College Inn on my other blog pic journal.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

dot art Turns Three!

Three years ago I started this blog about my dot artwork. My journey started with AOL’s blogging area. However, AOL didn’t cater to Mac users. When I was poking around a top ten list, I soon found myself being confronted by Blogger’s friendly question asking me if I wanted to create a blog. I was a bit startled at first. But then my curiosity got the better of me. Soon I created several blogs.

At that time I was very grateful that my adult art had survived the post Katrina flood. Unfortunately I had stored my kid art at an aunt’s home – that flooded after the storm. Some of the art, that I had placed high off the floor was alright, but the other works had to be pitched.

Interestingly enough, AOL has decided to not only shut down its blogging area, AOL Journals, but also to shut down its web site area, AOL Hometown and AOL Pictures. For those who wanted to transfer blogs over to Blogger, AOL had made arrangements. After receiving those three blue envelopes, I’m a bit skittish about receiving any more of them.

Two months ago New Orleans was all set to recognize the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and the flood. But Hurricane Gustav had its own plans for Labor Day weekend. Many locals found themselves evacuating, yet again. Some decided to stay this time. All things considered, the city lucked out.

This Saturday begins an event in New Orleans, called Prospect.1 New Orleans [P.1]. It is an international biennial that will run through January 18, 2009. The show will showcase global and regional artists – 81 artists scattered across 24 city locations. I like to refer to it as an “art world’s fair.” That at least gives locals an idea of what is happening. Prospect One was curated by Dan Cameron of the New Orleans Contemporary Arts Center. One piece discussed in our local paper, The Times-Picayune, is an ark installation in the lower ninth ward.

Anyway, it’s now three years later. My dot art has done well with tourists and locals alike. This blog has served as a place for feedback. It also has become part of my dot art process. Happy birthday, dot art.

xa

This story begins with another video I made while driving around my metropolitan area. I drove from the foot of Canal Street in New Orleans and wound up in Metairie. There are all kinds of lights that show up along the way. Much of the final section, of the video, shows circles of light flashing by the camera. None of their sources are obvious. Only near the end do buildings become clear again, with a full moon in the sky.

Of all the videos I’ve made, this one was perfect for my dot theme because of the dots of light. This time I took four still shots from the video. I even printed them out to help me with my painting.









Without further ado, here is the sister painting, to the last one I discussed. I took the four videos stills and combined them when translating them into a dot painting. This painting showed me how hard it is to paint bright color dots on top of a dark background. The difficult process, for this piece, made me put off its completion until the very end of the batch.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

wa

Having watched a number of time-lapse videos on Google Video and YouTube in 2006, I decided I should make one too. I taped my camera/video camera to my driver’s window with packaging tape. Beginning at my father’s family home Uptown, I drove out to Metairie. Later I took the 10 minutes of footage and compressed it down to 2 minutes and 36 seconds.

When I made my list I knew I wanted to make a painting based on this video. So I took a still shot of the video and abstracted into a painting. Using the overall colors from the video I translated the image into dots. So now you have some idea of where this image came from - although I wasn’t as concerned about being exact in my rendering of it.




acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

va

During the summer of 2006 my ophthalmologist informed me that my eye pressure was too high. He said he would bring me in a couple of more times for tests prior to prescribing drops and maybe surgery down the road. After the tests he changed his mind and insisted that I would need surgery. So, what does that have to do with this painting?


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

Well, this is an abstract way of describing the green laser that was used in my surgery. Only one eye could be operated on at a time. It was a five-minute procedure. My eye bothered me one day and was fine after that. One eye was done in December 2006 and the other one was done in January of 2007. My eye pressure readings since then have been fine. I kept the image simple with two shades of green on a black background. And for now the image is my avatar.

ua

On election night of 2006 I was driving home after a free screening of “Harsh Times.” It was a route I had taken many times before. At an intersection a jeep tried to turn in front of me. I was not able to stop in time. As a result of the collision my Volvo’s radiator was exposed. Everything in front of it hung down toward the ground. Fortunately I wasn’t hurt and neither were the teen boys in the jeep. The jeep had a dent in its side bumper. An officer talked to me and then to the boys. Afterwards he told me that the other driver would be held responsible.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

This painting is an abstraction of the front of my car after the wreck. I wanted to emphasize the idea of the exposed radiator and parts hanging downward. Color did not figure into painting this one.

ta

A couple of years ago AOL introduced AIM Pages for AOL and AIM screen names. It was an attempt to jump into the social networking that became popular with sites such as MySpace and Facebook. More recently these pages were reorganized and renamed AIM Profiles. When I first set up my AIM Pages, I chose different backgrounds for various screen names. Each of my screen names and backgrounds was tied a type of art
I make.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

Anyway, this painting is an interpretation of all the backgrounds I used: bubbles, clouds, smears, splatters, stars and triangles. The imagery is all combined together and simplified. It definitely looks surreal.

sa

Previously I talked about the restaurant Five Happiness and its Imperial Room. Now I’m going to talk about the main restaurant that re-opened with a whole new look. What fascinated me most is that it did not have the red stained wood that I’ve seen in other Chinese restaurants. The décor was an inspiration for this painting.







For my background I used some colors from the dining room furnishings. Then I added dots using colors I found in the robe that is showcased with spotlights. I painted them in a curved pattern.




acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

ra

Two summers ago I had a sleep study. A bunch of electrodes were attached to me to monitor different items while I slept. Unfortunately I never slept as deeply as sleep doctor wanted. My second try in December was not any better either. I was diagnosed with severe apnea. I now use a CPAP machine
at night.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

So, this painting is based on sleep study dramas. I created a pattern with the electrodes. The colors are based on the colors of electrodes used during both studies.