Posts Tagged “Jay DeFeo”

75 Reasons to Live: Rebecca Solnit on Jay DeFeo

08.09.2010  |  By
Filed under: One on One

San Francisco-based writer Rebecca Solnit‘s forthcoming book Infinite City: A San Francisco Atlas reimagines traditional map-making in 22 inventive maps, 7 of which SFMOMA is issuing this year in broadside copies linked to a series of Live Art events. The second program of the series is this weekend. Rebecca speaks here about what it meant, especially in the 50s, to be a West Coast, Bay Area artist, touching on Wallace Berman, George Hermes, Bruce Conner, Jess, Wally Hedrick, Michael & Joanne McClure, Joan Brown and Manual Neri, and indeed Jay DeFeo, and The Verónica (1957). More Jay DeFeo. More Rebecca at Alternet. Come see the painting, it’s extraordinary, and nothing but seeing it in real life will do. Only up through the end of the month.

Remember the end of Manhattan, when Woody Allen asks himself what makes life worth living? Last January, during SFMOMA’s three day 75th anniversary celebration, 75 people from the Bay Area creative community gave extremely... More

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One Final Long Tracking Shot

06.08.2010  |  By
Filed under: Field Notes

I head over to SFMOMA for one last visit before I write this, my final post in my 8-part memoir based on items in the museum’s permanent collection. In the park at Yerba Buena Center, two young women with German-ish accents stop me and ask if they might take their photo with me. It’s for a school project; they’re to have their photo taken with a variety of people they meet on the street. I agree, and they ask a guy who’s sitting on a nearby bench to snap the picture. The women stand on either side of me and we smile. Click. They s... More

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Moholy-Nagy (Part 1): In Memory of Beulah Seckinger

05.31.2010  |  By
Filed under: Field Notes

I’m sitting in a radiology room at Kaiser with my left hand resting on a square metal plate that I assume contains film. The x-ray tech twists my hand to the left then flicks off the overheads. A box of light floats over the wrist, a cross-hatched shadow dividing it into quadrants. Beneath the focused beam my hand turns sculptural, the gracefu... More

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Veronica p.s.

04.02.2010  |  By
Filed under: Field Notes

This morning I received an interesting note from Julian Myers concerning the name Veronica:

My dictionary tells me that the name, Veronica, is from Greek: pherein nike (she who brings victory), which leads me instantly here:

This puts an exciting new spin on DeFeo’s painting—and Nike’s transhuman wings are so perfect for the way I was seeing The Veronica.

In my (over)researching for this post, I came across various meanings for “veronica.” A spiky blue flower. A bullfighting maneuver in which the sweep of the bullfighter’s... More

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The Good, the Bad, and the Pretty

04.01.2010  |  By
Filed under: Field Notes

In March I went to a party in honor of curator Raimundas Malasauskas’ brief visit to San Francisco. It was held in a two-story condo the Kadist Art Foundation provides for visiting artists—on Bryant near 6th, a dismal neighborhood, but you can imagine how much the thing cost. As chic, gorgeous Europeans and South Americans strolled between the kitchen area and the outdoors balcony to smoke, I stood near the dining room table with Kevin, feeling all stiff and squeaky American. I was delighted when my party buddy, art historian Julian Myers came up to us. The first thing Julian said to me was, “I haven’t read your blog posts.” “That’s okay,” I said. “That’s okay?” h... More

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