Gallery hopping
March 2025
I was morose last week, pining for my lost life as a musician, and all the peeps I will never see again. Sad, sad, blue beret. I didn’t know how deep it went, until a long phone call with E brought me near tears more than once at the memory, how hard it is to process or follow through. I have no urge to jaunt about to open mics, hang out in bars or drag myself home in the dark with gear, all alone. It does not spark joy. I have been sitting up at night in that same dark tho, playing the old toones on my reconfigured Stella Toy Bass. I remember it all, sing better than ever, even over the sketchy intonation and sometimes hitting a wall–what key was that in? and no muscle memory will save it without an intro by Ann.
I knew, the next day, that discharging emotion like that usually results in a breakthrough, and in fact is the only way through. So surprise, no surprise when I got a call out of the blue from PMav inviting me to a gallery show in San Francisco and nearby SFMOMA afterward. Looking into the gallery I am utterly shocked to see it is a show of Leonora Carrington, not so much for herself but because the gallery also represents Remedios Varo, and has had THREE solo shows of her work in the past decade or more.
Crazy coincidence, Grif had turned me on to her years ago (she had lived and died in Mexico City around the time he was there) and had used several of her images for band fliers for the Ravines. Full circle, somehow. There is also another link to Gordon Onslow Ford, who drifts in and out of my vision in odd ways, such as the book I was reading about poets that mentioned him living and painting on a houseboat owned by Alan Watts in SF Bay.
After the gallery, and an excellent Hunan lunch, we stopped in at SFMOMA, somewhat disappointing until we got into the permanent collections, and the book store, where I found they stock my favorite $3 paintbrush/pencil combo. Then off to Bart, and home by dark.
PMav asked me if I was painting, as he does, and I lapsed into my cover story: rebuilding sewing machines, the bobbin wheel adventure, constructing ski pants, that I just cleared from my work table. I have almost repopulated the watercolor layout and have empty pages open, and have got most of my vehicle paperwork cleared away, so here is hoping I will kick my own ass and start a new surge of painting, with an eye to something new and, maybe, original.
Sometimes it’s a struggle and doesn’t come naturally. It’s sad to scroll through my phone to see screenshots, ideas, other people’s work. It’s that bugaboo of originality that I beat myself up over. Ow! Stop that! There is the sense of being screw-tin-eyesed, or being graded. When I was young, drawing was a place to hide. Now it has become homework. All I want in life is to be able to goof off and get away with it. If I am painting to be judged, or to avoid being judged, what is the fun in that? I think the previous binge was a result of the practice of Bad Painting. That seemed to kick the dust off, and derail the demon at my ankles. We’ll see. . . Meanwhile, here is some old journal filler from the before times, endpapers, from Canyon, and maybe even BSPco. Horrors!
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