ICE

part of a painting of Kimberly Sikyea I'm working on. Doing portraits is such a great challenge... I really tried to pay great attention to subtle shifts of color on this one. Left the angst for another piece. this one is love

THE SHOW

was a success!! There was a very good turnout and I was happy to see lots of friendly familiar faces. I also met some beautiful old souls. The two fastest hours of my life. It just came and went. For the show I finished a painting I started years ago ... first hanging on my bedroom wall in Alhambra and eventually in Pasadena. Some of you friends might remember it... here's the bottom left corner. A symbolic birth and worship of the spiral. Psilocybin goodness!

I've neglected the BlogOSPHERE

So I've been absent from this wonderful, secluded format... well somewhat secluded. I brought back from the dead a gigantic painting I had on my wall in Alhambra and then Pasadena for years... years ago.. wow.. YEARS!!! I watched Control Room and was moved by this image of a bomb victim being interviewed on Al Jazeera So I played GOD and used a bit of her likeness to make my own version of lady justice. I ripped off the shape of her body from a Bouguereau. I felt like Frankenstein and I heard thunder when I was done with this one. The show is coming up soon and I gotta finish this monster I started years ago.... hmm there are lots of ghosts on the way

FUCK YEAH!!!

Finally!! 4 person show in Coconut Grove, Miami during Art Basel. Totally supa dupa stoked about this!!! Write more later, must paint paint paint!!

finito

I took this flick under a dimmer light so the colors look warmer and more saturated than in the actual piece. Not only do I look like I have a migraine in this piece but it really was a pain figuring out how to bring together all the separate elements. It took me months to figure out what the hell I was doing since I started with a completely different idea. This process is exciting but it drives me nuts because I won't have a clue where I'm going until I'm about two thirds done. My hope is that one day I'm smart and capable enough to figure out the steps in my head... (as in a chess game) and avoid unnecessary mental stress and thinking I'm better off burning a piece than finishing it. But... this is life...and I'm thankful and lucky to be able to to manifest my thoughts.

waiting for the eye of Horus

this is a funky snapshot of a painting slowly manifesting itself... I'll be more descriptive once I'm done

identity

this woman

has really nice features... I was seduced...so I HAD to draw her! I love cheap ass ballpoint pens

life and death

greenstance

QUAIL DREG LYRICS Music: Power Douglas

QUAIL DREG (featuring Tunde Adebimpe of TV on the Radio)

clutching this transient dungaree shamshir in the mammalian dominion

pre.teen cougars panting for me

visceral breathing free clamor at brook, to cleanse this cobra flesh delirium ashes egalitarian ground soot

i must talk to the oak

it clashes with cathedrals and electrical behavior,fetal swans kodiak hunt for strangers

howling at the motherfuckin sun under miniscus dark banter came the burial for the wanderers

tonight i climb a conifer!

watch for the breeds tracing my cabin built on the covenant that i'll return to my engines and wine

i am

this splint here is lacquered in blood

when i weep i'm more fierce

binary love solomon them two

my hands gnaw a catacomb in the ravine soil down the waterflask

and oats remain cool the fangs of appalachian gust, i duel

cintaurs nest by yonder ridge, we trade stonemachines for figs

now i know man is younger than the moon

beige dingos whimper patriarchal strife

exuberant canyons snatched my wife

after the carpentry of clouds the heart is fertile

now i know man is younger than the moon

binary love solomon them in two

scribed and diagonally pierced by furor thin, new halogen burned by tunde adebimpe

copywritten and pantherism enforced

Namaste

Yuki as dkem e nostro meeslsidixome diken yoru en cuanto assarishita neifarke tem ask assarishita kiyu-zu sarukan charaista nematis ka ala q state va faqurishdego ifkramen eker istremeacledeh ekna stakita

Relativity

Matt on the left. Eddie on the right. I'm hiding under the covers in the back... afraid of witnessing my worst nightmare.. the animal in us...taking over the galaxy.. taking over everything like if it's all one big playground... what's left of the earth is the core of an apple. Once you get to the unknown ledge of knowledge, will it be useful, will it matter? Are we worms? When I went to see Tool and Melt Banana perform, from a height people looked like worms...the pit looked like a black hole...like the one in the center of our galaxy. It's all relative right? There's always more, much more.

spirits

in my head, on the wall

sidlal;dnfisos

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David and Alex

My two dear friends David (foreground) and Alex(background w/ helmet) had an interesting relationship in highschool. This piece is an example of a touchy subject for Alex that wasn't as delicate for David. Here we see Hitler's army invading Poland. David is looking at the past while Alex although aware of it choses not to. The expressions on their faces is key. David with a slight smirk and Alex dead serious.

In your eyes

In your eyes I saw everything
Sunrise, Sunset, Twilight, all the seasons, all the weathers
you came to me from a foggy dream
and back to that fog you went

My point of reference, Shangri-La hourglass
Gracefully clumsy, brilliantly ignorant, urban wildchild
you bore the mark of the moment
and the moment's war paint danced to your beat

We lost equilibrium but we smiled at inhibriated shadows
Knowing soon we'd be that to each other
Done with this, next with that, no formula to explain
why we laugh when we want to cry

Who were those people when I look back on us?
Two neighboring galaxies warped in proximity
No repetitive attempt at fusion could have changed the course
of two spirits bound to different destinations

The death of this present is, not looking at the past
Hindsight is foresight through insight
we were compelled to become the others
and float from the lake, back to the river and onto the ocean

David E. Olivera

My best friend David has been working on a series of landscape paintings of the city of Arnhem in the Netherlands. The amount of research and planning that he has done to meticulously recreate this city is truly inspiring. This city was the location of a major battle in WW2 and had the Allies won this battle they would have ended the war sooner and less people would have died. The Allies lost (the war dragged on for another year) and the bridge featured in most of these paintings was destroyed as was much of the city. To look at these paintings is to be transported to another time period...right before the city was blown to smithereens. An admirable undertaking by an amazing painter (and he's only a year older than I am!). I'm only showing here 3 of about 12 pieces he's done so far but I'll be linking him up in the future when his page is up! Go David go!!

for the sake of the empire

the good/evil Darth Vader Ant Godhead on the couch is telling me I should WORK

"Chiiiiiill, Winston"

I need to chill and FoCUS.. FOCUS FOCUS FOCUS. For the past couple of months I haven't been able to harness my energy into a single piece from start to finish. This can be really discouraging because I can't seem to land on any solid ground. All I've been able to do is dish out countless line drawings of what appears to be nonsense. This is not my brain on drugs, this is my brain when it doesn't know what to do with itself.
Also. Here are two visual rides through a couple of paintings I did a while back. There's no intent on making these clips look professional so you will be subjected to a shaky camera if you choochoochoose to watch...and if you don't like Bjork then don't even bother.

AAAAANNNNNNND this one

1962 Collabo

Collaborations!!! ahhhH!!!! I want to "do" more of THEM. So far this is my favorite performance so farOUT. This image is only half of the actual piece but since I don't have the original I decided to finish it off as a sort of collage. The blue strip on the right was the latest addition and it's pretty much the photo of the original art covering part of Ilya Repin's painting of Jesus in the desert. Eli Sipsas started it off with some prints of his designs on wood. I worked from an Edward S. Curtis photograph and tried to adjust the image as best as I could using Eli's design elements and the color palette he had initially established. Andrew Hem added a couple of circles for some embellishment. This is one of the fastest paintings I've ever done, Eli is a witness.. and ironically I was stoned off my mind (thank you Eli). I usually can't paint under MJ's influence but once in a while... OOOLAALAAA! As Usual there are a couple of hidden elements but they are in the state of becoming and I don't want to seal their fate.

BLACK ELK SPEAKS
BLACK ELK SPEAKS
BLACK ELK SPEAKS
....and his vision is alive

More BiRDS and raison d'etre

this is probably the best buuuuuurd I've ever drawn. If you are what you eat then we can see this bird's been pecking at some seeds and worms... there's the back of a bull coming out of the side of its head... maybe this raven liked to eat bugs off the bull or buffalo's back. I stumbled upon foreign territory on this one and I have yet to fully explore the ideas I found with this drawing. Not only is making new connections important but also realizing their relevance, synthesizing into a digestive whole, and presenting others with an alternative way to see and understand the world.... IS..... My raision d'etre (reason to live)

Birds

I'm obsessed with birds. Maybe I'm jealous that they can fly and I can only do it in my head. Plane rides don't count. Dreams are the best. Some feel so real so true... my Peter Pan syndrome. I feel I've been saying goodbye to Jasmyn for a long time now...even before we had to part. Our relationship was such an obvious landmark in my life/art. It's very hard for me not to think of my art as a manifestation of my innermost personal struggles. I read somewhere that the ironic thing is that the most personal art turns out to be the most universal. Her and shrooms go hand in hand...my eyes were opened to a world of extreme complexity and diversity...where nothing is stable or easily understood. If I can't get that across with my work then it's all hopeless. I hope some day to achieve a serene simplicity in my work (maybe along the lines of Turner?) but like Saul Williams says.. "Out of Chaos comes order". I already figured that the only way to reach that simplicity ( and when I do reach it ...it should be foreign yet slightly familiar to the onlooker) is to extend my thoughts beyond my present state of comfort. Ask more questions, draw more lines. The day this happens will be like John Muir finding calypso borealis in a swamp... a sign of hope,beauty in the dark, in the worst of places. But I have to get lost in the swamp first. This is the last drawing I did dealing with our relationship. She's holding her index fingers as the last moment before separation. Arrows flying towards her. Outlines of rooftops inside of her...the home she left and looks for, forever wonderwander.The bird near her hands is one of two I found dead. This was really strange...her and I found it together and when she left I found another one near my house, almost identical and I burried it. I had never seen that type of bird before those two instances and have never seen any other one like it since. Events like these are the reason why I find everything to be symbolic. Everything matters

Field Trips

I can't stress enough how important highschool was for me in terms of shaping my whole outlook on life, opening my mind and giving me a glimpse of endless possibilities. I would not be the same person if it weren't because of those 4 years I spent going downtown, waking up at 6 in the morning to enter a building full of some of the most creative and beautiful people I've ever met. Robin Whitelock was the light of my middle school years. A wonderful art teacher who incouraged me to push myself and told me to apply to New World because it was the best. New World had a legacy of SICK artists...some floors decorated with great paintings that do not cease to amaze me til this day. The best part was that all the arts were mixed up... we would take academic classes with kids that were musicians, theater students, dancers and after 5th period when most highschools would dismiss their students we had an extra 3 hours of respective art classes.
In the visual arts department we would go on fieldtrips a couple of times a year to paint at the beach and other outdoor places. During one of the trips I was walking around and saw a man asleep sitting on a foldout chair. Seemed as if I had just intruded in this man's house... except his house had no walls. One of the many homeless people in Miami. I don't know this man's story, I didn't want to wake him up so I just snapped a couple of shots...and left my shrink-wrapped sandwhich next to him. Actually that's an understatement.. I threw it at him but it fell by his feet. The subsequent painting was started at home in my studio on two separate pieces of wood. To prepare the surface I used a lot of gesso layers letting it drip mainly on what would later become the background and placed. the pieces of wood on the floor where I proceeded to dance on it with my bare feet. You can still see some footprints mainly on the bottom right section. It's a shame this piece is in such shitty condition but then again I think it works with the subject matter. There was no Uncle Sam poster in the background but the American flag WAS there. I just added a big ass burnt bullet hole on it cause I felt like it. This is still one of my favorite pieces not only because it captured a slice of real life...none of it was staged..but also because it was a lot of fun to work on ( and to step on ). I believe my footprints might have inspired my good friend Matt Krawcheck to step on his work as well except he used house and oil paint found in dumpsters and that's why he's more badass than I am :D.

WoW!

So I'm on this thing.. I'm on it and I'm in it .. who's behind it?? This is pretty exciting stuff cause now I can just ramble on and write about my work or cupcakes and it won't be tucked away away somewhere like in myspace. If this goes well I can see giving up the myspace crack altogether.. people need their space.. I guess, but how can you quit crack?? This reminds me of when I used to have a deadjournal.. R.I.P dj ...I'll never feel so "underground" again. Being back home in Miami puts me back in touch with the elderly.. and by that I just mean my grandparents. Today I took grandma to pledge and get her citizenship "diploma". She was so lost. I had to tell the guards she had Alzheimer's disease and I needed to be her guide. Becoming a citizen (KANE!) is such a strange and almost comical process. Well I could just about laugh at anything (especially myself)...but seriously, you get little american flags, you're in a giant room sitting shoulder to shoulder with people from all over the world and you watch a video of Pres. BUSHwacker telling you how impressed he is that you passed the test and all this other shit he's reading from a teleprompter followed by a video of sweeping views of the U.S. landscape, close-ups of smiling kids, people of different races and such while listening to the song "Proud To Be An American". I think the most disturbing part is all the military references ... seeing my grandmother pledge to take up arms if necessary and protect the nation... the whole ceremony seems like a really empty ritual to me ...." I swear I will protect this abstract entitiy I call the United States "... or am I really saying ... " I will protect whatever government happens to be in power because they might offer some kind of protection to me ". I don't want to sound ungrateful, but there are many factors that have contributed to my life here in the U.S. and I can't just generalize like I'm being told I should... I see through the cheesy intentions to make me feel patriotic and shout out "Sieg Heil" to the flag. I almost feel sorry for the people that buy into that flag-waving america vs. the world shit. I feel sorry because they don't know any better. Then again, we all have to buy into someone's story... so how do you choose?
Here's part of my story.
...more of an attempt.
I would like to explain through this site my fascination with things that are hidden, ambiguity and metamorphosis. My work has been compared a lot to Salvador Dali with reason. My dad was my first influence but Dali was my first favorite painter. I'm still discovering new things when looking at paintings I thought I was familiar with. In a sense that's what I hope to accomplish... works that refuse to be easily understood or pigeonholed and that with time, will evolve into diaries that other generations will read and perhaps better understand or misunderstand ha!
I decided to get things started with a drawing I did my freshman year of College at Art Center. This one is titled " my friends and I are not superheroes" and is basically a drawing of the 4 original roommates in the Fall of 02. Pasadena, CA. I'm the freak with the muscles, behind me is Edgar Cuarezma ( GRRR), then the lovely ms. Jane Kim and to the right my best friend since highschool David Olivera. Too many adventures to mention ... but... this drawing is slightly prophetic. David jumping on a paper boat made out of a letter from his gf (La Domi as he would call her) with a tidal wave about to hit is symbolic of what happened in his relationship later on. The tire marks on Grr's face are a reference to getting run over by a car when he was a kiddo. Jane and I always fucked with him cause he loved to sleep ( I do too!!) and David would call him the gentle giant. Well here he's in a trance watching sheep bounce on Jane's head ...trying to reach his favorite dream state, dreaming of sheep with hats labled LuLu...a reference to his love at the time. As for me I'm just some weirdo trying to be the captain of my own mutating body and mind, floating like a balloon... as for Janey, well only she knows.