John Baldessari, Cremation Project (Detail), 1970
Before leaving San Diego/National City for a teaching gig in Los Angeles, John Baldessari cremated most of his paintings. He left behind his past (artwork and process) to become a Conceptual artist in a new location. Although I wasn't thinking about it at the time, my pyre on the beach (minus leaving the ashes for the tide to take away) evokes a similar purpose. In regards to the VB project, I am starting my California trip in San Diego, the place my parents also left behind to start a new life elsewhere. I have always seen San Diego as a point of departure and although this has nothing directly to do with my personal history, it's worth exploring for these two reasons.
After perusing Pure Beauty with new vigor, these are the connections I have to Baldessari's work:
John Baldessari, The Backs of All the Trucks Passed While Driving from Los Angeles to Santa Barbara, California, Sunday, 20 January 1963
#1) The "every single" factor. ALL the trucks are recorded within a certain span of time (and therefore counted, catalogued, and organized into a grid). They record not just an experience with one object but a passage of time. [Incidentally, this is a commonality with Ed Ruscha as in his artist's book Every Single Building on the Sunset Strip.]
John Baldessari, Everything is Purged..., 1966-68
#2) Text indicating an idea but leaving the visual up to the viewer's imagination/mind. Again... "everything."
John Baldessari, Wrong, 1966-68
#3) Going against the grain of traditionally accepted practices. He makes it a rule to avoid what most artistic photographers would deem a deadly composition. This quote sums it up for me: "Probably one of the worst things that happened to photography is that cameras have viewfinders." - John Baldessari
John Baldessari, California Map Project, 1969
#4) Use of maps. Here Baldessari re-visualized the landscape based on a drawing that we all know and recognize - a map of California. There are two different versions of place represented. He also meddles with the land to create his letters which are so far from the original scale of the map "alphabet," it can't help but be seen as comical.
John Baldessari, Commissioned Paintings, 1969
#5) Humor/Literally pointing out the obvious. This work was created in response to a quote from the painter Al Held regarding his belief that Concpetual Art was all about pointing out things. Baldessari recreated that statement as a literal interpretation. Baldessari also makes it acceptable to make funny artwork. Thank you for that.
John Baldessari, Art History, 1970
#6) Referencing the past as a valid document of exploration. Even though this work isn't serious, it's all about art history. The text in the above work reads:
"A young artist had just finished art school. He asked his instructor what he should do next. 'Go to New York,' the instructor replied, 'and take slides of your work around to all the galleries and ask them if they will exhibit your work.' Which the artist did. He went to the gallery with his slides. Each director picked up his slides one by one, held each up to the light the better to see it, and squinted his eyes as he looked. 'You are not in the mainstream. We’re looking for Art History.' He tried. He moved to New York. He painted tirelessly, seldom sleeping. He went to museum and gallery openings, studio parties, and artists’ bars. He talked to very person having anything to do with art; traveled thought and read constantly about art. He collapsed.He took his slides around the galleries a second time. 'Ah,' the gallery directors said this time, 'finally you’re historical.'
Moral: Historical mispronounced sounds like hysterical."
John Baldessari, Cigar Smoke to Match Clouds That are the Same (by Sight-Side View), 1972-73
#7) Emulation through the dual nature of contrast/comparison. Again... humor. Photographing the photograph. The performative action.
John Baldessari, Throwing Three Balls in the Air to Get a Straight Line (Best of 36 Attempts), 1973
#8) Chance. Baldessari gave himself an assignment that risked possible failure. "Every single" photograph on a 36 exposure roll of film was dedicated to this action. Did he succeed? He did just by trying.
John Baldessari, Brutus Killed Caesar, 1976
#9) Repetition. This is evident in the "every single" factor and several of the images above but this category refers to it from a visual standpoint. There are two constants in Brutus Killed Caesar and the middle image is always changing, creating a new context. Same players, new story all based on a solitary object.
John Baldessari, Pencil Story, 1972-73
#10) The thoughtful question/the elevation of the lowly object to an artwork/a mundane activity all told through a story.
I have created quite a list with these ten connections. Not that I want to create artwork directly based on Baldessari, I am finding out that I indirectly already have.
One of these days really soon, I will stop posting other people's Marilyn Monroe photographs and finish my own. In the meantime, the highlights from John Vachon's book:
Richard Avedon: "She understood photography. Not only was she curious about the process but also she understood the ways that photographs could create meaning, establish reality. She also understood what makes a great photograph - not the technique, but the content. She was more comfortable in front of the camera than away from it... She was completely creative... She was very, very involved with the meaning of what she was doing, in an effort to make it more, to get the most out of it."
Richard Avedon's portrait of Marilyn Monroe, 1957
John Vachon, On location of The River of No Return, Banff, 1953
Marilyn is wearing a cast in these images so the photographer for David C. Nolan's collection missed the time period when she sprained her ankle on the movie set.
The reason I find this photograph so humorous relates directly to Robert Mitchum, the other main star in The River of No Return. The clip below from Jim Jarmusch's Dead Man shows another encounter with a bear beginning at 48 seconds.
It's almost the same ursine.
Dream of Voodoo Doughnut while I check off my list:
Yesterday (5.5 hours):
• Ed Ruscha Letter agonized over, completed, photographed & sent. Check.
• Postcard Collective photograph taken & postcard designed. Check.
• Three books perused for scanning. Check.
• Venice Biennale research. Check.
Today (7.25 hours):
• Tripod fixed at Jack's Camera. Check.
• Plexi-glass ordered for Nine Fake Cakes... frames. Check.
• Three library books scanned & four more books checked out. Check.
• Postcard Collective printed, labeled, and ready to go out tomorrow. Check.
• Lots of Venice Biennale research (big post coming soon). Check.
341 ... and what will another year look like?
The first one was rewritten in a note format and delivered by tacking it to his fence so I'm not even sure he received it. This one is officially typed (because I don't trust my handwriting will translate as legible) and sent Priority. Now the wait begins....
I spent the day researching and writing (for 7 hours!). I am formulating ideas about the California portion of the VB trip which will be here before I know it and the majority of the day was devoted to this task. There's nothing like thinking of commonalities between artists like John Baldessari and Ed Ruscha and what work I would like to delve into that explores that (or what work I already make that comments on theirs and how I never realized it).
Ed Ruscha, Spam Product Shot, 1961
John Baldessari, The spectator is compelled..., 1968-79 (perhaps he's looking for Spam)
More time was devoted to Marilyn Monroe as visiting David C. Nolan's address in San Francisco is part of the California project and it would have been her 85th birthday today. The Lost Look Photographs by John Vachon arrived at the library and I've been perusing it. On a side note, I did see The Misfits while in Astoria (horrifying/fascinating = last film for both Monroe and a very sweaty Clark Gable). It was nowhere near the snooze fest of Seven Year Itch and still didn't beat Some Like it Hot but it was worth seeing even though the horse scenes were hard to watch. Speaking of The Misfits, this is what the back of a press photograph is supposed to look like (ahem, David C. Nolan):
Four more applications were sent today as well. Jennifer sent me the link to Mary Bennett's new exhibition, 1983 Rejections: 3 Acceptances and my odds better not be that bad (.15% = yikes). I never keep my rejections letters thankfully as that would be too painful to behold.
Mary Bennett's installation at 23 Sandy Gallery, Portland, Oregon
From the website: "This unique documentation of a poet’s struggle and success was found in a dumpster in San Francisco’s Noe Valley neighborhood in the mid 1990’s. The tattered, annotated index cards show a record of submissions to literary journals from 1973 to 1978. The installation is an attempt to recognize and honor this poet for her forbearance and patience."
There is definitely a connection to the Art Guys' Wailing Wall:
Marilyn Monroe photographed by Douglas Kirkland:
Pin-up by Billy Collins
The murkiness of the local garage is not so dense
that you cannot make out the calendar of pinup
drawings on the wall above a bench of tools.
Your ears are ringing with the sound of
the mechanic hammering on your exhaust pipe,
and as you look closer you notice that this month's
is not the one pushing the lawn mower, wearing
a straw hat and very short blue shorts,
her skirt tied in a knot just below her breasts.
Nor is it the one in the admiral's cap, bending
forward, resting her hands on a wharf piling,
glancing over the tiny anchors on her shoulders.
No, this is March, the month of great winds,
so appropriately it is the one walking her dog
along a city sidewalk on a very blustery day.
One hand is busy keeping her hat down on her head
and the other is grasping the little dog's leash,
so of course there is no hand left to push down
her dress which is billowing up around her waist
exposing her long stockinged legs and yes the secret
apparatus of her garter belt. Needless to say,
in the confusion of wind and excited dog
the leash has wrapped itself around her ankles
several times giving her a rather bridled
and helpless appearance which is added to
by the impossibly high heels she is teetering on.
You would like to come to her rescue,
gather up the little dog in your arms,
untangle the leash, lead her to safety,
and receive her bottomless gratitude, but
the mechanic is calling you over to look
at something under your car. It seems that he has
run into a problem and the job is going
to cost more than he had said and take
much longer than he had thought.
Well, it can't be helped, you hear yourself say
as you return to your place by the workbench,
knowing that as soon as the hammering resumes
you will slowly lift the bottom of the calendar
just enough to reveal a glimpse of what
the future holds in store: ah,
the red polka-dot umbrella of April and her
upturned palm extended coyly into the rain.
Marilyn Monroe on the Beach, 1949
I have been following the ArchDaily blog for a year or two though I usually whip through most of the entries because I'm looking for houses with swimming pools & I'm not interested in architectural renderings or plans. Since April, I've collected every pool shown on the blog. Yes, this is the ideal paradise but we take what we can get with the inflatable version on a art professor's salary.
16 April 2011 Entry, Minas Gerais, Brazil
19 April 2011 Entry, Castellon, Spain (reminding me a little of the pool in this film)
26 April Entry, Spain
30 April 2011 Entry, Germany
3 May 2011 Entry, Paradise City, Arizona
4 May 2011 Entry, Scottsdale, Arizona
5 May 2011 Entry, Israel
9 May 2011 Entry, Desert Hot Springs, CA
23 May 2011 Entry, Victoria, Australia
25 May 2011 Entry, Paradise Valley, Arizona
26 May 2011 Entry, Thailand
