Mickey Mouse and Pluto

“Love's not Love”. Galería Ester Montoriol, 2020. JUJA. Mickey Mouse.  Ooof !! -- what a hackneyed theme. I am sure Mickey doing it with Pluto has crossed a lot of minds. It crossed mine. Love possess. Cupid has stung them both. 

As vulgar as this seems, it's about the cupid.

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200 x 150 cm mixed media on Fabriano paper. 2021

Popeye Laverda Mirage

Popeye and a Laverda Mirage. If paintings are to be representational, then there are all kinds of structural motifs that have to be there. One being the figure ground relationship. It becomes a formal problem -- these two paintings in a very simple way illustrate two versions of the landscape issue: one has trees and a stream, recognizable motifs and immediately understood. The other a drop shadow on a white ground. The white ground functions as the landscape. 

The Laverda Mirage was a 1200cc, 3 cylinder DOHC  Italian super bike from the late 70s. When I came to Barcelona, I'd sometimes see them on the street. But I didn't see a lot of them. Mostly people drove scooters: Vespa Primavera 125cc, or small bikes like the Montesa 125cc, Bultaco 125cc, and the unusual Catalan Sanglas 350.  All small cylinder bikes, relatively affordable, practical and two-stroke. Smokey blue exhaust and the grindy two-stroke sound. Bikes that were initially designed in the 50s and were even back then retro when retro wasn't cool. It was unusual to see super bikes. They were impractical for getting around the city, and probably the main reason was to drive a 125cc bike you didn't need a motorcycle license. Unlike the effete BMW Boxer which was the common big bike back then, yuck!, the Laverda was an unusual 3 cylinder four stroke overhead cam design and had the tough Italian design look. They sounded amazing and I thought they were beautiful and exotic. Another looker was the Italian Moto Guzzi 500. They were used by the Spanish National Police, which I frequently saw, and they were an even tougher looking biker type bike. And back then, the cops smoked on duty, usually Ducados. It was a whole look. But being 500s, they looked a bit poky, compared to the Moto Guzzi 1000 Le Mans. That was something. Same design but bigger. It was also quite uncommon to see and it was equally beautiful like the Laverda Mirage, but sounded harder because of the V twin boom bloom design. Motto Guzzi was a bikers' bike. Seeing cops driving them—what could be more Spanish, incongruent and macho than that? Both were cooler than the Ducati's from the 80s which were flat out race bikes, screaming red, raked forward and looked really uncomfortable to ride. The Moto Guzzi 1000 Le Mans was definitely the most exotic of them all. The Laverda was a bit more elegant. Popeye is driving a Laverda in these paintings. 

Motto Guzzi 1000 Le Mans, 1980s

This is the Laverda model that Popeye is riding. What a beauty. Orange was Laverda's distinctive color. Not the obvious Ducati or Ferrari red. 

Laverda Mirage 1000 without the faring. It looked a bit like the Honda 750 Super Sport, but way tougher. 

Don't Eat Meat, Eat Pussy

A friend’s (Geni F., R.I.P.) daughter has tattooed on the back of her arm “EAT PUSSY, NOT ANIMALS”.  I am not sure if she's vegetarian or vegan but she's definitely against eating certain kinds of meats. I think she'd approve of this painting.

Installation View Expo at Atelier Cora Egger, Barcelona

“Love's Not Love” at Atelier Cora Egger, June 6, 2019, Barcelona.

The theme of the show deals loosely with the theme of love in some of its aspects: carnal love, lost love, promised love; and the related themes of gender, power, morbidity, sexism, and what is or isn't pornographic. This was the first time I had shown my work in a solo show in a long time. The work was new, and the timing of the show couldn't have been better. Thanks, Cora!

This was one of the first raster gnomes I painted. They are all the same theme and subject. A landscape, central gnome in the foreground. A knife in one hand, a bleeding heart in the other. 

I was invited to a small group show at Cora's space a few months earlier and then she offered me the space to do a solo show, documented above. Lots of artists and friends that I hadn't seen for a long time came out to the opening. That felt good. 

Gnome BBQ Deer

“Gnome BBQ Dee’’, 200 × 150 cm, 79 × 59'', mixed media on Fabriano paper, 2019.
I started to work on large rolls of paper after working on wood. It is painted with a refillable marker and a sprayed line. No brushes. It was really rewarding to get this done. Deer steak. Yum.

Beavers R Cute

“Beavers “R” Cute”. Well, beavers are cute. And they are furry too. What else can I say? Beavers are loveable. They are Canada’s national symbol. It's on the 5 cent Nickle coin. So, being a Canuck….
200 × 150 cm, 79 × 59’’ painted drawing on Fabriano paper, 2018.

Wood Gnome

This is the first rastered gnome I did, based on an animated ONCE pixel board ad (ONCE is a Spanish foundation for the blind). The original image was taken from a pixel board animation for Xmas lottery tickets. It was a simple animation of Santa's elves running along. I loved seeing the animation every day in the tunnel leading to the Ferrocarriles (Catalan commuter train).  

200 × 150 cm, 79 × 59’’ mixed media on Fabriano paper, 2019.

Titian

Based on "Mars Venus and Cupid" by Titian. 

The original Titian is such a powerful painting. My dear friend Toni Serra, R.I.P. suggested the image. So I painted it. 

Rip it Out Baby!

The simplicity and flatness is intentional. The trees are painted with a dabber and a refillable marker. To be able to draw a painted line is a great feeling. I'll do anything to avoid using a brush.

‘‘Rip it (Out), Baby!’’, 200 × 150 cm,  79 × 59’’ painted drawing on Fabriano paper, 2019.

More hearts getting ripped out. I was having a bad day that lasted a few months. So I did all these desperate paintings about heartbreak. There's nothing like pain as inspiration. 

Oh my Ears, my Whiskers 1

First painting in the series, “Oh My Ears, My Whiskers”. 40 × 50 cm, mixed media on wood. A landscape. A house. An exuberant bunny. 

Oh my Ears, my Whiskers 5

‘‘Oh My Ears, My Whiskers 5’’. 40 × 50 cm, mixed media on wood. 

Oh my Ears, my Whiskers 2

“Oh my Ears, my Whiskers 2”. The title is from Alice in Wonderland. 40 × 50 cm, mixed media on wood. 

The Cottage

In 2016_17 did a series of small works on wood panels dealing with the idea of freedom. I wanted to make my version of a traditional landscape painting. So what's in a landscape painting? Well, a horizon line, a house, flowers, and the subject. An exuberant bunny rabbit jumping over a cottage. In this painting, the bunny has disappeared and only the cottage remains.

60 × 40 cm, mixed media on wood.

Oh my Ears, my Whiskers 4

This series of bunny paintings were a return to “narrative painting” and the seed for the painting I am doing now. 60 × 40 cm, mixed media on wood.

Color

Studio view summer/autumn of 2019.  Introducing color again.

I have a thing about frames. Frames in a frame. Centering an image. Making the composition as simple as possible. These were the first that I painted in this paper format. 

NY

 

In 1997, after being in Barcelona for almost 9 years and having showed in a bunch of galleries like Galería Carles Poy, Galería Thomas Carson's, La Central de Energía, Lino Silverstein and in Juana de Izpuru in Madrid, it was time to leave and go to NY. This is my first studio I had in Brooklyn, NY, which I shared with Yun Fei Gi, a fabulous painter in his own right. It was on north 3rd and Wythe, in a huge building full of artists which eventually became condos and all the artists were chucked out. My part of the studio space was probably 125 sq. ft and it was affordable. I was paying $350. Those days are long gone. I really liked the Cobi t-shirt by Mariscal, a Barcelona designer, from 1982. Cobi was the Olympic Games mascot.

Pokey Paintings and the Kid with Moxie

Back in Barcelona, I continued on a long journey in abstraction. I love abstraction. And down the rabbit hole I went. I was caught up in gestural marks. At first working in oil paint, and when I no longer could, I started using Flashe paint thinking it could be an oil paint substitute. Wrong! It culminated in a series of small, intimate works.  A few of the pieces I showed at an alternative art fair to Frieze, in London, called Pilot II in 2005. It was organized by Rory Macbeth, a good friend and a brilliant painter and artist in his own right. 

I thought the work from this series in general was pretty anal, and I started back into figuration and gave up on the pokey abstract work. The real abstract painter who had the moxie was my 3-year-old son. Not me. Check out the video below. 

Unfortunately, he stopped drawing on the walls after about 6 months and never returned to painting or drawing again. 

Psyco-Bunnies

Bunny portraits are an installation shot from an expo at Galería Carles Poy, Barcelona in 1993.  The two painting below are 230 × 175 cm of the Psyco-cosmic - bunny series that I did afterward. I showed the one with the bluish ground at Kiku Mistu Centro del Arte, Barcelona in 1996. The cosmic bunnies were a culmination of the pop work I developed in Barcelona from 1988 to 97, before I left for NY. 

Exterminating Angels

Paintings from around 1995. I used to go to a junk store around the corner from my studio in the Raval, which was called the Barrio Chino back then. City Hall (El Ayuntamiento) had tried to sanitize both name and hood after tearing-down the worst parts of the neighborhood and partially eliminating a lot of the marginal activities like prostitution and drug dealing. That still goes on, but it is nothing like it was. Anyway, I'd go to a junk shop around the corner when I was stuck in the studio and I would find stuff, like old photos and figurines. I found this cheesy kitsch cast figure of an angel with a movable head. These are the result. Exterminating Angels. The painting with the male figure is Brains from the Thunderbirds, which fits with this theme.
All these paintings are 230 x170 cm. I believe one of these paintings was shown at Galería Thomas Carsten in Barcelona in 1995—the angel with the turquoise background.

Galería Carles Poy

Installation shot, street view, at Galería Carles Poy, 1993. Wandering on the Ramblas, “Mortadelo and Filemon” comics jumped out at me. The creation of the Barcelona artist Ibañez, every kid in Spain grew up reading them.

After moving to Barcelona and finding my present studio live workspace a year later, Carles Poy opened his gallery just literally around the corner on Carrer Jupí. Discovering him around the corner and still being a bit disoriented after being here less than a year was a bit strange. The gallery was an intimate ground floor space with an upstairs mezzanine. He was amongst a group of young gallery owners who were betting on young upcoming artists. There were the Alcolea Brothers, who had Lino Silverstein in El Born which lasted a year and then their main galleries uptown, both brothers having a gallery each. There was Galería Benet Costa, Toni Bernini Gallery, Galería Thomas Carslens, and Metrònom, an incredible space in El borne. The art market boom in the 80s in New York and particularly in painting was the driving force for all these new young galleries betting on young artists in Barcelona. But, Barcelona doesn't and didn't have a very strong collector base. The collectors that did buy tended to buy very conservatively, and those who did buy work by younger emerging artists in terms of important collectors were very few.  It was an exciting time in Barcelona with a lot of young artists coming up and showing. Space was cheap, and all kinds of things were happening. The Contemporary Art Museum was built and everything seemed to be promising. But the art market crashed big time in the early 90s, and all these new galleries closed for one reason or another.  The Museum of Contemporary Art Barcelona, MACBA, recently finished, a big white thing by Richard Meyer, turned out to be a disappointment. It was underfunded from day one. Ham strung by budgetary constraints.

Installation view. Bunny painting. Galería Carles Poy, Barcelona, 1993.

Two Cowboys. Installation shot at Galería Lino Silverstein, 1990. This gallery lasted about a year.  Owned by Fernando Alcolea, he showed a number of high profile New York artists, probably the best known was Donald Baechler. They had some excellent shows there. I've always been interested in detritus, and these images were from a bow and arrow set which I found on the street on Carrer Escudiers. These were some of the first paintings I did after moving into a great live work studio set up.

Mortadelo and Filemon

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When I moved to Barcelona in 1988, the city was a very out-of-the-way-place. An alternative, unknown quantity, and for me quite exotic in its authenticity. I came from Toronto, an anodyne and pale landscape, and no real important painting going on. I felt like the good painting was going on elsewhere.  Anywhere else than in Canada.

I knew instinctively even before coming to Barcelona that there wasn't a lot going on as far as visual art. Well, there were things going on but they definitely weren't that interesting as far as painting, or seeing paintings, or finding good galleries was concerned. I had moved from one bad painting town to another. A lack of solidarity between artists and few collectors meant everyone starved and fought for the small slice of something that was there. I wasn't part of that, which was fine for me. I was more interested in the sailor bars, junkies, and locals. That was inspiring, if not disturbing. I developed my work and isolated myself from my surroundings. One of the things that grabbed my eye was the comic book "Mortadelo and Filemon", quintessentially Spanish, and for me very captivating visually to look at. 

I wandered around my neighborhood, looking at stuff. It wasn't the “Mortadello y Filemon” comic parse that I liked, but the colorful zany covers, which were well displayed in the kiosks on the Ramblas.  That was a continuous presence and something very native and pop. The more I looked at it, the more I wanted to paint the frenetic warped surreal scenes and the bright, garish colors. I did end up painting Mortadelo and Filemon. Sometimes just Mortadelo -- 230 × 170 cm size in oil. 
At the time, 1988-96, there were some good painting shows passing through Barcelona. Bits and bobs at the Caixa Forum.  Really some great shows: Howard Hodgkin, Ed Ruscha, Bruce Nauman, the German painters like Keifer and Sigmar Polke and others.  The two paintings in the photo are installation shots from the now defunct Galería Carles Poy in 1993, in Barcelona. 

Going Abstract

I moved to NY in 1997, and I decided to change my work. Since I had decided to change my life, the change in my painting seemed logical. The move was quite radical and I started from zero in NY. I was quite well set-up in Barcelona and very comfortable there when I left. New life in NY, it seemed necessary to start fresh and leave the pop images behind and just concentrate on painting what I loved, which was abstraction. While I was still working in oil paint, that work culminated in a show in Barcelona at Galería Victor Saavedra in 2000, where I showed these and other works. Sometimes you do what you think you should do rather than doing what you feel you need to do.  Although I love abstraction, I couldn't get it right. I was always feeling like something was missing. And it was. It was the narrative, the irony, the imagery.

A FOR-REAL Painter -- the real MacCoy Rory MacBeth

2 very different paintings by the same artist Rory MacBeth. Although they deal with the same issue of authenticity and originality.

This image is of one of his amazing paintings. And it is a painting, not a piece of sterling board, although you wouldn't know it. A real challenge to our notion of reality as it is perceived, and to our expectations of how things really are and not how they just appear to be.

Rory Macbeth was once a Street Painter. We met in Barcelona in 1988. A phenomenal painter, and phenomenally talented. Now he shows all over the place aside from having been one of the organizers of Pilot, in London, an archive and showcase of unrepresented artists.

Gratutious Street Agit-Prop Posters

This is the first poster in a series of 3 street posters, A2 size, that I did and were pasted-up in the autumn of '95 in Barcelona. It depicts a woman in leathers (S+M) painting a fellatio. It says: “Being an Artist is Easy… Intensive 3-week courses….Pastiching…all graduates will show in the most prestigious galleries… collectors to buy your work…learn to paint like Tapies, Picasso….Salon Autónimo de Barcelona, Riereta 10" (which was the actual address of my studio) and there were people actually coming by inquiring about taking classes.  Which astounded me. I did these posters as I was quite fed-up with Barcelona art scene. I moved two years later to New York.