Brogo does something different

[Stronkey Kong]

 

Today I got breakfast at the gas station. Donut holes and a couple tornados. My mood was better thanks to the calories,  but my stomach was mildly irritated by the crappy food. So skipping is a better option than eating gas station breakfast,  but a healthy home cooked breakfast when I have the time is the best option. I'll try to remember this going forward. 

 

I tried to beat yesterday's step record but came up short by a little over 300 steps. 

 

I haven't done much on stretching. But,  I was doing some tow touches after lunch to loosen up my back and a Co worker commented on how limber I was and showed me how he couldn't even touch his. Granted he's like 70, but he's still in pretty good shape and the compliment was welcome.

 

Tomorrow I will spend all day painting. 

 

Unfortunately,  it will be my mom's living room and kitchen, and I don't think she wants a mural depicting the demon toad king and his ghoulish subjects at court. She is trying to sell her house after all.

[Stronkey Kong]

Re: Art

 

Having my own website top sell my art has been the idea all along.  I even had gone as far as getting hosted and a domain name. But I didn't have time to actually build it. Then it expired and I didn't have the spare money to renew.

 

The whole idea with going back to art school is:

 

1) Forced immersion.

2) Networking and interacting with artsy people. 

3) Learn and develop my (excrutiatingly complex) ideas. 

4) Be able to put my own work into context. 

 

Art requires discipline, or at least, rigor. I want to do work that will hang in museums one day. I'll even take it posthumously. It's not just about painting because I like it. I want to push boundaries,  my own and those of art itself. Painting a few hours on the weekend isn't going to get me there. You're going to say it'll all add up... no it won't. At some point I'm going to have to dive deep to get what I want. Picasso locked himself away for a month when he painted les mademoiselles. And that was still after a ton of previous hard work and experience. 

 

I'm totally ranting at myself now. 

 

Anyway,  I've got a really interesting idea right now and I'm gonna start sketching and working on it. And hopefully I'll get this programmer job so I can make adult money and pay off some debt, then maybe go back to school. 

 

I've also got enough vacation dabbed up to take a week off, so I'd the idea gets fleshed out I might be able to take some time to work in it.

 

I also found my dad's old camera the other day,  so wet might have some photography adventures coming soon. 

[WhiteGhost]

Good luck with the new position, hope it comes through for you.  My brother-in-law is a professional artist (oil paintings, mostly) but he can only do that because of my sister's job.  Trying to do it full time and make a living is really hard.

 

Re: the toe touches, it sounds like you are much more limber than me. I can only get about mid-shin.

[Stronkey Kong]

6 hours ago, WhiteGhost said:

Good luck with the new position, hope it comes through for you.  My brother-in-law is a professional artist (oil paintings, mostly) but he can only do that because of my sister's job.  Trying to do it full time and make a living is really hard.

 

Re: the toe touches, it sounds like you are much more limber than me. I can only get about mid-shin.

 

Thanks. 

 

When you get to your shins and it feels tight,  take a deep breath and try to sink a little further by relaxing what feels tight . Don't try to get there by forcing it... unless you've hit a limit without any tightness or pain. Take a few more breaths if you can. Stand back up and try again. You'll probably get further on the second attempt and if you make a habit of doing this daily you'll be touching your toes in no time. Same with any other stretch. 

[SageAndRage]

Good luck! And get some non wall painting art time too. I believe in you. 

[Stronkey Kong]

17 hours ago, WhiteGhost said:

Good luck with the new position, hope it comes through for you.  My brother-in-law is a professional artist (oil paintings, mostly) but he can only do that because of my sister's job.  Trying to do it full time and make a living is really hard.

 

 

I re read this post and realized something...

 

What I really need is a sugar mama. 

[WolfDreamer]

12 hours ago, Curl Brogo said:

What I really need is a sugar mama.

 

Nah, too high maintenance. 

[Stronkey Kong]

 

Well. I got some more painting in besides walls. I started a still life of one of my old food pr0n photos. This one I'm doing in acrylic. It's going okay so far. 

 

I snacked on chips all day yesterday while painting walls,  and today I had little tolerance for going hungry. And now I'm drinking plain sweet vermouth for some reason. 

 

No adventures.  Not really much time. The painting was more important.  And I have to work overtime tomorrow, and the next two days are 11 hours. 

[Stronkey Kong]

Proof of painting... in progress

 

 

I'm painting from this photo

 

 

I started with the intent of getting photo realism, but I know I'm only going to pull off a decent likeness. To get it photographic I'd need to put a lot more work in the sketch before I paint. It'll be more real than impressionism,  but it won't be exact. 

 

Today at work was insane. 11 hours of nothing but walking. 

 

And I still managed to stay hungry. Only having a clif bar at lunch. Ate some pulled pork, sweet potatoes and green beans for dinner, followed by a small bowl of pasta with marinara. 

[Stronkey Kong]

I am soooooo, tired. Fuck prime day. 

 

That is all. 

[Sylvaa]

13 hours ago, Curl Brogo said:

I am soooooo, tired. Fuck prime day. 

 

That is all. 

 

I bought an island off of Amazon the other day (Saturday) and thought of you. It didn't come through your warehouse, but I'm sure there was cursing involved in lifting 5 boxes of parts.

[Stronkey Kong]

10 hours ago, Sylvaa said:

 

I bought an island off of Amazon the other day (Saturday) and thought of you. It didn't come through your warehouse, but I'm sure there was cursing involved in lifting 5 boxes of parts.

 

On behalf of my colleagues...

 

Fuck you!

 

BTW: Island? WTF is that?

[Broba Fett]

20 minutes ago, Curl Brogo said:

 

BTW: Island? WTF is that?

 

My guess would be she means one of those kitchen counters that just sits in the middle of a kitchen:

 

 

Probably smaller and without a sink if she ordered from amazon. 

[Sylvaa]

13 hours ago, Curl Brogo said:

 

On behalf of my colleagues...

 

Fuck you!

 

BTW: Island? WTF is that?

 

I thought were were friends! 

 

Broba is correct, it's a freestanding kitchen cabinet. Could you imagine how much Amazon employees would hate me if it were an actual island? Hope your week has gone better and the excitement from Prime day has lessened!

[Stronkey Kong]

10 hours ago, Sylvaa said:

 

I thought were were friends! 

 

Broba is correct, it's a freestanding kitchen cabinet. Could you imagine how much Amazon employees would hate me if it were an actual island? Hope your week has gone better and the excitement from Prime day has lessened!

 

Politeness is for strangers. 

[Stronkey Kong]

 

I finally went in to this fried fish and chicken place down the street. I drive by it daily, and have been wanting to stop in and try it. The wings weren't that great,  but the fish was awesome. Hello new comfort food... it reminded me of a lot of my Dad's old haunts in Chicago that he used to take me for food when we visited or went fishing on the lakeshore. 

 

I heard back from the art school... my email has been forwarded to the chair of the art department and maybe he'll have some advice. 

 

My boss,  who is also the hiring manager for the programmer job also let me know that she saw my application and told me that they'd be starting the selection process next week. So it's time to get ready. 

 

If I get this job,  I'd have a lot more money and time to invest in my art and still be able to pay off debts,  and could still afford to take a class or two somewhere. So if I get it I'll stick to it until I'm debt free, then I'll decide whether to dive back into art full time if I still feel that's what I need to do. 

 

If I don't get it,  I'm gonna have to make decisions fast. I might have to paint my way out of a corner.  <shit-eating grin>

[Broba Fett]

15 hours ago, Curl Brogo said:

 

If I get this job,  I'd have a lot more money and time to invest in my art and still be able to pay off debts,  and could still afford to take a class or two somewhere. So if I get it I'll stick to it until I'm debt free, then I'll decide whether to dive back into art full time if I still feel that's what I need to do. 

 

Fingers crossed sir.  I hope you get it. 

[Stronkey Kong]

 

Eggs and oatmeal for breakfast. 

 

Then I went on a little adventure. I went to an art supply store across town. I wandered around inside seeing all they had. This is definitely the place to go from now on, and especially when I decide to do bigger pieces. I bought a few tubes of acrylic paint and like 16 or so cheap ass tiny little brushes. Then I went grocery shopping. I bought a mango and some yogurt... among other things... when I got back it was mango lassi time.

 

When I got back I did some painting. 

 

 

Well, actually this one was from yesterday. I am back in to my abstract expression music painting thing. I was experimenting with painting randomly positioned and sized rectangles of color just to see how the colors interact. Note: these are truly random. I wrote a computer program to generate random instructions for me. 

 

Here's the one I did today,  unfinished

 

 

That took me 4 freaking hours. Then I decide to go De Kooning on that shit with the same palette:

 

 

20 min. It has so much more energy and manages to do everything I was hoping random rectangles would. 

[WolfDreamer]

16 hours ago, Curl Brogo said:

20 min. It has so much more energy and manages to do everything I was hoping random rectangles would.

 

The last one is my favorite. So free and just in your face like "Screw you, this is art." 

 

 

[Sylvaa]

Dear Sir,

 

It has been almost 10 days since I have seen any of your shenanigans. What are you doing? Has Amazon finally claimed your soul? Any update on the job front?

 

Sincerely,

 

Me

[Stronkey Kong]

3 hours ago, Sylvaa said:

Dear Sir,

 

It has been almost 10 days since I have seen any of your shenanigans. What are you doing? Has Amazon finally claimed your soul? Any update on the job front?

 

Sincerely,

 

Me

 

Amazon might have stolen my soul if grad school hasn't gotten to it first. 

 

I've been mulling over the possibilities of my own artistic practice. I've watched a lot of YouTube documentaries about artists, how to paint like them or their bios, and read Wikipedia bios and other articles. And experimenting with ideas that come up. 

 

Here are some of the artists and my reactions. 

 

Willem De Kooning: abstract expressionist painter. I like his style and energy. But, I personally find smearing paint endlessly to be very unsatisfying. Working through it just feels like painting entirely for paintings sake. 

 

Jeff Koons: sculpture mostly. Pop art.  I love/hate his work. He has a great grasp of art history and a great sense of seductive advertising. But he falls short in my opinion by using this knowledge to promote himself rather than empowering people to see past their own materialism. Plus everything is way too polished, and I think he's too slick and pretentious. I had a strong visceral sense of disgust when I watched the first documentary on him. I might consider him am antagonistic influence. 

 

Damien Hirst: installation,  sculpture,  painting. I like his previous installations. Francis Bacon meets Jeff Koons, poppy but proactive and dark. He seems to have run out of good ideas lately. 

 

Tracy Emin: installation art, paintings.  I love how she communicates so bluntly, and unpretentiously, yet everything has a cleverness and depth about it. 

 

Mark Rothko: abstract expressionist painter. Color fields. I love rothko. Simple but very deep conceptually, spiritually,  and emotionally. 

 

Cornelia Parker: installation and sculpture. I love her work. She applies violence to mundane objects in a very considered way which makes them beautiful. 

 

Ali Banisadr: painter.  He's a synaesthete who paints according to the music he hears in his head when he sees his lines and colors. He had the same ferocious painterly energy I'd like to see in my own work. 

 

Agnes Martin: minimalist painter. I saw a video on how to paint in her style. Pick a background color.  Make a grid.  Paint using simple strokes within the grid with a foreground color. I tried to imitate this with my musical painting idea. Ilike her results,  but I don't like working in a grid. It's too repetitive and confining. 

 

Maggie Hamblin: painting, drawing,  sculpture. I love her work. Very classic. Strong energy. Realism giving way to deep, interesting abstraction. Very human. I'd love to be competent in the same media and producing work in a similar way. 

 

Tjalf Sparnaay: painting,  mega realism with a touch of pop. He paints a lot of blown up pictures of food and found objects and pulls off photorealism with abstract details. Bright colors. Lively... but always includes elements of disorder and decay. I admire his technical skills,  though I'm not sure I have the patience for it. 

 

What am I to do?

 

 

[Sylvaa]

4 minutes ago, Curl Brogo said:

What am I to do?

 

You've inspired me to take a trip to the museums in DC. I wanted to anyway, but moving that up. 

[Stronkey Kong]

Other updates.

 

I've been consistently in the lower 250s in poundage coming in at 252.2 this morning. I tend ro stay hungrier when at work. I hope by the end of this challenge to cross below 250 for the first time in like three years.

 

No adventures. I had my first three day weekend in a month. I spent a lot of time painting, then too much time being lazy AF. 

 

I scaled up my canvas and just started a charcoal sketch for my portrait of the demon toad king like five minutes ago. I'm planning to tinker with the sketch all week then start the grayscale under-painting next weekend. 

 

My stretching still just comes in sporadic bursts throughout the day. Idk. I need to work on this and figure out a routine again. 

[Stronkey Kong]

249.8 lbs.!

 

I believe I deserve a beer. 

[WolfDreamer]

3 hours ago, Curl Brogo said:

249.8 lbs.!

 

I believe I deserve a beer. 

 

Awesome! Well done!