Essays on Sculpture

In Repose Green #8

12/15    As the judge writes my future i'd like, through these objects, for the reverse to also be true, that my marks mark her life. Interesting the confluence Art-objects and my life, how under duress they appear and are flipsides. Given that and the fact that these words are almost unseeable, both under drawing and broken on the overcoated flat sides, it occurred to me to write something different from the obviously pleasant/pleasing shapes & colors. Both my nemeses and salvation flow from prison, the mindlessness of these bureaucrats/guards free and restrict me to the extreme. Walking the tightrope, while often mundane, casts this shadow-life into high relief, i despise/fear them while frustrating/appreciating myself, as if we were death-dancing, which of course we are.

... It does not interest me it fascinates me, one cannot be an outsider, especially from inside. In a Gnostic sense the only center is the fringe, as the mantle keeps subducting. Over this last decade the whole justice system's run afoul, not just murder and corruption, our whole society's been effectively legalesed, from high-speed live coverage to glossy-print commercialism, Crime and The Trial are major metaphors everywhere. The life i live is but a mirror to the times, under constraints, either victim or scapegoat, no one escapes. A litany of headline cases was one way to approach this subject, listing them here. But, not only would that date this work, it would minimalize it. My conscious life, from McCarthy to this election, has been the Chinese curse made real, we have lived in interesting times.

... Aesthetics have radicalized accordingly, now art's listed as a business opportunity, as crime is listed as entertainment, to the point where they merge. The only honest person is the one who makes his profit illegally, rather than selling out after the fact, either to reduce his prison term or sell products on tv-shows, from porno-housewives to ex-presidents buying elections, the aesthetics of the era is gloss-shock with residual rights for the aftermarket.

... Both aesthetics and DNA are ways to carry information into the future, and both depend on mutations to enrich the general fund ... it's then the environment that determines which is carried over to the next generation. One small change is magnified over time by those that inherit it ... and it's non-directional, there's no progress, only changes that seem to be rushing-up faster each day. As it is in prison it is in art and life, mutations abound, mine and arts' cultural genetic drift flounders on the shores of virtual reality, waiting to mark our passage.

Writing