Abandoned Heart at Pea Ridge

Abandoned Heart at Pea Ridge (3-7-1862)

oil on canvas 16 x 20 inches


Part of the at exhibition at Albany Institute of Art, Ransoming Mathew Brady: Re-Imagining the Civil War.
This show runs through Oct. 3 2010 and includes over 25 works inspired by Mathew Brady and his Civil War photography.

Albany Institute of History & Art
125 Washington Avenue
Albany, NY 12210
Tel: 518.463.4478
E-mail: information@albanyinstitute.org

Saatchi Showdown - Parts and Smoke at Chickamauga

Parts and Smoke at Chickamauga 2007







Not only is this painting currently being shown at the Albany Institute of Art, it will be part of the Saatchi Showdown, 8/9/2010 - 8/16/2010

You can cast your ballot for this painting by going to:
http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/showdown/index.php?showpic=280336

This showdown is only active between 8/9/2010 - 8/16/2010

Shown at the Albany Institute show

Antietam in Smoke (Sept. 17 1862)
2007 Oil on canvas
46 x 62 inches





Part of the at exhibition at Albany Institute of Art, Ransoming Mathew Brady: Re-Imagining the Civil War.
This show runs through Oct. 3 2010 and includes over 25 works inspired by Mathew Brady and his Civil War photography.

Albany Institute of History & Art
125 Washington Avenue
Albany, NY 12210
Tel: 518.463.4478
E-mail: information@albanyinstitute.org

Notes From An Opening

Ransoming Mathew Brady


Opalka Gallery


June 9 2010



i went to the opalka exhibition with some anxiety, fearing that i
might not like the works which i am seeing for the first time, all
together in a collective space.

sometimes in previous exhibitions, i literally could not see the work. i would look away and then at the image and it would take time to see in new spaces what i had known in the familiarity of my studio.

then when there were people present, their energy would move me to see differently.

once in mexico city, during an exhibition of mine, i saw a couple embracing with a
prolonged passionate kiss. highly complimented,sensing that the work
they were standing in front of was responsible for this wonderful
arousal, i asked them precisely what ingredient in the work led them
to such a state of ecstasy.

they seemed bewildered and said they just like to kiss.

Venue and Description of Art

Often the way art is received has much to do with the venue and in which it is seen and the description that accompanies it. In May 2010 the Crescent Hotel in San Francisco put John Phillips’ oil painting The Family Bed on permanent exhibition in the main lobby.

John,

Well, first off, it has been a while. How have you been? I hope things for you have been good.

I wanted to let you know that the piece that I bought from you several years ago is now hanging in the lobby of our newest Hotel, Crescent San Francisco. I will send you pictures of how it looks. But needless to say, we love it and think it adds a lot to the space.

We would like to have a museum tag next to the piece. You of course remember it is Family Bed. Can you write something that we can have printed which would be placed next to it on the wall?

We did have one woman say that it shocked her, and appears degrading to women. Of course, we all know that art will elicit a variety of reactions from people, some good some not so good. I suppose if it didn't stir something, it wouldn't be art. But when you consider what to write, perhaps keep in mind that its a Hotel and we want to have people feel like its interesting but not necessarily controversial.

I look forward to catching up. Thanks.

Best,

Greg

-----------------------------

John was “hard pressed to give one because the work is about family intimacy” but thought they could use a few lines from the book “The Bed as Autobiography” where the painting appears.

-----

And They did

----

FAMILY BED, (2000. oil on canvas) takes the subject of one's bed as a realm where extraordinary things take place -- among them, our key human rites of passage. We take to our beds to be born and to grow, to hide and to dream, to lie alone and cling together, to come of age and make love, to create and to procreate, to ail and to heal, to rest and to die.

-----------------

Having seen what was chosen John thought the venue needed a description that was somewhat different.

-----------------------

Greg,

Since this is a hotel lobby, you might want to delete dying and
substitute "to rest and to sleep".
I want to make this work which, is very intimate, positive, hopeful and a public experience.

-----------------

And so it was changed.















FAMILY BED, (2000. oil on canvas)

Emily Dickinson - Fragments From The Dreambook

Emily Dickinson---Sleeping With God
Watercolor










Emily Dickinson---My Letter to the World
Watercolor










Emily Dickinson--- Emily on Fire
Watercolor

For more on John's journey with Emily in Egypt go to:

Egyptian Travelogue: Week 3
Egyptian Travelogue: Week 4

MARY TODD LINCOLN

Excerpts from the soon to be published Mathew Brady’s Dream Book. http://ransomingbrady-dream book.com

Mathew Brady invades the dreams of famous Americans he has photographed





Mathew Brady: Mrs. Lincoln, the president’s wife, used to visit my studio frequently. Ordering me around, she would search out the best lighting to enhance her importance. She was a vigorous custodian of her public image and censored what she deemed not worthy of who she believed herself to be.

She loved clothes and seemed to subscribe to the maxim that such matters were not disguises but revelations of true character.












mary lincoln's tear bed 70x90 oil 09


Mary Todd Lincoln:
Excerpt at the end of their joint dream.

I visit photographers, no not Mr. Brady who is interested in the surfaces of existence, but those who can access other dimensions. My senses hunger for connection, new circumferences, and Mr. Mumler of Boston provides me with new opportunities. In my visits there, I have to climb stairs to encounter my own self-image of woman-ness, fertile as the moon, giving life to males.

And when I reach the top of the stairs, I encounter a familiar smell, dusty and pungent which seems to be waiting for me. It pervades my sittings with Mr. Mumler and when I leave I take with me an image of an old lady in black, strong in her past fecundity, with two gentle hands on her shoulders, loving and peaceful. There are others, but this is my favorite and I leave the studio at 170 West Springfield Street, and I leave Boston and eventually I leave even America.

But before my departure, I push Mr. Brady out of my dream and he awakens full of fear and consternation.

I get out of my mother’s bed quietly but with some dispatch and move to the corner of my bedroom, where the moon’s light is blocked. I have never seen spirits, but I have seen other people’s dreams. In the old-wet collodion days, I recall taking a positive print from a negative and being surprised to encounter a ghostly figure floating above the sitter.

This spirit-like image was also evident, but less so, in the negative. I sense that what we have here is double exposure, an incompletely cleaned surface of the plate then transferred to the negative and in turn to the positive print. President Lincoln’s spirit is a chemical action registered between the image and the glass itself.

So I get back in bed happy I have explained the phenomenon, but then I see at the foot of my mother’s bed the President himself, gaunt, regal, and disheveled. But I am awake- this is no dream- so I study this specter and he makes no move to leave my darkened bedroom. Then he is joined by three small boys who look disappointed when they look where their father is looking. Had they expected their mother, whose presence I left long ago when I left her dream? Or are they confusing my energy with hers since I had invaded (not exactly with invitation) her nightmare? The wallpaper in my bedroom begins to wilt, and a strange unearthly smell descends into my bedroom. A window opens in the corner and all four Lincolns exit.