There's a great photo of Abstract Expressionist Mike Goldberg and the New York Beat Poet Frank O'Hara that used to hang in Goldberg's studio - the two of them clowning around in front of a Picasso at the MoMA. Both young and enthusiastic, it was a great reminder of the youthful bond between the painter and poet. It was taken around the time Frank wrote his work 'Why I am not a Painter' about Goldberg and his painting Sardines that now belongs to the Smithsonian American Art Museum. I am not a painter, I am a poet. Why? I think I would rather be a painter, but I am not. Well, for instance, Mike Goldberg is starting a painting. I drop in."Sit down and have a drink" he says. I drink; we drink. I look up. "You have SARDINES in it.”"Oh." I go and the days go by and I drop in again. The painting is going on, and I go, and the days go by. I drop in. The painting is finished. "Where's SARDINES?" All that's left is just letters, "It was too much," Mike says. But me? One day I am thinking of a color: orange. I write a line about orange. Pretty soon it is a whole page of words, not lines. Then another page. There should be so much more, not of orange, of words, of how terrible orange is and life. Days go by. It is even in prose, I am a real poet. My poem is finished and I haven't mentioned orange yet. It's twelve poems, I call it ORANGES. And one day in a gallery see Mike's painting, called SARDINES.     Together with his Estate and Michael Rosenfeld Gallery, I have been working with the conservation team from the Smithsonian to provide an insight into Mike's work, particularly his process and use of tape. Painted in 1955, Sardines needs a little conservation, particularly the masking tape that is used in the composition. It makes me chuckle a little when I remember a line Mike once said when I questioned the permanency of some of his material choices.. 'Who gives a fuck, let the conservators worry about that later'. Classic Goldberg! Below is an article from the Smithsonian's Eye Level, detailing the restoration project: Conservation: Paint, Tape, and Sardines March 25, 2014 Michael Goldberg's Sardines A challenging theme has developed in Jessica Ford's projects at the Lunder Conservation Center: tape! In painting conservation, adhesive tape is not usually encountered during examination or treatment. However, in contemporary art the use of unconventional materials is rarely surprising. At times, tape was applied by painters to frame the edges of paintings or to guide a straight line. Michael Goldberg's Sardines uses a different approach and prominently features adhesive tape as part of the painting's composition. Goldberg's paintings often grow from a central, physical object. The artist begins with a realistic element and then redefines it with an energetic working process. Here, simple line drawings were covered in swaths of heavy paint, collaged elements of paper or tape were relocated or removed, and new lines were painted or carved to recall the original object. Although expressive and experimental, his work was also carefully crafted. Sardines was brought into the Lunder Conservation Center primarily because both the paint's and the tape's adhesion to the canvas needed to be strengthened. Part of Jessica's work will be cleaning the surface, stabilizing the paint layer, and analyzing the paint's composition. Her other major focus will be addressing the two different types of adhesive tape used by Goldberg. As a material, tape can deteriorate quickly. Over time, it can darken, lose adhesion, and become brittle. A conservation treatment must be planned that does not compromise the artist's intent or the appearance of his materials. In the coming weeks, Jessica will research the art historical context of Sardines and draw on her technical knowledge of artistic media to develop a treatment approach. Currently, Jessica is looking into the history, material components, and conservation of adhesive tape. Art conservationist often share their findings with others in the field. So, Jessica, along with Lunder conservators Tiarna Doherty and Amber Kerr, will be talking about their work at the American Institute for Conservation's annual meeting this coming May.

Written by

MasDeco Market is a unique design fair that showcases everything from furniture to fine art. Created in 2012 by Chilean newspaper La Tercera, MasDeco invites young designers and artists to exhibit their work in a trade show environment. On April 23rd the fifth installment of MasDeco Market begins at Centro Cultural Estación Mapocho, Plaza de la Cultura in Santiago Chile. This year TWFA's Bernadita Castillo will be participating and exhibiting recent work.    

Written by

The print was one of the first examples in human history of a mass produced item. From humble beginnings over 3000 years ago, print technology has made it possible for hundreds, even millions of identical images to be produced from a single source. From early Chinese woodcuts to the modern machine press, the print has brought visual media to the masses. Andy Warhol was inspired by mass production, so much so that the process of reproduction became the focus of his art, both physically and conceptually. Warhol theorized that the most important, cultural significant items were those that were accessible to everyone thanks to the economy of mass production. “What’s great about this country is that America started the tradition where the richest consumers buy essentially the same things as the poorest. [...] The President drinks Coke, Liz Taylor drinks Coke, and just think, you can drink Coke too.” Andy Warhol. In his 'Factory', Warhol would create copies of each artwork through the screen print - the original artwork essentially no different to the reproduction and no less valuable. The body of multiple prints were in fact the artwork, a piece made of numerous identical components. A friend now has a Flea Market print of a Warhol Campbell's Soup Can hanging in his living room. It may be a poster, but the image is still an exact copy of the real thing. The Campbell's Soup Can is the perfect example of an artwork that has been incessantly reproduced to the point that it has become a cultural icon. Reproducing the artwork in print hasn’t adversely affected the aura of the original series hanging in the MoMA, instead it has formed the basis of it's fame. The Campbell's Soup Can has long ceased to be famous because it is great - today it is great because it is famous.       ‘I should have just done the Campbell’s Soups and kept on doing them ... because everybody only does one great painting anyway.’ Andy Warhol  

Written by

Somewhere between a computer screen saver, a journey to find your spirit animal, and a car window streaked with rain, you'll find Chris Trueman's electric abstract canvases. (Huffington Post) [caption id="attachment_7301" align="alignleft" width="538"] Natural Selection #28, Chris Trueman 2012[/caption] 'My process begins on a raw canvas, I start by painting gesturally, with brushes, squeegees, and a variety of tools. The second layer is often a process of masking and spraying with an acrylic based spray paint. In this process I have to start building backwards, because the negative space is what will show through. Sometimes the spray is solid, at other times it allows the previous layer to show through, sometimes the masked layer covers the whole surface, sometimes just parts of the painting. The interesting thing about using the acrylic spray paint is that it adheres differently to the various surfaces, so the areas with the underlying gesture the spray is more solid, whereas the areas of raw canvas, the paint doesn't adhere as well. This ends up merging the layers, rather than a flat even graphic layer on top of a gestural painting, the graphic layer takes on the shapes and forms of the underlying layers. I then repeat this back and forth, more gestural painting, sometimes staining by watering down the acrylic paint and then back to the masking and spraying. What makes this body of work different than the previous bodies of work is that the gesture comes back to the top, before the final layer was a masked and sprayed layer. I know it is finished when there is a tension and balance between the forms, even though I work somewhat intuitively in the process, I start out with an idea of what the work will more or less look and act like in the end and I can see when I have accomplished my objectives while maintaining a freshness.' CT Chris Trueman - Interview We are thrilled to be working with Chris . Visit his artist page to view our exclusive limited edition print portfolio.

Written by

Awkward x 2 is a collaborative project between artists Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe and Rebecca Norton. The artists work alternately on each piece, going back and forth with the artwork, building upon each others composition to create a visual hybrid. The Museum of Contemporary Art in California (MoCa) recently featured the artists work on MoCa TV. To browse these works in print, visit Rebecca Norton or Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe's page at twfineart.com. [divider] MoCa TV - Published on Jan 18, 2013  Painters Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe and Rebecca Norton try to make work that they can't predict, superimposing grids in their collaborative paintings to create a third image whose existence hovers between each painter's marks. In this unconventional artist talk, Gilbert-Rolfe and Norton discuss the various facets of their work, from conception to execution. Mapping irregular spaces onto the canvas is a way for the painters to generate an unfamiliar, yet controlled zones of movement animated by geometry. Colors are then added to the gridded spaces, releasing forces already present in the painting's structure. Referring to the weightless movement of the animated cartoon image, Gilbert-Rolfe and Norton's colorful collaborative paintings are full of physics: speed, mass, light, and math. Key to their process is the notion of going against expectations. As Rolfe-Norton explains,"Good art cuts across art history by not fulfilling its expectations, but instead doing something else." Filmed by Stephen Pagano and Tom Salvaggio. Edited by Stephen Pagano VIEW @ MoCa TV

Written by