I'm finally done with "Beauty and Grace." It has taken me about eight months of intermittent weekend work, from when the idea first ossified in my head during that Against Me! concert last March until I submitted it as my entry for ArtFields 2018 this evening. I finished "Grace" in time to put her into the second part of my Afterburner show at Tapp's in June, and I have mentioned the combined piece in passing a few times and posted a few photos on the Zero Point Mechanic page on Facebook. But other than I haven't talked about it too much.
That's "Grace" on the left, "Beauty" on the right.
That's because I was too busy struggling with it to spend energy talking about it. The beaten and bloodied boxer sitting on the stool between rounds doesn't want to chit chat.
Someone will probably accuse me of making up some art weirdo nonsense for saying this, but trust me when I tell you that sometimes you really don't know what a piece is about as you're making it. You think you know, but you don't. You're looking and seeing and doing, but meaning is percolating on some other level.
I always knew this piece was about the tension/opposition/inter-connectedness of transformation ("Grace") and acceptance ("Beauty"). It was only during another musical experience -- the Foo Fighters concert in Columbia last October -- that I understood the feeling I was going for. It's been a long week and it's beyond me right now to try to articulate it. That experience of hearing (and seeing, and feeling) live the music that connects together so many parts, people, places of my adult life was like pulling on a loose thread and seeing that what looks like a tangled mess is actually a beautifully complex, inter-connected structure. I understood then what “Beauty” and “Grace” represent to me and how they connect, relate, and depend on one another for balance. I can't explain it. But it's art, so I don't really have to.
I'll write more about making this piece at some point. For now, here are some more images from my "four king sheets and a bunch of safety pins" hillbilly photo studio in my driveway:
Someone will probably accuse me of making up some art weirdo nonsense for saying this, but trust me when I tell you that sometimes you really don't know what a piece is about as you're making it. You think you know, but you don't. You're looking and seeing and doing, but meaning is percolating on some other level.
I always knew this piece was about the tension/opposition/inter-connectedness of transformation ("Grace") and acceptance ("Beauty"). It was only during another musical experience -- the Foo Fighters concert in Columbia last October -- that I understood the feeling I was going for. It's been a long week and it's beyond me right now to try to articulate it. That experience of hearing (and seeing, and feeling) live the music that connects together so many parts, people, places of my adult life was like pulling on a loose thread and seeing that what looks like a tangled mess is actually a beautifully complex, inter-connected structure. I understood then what “Beauty” and “Grace” represent to me and how they connect, relate, and depend on one another for balance. I can't explain it. But it's art, so I don't really have to.
I'll write more about making this piece at some point. For now, here are some more images from my "four king sheets and a bunch of safety pins" hillbilly photo studio in my driveway:
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