A Block of Tofu

I love sending and receiving mail art.  And sometimes I get mail sent back to me that somehow incorporates my own work or references it in some way.  I am always delighted to receive those and quite flattered.  On Saturday I found this gem from San Francisco artist Todd Young waiting for me in my PO Box.  It is a little block that incorporates some of the postcards from my current show Collage + Landscape = Collagescapes.  Todd cut out and layered the cards creating the impression that my name, Tofu, is carved into a stack of cards.  Brilliant and a big thank you to Todd!

Art Treasures in Silver City

Silver City, New Mexico has been a place I have been thinking about visiting for some time.  It’s isolated in southern New Mexico and an hour detour off the Interstate.  I finally made it there this month and nearly missed it.

I was hesitant to make the trip because of experiences in other “artsy “ towns along the way.  So many places have gone from funky and artsy to bland and high end.  The rents go up, the prices go up.  What had been cool and interesting, is now expensive gift shops and dull galleries.  The art is often well executed but generally predictable and safe.    These towns have commercial centers that offer nothing for locals who are pushed to strip malls on the edges of their communities.  Does it sound like Santa Fe?  Well I could also be describing most towns on Cape Cod and just as many along the coast of California from Hermosa Beach, to Carmel to Sausalito, etc.  I could be even describing San Francisco.

With this fear, I made the trip to Silver City, arriving from the East to be greeted by the ubiquitous sprawl of chain restaurants and motels.  Keeping my mind open, I drove through town, followed the signs and found the historic downtown.  What a treasure, it’s a good size, full grid of tight streets filled with Victorian, Western and Southwestern Architecture.  On it’s own it’s a photogenic gem.  And yes, I did see some of that high-end kitsch.  But I also saw what happened when a town is relatively isolated and rents remain affordable.  Now it wasn’t all to my taste, nor should it have been, but there was a real mix of art going.  And in case you were having trouble finding art, those big red dots painted on the sidewalks helped you find the way.

The new prints of old photos at Lumiere Editions Gallery caught my eye. They are reproducing early prints from Kodak proto-Brownie cameras.  They are a round format from a camera that was designed for amateur use.  If you remember instamatic cameras, you kind of get the idea.  The originals were taken by one of the gallery owners’ great grandfathers on a western trip in the late 19th Century.  Now, if you want to see something new in the gallery, just look to your right, that’s a John Baldessari hanging right next to you.  Lumiere Editions is also the exclusive printer for some of the powerhouses in American Art (see their website for more).  That’s how New Mexico is – you never know what you’ll find in the most seemingly isolated place.

More wandering around town lead me to loud music blasting from an open door.  I walked in, and before I found the art and was reminded why I need to do a second Collage meets Landscape show.  I fell in love with Jean-Robert Béffort’s work (see above).  His ASpaceStudioArtGallery makes me want to leave San Francisco and just to go to a place where I can have a big old warehouse full of art and coolness.  Jean-Robert’s great and his art is out there – out there where more of us need to go.  I also always get excited to see other artists re-purposing and doing amazing things with old globes.

Silver City, I’ll be back – just try to stay the same and not get all fancy on me.

Just one more week...

There is just one week left, if you haven’t seen Collage + Landscape = Collagescapes yet, you have until Sunday, September 28th when the show closes. 

The show has two parts and 50 pieces of art:

On the main level, my new series of work called Collagescapes where I combine landscape painting and collage.   On the upper level I am joined by 12 artists for a companion show where the theme is Collage meets Landscapes.

Collage + Landscape = Collagescapes

Glama Rama Salon & Gallery

304 Valencia Street (at 14^th St.)

San Francisco, California

July 29^th  – September 28^th, 2014

Glama Rama is open Tuesdays through Sundays.

A Museum Day in Santa Fe

I like to get to New Mexico at least once every year.  Unfortunately I had not been back for a few years.  But that situation was remedied by a visit earlier this month to the state I like to call The Holy Land.  It never disappoints and it was great catching up with friends, eating a lot of good food and seeing some awesome art. 

In spite of the touristy, over-turquoised side of Santa Fe, I always enjoy the place and the collection of art museums there are world class.  I started with the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum where I learned something new – I had no idea she visited Hawaii and did some incredible work.  I began my day with those green lush landscapes and already knew it was worth the trip.   

The next stop was the New Mexico Museum of Art.  There’s a fine permanent collection and my personal “discovery” of the artist/printmaker Gustave Baumann. Delilah Montoya’s show Syncretism included an installation of photos depicting the desert landscape migrants cross to reach the United States with empty plastic water bottles dangling from the photos (see above).  A compelling installation but I am curious why the curator failed to label the work in Spanish as well as English.  It seems odd that in a place like the New Mexico Museum of Art the labels are not bilingual.  

The Museum of Contemporary Native Arts retrospective of Ric Gendron’s paintings was another show that asked me why we don’t get things like this in San Francisco?  Not that I regret travelling to Santa Fe, but one wonders about some of the curatorial choices made in the “big” city I call home.   One of the docents very correctly recommended I watch the video of the Bert Benally and Ai Weiwei installation. 

Lunch was up the hill and then visits to the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture and a perennial favorite – the Museum of International Folk Art. 

You might be wondering why I haven’t mentioned any galleries?  Well, in 20 years of visiting Santa Fe, I still have not made it Canyon Road – maybe next time, well, probably not.  And I also missed SITE Santa Fe – just because the New York Times gushes, doesn’t mean we have to go.  Plus, it was also closed the day I was there.  When I got up the next morning, I left town instead of seeing SITE Santa Fe.  I headed south for the sublime experience of remote abandoned missions instead.  Plus there is plenty of contemporary “art” for me to see in San Francisco if I choose to. 

My museum day was a full day and a perfect day – finished off with green chili mac-n-cheese washed down with cold beer.

Reds, Browns and Pinks

When I travel the desert southwest, my road trips always combine three of my favorites interests: nature, art and history.  I just completed a two-week trip to New Mexico and back, 3665 miles and plenty of stops along the way. 

My last stop, before arriving in New Mexico, was in Arizona’s Petrified Forest National Park.  It was the middle of a hot desert day that discouraged any sort of hiking.  But I kept jumping out of the car and took a lot of pictures.  I love the colors of the place and realized I still need to do a Collagescape to capture that petrified wood palette of reds and browns. 

As you wind through the park and head back to the Interstate, one of the last stops is the historic Painted Desert Inn.  Now I always appreciate a good national park lodge, and this one, well it’s a real gem.  The Painted Desert Inn is small and modest.  It is not one of the bigger lodges that get all the attention like Yosemite’s Ahwahnee Hotel or the Timberline Lodge up on Mount Hood.  As beautiful as those grand lodges are, this might be one of the best.

The Painted Desert Inn is too small by today’s standards to operate as a national park lodge.  And this is what makes it special.  It functions now as an extra visitor center, but more importantly as a thoughtfully restored and well-maintained example of unspoiled, 1930’s Pueblo Revival Architecture.  It also stands as a fine monument to the good work done by the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) during the Depression. 

The inn is situated on a bed of clay that has resulted in an unstable foundation requiring a constant series of maintenance to the building.  The last time I visited, the inn was more of a construction site.  Currently it’s there, as close as possible to it’s 1930‘s condition, for visitors to enjoy just a quick stop off of I-40.  Keep an eye on those colors, they might be appearing in some of my art in the near future.

Disconnecting from the Anti-Social Network

Years ago I was reluctant to join Facebook.  But I have to admit, it did help me reconnect with a few people who I had lost touch with.  And, at times, it’s helped me connect with more people about my art and widen my circle a bit.  But in recent years, Facebook has become more and more about algorithms that essentially are designed to make you look at advertising rather than what your friends might have posted.  I don’t know how many times I have heard someone say, “Did you see…….on Facebook?”  Facebook becomes less user-friendly as time marches on and I find it less useful.

In the past week there has been a big push, or should we say putsch, to force drag queens and other performers to use their “real” names – the names that appear on their drivers’ licenses, etc.  While I mostly am known as Tofu, the DMV does not call me that.  Not that the name my parents gave me, Scott, is a big secret.  It’s just that more people know me as Tofu.  I figure it’s a matter of time before my account is suspended.  Well, I am on the docks, have boarded the ship and am leaving the dictatorship of Zuckerbergland. 

There are so many good reasons why people use different names socially, and in some cases there are serious issues where people need to protect their privacy.  For example, one of my friends is a psychologist who uses a pseudonym so his patients are unable to find him on sites like Facebook.  It’s not about being secretive or clandestine.  This is what people like mental health professionals, teachers and even law enforcement might choose to do in order to maintain the social boundaries they are accustomed to creating in their day-to-day worlds. 

Many of my closest friends have always refused to join and many other of my friends on Facebook barely use it anyway.  I don’t need this anti-social network.  I always enjoy hearing from you.  Call me, write a letter, send me a postcard, or a regular old email.  I will continue to post my latest work and news about upcoming art shows on this blog.  Follow me here.  You can also always reach me via my website tofuart.com.

Now, back to making art, or meeting you for coffee…..

Zion Postcards

Back from a wonderful two weeks travelling around the Southwest.  I had ambitious intentions to make a bunch of hand made postcards as I travelled.  Let’s just say, I didn’t make quite so many, so you should feel a bit privileged if you received one.  This was the afternoon in Zion national park in Utah.