Insane Imaginings, Random Reveries & Other Creative Cogitation

Ever since I started doing PopCult paintings I have wanted to do something inspired by Andy Warhol.  But I have never been one to just copy something.  The germ of the idea behind Social Networking! came to me as soon as I started doing the Binary Birds, but it did not erupt as a full blown concept until this weekend.

Social Networking! by Jake Beckman. Four brightly-colored canaries socially network form their own squares. The ASCII Binary background reads, "Social Networking!."

Call to action: Buy Social Networking.  Mama needs new canvases. 

I looked over some of Andy Warhol’s work, letting the vibe flow through me, analyzing it in an abstract way. The iconic Andy Warhol image was the Marylin Monroe repetition, therefore I opted to embrace some part of this concept and do a four square Binary Birds painting.  Andy Warhol appears to have loved the color red (so do I), so I decided there would be  a lot of red in the painting. Finally I adopted the outrageous color variation that appeared in those images.  Initially I entertained the notion of repeating my own icon, the canary, in the boxes, but there the my analogy and Andy’s analogy parted ways.

My tweeties represent ordinary people, not famous people who would be recognizable at a glance.  My canaries had to be individuals. I departed from absolute repetition.

From there the concept moved into the sketch phase.  Warning, some quasi-technical stuff ahead.

 Having already completed many Binary Birds paintings with canaries, I just rounded up 4 of my favorite canary sketches, which had been scanned and saved to my computer.  I required an angel-winged flying one of course.  I liked the one where the bird is hanging off a vertical wall.  For whatever reason I like the one I call the “sideways singer,” as it looks like an Egyptian glyph to me.  Finally I settled on a perched canary with a long flowing tail for the fourth bird-I kind of like the idea of having its tail invade the next square.

I moved these into a new Photoshop document and began messing around with the colors. If you have several elements you need to play around with Photoshop is great for that.  Its also superb for color layout as well, which is primarily how I used it in this instance.  At first I thought I would have four solid boxes, but that turned out to be boring.  I recalled Andy Warhol did a repetition with a panda bear toy that had little frames around the image so I tried that.  So the frames are shades of red: Pink, Brick Red and Cadmium Red.  I opted for red, light blue, yellow and light green as the colors for my variations.  The canary in a given square picks up the color of the background in the square counter-clockwise from it, and the eyes, feet and beak pick up the color of the square kitty-corner to it.  I don’t know how Andy Picked is color variations, but the idea of using a pattern appealed to me-I like to create patterns, it is just the way my brain is wired. In my mind all four images are linked in a closed loop with one another via color.

Moving on to the binary…

The phrase “Social Networking” has 17 characters and 17 is a prime number.  There is no way to break it down into anything other than one and seventeen.  I wanted an edge to edge binary pattern in the background.  It occurred to me if I added punctuation I would have 18 characters times 8 bits per ASCII binary character, or 144 characters, which  would form a perfect 12 x12 square of ones and zeros.  Social Networking became Social Networking!

This painting is part of the 100 Paintings thing, but I am dropping 100 Days part as it was no where near a realistic goal.  Today is Day 52 and I have completed 18 paintings.  I accept that life happens and it has been happening to me a lot lately.  At my current rate of production it is going to take at least 300 days to do 100 paintings.  That’s not to say I can’t crank out a painting a day, I just do not seem to have the time to.  Also one thing I did not factor in is all the post production work that has to happen.  This weekend I spent an entire day photographing, resizing, labeling and uploading 7 newly finished works.  This morning I have spend the entire time on just one piece.  This exercise is teaching me a great deal about how much time a single smallish painting really takes-for me it is a minimum of three days: Sketch day, paint day, post-production day.  Of course that does NOT take into account any time spent on marketing the thing.  Thank goodness I quit using oil, I’d never finish anything.

So those are the real life artist thoughts behind Social Networking! If you would like more information about the painting or perhaps would like to buy it, see its page on my website.  Thanks for stopping by. 

Jake

Artist, AKAJake.com Come Experience the Art!

The art work in this blog is federally copyrighted. All reproduction and publishing copyrights are retained by the artist. Images are not to be copied, re-distributed, imitated, derived OR otherwise used in any form without the explicit written permission of the artist.

The lack of art production is incredibly depressing. What have I been doing?

I did get most of the tax class website up, all but 3 pages-but they are for part 3 which is not even going to be taught until October.  I have spend 82 hours on it so far.  I also did my preparations for the part of the class I teach too, which is a separate time investment.

I purchased an AC floor unit from Costco for 1/10 the cheapest  bid for a new heat pump.  After it arrived I had to wait 24 hours as they delivered it upside down; so much for the this-end-up markings.  The manufacturer recommend it be sitting upright for 24 hours before firing it up. Anyway, after 24 hours I finally got to turn it on.  It was not quite as simple as plug and play.  The exhaust hose that came with the unit was very short and not insulated either.  The power cord was also short.   The net result is I got the thing parked with great difficulty.  It’s up on cinder blocks to help the hose reach the window, and several feet from where I really wanted it (to improve air flow in the area) owing to the short power cord.  I also had to insulate the exhaust pipe & the window where the exhaust exits through as both were heating up the room, right next to the AC. Now that all that is done it works fairly well, keeping the air dry and in between 85 (in my studio) and 90 (in my office).  I’d like it to be a little cooler, but it is better than working in the rain forest by far.

Still no frames, still no travel plans for NYC.  I feel the need to start obsessing about that.  Fall show season is looming. I put in an application for the October Sunnyslope Artwalk already. Several people made noises about joining me on the NYC trip, but as the time draws closer, they have other plans.  It looks like I will be traveling solo.

the web, by Jake Beckman. A canary sings in tree branches connected with gossamer webs.

Yesterday I finally got back to painting and 7 of the 9 paintings I started 3 weeks ago got finished: six, seven, eight, nine, Hash, Splat! and the web.  Today I photographed them, did a bunch of Photoshop work, uploaded the result to my website, and scheduled posts on Daily Painters of Arizona. I realized today that I have about 20 paintings to register with Fine Art Registry, but that is not a priority at the moment.  Anyway completing six of these paintings allowed me to finally complete the cell phone composite.

Cell Phone Keypad Composit of 15 individual paintings by Jake Beckman

Tomorrow is another workweek with my day job.  I have to focus at least some time on getting ready for New York.  Toward that end I purchased several 24″ x 24″ gallery wrapped canvases and I have some ideas already.

It feels good to finally be painting again.  I was getting pretty crabby without it.

Anyway if you would like to find out more about the newly completed work, or would like to buy something, please check out their pages at my website: six, seven, eight, nine, Hash, Splat! and the web.

Jake

Artist, AKAJake.com Come Experience the Art!

The art work in this blog is federally copyrighted. All reproduction and publishing copyrights are retained by the artist. Images are not to be copied, re-distributed, imitated, derived OR otherwise used in any form without the explicit written permission of the artist.

It’s been 13 days since I last blogged.  What have I done?  Not much to be perfectly honest.  I went up to Oak Creek again, this time with a raft of people including 3 kids.  It was 5 days and a lot of fun (for the most part).  I did enjoy taking the little ones on this or that adventure like hiking up Munds Creek or going to the deep hole; it is nice to see the unfiltered joy of discovery.

After 3 days the entertainment committee started to wear out though.  Kids had to rediscover the ancient Nintendo in the trailer, which was rather amusing, the joy of the ring game (kinda like horseshoes), Yahtzee and other such pastimes.  Most of the adults and one child left on Sunday afternoon, as they had to work Monday.

I got some painting done but I still haven’t finished any of the paintings I discussed in my last blog.  I was really hoping to get more done. Silly me.  Lesson learned.  If you plan a retreat that involves non artists, you are not going to get much of a chance to paint.  I am not upset really; I did need a little summer retreat and taking it in 2 5-day segments is better than not.  On the other hand part of me is bugged because I did *waste* this time-and I know I shouldn’t be bugged.

A group of children and adults hunt for crawdads in Oak Creek AZ. Photo by Jake Beckman (c) 2010

When I arrived back in Phoenix I discovered my air conditioner had busted again.  This time the compressor shorted out. $1445 to replace it and the AC/heater we are discussing is about 45 years old.  If I fix the compressor what else is going to break? It still has several other ancient parts.  In the mean time I fired up the swamp cooler, which only provides a little bit of relief as its monsoon season and the humidity means it just does not work well. I unloaded the van and put a few things away, but some things just got put away today-that is so unlike me.  The house is a mess.  I do not want to deal with it.

I got a few bids on new heat pumps.  Holy Cow!  Needless to say I do not have that kind of cash lying around right now.  That was last Tuesday afternoon.  I ordered a floor unit from Costco, which is supposed to be delivered tomorrow. That postpones the decision about what to about the busted AC indefinitely, I can handle that, just as soon as I feel cold air washing over me again. In the meantime it has been hot and sticky and it is very hard to get motivated to do anything.  In the heat of the day I feel like taking a nap directly in front of a fan.

In my *spare* time, (ha, ha, ha) I have been working on the tax class website.  The website is 40 or cross linked/indexed pages complete with Q&A and sample tax returns (there are probably100  pdfs attached to these pages).  The SEE study website is actually pretty big. I am updating the information to cover the 2009 tax year and there are all sorts of little bits that are specific only to that year that have be located and changed from the previous tax year. I don’t have time to do it.  I am doing this again, why?

The same group I am doing this volunteer work for asked me to take over their website to.  I said no.  I said no.  I said no.  I think I said no on the phone for about 3o minutes.  Finally they heard no.  As for the tax class web, I tend to be a person of my word so if I say I am going to do something for someone else, I generally do it, even if I discover I have bitten off more than I can chew.  I am not so good at honoring those promises to myself and as I sit here writing this I recognize this disparity is definitely something I need to address, quickly. I have got to say no a hell of a lot more often.

So the short version is I got back, melted, did my day job, shopped for AC options, met with at least 4 HVAC guys, and have been forcing myself to work in the *rain forest,* which is what I am calling my office right now and have not really painted in about 2 weeks.  The 100 painting thing has been on hiatus for 2 weeks and it doesn’t look like I am going to have time to pick up the thread this week either.

I have to make the bleeping time.  More later.

Artist, AKAJake.com Come Experience the Art!

The art work in this blog is federally copyrighted. All reproduction and publishing copyrights are retained by the artist. Images are not to be copied, re-distributed, imitated, derived OR otherwise used in any form without the explicit written permission of the artist.

Hang Up by Jake Beckman. A Yellow Canary purchase atop the telephone icon of an "end call" cell phone button. The ASCII Binary arching over the top reads "Hang Up"

So it is day 23 of 100 paintings in 100 days.  I have completed 9 paintings and I have 9 others in various stages of completion.  With a good days work I probably can complete all of them, but my life is a continuous juggling act and I don’t know when I am going to get a moment to paint again in the next several days.

I came back from my trip to Oak Creek on Day 16.  I painted all day, then packed it in and drove back to Phoenix.  I decided I’d rather start off my short workweek refreshed in the relative cool of the Phoenix AZ morning rather than fried from driving back down the hill in the heat.  It was an uneventful trip home.  The usual stuff, my day job and all, awaited me.

In the last week I finished Vuvuzela’s, five, zero, Call Me, Hang Up & Do It!, photographed them and got the images up on my website.  I still need to register them with my provenance service.  I also blogged about Vuvuzela’s separately since it was directly related to the 2010 Soccer World Cup, which wrapped up last week too.

Do It! by Jake Beckman, a yellow canary angle flies before the "do it" button of a cell phone. The ASCII Binary reads, "Do It!"

I have found time to start 6 new pieces in addition to the three 11×14-inch paintings I started in Oak Creek.  The three inspired by my last visit to Oak Creek are tentatively named www (or web or net I am not sure yet), MySpace and My World.  The 6 new paintings are all 6×8 inch ones that will finish out my key pad: six, seven, eight, nine, Hash and Splat! I need to finish painting the Tweeties in 7 of these and overlay the binary.  My World and MySpace are somewhat less developed at this point.

As you can see, I am falling behind-I should have 23 completed and only 9 done with 9 more in the works-well short of my goal. And I still have a tax class website to prepare, tax class to teach, an artshow in NYC, a mess of art to frame, etc.  I haven’t even purchased the frames, nor have I solidified my travel plans for NYC.  OMG I am so far behind!

Breathe.

This weekend I am going back to Oak Creek canyon.  A fellow artist JChristi wanted to camp out and I suggested Oak Creek as it simplifies “camping” a little bit.  But unlike my last trip, this is more or less JChristi’s show, which means I am going to have to work around her schedule.  We are supposed to leave Friday morning.  Since it is a little after midnight Thursday has just started and I have many things to do before I can leave for Sedona.  I am looking forward to going back though; it is really hot here in Phoenix (112 at the airport today, 116 in some parts of the valley) and it will be cooler up there.  Also being unplugged does get my creative juices flowing.   JChristi told me to “bring my paints” so I am going to, but I am unsure how much painting I will actually get done.

DH is demuring about going with again, so our cats will have one of their people around.

Back to the subject at hand. Maybe 100 paintings in 100 days is not a realistic goal given all the other things I have going on in my life – after all I have missed my mark by 61% at this point-not counting the partially finished pieces.  Embrace the reality.  Maybe it will be 100 paintings by the end of the year (at this rate-even that is pushing it).  I don’t know, but I am going to keep at this.

In the meantime you can certainly check out the paintings I have completed on this project, and of course if you’d like to buy one that would be lovely as well.  Enjoy.    two, three, four, five, zero, Vuvuzelas, Call Me, Do It!, Hang Up

Also the cell phone keypad is approaching completion and I really think it needs a place to be displayed-in fact I have already laid out the pieces and had a look-see for myself. It’s definitely coming along.  So if you know of any place that might be interested in displaying it and perhaps selling it, please let me know.  I’ll post the entire work somewhere when its done.

Jake

Artist, AKAJake.com Come Experience the Art!

The art work in this blog is federally copyrighted. All reproduction and publishing copyrights are retained by the artist. Images are not to be copied, re-distributed, imitated, derived OR otherwise used in any form without the explicit written permission of the artist.

Photo of Oak Creek taken by Jake Beckman on or about July4, 2010. Isn't it beautiful?

I think I last blogged Day 5-6 of 100 paintings in 100 days.  In theory we are now at Day 13. So in theory I have had 7 more days to work and I confess I have not.  Sunday started with the best of intensions, but I didn’t finish anything.  Monday was back to work day and I carried out affairs of my other business.  Sometime this week DH interrupted me with a computer repair that sucked up a day & ½.  Wednesday I did some bookkeeping and delivered it Thursday.  This week I also dealt with getting my AC fixed-so painting, which I did do, was squeezed in 30-minute chunks of time waiting for this or that to happen.  Another advantage of working small-you can actually *do* something with a 30-minute chunk of time. 

Traditionally my friend Mayna, who retired after 20 years in the Marine Corps, and DH would join me on this 4^th of July vacation break; we usually stay a week or more.  Some friends and family have a dumpy trailer in Oak Creek canyon, with a lovely little deck hidden in the trees next to the creek-when I say dumpy I mean it an affectionate way. It is better than “literally” camping out as there is a gas grill, a gas stove, restroom facilities and even a shower.  It also is stocked with things like sleeping bags, air mattresses, lights and lawn chairs.  Basically you need to bring your entertainment, food, drink, clothing, and shower supplies. There’s a country store within walking distance-their prices are high, but you pay for the convenience of being able to get ice in the wilderness. Otherwise Sedona is a short drive away; it has all the usual accoutrements of a town.  

I usually take a bunch of pictures, we build a dam to make a swimming hole, hike about and I really enjoy being in a place where there is no cell phone service what so ever. 

So this year Mayna is sticking to home as she is out of work and trying to conserve funds.  DH, I dunno-we did discuss coming up here-I cleared it with the friends and family, purchased supplies, the plan was coming together. Then he did the heel-dragging thing all day Friday rather than flat out saying he didn’t want to come. I ultimately decided I needed to get out of town, even if it was by myself, but owing to DH’s procrastination, I showed up here sometime after 9 PM, well after sunset.  

Fortunately for me some of those friends were already up here; they fired up the electricity and water for the trailer so I didn’t have to find those things in the dark. I really appreciated them doing that; they are in a different trailer so they didn’t have to do that, but they did because they knew I would be coming. I also remembered to bring some precooked chow so when I finally did get situated I would have something easy to make and eat. 

Last night I slept under the stars.  When the moon rose some idiot bird started singing waking me up, but I drifted back to sleep until sunrise when a squirrel demolish a pine cone began throwing its orts at me.  The umbrella is up now so that won’t happen anymore.

This is where I slept and painted. A "Deck in the Trees."

 I did notice when I turned my laptop detected 4 wireless networks including an unsecured one. One I recognize as belonging to a person who lives up here year round.  I bet if I asked nicely he’d let me use it.  But I don’t want to.  Mostly I do come up here to “unplug” but it is getting harder and harder to do.  You probably can find an unsecure network on the top Machu Pichu these days.  Anyway, I am ignoring those networks as if they do not exist-hey the signals are “low,” they might cut out on me in the middle of something.   Currently this blog is in a word document to be cut and pasted later.

I brought the computer up so I could work on a Special Enrollment Exam Class I am supposed to teach in August.  I am responsible for updating a website full of material on all three parts and I teach the sections on depreciation and basis.  So I turned the box on, dragged out the part one materials, and find I have absolutely no desire to do it. Instead, I spent a leisurely morning unwinding-made breakfast, drank tea and read half a book, The Tomb of Hercules, by Andy McDermott, which is exactly the delightful escapist trash it sounds like.  Finally I am thinking of doing something constructive.  I am here in all this reeking fresh air and stinking nature complete with the full complement of bugs and other wildfire so I guess I should get my creative juices flowing.  Instead of working on the tax class website, I decided to blog.  And now to paint-maybe. 

A bit later.  I wandered down to the creek, Blackberry and Lumix in hand. There is this one tree creekside which reminds me of a tree ent ala JRR Tolkien. Don’t know how I can turn that into a binary bird.  But three other images did come to me-in the morning as the squirrel was throwing pine cone at me, I noted an abstract pattern in the branches of the trees overhead.  It was almost black and white (and blurry because I was not wearing my glasses).  The second image came to me as I watched a sucker swimming in a relatively still part of the creek.  The third image came later as the shadows started crossing from the West leaving a shaft of light weaving through the thicket of trees to illuminate a single stone.  When I finish them at least one will be posted here.  I don’t know what the ultimate version of these images will be as they are barely drafted at the moment. 

Enjoying the peace of the canyon, being unplugged, and having a moment to read for the joy of reading. I wish Mayna and DH were here to enjoy it with me.  The weather is gorgeous.

Jake

Artist, AKAJake.com Come Experience the Art!

The art work in this blog is federally copyrighted. All reproduction and publishing copyrights are retained by the artist. Images are not to be copied, re-distributed, imitated, derived OR otherwise used in any form without the explicit written permission of the artist.

I planned on taking the weekend off to paint.  I got on my computer, Saturday, and just spend the whole day there. I had eight paintings I needed to get on my website complete with all the lovely pictures, most of PopCult Gallery Three got uploaded.   Then I needed to start getting the word out there via social media, posting pictures on my Facebook fanpage which automatically goes to various places.  Once that was done I was finally able to post a blog about two of the new pieces and deep link on a couple of other posts that are in the que waiting their turn.

On the upside I started five, zero and a painting called Vuvuzelas in honor of all that soccer stuff I keep hearing about; I don’t have the sports gene so I was nit watching the matches. What that means is that I am still on track with respect to a painting a day for the first week, assuming I finish them by tomorrow  You should hear me right now… I am chucking at the unrealistic deadline I just set myself. In addition to this blog I want to write a bit about the other two paintings I uploaded so I can do some deep linking to them too.

I am finding social media is taking a lot of time.  I am trying to work in some more Linkedin and today I hit a bunch of new Facebook friends with a request to become a fan of my Fanpage.  While I was at it I uploaded the 8 new paintings to the photo album on my fan page and changed my avatars on my fanpage and Facebook page all the while chatting away via TweetDeck.  Oh my. 

I keep hearing that I need to automate newsletter sign up.  I have a newsletter – it tends to go out when I am have a show, but right now it’s too hot locally so no email newsletter, so I wonder what am I going to put in a newsletter.  Then there is affiliate marketing, monetizing the site, etc. etc. - those are just words to me right now – I don’t know what they mean.  Anyway while I was blogging I figured out how to put links to Twitter, my Facebook fanpage, Linkedin and MySpace etc at the top of my art blog.  When I set up the blog that idea never occured to me, now of course it’s, “Like Duh…”

By the time this post gets done I will have five and zero done, but will they be uploaded to my website, I am making heavy sighing noises even as I think about it. 

five, by Jake Beckman. Five yellow canaries cavort about an orange number 5. The background is an abstract of warm purple bubbles. The binary reads "five" and "5".

So this is five, finally posted in this blog, and zero is below.  Vuvuzelas got its own blog on the eve of the World Cup final.  I had to post it before the end.  It was coincidentally painted in the colors of the winning countries flag-red vuvuzelas and a bright yellow canary (excuse me, gold canary) .

zero, by Jake Beckman. An outline of a canary, representing the canary null set, flies before a gilt number 0.

OK I guess by now you know what 6, 7, 8 and 9 will look like.  But zero was a puzzle for me until I came up with my “null set” canary.   I am enjoying the miniature abstract backgrounds more too.  As much as I love painting my big ones, some of my effects take a long time and a long time to dry.  Working on this scale definitely speeds things up. 

As I write this blog on day five (pictures to be inserted later) I realize time-management is definitely and issue for me.  Got any tips? 

Also all this art is for sale.  Mama needs some more canvases.  Want to buy some? Check out five and zero‘s pages on my website.  Thanks for stopping by. 

Jake

Artist, AKAJake.com Come Experience the Art!

The art work in this blog is federally copyrighted. All reproduction and publishing copyrights are retained by the artist. Images are not to be copied, re-distributed, imitated, derived OR otherwise used in any form without the explicit written permission of the artist.

On June 22 I decide to attempt 100 paintings in 100 days. I don’t know if I can even do this.  Its a daunting task to contemplate, but I am going to give it a try.  Why? I watched Julia & Julia and it gave me this ridiculous idea.  Sure I have heard about it before as a method to develop a distinctive style. The theory is when you have to crank it out, your style will happen. 

There are periods of time when my productivity goes through the roof, but there are lulls, sometimes long ones where I let my life get in the way of my passion.  I also intend to blog about it.  Short blogs probably, but blogging about it is going to be part of this exercise.  I have a hard time talking about my art, it just doesn’t flow easily.  I also want to write better blogs and there is no substitute for, well, just doing it.  I am probably going to be experimenting with the plug-ins and what not as I attempt to get more advice on presenting the blog, so this will involve a lot of blogging too. Jeepers. 

Day 1.  I finished up 2 paintings that had been laying around.  One was very nearly done.  The second I thought was finished, but when I went to photograph it I hated it and had to edit it substantially.  So the editing job became the the first painting in 100 paintings in 100 days. I finished two for day 1 and I started a second and a third painting.  I had originally painted one and decided to paint two without really knowing where I was going with this idea. 

two by jake beckman, two canaries perched with the number 2, and ASCII binary of two & 2

As usual, the binary code has everything to do with the painting, spelling out two and 2 in ASCII binary. 

Day 2.  three and four were barely started yesterday, I had got beyond a sketch, but not by much, however they are finished today. Of course I have to photograph them etc now.  Since these are all 6×8 inch paintings I have decided they are going to be arranged like a phone keypad and be grouped that way; I have to do 5,6,7,8,9,0 #, *, and maybe answer, hangup and do it button too.  So I have the idea for the next 8-11 paintings, which will give me time to contemplate what comes after the cell phone number pad. 

I don’t know what you all think about this idea, but Julia’s mother’s comment about, “Why,” especially when I am so busy with other things does come to mind.  So if any of you all have ever undertaken a self-commited program for only reasons you can understand I’d like whatever advice you might chip in or what ever general comments come to mind as I embrace this insanity. 

If you’d like to find out more about one and two or perhaps buy them please check out their pages at AKAJake.com, one and two. 

Jake

Artist, AKAJake.com Come Experience the Art!

The art work in this blog is federally copyrighted. All reproduction and publishing copyrights are retained by the artist. Images are not to be copied, re-distributed, imitated, derived OR otherwise used in any form without the explicit written permission of the artist.

I finished this painting more than a month ago.  I can’t believe it has taken me that long to upload the images to my website and to sit down and blog about it.  As John Lennon said, “Life is what happens while you are making other plans.”  So true for me too.  I found myself spending several weeks dealing with feral cat issues, softy that I am.  Adding that one thing really put me behind on everything and so these paintings languished in the obscurity of my studio.

But no more.  Since June 27, 2010 was a total washout on painting I endeavored to “catch up” on my blogging, and my website maintenance among other things. I cranked out quite a few so I can post them later. It’s now later for this blog, enjoy.

Bridge is a spin off on iPod Tweety and iPod ads in general, but it is also a contrast as well. Once I did iPod Tweety, one of the first things that came to mind was a person who conducts an imaginary orchestra while listening to a recording of some kind. The cockatoo became the obvious bird because of the crest. I dunno but I think of conductors as having shocks of unruly hair sticking up.  Conductors usually wear dark suits so the bird in silhouette also tracked in my mind. 

But unlike the music behind Rock Me! classical music has layers, movements, changes in melody, key and other such devices that generally imply a more complex arrangement; besides most classical works are much longer than your average pop radio tune.  With this in mind I set out to make my abstract background conveying this complexity and passage of time.  I chose green.  The background is a very dark green, which is overlaid with bright green and then light sea green. I did several waves of color sweeping from the top of the canvas to the bottom around the conductor bird as a melody.  I placed a series of thick bright spires behind the cockatoo opposite these waves, I think of them as a deep throbbing baseline.  Finally I painted some thin verticals that were much lighter in color to convey a sprinkling of high notes.  The top of the painting is lighter in color and the bottom is still bright green but much darker, the waves and vertical lines “bridge” the two zones. I also have some textural elements in the waves and the thick bright spires. Of course while I was painting it I was not in this literal “this means that mode,” I was feeling the music. 

Bridge, by Jake Beckman. A crested cockatoo conducts and imaginary symphony while listening to its iPod. The green background is an abstract representation of classical music.

That was the thought behind Bridge.  I hope you like this different take on Binary Birds, iPods and music.  Any comments?  If you would like more details about Bridge or would like to buy it, please see its page at AKAJake.com.

Artist, AKAJake.com Come Experience the Art!

The art work in this blog is federally copyrighted. All reproduction and publishing copyrights are retained by the artist. Images are not to be copied, re-distributed, imitated, derived OR otherwise used in any form without the explicit written permission of the artist.

Howdy Sport Fans,

Update: I must have been channeling same vibe as Paul, the Octopus from Oberhausen Germany, when I made this painting, chosing red vuvuzelas and opting for a yellow tweety. The octopus apparently was predicting winners of the various soccer matches and ultimately selected Spain in the world cup. Me, I just started a painting in red and yellow about 3 weeks ago. Anyway, Spain won in OT or something like that.

This Binary Bird painting is because of you.  For weeks Vuvuzela was listed as one of the top 10 trend words on places like Twitter.com, all because the annoying little horns were omnipresent at the 2010 Football World Cup in South Africa-or so I have been told. Vuvuzela has been suplanted by LaBron James and assorted Harry Potter characters, but by now you’d have to be living in a cave not to know a) the Soccer Championships are going on b) what a vuvuzela is because of a).

Naturally I followed the United States team (or at least DH did)  until they fell out of contention.  Today, when I went to pick up my lamp from fellow artist, JA Jure, she told me all about some Spanish guy with a lot of hair (Carles Puyol?) making a spectacular play against the German’s yesterday to advance Spain to the final.  Me I don’t watch so I can’t say for sure. I do not have the sports gene.  However, I do love pop culture and right now Soccer is pop and therefore Binary Birds fair game. 

Back to Vuvuzelas-since it was the word of the day for so long, I, like the rest of the connected world had to find out what the heck that was, given that a do not actually watch soccer, and of course why everyone was talking about vuvuzelas. Immediately a Binary Bird image sprang to mind. I have finally finished painting it before the World Cup tournament ends, so without further ado, I reveal Vuvuzelas.

Vuvuzelas, by Jake Beckman. A yellow canary Soccer fan rolls a football against a backdrop of red vuvuzela horns.

The painting features my trademark yellow tweetie, with a football, and a background of red vuvuzelas.  The binary across the bottom translates as “Vuvuzelas.”   Initially I though about making the horns assorted colors (like red, white and blue ) but it made for a very busy picture. I chose red because I like the color and for no other reason.  The fact that Spain’s jerseys are that color is purely coincidental.  I am sure several other teams sport that color as well.  As for the tweetie I think he is conveying, “Hell Yeah!” just fine. 

If you would like to find out more about Vuvuzelas or perhaps buy it, check it out on its page on this website.  I hope you like my Football inspired Binary Bird. 

  Jake

Artist, AKAJake.com Come Experience the Art!

The art work in this blog is federally copyrighted. All reproduction and publishing copyrights are retained by the artist. Images are not to be copied, re-distributed, imitated, derived OR otherwise used in any form without the explicit written permission of the artist.

As I sit down to write this blog I realize I finished Rock Me! a month ago.  I can’t believe that much time has passed before I finally got it posted on my website and of course do this thing.  But I guess I must push on as I really do want to paint tomorrow, oh wait it’s 2 AM which means I want to paint today!

One thing I decided to do starting with Rock Me! was to create a series of smaller more affordable paintings.  I have heard person wanting to start collecting me might want to start small and work up to a larger piece.  There is an advantage in these smaller works in addition to affordability to my collectors; to some extent they do go together faster, my investment in materials is a little less, and they take up less space in my studio while being stored.  The downside is, I am not used to working this small, to some extent working in the smaller scale with smaller brushes takes as much time as working with larger brushes on a larger scale and doing abstract backgrounds on this scale is limiting. It feels odd to create non representational flow of color on something so tiny.  But I am endeavoring to do this very thing.

I love the idea behind Rock Me! It’s a spin off the idea behind of iPod Tweety and iPod print ads in general.  My first sketches had the full body of umbrella crested cockatoo including the spread wings.  As I fooled around with the sketch in photoshop I realzed what enamored me most about this idea was the full head of back lit feathers.  I really felt like it conveyed Rock & Roll’s energy.  The suggestion of the open beak completes the image of the rock afficianado howling and grinding to his or her favorite song. I decided not to zoom in any futher as it would have been too much black.  DH thinks I went too far… 

Red also seemed appropriate.  I love the energy of blood red.  And black is a very powerful color too.  As for the background I just wanted it to appear splattered with sound, volumn, energy.  As I do my abstract backgrounds I realize I think they not only represent emotion, but are accompanied by music as well.

Rock Me! by Jake Beckman. An umbrella crested cockatoo rocks out to iPod tunes.

I think I resemble this animal, I am pretty much a rocker babe. I hope you like this latest Binary Bird as much as I do.  Rock on!

If you would like to find out more about Rock Me! or buy it, check out it’s page on my website. Feel free to comment-like it, hate it? 

Jake

Artist, AKAJake.com Come Experience the Art!

The art work in this blog is federally copyrighted. All reproduction and publishing copyrights are retained by the artist. Images are not to be copied, re-distributed, imitated, derived OR otherwise used in any form without the explicit written permission of the artist.