malicious monkey

Painting and Collage - New Work

2012-02-05T14:07:00.000-08:00

Here's a portrait of Jayden, my great-nephew and a drawing started in December and recently completed.

Jayden
16" x 20", Oil on canvas

Yellow and Blue Still life
Charcoal, pastel, and collage on paper
12" x 18"

Austin - Scrambled Eggs

2012-01-13T11:20:00.000-08:00

Chris in SF

2012-01-11T22:56:00.000-08:00

Nancy at Ocean Beach

2012-01-08T20:51:00.000-08:00

New Year - New Art

2012-01-01T12:04:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year. One of the tasks I give my beginning drawing class at the end of the semester involves creating a cubist drawing of a still life. A fun project that moves them away from representational realism to abstraction where flatness mingles with the illusion of 3D and forms are plastic. I usually do a demo drawing and it brings me back to my love of collage and Cubist imagery. My drawing students also do a self portrait which I always enjoy. All three drawings were done this year.

Still Life with Birdhouse
Charcoal, pastel, and collage
12 1/4" x 18" on paper bag

Still Life with Skull, Guitar, and Coffee Pot
Charcoal, pastel, and collage
12 1/4" x 18" on paper bag

Self Portrait
Charcoal and pastel
13" x 18" on paper bag

Picasso Got Me Thinking...

2011-12-04T23:19:00.000-08:00

Saw the Picasso show at the De Young Museum a couple of months ago got me thinking about painting. These are some still life paintings I finished about a week ago.

Still Life With Acorn Squash

Still Life With Pear

Still Life With Pomegranate

Twin Towers • Collage Series Continues

2011-09-09T18:13:00.000-07:00

Here are three more collages in the Twin Towers series. There are 48 collages in the series and at least two more in the works. The first thirty collages are here (see previous posts) and at my Flickr site.

For about eight years I considered doing some artwork that explored my complex feelings about 9/11 and specifically the Twin Towers as powerful icons. Originally the series of collage and collage/paintings were a creative exercise that used the Towers as a compositional starting point. The more I explored various ideas the more interesting the work became for me.

Twin Towers #31
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

Twin Towers #32
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

Twin Towers #33
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

More Collage Work

2011-09-03T18:28:00.000-07:00

One of the joys of doing collage work is repurposing refuse.

Untitled (Petals 2), 2011, Collage on canvas, 11" x 14"

Old But New

2011-09-02T11:29:00.000-07:00

Here's a painting from 2005

Strongarm Tactic, 2005, Oil on Canvas

September 2011 • More Collage

2011-09-01T17:57:00.000-07:00

Untitled (Petals), 2011, Collage on canvas, 11" x 14"

Another day, another collage.

2011-08-19T16:35:00.000-07:00

Untitled, 2011, Collage on canvas, 11" x 14"

More Collage

2011-08-18T14:30:00.000-07:00

Here's a recent mixed media collage with text.

Untitled, 2011, Collage on canvas, 11" x 14"

Number 48

2011-07-01T10:49:00.000-07:00

Skipping out of sequence with this one. Owned by Kathleen McGinn, this is the
48th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #48
Collage/mixed media, 16" x 20" on canvas, framed.

Smoke, my new short film premiers tomorrow as part of the Scary Cow Independent Film Festival at the Castro Theatre, San Francisco, CA...Tomorrow at 3PM. Here's a teaser.

Smoke -Teaser Trailer from Mark Nobriga on Vimeo.

Mixed Media Figure

2011-05-01T12:09:00.000-07:00

Occasionally,the figure works its way into my mixed media work.

Wende with Pole
Mixed Media, 8" x 10" (on 14" x 17" paper)

A Collage A Day (almost) • Day 30

2011-04-27T19:28:00.000-07:00

30th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #30
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

Happy Easter

2011-04-24T15:24:00.000-07:00

Religious Painting #1

2002

29 1/2" x 29 1/2" - Oil, wax and fabric on panel.

Chocolate Jesus
2002
67 1/2" X 67 1/2" - Oil and metal leaf on panel.

A Collage A Day (almost) • Day 29

2011-04-24T00:14:00.000-07:00

29th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #29
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day (almost) • Day 28

2011-04-22T11:06:00.000-07:00

28th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #28
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day (almost) • Day 27

2011-04-21T13:43:00.000-07:00

Looks like I lagged on my posts this week. Here is 27th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #27
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 26

2011-04-16T09:07:00.000-07:00

26th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #26
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 25

2011-04-14T08:37:00.000-07:00

25th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #25
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 24

2011-04-13T22:12:00.000-07:00

24th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #24
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 23

2011-04-12T11:02:00.001-07:00

23rd collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #23
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 22

2011-04-10T11:41:00.000-07:00

22nd collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #22
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 21

2011-04-09T09:02:00.000-07:00

21st collage in the series Twin Towers. The series continues.

Twin Towers #21
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Look Back at the "Old" Stuff

2011-03-22T11:44:00.000-07:00

Fruitcake for Iraq (Gift of Democracy)
2004
30" x 30" - Oil, acrylic, metal-leaf, and collage on canvas.

Looking at some past work from my website http://www.marknobriga.com. Seems like it's been years since the U.S invaded Iraq- And yes, it has been years since Rumsfeld's "shock and awe" campaign in Iraq where at some point he uttered "It is unknowable how long that conflict will last. It could last six days, six weeks. I doubt six months." Uh, yeah. Can you say V-I-E-T-N-A-M. Anyway, here are a few of my pieces about the war since it started in 2003.

Building Democracy
2005
"18 1/2 " x 24 1/2" - Acrylic and collage on canvas

Democracy in Action
2006
35" x 45" - Mixed media on panel.

Spread of Democracy
2006
27 1/2 " x 33 3/4" - Mixed media on panel.

New Year New Art

2011-01-03T17:08:00.000-08:00

Cops Interrogate Kate from FIRE

It's been several months since I've posted. Since July, I've been working diligently on FIRE, a short film that I directed and produced. FIRE premiers February 13th at the Castro Theatre as part of the 2011 Scary Cow film festival. Above, is a still from the movie.

I've managed to get in some drawing time too. Here are three new mixed media cubist pieces I finished last week.


Cubist Still Life with Guitar, 2010 Mixed media on paper

Cubist Still Life with Skull, 2010 Mixed media on paper

Pink and Blue Cubist Still Life , 2010 Mixed media on paper

Figurative Collage

2010-07-09T17:13:00.000-07:00

Collage is my favorite way to make a picture. Here are two mixed media figure pieces that include acrylic paint with collage.

Two Nudes
2010, 8" x 10", Mixed media on canvas

Untitled 2 (Bent figure with a pole)
2010, 8" x 10", Mixed media on canvas

It is what it is. Or, is it?

2010-06-02T10:26:00.000-07:00

Some traditional still life work in ink and charcoal.

Untitled (Still Life), 2010, Ink on paper.

Untitled (Still Life), 2010, Charcoal on paper.

More Cubist Still Life Drawings

2010-05-30T10:41:00.000-07:00

Over the last few years I've had a renewed interest in Cubism. My focus has been in still life drawing more than painting although I have also done some cubist paintings too. Here are a couple of recent drawings in charcoal and ink.

Cubist Still Life I, 2010, Charcoal and collage on paper.

Cubist Still Life II, 2010, Ink and collage on paper.

Some New Drawings

2010-05-29T09:35:00.000-07:00

The Twin Towers collages are an ongoing project. At this point I have completed twenty seven. I'll post the next ten when they are complete. I dug up some drawings from the past year and completed several new ones recently. Last Fall I took my Life Drawing class to the Cantor Museum at Stanford. We drew from Rodin's sculptures. Here's a drawing of Rodin's sculpture of Adam.

Adam, 2009, Charcoal and chalk on paper.

Here's a mixed media figure from this year.

Figure, 2010, Mixed media on paper.

A Collage A Day • Day 20

2010-05-26T08:50:00.000-07:00

20th collage in the series Twin Towers. This will be the last post of the series until the next twenty are complete.

Twin Towers #20
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 19

2010-05-24T08:51:00.000-07:00

19th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #19
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 18

2010-05-23T10:24:00.000-07:00

18th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #18
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 17

2010-05-21T11:55:00.000-07:00

17th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #17
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 16

2010-05-20T09:22:00.000-07:00

16th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #16
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 15

2010-05-19T09:26:00.000-07:00

15th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #15
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 14

2010-05-18T10:16:00.000-07:00

14th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #14
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 13

2010-05-16T10:09:00.000-07:00

13th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #13
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 12

2010-05-15T08:33:00.000-07:00

Is it still a "collage a day" if I skip a day now and then?

12th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #12
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 11

2010-05-13T10:42:00.000-07:00

11th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #11
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 10

2010-05-11T11:08:00.000-07:00

10th collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #10
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 9

2010-05-10T07:48:00.000-07:00

Ninth collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #9
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 8

2010-05-09T16:19:00.000-07:00

Eighth collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #8
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 7

2010-05-08T21:32:00.000-07:00

Seventh collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #7
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 6

2010-05-07T08:04:00.000-07:00

Sixth collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #6
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 5

2010-05-06T07:58:00.000-07:00

Fifth collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #5
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 4

2010-05-05T08:04:00.000-07:00

Fourth collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #4
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 3

2010-05-04T23:47:00.000-07:00

Third collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #3
Collage, 9" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day • Day 2

2010-05-03T08:42:00.000-07:00

Second collage in the series Twin Towers.

Twin Towers #2
Collage, 9" x 10" on 14" x 17" paper

A Collage A Day •Day 1

2010-05-02T19:11:00.000-07:00

I have been working on a series of collage pieces since last Fall. The series is called Twin Towers. I have been thinking about making work somehow based on my thoughts about the towers and 9-11. Really started out as a formal exploration of the idea and is evolving throughout the process.

Twin Towers #1
Collage, 10" x 12" on 14" x 17" paper

April Showers

2010-04-18T15:12:00.001-07:00

I was reminded the other day why we have April showers...May flowers. More rain next week. Too bad the roof leaks.

I have lots of new work. As a matter of fact I am so busy making work (and doing some other things, like teaching) that I have had little time to post. Here is another cubist piece that I made on Wednesday.

Still Life with Mannekin
Mixed media on paper, 2010

Here's another piece that I started a great while ago and finally finished. It's a portrait of my friend Jon Koons as a potatohead. I promised him that I would do it twenty years ago. Finally finished.

Portrait of Jon Koons (as a potatohead)
Oil on canvas, 2010

Happy New Year!

2010-01-04T19:00:00.000-08:00

It's 2010. Somehow, I never thought I'd see that date. Here's some new work.

Have been a busy artist last year and in 2010. Lots of mixed media + figurative work. Here's an 8" x 10" mixed media piece I finished recently. It's now part of Dave Rhody's collection.

Snarling Dick

2009-09-30T08:44:00.000-07:00

Powerful men can really screw things up. Two wars, a lapse in civil liberties, torture, eight years of pain and on and on and on. What a legacy. Here's a portrait of a real life villain and puppetmaster, Snarling Dick.

Heads Up

2009-09-26T09:29:00.000-07:00

For the last three years or so I have been painting various heads - people I know, my own head, mugshots, political figures, and at least one pundit. It's not easy painting someone you can't stand to look at. Here's a painting of Ann Coulter. The piece is unfinished.

Sad Ann
Oil on canvas
2006

More New Work

2009-09-11T16:50:00.000-07:00

Have had a productive Summer. I completed several new abstract pieces as well as a self portrait. Here's the final version of the self portrait I started in June. You can see the first draft before I had applied a series of oil glazes, at my June 13, 2009 post http://maliciousmonkey.blogspot.com/2009/06/self-portraits-can-be-fun.html

6/09 Self Portrait, Oil on canvas

And an abstract that had vexed me but now is quite satisfying...

Still Life with Vase and Oranges, Acrylic and collage on linen.

Click here to see more of my self portrait work.

9/9/09

2009-09-09T19:36:00.000-07:00

So what's so special about number nine? I dunno. It just IS. Here's what Heather Whipps at LiveScience says about this date: http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20090908/sc_livescience/why090909issospecial

An experimental animation celebrating 9.

Have Another Donut

2009-08-31T20:59:00.000-07:00

Red Donut, 2001-2009, Oil on panel

Here's a recent painting destined for the SJICA (San Jose institute of Contemporary Art). Red Donut was part of a triptych completed in 2001. I have reworked the painting. I've changed the red a bit and intensified the 3D illusion.

Warm Weather Makes Paint Dry Faster

2009-08-29T12:16:00.000-07:00

A Dish of Pears, 2009, Oil on Canvas, 11" x 14"

I like warm weather for many reasons but when it comes to painting in oils, the warmth makes the paint dry faster and I can get more work done. Here's a piece I started a year ago and finally got back to and finished today.

Self Portrait, 2007, Acrylic on vinyl, 12" x 12"

Here's a self portrait I created a couple of years ago. It's painted on an old LP.

Cubismo.

2009-08-18T13:26:00.000-07:00

Momento Mori, 2009, Mixed Media on canvas.

A new piece finished a couple of days ago.

Want to know more about Cubism?
go to: http://www.artlex.com/ArtLex/c/cubism.html

More work by Mark Nobriga: http://www.marknobriga.com

Cubismo!

2009-08-12T18:05:00.000-07:00

Still Life with Uke, 2009, 12" x 12"
Mixed Media on Canvas

I have rediscovered my interest in Cubism. Here's the first in a series of Cubist-inspired works.

Health Care Reform NOW!

2009-07-25T10:22:00.000-07:00

Trampoline

2009-06-26T11:57:00.000-07:00

This is a music video I produced last Summer with the band, The Curios. Nancy Hall and Lee Parvin are a very talented duo from Pacifica, CA.

Here's their website: http://www.thecurios.com/

The video premiered at their 2008 Winter Concert.

Self Portraits Can Be Fun

2009-06-13T19:09:00.000-07:00

What can be more fun than creating a self portrait? Yeah sure there are lots of things that are more fun. For me, it's something I always go back to in my work. I do a couple of self portraits every year. I find it satisfying. Maybe it's like doing graffiti. Leaving my mark. So people know that I am here.

Anyway, this is a piece I started yesterday. It's still in progress. What you see here is the grisaille with a glaze of Cyprus burnt umber. Needs several more glazes...some flesh tones, some cool colors in the shadows...

Click here to see more of my self portrait work.

In A Gorky Mood

2009-06-11T07:32:00.001-07:00

Arshile Gorky was one of my favorite artists a long time ago. Yesterday, I was surfing for images of his paintings and stumbled onto a couple of pages with biographical information.

Gorky has been called the last Surrealist and the first Abstract Expressionist and he did indeed influence some of the AbEx artists. He had a painfully difficult if not tragic life. Born Vostanik Manoog Adoyan, in the village of Khorkom, Turkish Armenia. His family was forced from their home by the Turks in Turkey's second Armenian genocide (call it what you will) during WWI. They eventually ended up in Russia. There, far from his homeland, he lost his mother, who died of starvation. Eventually, he and his sisters emigrated to the United States. In the U.S.he changed his name to Arshile Gorky and pursued an art career.

Elements of his paintings hearken to his homeland and his work completed in the years before his death are unique in the history of Modern art.

Here are some links with information about Gorky:

http://artscenecal.com/ArticlesFile/Archive/Articles1997/Articles0297/AGorky.html

http://wwar.com/masters/g/gorky-arshile.html

http://www.haberarts.com/gorkybio.htm

Arshile Gorky, The Liver is the Cock's Comb (1944).

Time Marches On

2009-03-18T17:04:00.000-07:00

Facebook? I like it. Lately, I've been connecting with people I have not talked to in many years. Time flies. So nice to connect with friends!

Whatever I am teaching seems to influence the kind of work I do. Here are some more recent figure drawings.

Untitled Figure I (after Prud’Hon), Charcoal and conté on paper, 18” x 24”

Untitled (Two figures), Charcoal on paper, 18” x 24”

Wende III, Charcoal on paper, 18” x 24”

Happy New Year!

2009-01-24T10:42:00.000-08:00

Ok it's 2009. Time is passing way too quickly. And too much to do. I am feeling quite hopeful and looking forward to a new year with optimism.

GO OBAMA!
Nice to have a leader with brains. And the man is gettin down to business.
Change is good.

I have some new work to go along with a renewed optimism. Have been teaching life drawing and working with the figure. Here's a small piece I finished last month.

Untitled (Two nudes) 2008, Oil and Conte on panel

Another Self Portrait

2008-10-03T11:36:00.000-07:00

Here's a painting I just finished. This painting is a bit looser and has certain qualities like a drawing.

Untitled (Self Portrait)

Oil and charcoal on canvas, completed 10/08.

When in doubt, paint a self portrait.

2008-09-11T12:01:00.000-07:00

Here's a self portrait from 2007.

Oil on canvas 24" x 30"

entitled Skeptic

A Painting A Month

2008-09-01T18:03:00.000-07:00

Ok. What's the deal with creating "A Painting A Day"? If I could have that kind of discipline, or sheer painting speed, I'd be rich. I'm lucky if I can finish a painting a month. I'm not going to show you any of Duane Keiser's paintings because this is my blog and I want to show you my paintings. But do use the link above to check out his site. His work is nice.

Here's a painting I've been working on the last few weeks.

It's titled Slipper with Ball, an oil painting on canvas. 12" x 12".

Sometimes when I do a painting of a thing, any old thing, I appreciate what an enjoyable endeavor painting is. To see more work go to my website www.marknobriga.com and if you are interested, send me an email.

Have a donut.

2008-08-22T08:28:00.000-07:00

Ok. Tomorrow I am fifty. Really a strange thing to experience. My mind seems to be the same. I always was forgetful. The body, although my hair is grayer and thinner, is in as bad a shape as it ever was. Hmmm. Oh yeah, my knees ache a lot. Sometimes I am surprised when I look in the mirror. I see my grandfather. Time does seem to go faster as we age. The forties went so fast. I have come to the conclusion that although I physically seem to age at a reasonable pace or at a "normal" pace my mind doesn't want to accept that I am fifty. I thought thirty was a big deal. Then I thought forty was a milestone. Fifty? Sucks. Senior menu at Denny's... Hey I kinda like the idea.

Anyway, how about a donut?

This piece, "Yellow Donut with Sprinkles" is a painting that I am revitalizing. I first painted it in 2001 and was part of a triptych called "The Holy Trinity". I am giving it a bit of a facelift and sending it off as a solo piece.

It's been a while since I worked in oils. I am enjoying the process. I haven't done "sweet" paintings in a long time. I've added more images of dessert/donut paintings that happen to have sprinkles to the blog (in the right hand column) and there are more at my website http://www.marknobriga.com

Look for this painting at the SJICA auction this Fall in San Jose.

Good Clean Fun

2008-08-19T07:54:00.000-07:00

Jean Luc Godard was right. What can be more fun than a girl and a gun?

One of my many interests is film editing. I searched high and low and searched through many many films to find classic clips of women brandishing firearms. I put them together with an ol' Joe Tex song. The result is this...

Not sure where I developed such an interest in guns (a loaded subject :{). They've been the topic of a lot of my work for a long time. I've heard it said that the right to bear arms is "deeply entrenched in the American Psyche" and I believe it. Is it the right to bear arms or maybe we just love guns?

Just look at our movies.

The End of the First Half or, What is the sound of one hand clapping?

2008-08-17T17:58:00.000-07:00

Long time since I last posted. Funny thing is, I don't think anybody reads this. Two hands clap and there is a sound. What is the sound of one hand clapping?

It's about time that I put more of my work here. Nancy thinks that I should do work in progress reports about my current projects. I don't have anything to show that's new but...

To the right you can see a picture of my painting, Snarling Dick, a portrait of Dick Cheney.

Here's an interesting photo. Not mine but worth noting. From Beijing shows what Bush has done to the country. Or how he displays the flag. I'm not sure.

Fareed Zakaria has written an article in Newsweek - What Bush Got Right I have a lot of respect for Zakaria. He's a smart guy. Actually finds some positive words about the later GW Bush administration.

They did something right!? I do not believe it.

But, enough of that.

Did I mention what "The End of the First Half" means? Guess not. It refers to my life. On the 23rd I turn fifty years old. Same as it ever was...

Is it really the same as it ever was??

Yeah.

HAPPY NEW YEAR

2008-01-04T10:00:00.002-08:00

It's 2008 and am remembering when I was ten years old and I figured out how old I'd be in the year 2000. WOW - forty-two! Forty-two seemed really old when I was ten. Fortunately, forty-two is the new thirty-two. I am not so much older than that now but for some reason years are much shorter now. Anyway, seems like I have spent most of my life trying to figure out what I am and where I fit in the world. I have been an actor, a director, an artist, a painter, a student, a teacher, a (step) parent, a child, and on and on. I am still all of those things on some level. I started doing self portraits at about age twelve, undoubtedly inspired by Vincent Van Gogh's self portraits I'd seen in a book.

Artists have explored the image of the "self" (and others) for a very long time and the list of artists who have done some form of self portrait is very very long. Reakton Books Ltd. has published a book by Richard Brilliant entitled (amazingly enough) Portraiture, a theoretical study that looks at the way we look at ourselves. He explores the portrait from antiquity through contemporary history. A bit dense in the first chapter, 'The Authority of the Likeness', but it starts to pick up speed in the second, 'Fashioning the Self'. Brilliant presents some interesting observations and arguments regarding the many faces of portraiture.

The book is available at Amazon.com...here.

I'll be showing some of my self portraits as well as several other pieces at Los Medanos College from January 23rd through February 24th. Here's a link to the gallery's webpage:

Los Medanos College Art Department

Here are some links to sites with self portraits:

http://userpages.umbc.edu/~ivy/selfportrait/intro.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-portrait

http://www.artlex.com/ArtLex/s/self-portrait.html

And here's the link to my webpage that shows my self portrait work:

http://www.marknobriga.com/portraits.html

Little Boxes, Little Boxes

2007-12-22T07:36:00.000-08:00

Okay. I saw the Joseph Cornell: Navigating the Imagination retrospective at SFMOMA yesterday. I am sorry to say that I am somewhat disappointed. I have always found Cornell's work fascinating and magical. I still do. Unfortunately his box pieces were all encased in plexiglass boxes, two or more to a box. Few were 360 degree accessible --and doesn't it seem necessary to view three dimensional art all the way around. Duh. Nothing like looking through a box to see a box. So I wasn't disappointed with the show, just the way it was exhibited. How bout letting us SEE the art. Okay, okay, I know the work is fragile, but everything is already encased in a box.

On the flip side, it was a comprehensive survey of his work and had artifacts from his studio. Seeing the bits and pieces of detritus and their storage boxes gives the viewer a sense of Cornell's process. It's a bit like looking through his sketchbook and sifting through an encyclopedic collection of little junk that aspires to be art.

Cornell's work is poetic, playful, creative, and mystical. Although the exhibition sanitizes, qualifies, and catalogues the work, it remains intriguing and enigmatic.

Here's the link to SFMOMA's Cornell page:

http://www.sfmoma.org/exhibitions/exhib_detail.asp?id=264

Link to Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts (Co-Orinators of the exhibition with the Smithsonian):

http://www.pem.org/exhibitions/exhibition.php?id=60

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By the way...Here's a little-known fact: The song Little Boxes written by Malvina Reynolds, in 1962- You know...there are green ones and there are yellow ones, etc. was written about Daly City. Wanna see some of those "box" houses? Look at paintings by artist Eileen David. Actually, many of her little boxes are in San Francisco, although Eileen has done paintings of Daly City (unfortunately not as romantic as the city by the bay).

Here's her website: http://www.eileendavid.com/

New Day New Blog

2007-12-20T17:57:00.001-08:00

Today is a good day to start.

Going to visit SF MOMA tomorrow to see Joseph Cornell's work. Have done some three-dimensional box pieces myself, but Cornell made a lifetime of building boxes with stuff in them. Every time I decide to not renew my museum membership they come up with a blockbuster show that I really have to see. This Cornell show is one of those.

Here's the link to SFMOMA's Cornell page:

http://www.sfmoma.org/exhibitions/exhib_detail.asp?id=264

For those interested in my work, I'll be showing at Los Medanos College in Antioch this January. Here's a link to my website:

http://www.marknobriga.com

On my home page you'll find information about the show.

Finished work on Jake and Ronne a video short that I produced and directed. More information soon.