Now: 16:00 Greenwich Mean Time every Friday.
Here: A community of artists in Washington Heights / Inwood and the world meeting in this online gallery.
This: A piece of art created Now and sharing the most important thing on our minds.
Scroll down to view the exhibit below. Thank you for participating in and viewing Now: Here: This.--Peter Ferko, Project Director
how to join this project | about the artists | archived weeks
all work ©2004 by artists named
Now: Here: This is funded in part by the Puffin Foundation
Now:
Here: This
March 5, 2004, 16:00 Greenwich Mean Time
Laura Traverso, Washington, D.C.
good view
i am thinking about spring break in miami, on the beach.
Jacie Almira, New York City
Jacie [never] thought she would learn to drive a boat
before she learned to drive a car*
I'm looking into new possibilities and trying not to talk myself
out of it. I want to document my idiosyncrasies during
times of curiosity and boredom. Exploring the flimsy connections
I sometimes make that I usually perceive as powerful. But I want
to get to a point where I can see beyond myself. Where everything
else is more interesting than me. I'm so bored of me, but I can't
stop.
*I found this image and caption on the internet when I searched for "Jacie" on
Google (Images).
Rosa Naparstek, Washington Heights, New York City
Glazela Tay (Cup of Tea)
I found these gas jets in the garbage dump on Shelter Island several years ago. As I was stacking them in the box to bring home, the meaning of the pieces became obvious to me. However, I let them sit on a window sill for years, never able to finalize the shape of what I wanted to say. Recently, I found the cow in Cape Cod, bargaining at a flea market, and the tea pot in Chinatown. What made me bring it all together now was Mel Gibson's "Crime of Passion."
Tim Folzenlogen, Washington Heights, New York City
Understanding
Soon, there will only be two kinds of people: people who take sides, and people who don’t.
Soon after that, there will only be one kind of person.
Wendy Newton, Washington Heights, New York City
transformations: boiling water
reading life like tea leaves: more changes when you least expect them
thinking about the agency… the actual mechanisms… of transformation. how it happens, how you experience it, how you deal with it. it’s all about what moves you, what charges you, what you expect, what you allow, what you reject, what you pay attention to, what you notice, what you skip over. i had a post-birthday visit from my three and a half year old friend tess, who rearranged practically every (small, movable) detail of my apartment. i’ve been cleaning, sorting, discarding, and carefully arranging what’s left in preparation for my fortieth birthday party and spring in general, and had just reached a state of relative stasis with it all when in swooped tess, my little unexpected agent of change. it was like a positive charge had been introduced into the neutral field of my apartment. i chose to remain watchful but non-reactive (sounds like teflon, yikes!), using a certain amount of my energy to sit still in a growing swirl of awareness about how challenging this was to my sense of order. it was clear tess’ sense of aesthetics and narrative was more inventive and fun, if less subtle, than mine, and i was slightly embarrassed to find in this process of comparison between us the seeds of competition with a very creative three year old. in reference to a continuing theme… here are the fates of the three little plastic brides and grooms (Now:Here:This 2/20/04) that had been perched nostalgically over my kitchen sink for so long: one briefly stood in as tess’ champagne glass (the upside down skirt serving as the flute) and then was apparently lost; one wound up prone in a dish of lavender buds; and the third was found stuck upside down in the top of a candle holder (the candle had been recruited as a crayon to draw on the glass table). my assessment: for me the transformational bridge to the other side of forty and beyond will be about learning equanimity, balance, humor, grace; exhaling and letting go; unfocusing as a counterbalance to focusing and vice-versa; trusting all perspectives at once; nurturing the creative child in me.
Peter Ferko, Washington Heights, New York City
'Does Bliss Show?' Portrait #10: Love
The most important thing on my mind: Making Wendy's birthday blissful.
James Huckenpahler, Washington, D.C.
untitled study
On my bookshelf:
'From the Atelier Tovar' by Guy Maddin
'Battle Royale' by Koushun Takami
'Parallel Lines' by Stephen Bann
[Note: James has a late entry in February 20. See it in the archives]
Jason Gubbiotti, Washington, D.C.
untitled
Joel Adas, Brooklyn
untitled
Cezanne! Cezanne! Cezanne!
This Week's Guest Artists (How to join this project)
Sky Pape, Inwood, NYC
Postcard
Being thoroughly down and discouraged lately, I set out to make something completely positive. This fake postcard nods to the late great artist Ray Johnson, who made it known that correspondence IS art (www.artpool.hu/Ray/RJ_title.html). The elephant was drawn by Ray himself, lifted from a letter of his I have, as is the Locust Valley 1970 postmark. Nothing beats real mail in the box. I once got a postcard written on birch bark. Some old letters I dug out of my memorabilia provided all the choice snippets for this card. Reading them again made me entertain the thought that maybe things didn’t suck quite so bad. If you ever want to make a difference, try sending an encouraging, joyful piece of mail to someone. Anyone. (Why not me? 91 Payson Ave, #1C, NYC 10034). It works.
also from Sky
untitled (galactic)
Cosmic, dude. This is more typical of the stuff that comes out of my studio.
Take traditional drawing materials such as handmade paper and ink. Mess
around until something unexpected happens.
Karen Greene, Washington Heights, New York City
untitled
I am always very aware of textures and surfaces in my work, and this tree seemed to have incredible contrasts and stages of life.
Stephen Beveridge, Washington Heights, New York City
Santa Monica Beach 8am
Anthony Gonzalez, Washington Heights, New York City
Jazz Hands
"Yesterday upon the stair,
I saw a man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today.
I wish that he would go away."
Recently a friend sent an email to remind me that under the Patriot Act
a person can be arrested without probable cause, held indefinitely
without being charged, tried without a lawyer or jury, sentenced without
the opportunity to appeal, and put to death, all without notification
of
anybody. When Attorney General John Ashcroft testified on behalf of the
act he said that those who opposed it were "providing aid and comfort
to the enemy." These were carefully chosen words. "Aid and comfort
to the enemy" are words used in the legal definition of treason.
So - Ashcroft equates protesting against the government with trying to
overthrow it.
Bush's cynical political calculation in promoting a constitutional amendment essentially banning gay marriage.... the lies regarding Iraq.... the gutting of the Environmental Protection Agency....
How I long for the catharsis of a moment like the one in the McCarthy
hearings when Joseph Welch asked, "At long last, sir, have you no
shame,
have you no decency?"
Daniel Lai, Leonia, New Jersey
Awakening
To ignoramuses and bigots:
I have no power. I have no authority.
My voice makes no changes.
My words are mute.
But I have talent.
To mindless piety:
Mindless piety raises no questions.
Total obedience with ignorance.
If God wanted total compliance,
He would have created robots!
To blind faith.
Step out of the circle and look back,
The ignorance will shine at you like lightning.
Step out of the field of hate,
That was sprout in the soil of ignorance.
Stop using faith to justify hate!
Renee Tamara Watabe, Verona, New Jersey
Infusion
The sunlight is all around, and streams in, the moment I open the blinds
ever so slightly.
I had no idea how bright it was. Silly me.
It seems like so little to go on, and yet, for this moment, it fuels me,
and becomes everything.
Comments on Last Week's Now:Here:This
submit a comment | view archived weeks
From Anya for Tim:
Okay. I'm going to make a comment. Joel and I love your work!!! How's that? The reason I haven't made any comments before is pretty simple, I haven't had the time to get it out there in words that are satisfying to me. I really work over those words before I hit the send button. But maybe that's being selfish. Anyway, here it is. Send.
From James H:
Peter, this line struck a chord with me:
I'm not sure I buy that we can tell the world (or its inhabitants) to be a better place.You can't force people to volunteer, or impose charity, or impose a culture of democracy from the top down. [Democracy is as much cultural as it is political]. That's why - at a practical level - the current administration's foreign policy goals in the middle east will likely fail.
and from Tim:
and hardly anyone has commented on anything that anyone else has said or done here.Speaking for myself, it's pretty difficult engage in discussions with
people that I'm not in the same physical space with. Even Peter, with whom I've had a long friendship with, and with whom I share a pretty broad set of ideas and references, is tough to write to/about.That said, I wonder if the comments may be more subtle, residing in the work. I'm most interested in the work I've seen by Wendy, Renee, Pat, Laura and Aineki - all work by women, and much of it closer to journal entries rather than self-contained work. I'm wondering how that's going to filter into my own work, both procedurally and thematically. Maybe it already has.
Peter - is there a rationale for bringing the project to a close? Seems like this would be interesting to extend over a longer period.
[From Peter in response to James's question
Now that there is one month left to this project, would participants and viewers like to see this project continue in some form? Send your vote by clicking on Make a comment and I'll report the outcome next week. Also feel free to comment on the form it should take.]
From Tim in response to Peter:
Peter: I understand your desire for "utopian" behavior from others (which is an admittedly rough label for the urgings that I see in your writings), but how do you reconcile those urgings with one of your seemingly primary tenets: "if you were in someone else's shoes, you would do exactly what they are doing?" Isn't it more likely that we can see changes in front of us by evolving changes in ourselves?
Tim: Everyone is evolving. The only constant in the universe is change. Nothing stays the same. Today, change is occurring much faster than ever before. Why? It’s because we are being bombarded with so much information, from so many different points of view, giving us so much more to think about. That information comes from the outside. All experiences in life do, as you can only see what is outside of you.
But it’s true that the speed of change is completely determined by the individual, depending on how open they are to engaging the outside experiences. It has to do with the kind of questions they are asking within themselves. If you look at all phenomena with wonder, as you did when you were a small child, you will change VERY fast. This is what living in the moment is all about. No experience is any better than any other, as you will learn and grow through all of them. The very best one, the only important one, is whatever you happen to be experiencing at any given moment.
But most people simply do not experience life with wonder. They “know” who they are, and try hard to ignore anything or anyone who is different - labeling and dismissing rather than engaging the other with their honest and sincere thoughts and questions.
But change still occurs. None of us are like our grandparents. We are all much bigger in terms of all we think about, simply because we have experienced so much more than they.
Peter: I'm not sure I buy that we can tell the world (or its inhabitants) to be a better place. The world is inherently characterized by opposites (good/evil, dark/light, masculine/ feminine) being played out by others.
Of course the writers of gospels, self-help books and manifestos tell others what to do to find happiness, so there's no reason you can't share your wisdom in that format as well.Tim: What you call opposites, I see as being little more than people wearing different colored shirts. Fundamentally, we are all the same.
As for comparing what I do to “gospels, self-help books and manifestos”, again, I think you misunderstand.
Think of those primitive tribes that get discovered from time to time, living in The Rain Forest, completely cut off from outside civilization.
Then, one day, people carrying cameras show up.
I’m like the flying saucer that lands in your backyard. It’s real. You can see it, you can touch it; and right from the get-go you understand that this is going to radically affect your every thought from now.
People of every time and place always think that what they got is all there is.
Look through The Hubble Telescope and try to tell me that any of us here, understand much of anything, when considering all of what is out there.
Maybe this is an extremely primitive planet, and there are levels of understanding that make everything we believe in, look like those Rain Forest guys in comparison – truths that are so obvious, as to be undeniable by anyone once experienced.
What I’m about was given to me when I was five years old. I met the guys with the cameras. I’ve spent my entire life thus far, testing what was given to me, and trying to figure out how to express it to others in a way that can be understood. It’s actually very simple and obvious stuff - you don’t have to be an intellectual to get it. The only requirement is that you look at it with wonder. You have to set your concepts aside, and breath the whole of it, without shooting it down paragraph by paragraph based on what you already think.No one who reads all of the essays on my website with an open mind, will disagree with them. Not one person. That is quite simply not possible. The Rain Forest guys cannot deny the camera once seen.
What’s more, what anyone who reads my essays will realize, is that they already understood everything that is there. They’ve always known, just they got obsessed with their immediate circumstances, and so they forgot.
Peter: I'm curious to know how you think this activity (i.e., writing as a primary component of your art) affects your painting and vice versa.
Tim: I’ve always thought of my painting as the stage I had to build in order to get others to consider my thought. That said, everything in my life is art – seamlessly so.
What I really want to do, the painting I most want to create, is a world that works for everyone. My every painting, relationship, thought or conversation, is a stroke of the brush in that painting.
At this point in time, I’m pretty sure I can accomplish this, and that it wont even be hard.
Look at history. The further back you go, the slower the speed of change.
Look at how fast everything is changing today.
What I’m telling you is that we haven’t gotten out of first gear yet.
You simply cannot imagine what is about to occur.
Also from James H:
Regarding Peter's portrait #7
is by far the funniest and smartest of the series - and in a way, it strikes
me as the least self-conscious. WOW. I want to make a piece that cool.
Make
a comment for this section of the exhibit site by clicking
here
or send email directly to Artists who have listed their website or email
in About the artists
Thank you, artists, commenters and viewers, for participating in Now: Here: This. -Peter Ferko
How to join this project | About the artists | Archived weeks
all work ©2004 by artists named