The work of Agnes Martin and Cy Twombly had, or rather, more surprisingly, stole my full attention this evening.   Both took my mind to another place.  If you haven’t, I’d suggest looking for their work.

painting: Untitled by Agnes Martin

painting: Untitled (New York City) by Cy Twombly

It was the painter, Alex Steckly who I who had a nerd-out over art today, that brought them both to the conversation.  He currently has a solo show up at Fourteen30 in Portland OR, showing some really impressive new sculptures.

painting: by Alex Steckly

On a side note, on a long weekend out of the city for the holiday, hiding out and working on some new web stuff with Benjamin Diggles that I’m really looking forward to sharing here.  Hopefully soon.

And really exciting, reading Roberto Bolaño’s book 2666, which is really really worth picking up and going head first into.  Goddamn good Lit.

photo: Untitled, 40×50″ by Graeme Mitchell.

Dropped by and shot a few rolls on the set of The Other Guys for New York Magazine:

photo: Will Ferrell on the set of The Other Guys, NYC, 2009. ©Graeme Mitchell.

photo: Mark Walberg on the set of The Other Guys, NYC, 2009. ©Graeme Mitchell.

photo: Movie extras on the set of The Other Guys, NYC, 2009. ©Graeme Mitchell.

photo: Andy Buckley on the set of The Other Guys, NYC, 2009. ©Graeme Mitchell.

photo: Suicide dummy on the set of The Other Guys, NYC, 2009. ©Graeme Mitchell.

This picture of Minor White’s is the best argument towards the existence of G_d that I’ve ever come across:

photo: Windowsill Daydreaming, by Minor White.

It is a photograph that poses ineffable questions while at the same time offering inherent answers.  One risks vanishing into it.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

Facing the Music
by Paul Auster

Blue.  And within that blue a feeling
of green, the gray blocks of clouds
buttressed against air, as if
in the idea of rain
the eye
could master the speech
of any given moment

on earth.  Call it the sky.  And so
to describe
whatever it is
we seem, as if it is nothing
but the idea
of something we had lost
within.  for we can begin
to remember

the hard earth, the flint
reflecting stars, the undulating
oaks set loose
by the heaving of air, and so down
to the least seed, revealing what grows
above us, as if
because of this blue there could be
this green

that spreads, myriad
and miraculous
in this, the most silent
moment of summer.  Seeds
speak of this juncture, define
where the air and the earth erupt
in this profusion of chance, the random
forces of our own lack
of knowing what it is
we see, and merely to speak of it
is to see
how words fail us, how nothing comes right
in the saying of it, not even these words
I am moved to speak
in the name of this blue
and green
that vanish into the air
of summer.

Impossible
to hear it anymore.  The tongue
is forever taking us away
from where we are, and nowhere
can we be at rest
in the things we are given
to see, for each word
is an elsewhere, a thing that moves
more quickly than the eye, even
as this sparrow moves, veering
into the air
in which it has no home.  I believe, then,
in nothing

these words might give you, and still
I can feel them
speaking through me, as if
this alone
is what I desire, this blue
and this green, and to say
how this blue
has become for me the essence
of this green, and more than the pure
seeing of it, I want you to feel
this word
that has lived inside me
all day long, this
desire for nothing

but the day itself, and how it has grown
inside my eyes, stronger
than the word it is made of, as if
there could ever be another word

that would hold me
without breaking.

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: ©Graeme Mitchell

photo: from light study, 2009, ©Graeme Mitchell.

photo: from light study, 2009, ©Graeme Mitchell.

photo: from light study, 2009, ©Graeme Mitchell.

photo: from light study, 2009, ©Graeme Mitchell.