A History of Art part 4

Another busy afternoon around Monmouth County. First I hauled a bunch of outdoor furniture up to my brother's new place in Hazlet. After that it was a series of steps south. Next stop was SICA in Long Branch, mostly to see the latest Fresh Meat show, the annual group show of work from new MFA students from NJ schools. I'm always curious to see what's coming out of the schools. My favorites of the 21 artists were the mixed media paintings of Ahni Kruger (from Montclair State, one of my old schools) and the installation of cast iron pieces from Gina Miccinilli. (William Paterson U.) I was a bit surprised at how many of the students were more experienced artists, with a decade or more experience as an artist before earning their MFA. Things were quiet around the gallery, but later in the evening Molly was scheduled to do an artist talk on how to make intaglio prints. SICA doesn't have a press, so I guess this will not include a full demo.

From there I took the Ocean Ave through Long Branch, Deal, etc, then Main through Asbury to the Studio. I continued where I had left off with the new block. I finished drawing the rest of the bottom layer of the tower, at least the basic structures. When I previously did large complex prints, such as Employee, I worked out everything in detail on paper and did a reverse grid transfer to get it to the block. My paper sketch this time was a bit rougher, quite a few things not completely worked out, so I'm making a reversed freehand drawing from my sketch, creating a lot of the structure, inventing the transition spaces, and adjusting proportions of the layers as I go. This may allow me to squeeze in some of the stuff that got left out of the first sketch. Today's output may not look like much, but it's the result of considerable effort.

Left the Studio around 7:30, and followed Main down to Belmar, stopping at the Boatworks. An e-mail earlier today from the BAC mentioned that they'd like to see the next round of mural proposals to exact scale. The south side wall is an even rectangle, but the north side (where my piece would likely end up) includes different sections, with a window, door, and garage door. I brought a tape measure and made notes about all the measurements of this more irregular wall. Sometime in the next few days I'll do my scale drawing of the wall, then figure out how to make my idea fit it.