Grateful Dead

dead.net the official site

Wish I was able to go to this event and see the whole display and meet the artist, Mickey, too. But living on the east coast of the USA, and given such short notice, it's next to impossible to attend.

(the photo shown above is Fierce Chinese Dragon) Classic Mickey! -- PREFACE “IN THE BEGINNING WAS NOISE AND NOISE BEGAT RHYTHM, AND RHYTHM BEGAT EVERYTHING ELSE” TAO OF WOOD Redwood forests are magic. You enter and feel the soft forest floor beneath your feet, take in the sweet damp smells. You touch the trees, look up through the maze of branches, and then fall under their spell. For me, redwood forests are temples filled with transformative and mysterious wood energy….life in transition. These pieces are part of that cycle. I found them resting in the deep forests of Northern California. I removed the detritus, but have not altered the shape created by wind, rain, forest fires, falling trees, and of course, the greatest architects of all, the insects. These most common of all creatures inhabit these fallen giants for hundreds, maybe thousands of years. They chew on the branches, live in the trunk, and eventually consume them completely. These pieces represent a freeze-frame in that life cycle. We are born, we live, we die and eventually so do the trees, only to be replaced anew. Impermanence is the Tao of all living things. DANCE OF THE DEAD These images were inspired by Hans Holbein’s Dance of Death woodcuts. They are shaman images, psychopomps, guides, escorts to the other side who can travel at will to the heavens or the underworld. They induce a trance for the journey. These guides are not alive nor dead; they live in both the earthly and spirit worlds. They give our souls their sound, and guide those who are prepared and some who are not…. They play till eternity, and beyond eternity. They are the gatekeepers to the sacred dimension. I have lived with these images for many years in my dreams. All have unique personalities and are very playful, once you get to know them. THE TAO OF RHYTHM “reports from the sacred dimension” It’s about the rhythm in things, patterns moving through space; the flow, the pulse that is at the very heart of the universe. The sound of the drum creates a spiritual reverberation in me and brings meaning to life. These images can be looked at as fragments, artifacts from the drum dream that have passed through my consciousness; images created using the drum as conjuror. In the hands of shamans, the drum becomes the wand of god, sound becomes the vehicle of transcendence, and rhythm makes that sound spiritually powerful. The imagery depicted in these paintings symbolizes our connectedness to the vibratory world all around us, things moving, coming and going. The forests, the deserts, the spinning earth, tides, heavens….us. Rhythm is the glue we use to keep track of time. Our world exists in time, layers and layers of time, cascading, flowing in and around each other.

but in my view, as if. Of course I haven't seen this stuff yet, but I talked to the gallery owner this afternoon because I want to do a calendar spotlight on it in the Chronicle (one of my other freelance gigs), and I'm waiting for the photos and press kit from the PR guy. I suspect the reception will be a zoo, but I'm tempted to go anyway because I think the art might be pretty interesting, whether it's found driftwood that caught Mickey's eye or something a bit more produced... Mickey's got a pretty good eye, I think.