Angels, Dragons, & My Live Painting From AURA 2013

"It is high time to ask whether it is really any scandal, any deplorable inconsistency,
for a human being to be both angel and animal with equal devotion."

– Alan Watts

Seraphim

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Buy 11"x17" Prints

Painted with opaque markers on 24"x36" stretched canvas at:

2013 02 15, 16, 17 AURA Festival at Spirit of the Suwannee Music Park

(Consider The Source, Break Science, Kung Fu, Perpetual Groove, 

Greenhouse Lounge, Papadosio x2, Infinite Geometry)

02 23 Cirque de L'Amour at Austin Music Hall (Vibesquad, Quixotic, Tipper)

02 28 The Parish (The Digital Connection, ONE4ALL, Chris B.)

03 01, 02 Head For The Hills at Quiet Valley Ranch (Eliot Lipp, A Live One)

Click below to check out the whole process of this piece:

How many different animals can you see in this painting?  I obviously meant to put snakes in there, but was surprised to find forms that remind me of an owl, an octopus, and a tiger (or crocodile)...and someone surprised me with "elephant," as well.

The chimeric nature of this piece makes sense, since it's a remix of several of my earlier paintings.  There are many different visual references to my other work collected here and alloyed, sublimated.  Taken together you can see my work as a kind of evolutionary progression – not a linear march but a melody, returning time and again to weave through certain themes...

Painting is a process of discovery for me, a kind of intuitive listening, and this painting connected more dots for me than most – namely, the relationship between angels and dragons.  The Old Testament word for the highest angels, "seraphim," literally means "the burning ones," and is used throughout the Bible as a synonym for "snakes."  Flaming snakes with wings?  Gosh, that sounds familiar...

I don't know why it hadn't occurred to me – even after years of savoring the connection between "Archangel Michael & The Serpent" and "St. George & The Dragon" (and "Lord Garuda & The Naga," further East...birds versus snakes, world round).  The snake – which as many of you know shows up in the yogic traditions as a symbol for the wriggling, electric life force called "kundalini," sprouts wings when our animal nature reaches its crescendo and sprouts from the crown of the head, fully integrated with subtler, perceptibly "feathery" celestial energies.

Following that rabbit down (or up?) its hole, I remembered that to the Chinese, the dragon is an occulted natural force, a terrible mystery that reveals itself through what insurance companies call "Acts of God" – lightning, wildfires, and floods.  In other words, the dragon appears worldwide as a kind of mythological shorthand for the terribly transcendent, especially in what author Erik Davis calls "the electromagnetic imaginary" – our collective mystical experience of electricity and magnetism, whose awesome power has captured social imagination for thousands of years.

In a blog post describing his vision of the coming alchemical, musical paradigm he believes will replace materialism, cultural historian and former MIT professor William Irwin Thompson draws a straight line through angels, aliens, and electromagnetism:

"Since [our experience of] space would no longer be empty and separating, space itself would be a plenum of vibrating streams of energy that in the medieval lore of the Jewish Zohar in Spain and of the Muslim Sufis in Andalusia were known as angels. At the end of industrial civilization, through the popularity of science fiction, these beings were often re-presented as high-tech extra-terrestrials."

In other words, aliens = electricity = dragons = angels.  Chew on that for a minute.

(Then watch this documentary, Thunderbolts of the Gods, which argues that enormous electrical storms in space were responsible for much of our ancient mythos...)

It's no wonder that all of these things captivate me, and so many other people.  Whatever else they are, angels and dragons and aliens (as well as flames and lightning, the concrete natural phenomena in which these symbols are experientially anchored) are all wrapped up in one big ball of myth together, implicated as the various faces of the transcendentally Big-Loud-And-Scary.  Their popularity persists because they help us discuss the Mysterium Tremendum – that truth greater than our own, before which we quake as children...

Speaking of which:

Definitive New Live Recordings

Listen/Download

Definitive live recordings of nine incendiary guitar tapping etudes and space-hued transpersonal love songs, performed to an intimate listening room audience at Flipnotics in Austin, TX, 30 January 2013. 

A return from improvised electronic guitar work to my roots as an instrumental composer and singer-songwriter, this album features my "nice guitar," a 2001 Martin D35, and its new LR Baggs Anthem amplification system - the first pickup capable of reproducing the gorgeous tone of this instrument.

Seriously, these songs have never sounded this good.

You can get the album free for buying a print of the cover painting.  It's $3.33 or more if you just want clear, brilliant live recordings of my most dazzling solo guitar work, without the art.  (And if you like my music but not enough to support it, here are some decent live recordings you can have for free.)

"Michael Garfield has some absolutely amazing chops...
the musicianship on this album is truly wonderful."

- Marquee Magazine (on Alive With You, 2010)

"Esoteric and intricate, I found myself struggling to describe his sound and style...
some surprisingly pleasurable heartbreak."

- Mousike Magazine (on Double-Edged Sword, 2008)

(More reviews here if you need convincing.)

That's all for now.  Thank you for reading!  In the next update I'll share pics of my Barton Springs Salamander painting!  I'm super excited to show you that – but in the meantime be well and have a beautiful day!

"Glass Chrysanthemum," My New (Free) Cyber-Acoustic LP...AND Three New Paintings

“It is the function of art to carry us beyond speech to experience.”

- Joseph Campbell

"After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music."

- Aldous Huxley

"If you develop an ear for sounds that are musical it is like developing an ego. You begin to refuse sounds that are not musical and that way cut yourself off from a good deal of experience."

- John Cage

A few days ago, my friends and I climbed out on the roof of our place in Boulder to catch an exceedingly rare cosmic occurrence: a full moon lunar eclipse during the winter solstice. If you're like me, you're probably marveling at how all of the super-unlikely planetary ballet moves seem to be going on at once, these days – as if the stars grind along with business as usual for a few thousand years and then bust out in a flashmob musical. The more I read about this (and there are good articles here and here if you're interested), the more amazing it is.

There are already plenty of people reminding you why this time of year is important, so I'd rather celebrate this special transit, which hasn't happened in about two thousand years. Now is a perfect time to contemplate the spiraling elastic bounce between darkness and light...but perhaps, especially, the darkness within the light, suffusing us even in our sleep.

And so I'm delighted to bring you Glass Chrysanthemum, my first full-length album of cyber-acoustic adventures on the live-looped guitar – forty minutes of the deepest forays into my experimentations in improvised hybrid electronica. It's free to you to commemorate our time here together at the precipice of the Singularity, one more lovely winter before we dive off the deep end of 2011...

Download it for free now!

Glass Chrysanthemum:

Cyber-Acoustic Adventures In Hyperspace (2010)

The glass chrysanthemum is the mandala people see before leaving their bodies during a near-death experience or intense entheogenic experience – a kind of portal between the personal and transpersonal realms – the gateway to the soul. And so it's only appropriate that I dedicate this album to my dear friend Robert Roy Smith, whose recent brush with three heart attacks proved to him that life is a universal principle, that there is life even in the abyss.

Send him your prayers, people...and grab a copy of this while it's still free – I have about 1400 free downloads to offer my friends, and there are 3700 of you on this newsletter. (Wow!)

And now on to the paintings. :)

Jelly Chrysanthemum

2010 12 01, 02, 03, Freebird Live, The House, The House of Time

(Perpetual Groove, Vibesquad, KiloWatts, High Top Kicks, The Polish Ambassador, Dojo, Miles

18"x36" - paint markers on artboard - check price/availability

11"x17" prints (1/$25, 2/$40, 3/$50 incl s/h) - email me

Dedicated to Tourmaline Todd & Adam Fu Reed of Austin TX, whose intense commitment to the creative lifestyle is an inspiration to me. Also dedicated to Aaron Holstein (aka Vibesquad), for whom I've been painting seemingly since the rosy mists of the Cretaceous Period, and whose infectious good spirits make people's hearts blossom wherever he goes.

(click for a closer view)

Five, Six, Seven, Eight

2010 12 11 City Hall

(The Fantastic Hosts)

24"x30" - paint markers on masonite - check price/availability

11"x17" prints (1/$25, 2/$40, 3/$50 incl s/h) - email me

Dedicated to Gracia Wenzel, whose birthday just so happened to coincide with one of the most awesome parties I've ever attended in Denver, and who I believe to be on the same Earth-based team of reincarnated extra-terrestrials (wink). And to The Fantastic Hosts, for throwing that party.

(click for a closer view)

Crystal Eyes

2010 12 18 The Majestic Theater

(Ana Sia, DJ K@dog, Freddy Todd, Angela OohLaLa, Popsh!t)

18"x24" - paint markers on masonite - check price/availability

11"x17" prints (1/$25, 2/$40, 3/$50 incl s/h) - email me

Where can I even begin to demonstrate my appreciation for my newfound friends in Detroit? Last week I flew out there to be the featured visual artist and setbreak live looping weirdo for the latest Cirque du Womp event – a sold-out plaster-rattling blacklight freakfest at the 1,000 person Majestic Theatre in downtown Womp City. In spite of hilarious mix-ups with airline reservations, prehistoric-Volkswagon engine trouble, and the bitter cold of the Detroit "tundra," my time there couldn't have been more exciting, beautiful, and strange. Major love, and painting dedication, to Scott, Grant, and Angela...I'll be back up in Michigan soon, fingers crossed.

(In the meantime, my soundcheck from Circus 8 is available for your listening pleasure on Glass Chrysanthemum – or you can find it on my new soundcloud page, where I'll be regularly posting live clips and exclusive releases...)

(click for a closer view)

More treats for everyone next week...in the meantime, enjoy the paradoxical anxious abundance of the holidays, get some good sleep, and feel welcome to write me for any reason. Thank you so much for your precious time and attention...

Epic New Live Painting & Intimate Living Room Recordings

"There is an almost sensual longing for communion with others who have a 
larger vision. The immense fulfillment of the friendships between those
 engaged in furthering the evolution of consciousness has a quality 
almost impossible to describe."

- Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Aloha from the Love Without End Tour! In the first week of April I set back out on the road to continue the endless pilgrimage I started in 2006; in these last few weeks I've been back in the saddle, bringing art and music and science-inspired and -inflected presentations to people across the country. It's been an amazing run so far and there is so much more to come…

For now, I trust you all won't mind that my updates have been more erratic than usual. I've been so inspired by the amazing people I've met and events I've participated in that my productivity is through the roof…and so busy it's been hard for me to keep up with everyone in a timely fashion. In order to keep every email readably short, I'm going to start breaking my updates up into smaller pieces and sending them a bit more frequently. That way, we all win: I get to share everything while it's still fresh, and you don't have to wade through a tome every time I send you my new work. So here we go!

> Writing ("best of" gathered here)

D/Visible Magazine: Interview with Live Painter Kris D

After my last brief interview with live artist Kris Davidson, he and I decided that we hadn’t drilled quite deep enough into the mystery of what compels us both to paint. So over two weeks, while Kris was on the road in India and I was couch-surfing in Boulder, Colorado, we kept a lively correspondence about symbolism in art, mapping the unconscious, the visionary experience, anarchism, sacred geometry, and more. Here is the transcript of that conversation – an exchange that inspired us both to go even further sometime soon, that left us both delighted but wanting more...

> Music (listen & download here)

My last few days in Boulder were marked by long-anticipated visits from out-of-state friends and epic goodbye gatherings – including my buddies' monthly art and music event, CASh & Check. The fourth CASh & Check featured a living room open mic stacked with some of Boulder's finest unsung talent, and I was lucky enough to squeeze into the program for a quick one-two.

http://michaelgarfield.bandcamp.com/album/live-at-cash-check-ep

It isn't often I have the chance to play for such an engaged, attentive, open audience, and you can totally hear the difference. (This EP is dedicated to everyone who was there that night.) You can listen to those eighteen minutes – some of the sweetest and most intimate I have ever played – at my bandcamp page. Among the three songs I performed was a rough first acoustic draft of Yeasayer's "Ambling Alp," my favorite song of 2010 so far – and so, unlike the rest of my recordings for which I accept whatever people care to pay, I'm making this one entirely, don't-even-argue-with-me-about-it free. Enjoy!

> Imagery (full gallery with price list here)

Capture

Before

After

18"x24", opaque paint markers on canvas panel

2010 04 08 320South (Octopus Nebula),

2009 07 23 & 07 24 10KLF (Garaj Mahal & Boombox)

- original stolen; prints unavailable -

On my first day's drive from Boulder to San Francisco, I happened to be in Breckenridge at the same time as my friends Octopus Nebula and ended up sticking around to paint for their show.

This is the first painting to be stolen from me. My apologies for the lousy picture, but I didn't have the opportunity to get a better one; the guy who now has it (his name is Nicholas Hernandez) sold me on a beautiful story about how it reminded him of his lost lover and how profoundly he connected with it. He went so far as to talk me down to half my asking price, grab cash from an ATM, help me pack up my stuff at the end of the night, and offer me a place to stay before he disappeared in the confusion with both my painting and the cash.

I have a sense of humor about these things…I mean, wow, if he needed it that bad, he needed it a lot more than I did. I consider this theft as an initiation into my grand unprecedented road trip, a slight improvement in my gas mileage, and a worthy story. It was also a lovely reminder to trust the world completely, and people only as far as I can throw them. In spite of how entertained I was by the whole debacle, Nick Rodriguez demonstrated an almost hilarious, scarcely believable lack of integrity. This painting is dedicated to him…here is his email address, in case you want to write him a thank-you letter for reminding me to keep my street smarts sharpened (or for any other reason).

As for the painting itself, I took this opportunity to attempt a technique I've wanted to use for years: the distortion of an image through a transparent lens or bubble. Wherever the ribbons coil behind the spheres, there is a distorted refraction…it's an exercise in holding the vision, imagining not just the forms I paint but how they interact. A challenge to start thinking and painting more multidimensionally. That one orb is different – it radiates from the luminous coil held within. If you're curious about the first two nights of work I put into this one, you can read about its origins here.

Venture To The Stars

24"x40", opaque paint markers on masonite

2010 04 10 Yuri's Night Bay Area, NASA Ames Research Center

(Hamsa Lila, Beats Antique, Glitch Mob, Random Rab, Savage Henry, Vibesquad, Flying Skulls, Dyloot, Majitope, Barb)

- original and prints for sale; inquire by email -

(Definitely click this picture for a more detailed view.)

Two straight days of driving later, punctuated by sleeping in the backseat of the Windhorse, my glorious new 1995 Subaru Legacy station wagon (all shiny silver like a UFO), I arrived in Mountain View, California – home to the NASA Ames Research Center and unlikely venue for one of the most incredible day festivals I have ever attended.

Yuri's Night is a global celebration of cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin's first manned spaceflight, that pivotal moment in the history of our species when for the first time, one of us saw the planet from space with his own eyes. It is a celebration of our solidarity as a species and as citizens of Earth, an opportunity to unite in revelry with our eyes to the future and our destiny amidst the stars. The San Francisco Bay Area's Yuri's Night party was thrown by legendary West Coast promoters Symbiosis Events, who not only managed to somehow throw a rave inside a federal aviation facility (complete with air show, an entire hanger-full of interactive science exhibits, and a surreal number of people walking around in flight suits), but who also allowed me in as the only performance painter for the entire event. (Such is the glory, I suppose, of using pens instead of spray paint or sloppy brushes…I'm far less of a threat to fancy establishments.)

I haven't ever had such a wonderful opportunity to participate in something that simultaneously stimulated my passions for both art and science...mythic grandeur and investigative discernment…it was a cosmic moment in which I felt uniquely prepared to shine for the benefit of everyone in attendance. And sure enough, I spent much of the twelve or so hours I worked on this piece (noon to midnight) talking to fellow partygoers about plasma cosmology, archetypal astrology, cymatics, holarchies, extraterrestrial disclosure, and other wonderful spacey topics I regard as pointing to the future of science and human experience. Epic introductions were made. Titillating friendships were established. I got interviewed on video by NASA's own media team (although, as is typical with NASA's videography of extraterrestrials, I have no idea what became of that footage). I blew minds; they blew mine. I ended up with my biggest painting yet, with which I explored the ancient "blending-paint-with-fingers" technique to a glorious degree. I finally feel like a gen-you-wine painter.

In other words, and in the parlance of our times, it was a total rage-a-thon. I ended up crashing (Flight 1549 style, not Space Shuttle Columbia style) on the couch of my awesome new friend Lou of The Flaming Lotus Girls, arguably the hippest installation design team at Burning Man, who weld together massive and awe-inspiring inflammatory artworks like this.

I named this painting after a line pulled from John Boswell's life-changing Carl Sagan remix, "A Glorious Dawn": "The sky calls to us. If we do not destroy ourselves, we will – one day – venture to the stars."

The entwined caduceus serpents of masculine and feminine, left and right brain, the East and West, positive and negative charge, rise up from their earthly origin to dream together about their common future "out there…" Saturn's polar hexagonal storm cell hints at both the mysteries of the unexplored inky vastness and the enlightened science that will open it to us (and us to it).

Saturn rules time, fate, science, and paternity…the planet featured so prominently in Arthur C. Clarke's novel 2001, the location of so many anomalies (liquid water-bearing moons, angular moons, and the hexagonal storm are just a few), is also the planet which archetypally "owns" scientists in the Western Zodiacal system. As a Capricorn sea goat, with front legs on a mountain and a fish tail in the sea – one of those paleontologist artist types, living between two worlds – this is a self-portrait, my own inner multitude poised on the brink of the transcendent, looking outward the into Great Beyond.

To quote Sagan again: "The surface of the Earth is the shore of the cosmic ocean. Recently, we've waded a little way out, and the water seems inviting."

Carl, this one's for you.

> More Soon! (tour calendar here)

More art, music, and inspiring mouth-noises coming very soon from my legendary weekend at the Multidisciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies Conference, Alex & Allyson Grey's Chapel of Sacred Mirrors Bicycle Day Benefit at Temple SF, 420 at Golden Gate Park, the San Francisco Evolver Spore, Beats Antique in New Orleans, and other beautiful events...

In the meantime, you can check out my swiftly-growing Love Without End Tour photo album on Facebook – don't hesitate to reach out with your questions or comments, and thank you deeply for your time and support.

your comrade in (very) low-Earth orbit,
Michael

New Work From Burning Man & Trinumeral 999

> Imagery

2009 09 01 Burning Man (Heart Space Sign) - 24"x48"

The entry sign for Entheon Village's Heart Space at this year's Burning Man. The Heart Space was where all of the presentations, discussion panels, and musical performances were at Entheon, and Entheon is one of the most progressive and inspirational theme camps out there. For those of you unfamiliar with Burning Man, here is a fabulous video segment on it by Time Magazine. This sign was adapted (in pseudo-Shepard Fairey style) from the staff patch design they asked me to create, which was unfortunately lost on the way to the printers and so still exists only in digital form:
The tesselated octagons (two kinds – one in which every other point faces inwards) are an Islamic symbol for The Breath of the Compassionate, the endless cycle of creation and destruction of forms within the divine mind. Looking at this pattern brings me great peace by reminding me of the greater context, the infinity in which we all participate...it seemed an appropriate design to contemplate during Burning Man's ritualistic embrace of personal and social transformation. So I went with it while working on the other paintings I made during the music that week:

2009 09 02 Burning Man (Sonic Bloom - Anahata Sound, Beats Antique, Lynx & Janover, Vibesquad, Heyoka, Mimosa) - 20"x30"

Jamie Janover imported Sonic Bloom to Entheon Village this year, organizing a fabulous dance party on Wednesday night. I set up immediately in front of the entrance to the Heart Space and painted shirtless for the first time ever because 1) the weather was incredible, and 2) someone had painted a seven-pointed star with a heart inside of it on my back in henna that afternoon, which I wanted to show off (seven is the number of the virgin, of undivided purity...a cool thing to have emblazoned on one's bod). What an incredible amount of love I felt that night! This piece wrapped itself up at the very last note of the music, just as dawn was stretching over the horizon...you can kind of feel it in the red "window" panels. It was a real trip to be painting for so many familiar artists in such a strange and distant land...

2009 09 07 Burning Man (Hookah Dome - Random Rab, Radiohiro, Eskmo, Welder, Thievery Corporation) - 18"x24"

A lot of nonsense gets spread around as news at Burning Man. One camp put a Kraftwerk & Daft Punk concert in the What/Where/When, which I knew was a prank...but I wasn't so certain about the alleged Thievery Corporation show I'd heard would take place on Sunday night. It ended up being in a different place and at a different time, but sure enough I got to paint for the guy at his first-ever set at Burning Man! (He told us all it had been the best week of his life... The other acts all played excellent sets as well, but I'd painted for them all before so excuse me for not expressing quite as much excitement.) "So I've got that going for me..." (– Bill Murray, Caddyshack, on being granted total consciousness at the moment of death by the Dalai Lama as a caddying gratuity) I got to test out my new battery-powered 20-LED "SquidBrite" lamp, which definitely proved its utility while I painted from a cozy high-traffic spot off to one side of the crowd. And it was an amazing way to end the festival, celebrating after the Temple Burn, squeezing every living volt out of the tail of the week.

2009 09 10 Trinumeral Festival (Pnuma Trio, M80 Dubstation, Conspirator) - 18"x24"

After helping strike camp at Burning Man and driving cross-country with my friends for a day and a half, I repacked in Kansas City, slept three hours, got on a plane to North Carolina, rode out two hours from the airport to the festival site for Trinumeral 999, jumped out of the car, set up my easel, and knocked this one out during my first Pnuma Trio concert. Where the energy came from, I don't know...and in fact, I think this piece betrays how frazzled I must have actually been. But I dig the white-to-purple-to-blue electric glow, and intend to keep working on those tetrahedral surfaces. It has kind of a Navajo blanket vibe.

2009 09 11 Trinumeral Festival (The Sun Ra Arkestra, Béla Fleck/Zakir Hussain/Edgar Meyer, The Glitch Mob) - 18"x24"

What an eclectic festival! To have Sun Ra's old 13-piece band reassemble for this event, followed by the debut performance of a mind-blowing experimental neoclassical supergroup I could scarcely believe, followed by The Glitch Mob? On the same stage, too. I don't even know where to start with that, so I won't. I'll just say that in going for the 999 theme, I tried to work out a pattern based on the Borromean Rings, each of which only interlocks with one other, but together all three are inseparable. Threes and nines (the nines only insinuated by the logarithmic curve of each extended ring). It ended up somewhat messy, but encouraged me to attempt more Celtic braidwork in the future. And I like the snakey green cybertube vibe it ended up with.

2009 09 12 Trinumeral Festival (The Egg, The New Mastersounds, Toubab Krewe) - 18"x24"

At this point, I suppose, I'd given up on the nines. Kind of a petroglyph-circuitboard, weird and dimensionless but nonetheless it still captivates my eyes. Hanging out and painting next to Kris D all weekend must've rubbed off on me, all that abstract geometry.

2008 11 05 & 2009 07 29 Hodi's Half Note (DJ Rootz) & in-studio - 18"x24"

Here, by the way, is an older painting I spent some time updating this summer and haven't yet re-posted in its final form. Radiating bronze lines over gold spraypaint really solarizes this one, although it's hard to fully appreciate from a photograph. It's kind of the counterpart to the Pnuma/M80/Conspirator piece...the hole to its peg. Simple, bold, molten.

> Writing
I'm ultra-proud to announce that my latest epic article, "The Psychedelic Transhumanists," made the cover of H+ Magazine's Fall Issue. It's an adventurous exposition on the common vision of various psychopharmacological visionaries for the future of humanity and consciousness in general...a "virtual conversation" between Timothy Leary, Terence McKenna, Erik Davis, Mark Pesce, and David Pearce, culled mostly from previously un-transcribed video materials and tied together with my own virtual persona as moderator. Topics include emotional machines, the linguistic nature of reality, the illusion of control, the evolving definition of "selfhood," and whether there is even such a thing as "artificial" intelligence. It's one of the more profound things I've ever written and I'm so, SO happy to share it with you. You can read the entire article in the latest issue's free pdf version, or read just the intro on my friend EROCx1's blog, or buy a paper copy at your local newsstand next month. (I highly recommend option #1.)

> Music
Coming soon: my recordings from Entheon Village.

1) My Saturday night pre-burn concert in Entheon's dining hall;
2) My Tuesday and Friday afternoon presentations ("Does Evolution Have A Direction?" and "The Science of 2012: How Geomagnetics Influence Human Consciousness"); and
3) The Friday afternoon discussion panel on "The Evolution Of Consciousness," in which I participated as an "expert" alongside Daniel Pinchbeck, Tony Vigorito, Mark Heley, and Mark Martinez.

These were the most inspiring public presentations and conversations I've ever had, and I can't wait to share them with you. It's an enormous amount of audio material to mix and render, however – some of which is still in the hands of Entheon, so I'm at the mercy of their clock. But I'll have them available for free as soon as I can!

In the meantime, thank you for your time and attention, and feel free to write with any questions or comments! Have a beautiful day...

love
Michael

--
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New Merchandise Store & CO Paintings

First of all, I'm excited to announce that I've been inducted into the roster at ArtsProjekt.com, a super-hip and progressive online artists' collective. Which means that I have a new merchandise shop – now, you can buy my artwork in the form of postage stamps, coffee mugs, postcards, buttons, stickers, skateboards, and soon plenty of other items. I'll be adding new products with some regularity and am happy to take suggestions, so if you have any ideas for sweet art/merchandise pairings let me know! And enjoy your new options...

2009 08 14 Mishawaka Ampthitheatre (EOTO, Vibesquad, Big Gigantic)
16"x24" - paint markers on masonite

Another trip out to the beautiful Mishawaka Amphitheatre yielded this lively number...an attempt to cover "surfaces" with tetrahedral reliefs, a la the Epcot Center's Spaceship Earth and other quasi-geodesic structures. Thanks to the Mish's crazy late-summer weather, I did indeed get to paint while it was raining for a while...right next to me, fellow painter Kenzie Page was having a blast with her drippy acrylics, whereas my pens were impervious to the weather. It worked out for both of us. The show was a blast – I've made it known on every possible occasion how much I enjoy painting for all of those artists. And I got to soak up a lot of Colorado love, lots of friends I haven't seen in ages. This show made it very, very hard to stay away.

2009 08 15 Boulder Theatre (Freq Nasty, Heavyweight Dub Champion, Ana Sia, Jantsen)
20"x30" - paint markers on masonite

The next night was the homegrown SoundQuake Fest at the Boulder Theatre – a real landmark venue, and one I'd never painted in before (although once upon a time I DID get to play Chapman Stick on stage there, for the 2008 Bao Bao Festival, in a fairly ridiculous highlife band). Majestic and spacious, the Boulder Theatre was decked out with fabulous chill spaces and a stage half-filled with busted old TVs displaying static and weird visual noise. My man Ralf put the whole show together himself, a real grassroots achievement...even if the Boulder crew was strangely thin that night, probably still burnt out from Phish tour and STS9's Day Out Of Time. Eva Andreano set up along the opposite wall, painting on board and frame all at once. And I ran the whompy, aggro theme of the night, applying my unique appreciation for heaviness and paradox to the night's work. It feels good to be getting back to more focused, centralized, object-oriented compositions, after a summer of so much play with background layers and fields. This piece goes out to a special woman in my life, who wonders if our feelings for each other are more wings or anchors. Here's your answer, babe.

New Paintings With New Pens

available - 2009 01 17 - Jackpot Saloon (Breakbeat Buddha, Johnny C, DJ Clandestine)

A milestone in both the "redshift" and "blueshift senses: my last gig in Lawrence, and my first gig using the new ultra-fat-tipped "Hardcore" brand markers I bought to mix it up a little. Working with only one width kept me from throwing broad swaths or solid patches of color on the paintings, which led to a lot of tiny, clustered, focused work; the idea was to start with a few bold strokes and then use the finer lines to bring out detail. You know, some kind of actual painting technique! But those big pens with their wide flat tips were more difficult to wield than I had anticipated. It takes A LOT more work to an even line - kind of like being a kid playing with your parents' calligraphy set (if that metaphor connects at all with anyone!). Those fat ribbons ended up a little more wiggly than I had meant to make them... I like how the fat yellow pen is kind of transparent and you can see the ribbons a little bit through the orbs. Keeping everything overlapping in the right order was the biggest challenge of this piece, but I think overall the depth is fairly convincing.

available - 2009 01 26 Hodi's Half Note (Vibesquad, Bass Science, Savoy)

This is what happens when I drive for eight hours and THEN paint, only to try and finish it at 5 AM after the concert, when my brain is wondering why I'm keeping it awake. Exhaustion aside, I got to try out a lot of cool new things with this piece - like making transparent orbs out of concentric circles, and giving scaly leaves to the bold wide strokes of green I laid down first. Another experiment with this one - and something I'm going to have to try again a few times, because the idea is so satisfying - was to create a minor explosion of light IN THE MIDDLE of the object, BETWEEN the tentacles or whatever they are, as if the roots of the thing are ripping open and illuminating everything from the opening rift. The electric blue margin on that foreground tentacle really pleases me, but it wouldn't have looked as if I had extended it anywhere else. Kind of like part of another painting busting into this one.

available - 2009 01 28 The Root (Pnuma Live PA, Lazer Sword, Eskmo, Welder)

The transparent plants were a first. And this one is another attempt to leave more and more of the painting "unfinished" as it goes from one side to the other, to reveal little glimpses of the process. This one didn't leave MUCH unfinished - just a little at the top. I also tried creating a "scalloped" boundary along the outside of the bubbles, giving them a bit more of a liquid look to them, by outlining them with one wavy line and then again by normal curves that partly occluded the waves. You can see some of the original wavy bubbles up toward the top. Looking at it now, it seems like those plants are trying to grab the bubbles as they float by but keep missing. Or maybe that's just how I felt at The Root while painting this. It was a weird night - not many people there, given the talent, and SO cold, even indoors.

10 Jan 2009 - Critical Mass @ The Uptown Theater

18x24, taken - 2009 01 10 The Uptown Theater (Vibesquad, Somasphere, Johnny C, The Floozies, GEM)

Another investigation of partiality, transparent process (leaving some parts incomplete allows people to follow my train of thought), and layering of complementary geometries (letting hanging "vines" drop over the top of the painting and the partial wall gives it a "trellis" effect...I'll be returning to this combination of discrete abstract and organic elements in future work). I like how the negative space at the bottom gives the entire arrangement a feeling of suspension, like you might be able to duck under it and check it out from the other side.

This was painted in the smallest room of the biggest electronic music event I have ever seen in Kansas City. Three different production groups got together to pack the historic Uptown Theater with people covered in blinky gear; it was pretty amazing. Big events like that come so rarely to the Midwest that the excitement was palpable, everyone was flashing eager smiles to each other as they came in...there was a definite contingent of dressed-up club types, but just as much tie dye, as well as less ostentatious general nightlife aficionados. They don't call these things "raves" anymore...but, uh, what are they called? Cuz that's basically what it was. Only with three rooms on as many floors.

The main room was headlined by Bad Boy Bill and DJ Magic Mike - of whom I can say nothing, because I was in the room put together by Lawrence KS's Cicada Rhythm Productions. Johnny Gallup, the man behind the cicada, has done more than any other person to bring quality electronic music to the KC/Lawrence area, and he's a genuinely friendly guy to boot. EOTO thanked him by name in their liner notes, because he's just that cool. And he brought some great music to the little bar by the entrance where I was camped all night:

G.E.M.
Lawrence local live electronic groovers, the golden child of the scene, here/now. Still in the early line-up flux stage, but strong in The Force. Potential energy...just like an actual gem.

The Floozies
Drums and looped guitar/synth duo with entirely too much funk and talent to be languishing in Kansas City. If you produce shows, book these guys. I've seen them bump two hundred people like they were just rolling out of bed.

Johnny C
A Cicada Rhythms standard, this DJ not only put "tasteful" and "dub-step" in the same room together for the first time, he officiated their wedding and delivered their kids.

Somasphere
Lincoln, Nebraska quintet riding the wave of techno-translated-into-rock, high energy, high tempo, great drummer...they make it around to festivals, so keep an eye out. They're a lot of fun.

Vibesquad
Aaron Holstein of Zilla's DJ/producer project. He actually went to school for music, knows the theory, has killer studio skills, can play bass and keys at the same time...and yet when he gets behind that laptop we can forget all of that and just let his luxurious bass rattle our hips and levitate our waving arms. My first night live painting was for him, so I get all sentimental whenever I have another opportunity to do so...largely because his positivity is unstoppable. Right before his set, some dumb girl unloaded a fire extinguisher over the crowd and they had to close the whole room for half an hour while they cleaned up - we weren't even sure if he was going to be able to play. (What's worse, we all thought it was a fog machine and stayed there, breathing toxic fumes, until we were all coughing and realized something had gone awry.) But then he just booted the whole party back up like nothing had happened, reminded people that nothing really stands between a dancing crowd and a good time.

So yeah, it was a lovely night, and I met some amazing people in the crowd. Everyone was at their sexy best, lots of glitter and feathers and custom ballcaps and trophy girl/boyfriends. A real lust parade, which as far as I'm concerned is one of the best live painting environments. I really wanted to get out of that room a little more and shake it in the main hall...but hey. I had a job to do.

***

In other news, for those interested in art theory and philosophy and psychology and spirituality and where those things all tie together:

Around this time last year, I interviewed the internationally renowned integral philosopher Ken Wilber. We talked at length (75 minutes) about his elaborate (but previously unexplained) perspective on the future of art and music, the common qualities of post-ironic expression, and the spiritual significance of the artist. If you can handle reading along to my transcript with its handy notes (necessary for understanding Ken's dense and specific philosophical language), I HIGHLY encourage hearing what he has to say about this shit. It is SUPER important information for anyone who wants to learn more about how the evolution of consciousness we're all going through is starting to take shape in the arts. I never found a suitable place to publish it, though. So here it is:

Michael Garfield interviews Ken Wilber on Integral Art

New Year's 2009 Week Paintings (Denver & Boulder)

Each painting is available in 11"x17" prints for $15 each.
(Email me - michaelgarfield at gmail dot com - if interested.)

18x24, available for sale - 2008 12 29 Cervantes (Everyone Orchestra, Eric McFadden Trio)
Experiment in pseudo-tesselating stars, hexagons, and diamonds; three variations on a bubbling fringe; suggestions of a hidden gold and white layer behind and between; broad hatches as background noise; an occasional eye; implying directionality in flow. At Everyone Orchestra conductor Matt Butler's suggestion, I got this one signed on back by half of the band (a first).


18x24, available for sale - 2008 12 30 Cervantes (Panjea, DNALand, Lynx & Janover)
Play with ribbons: creation of an "obstacle scape" through which to thread orbs while teaching myself about layering; precision trial in black outlining; attempted "curtain" effect with ambiguous implied-motion relationship between ribbons and orbs (Rising together? Falling together? Moving past one another?); use of simple color theory to suggest depth (blues behind reds to simulate "bluing" with distance).


18x24, reserved until February - 2008 12 31.1 Quixotes (Sporque, Vibesquad) (late show for the 30th)
One continuous field of hexagons (reiterated inside themselves) split into two "passing" schemes; an attempt at something more primordial and diagramatic (as if those two things go together). Purple lines in the blue sections half-create cubes, and half leave it looking like a cross-section. It reminds me of a microscopic view of pollen collected on some membrane, or maybe natural glass.


18x24, available for sale - 2008 12 31.2 Cervantes (Panjea, DNALand, Lynx & Janover)
Another study in curtains of helices and bubbles, this time more formally related. Hoping to follow the festive New Year's theme resulted in inadvertently and uncannily illustrating the purple ribbons hanging from balloons on stage (although they weren't released until after I'd started the painting...). People kept asking if I was painting the balloons. I guess I was.


18x24, available for sale - 2009 01 01 Crowne Plaza Hotel & Owsley's (Boombox, Everyone Orchestra, & Vince Herman) (late shows for the 31st)
Picked up from a monochrome tunnel pattern I started on this board but left in my trunk for a month, this one's awkwardly balanced between two and three dimensions (Are the minicubes inside the bigger ones, or attached to their faces? Are the bubbles emerging from the golden void within each cube, or resting on their golden lids? Are the cubes actually receding into the distance, or just getting smaller?). Ambiguity and liminality were kind of themes for the night, but I can't claim total intentionality.


18x24, reserved until February - 2009 01 02 Rock N Roll Grill (Project Aspect, Motion Montage, Jeff The Box)
I wanted the ribbons in this piece to obviously organize the orbs, sweeping them up into a coil rather than just interacting idly - not a caress, but a grab - thus the contrast between free-floating and "wrapped" elements. Hexagons give a "trellis" style backdrop, and I finally attempted some kind of patterning on the ribbon itself. Lots of silver outlining. The artists at this show are all local basement projects that merit your attention - I can easily see this same line-up selling out The Fox in a year, so take notice!


18x24, available for sale - 2009 01 03 The Fox Theatre (Bonobo, Big Gigantic, Future Simple Project)
Varying states of completion in two interlocking elements (the flowers and orb clusters) made for a quick background that still gives the sense of approaching/receding and various depths; "plants" and jellyfish in the foreground rooted the image in something recognizable and took the flow off the sides of the board. Simple foreground coloration didn't confound the already-intricate backdrop. Modularity was emphasized. After a year of people telling me I draw deep-sea stuff, this is the first one to put representational and nonrepresentational elements together in the same painting in a way that unequivocally shouts "aquarium!" Expect more stuff like this, probably integrated with the ribbons and helices, in the months to come.