Two Poets and a Bridge – A reading and an exhibition. Last Sunday, March 25

1- 6 PM: View my New Golden Gate Series

I will show my full Golden Gate Series this once – only. Several of these paintings are reserved for exhibition at the SFMOMA Artists Gallery at Fort Mason opening May 26 for the 75th anniversary of the bridge. Another painting will be on exhibition at George Krevsky Gallery, May 3 – June 9th. also celebrating the anniversary with a special catalogue.

4:30 PM – 6 PM:  Attend a reading by Eddie Stack and John Norton   Refreshments provided.
These two writers, of Irish heritage, will present their work. What do they have in common with the bridge? Well, for sure there must’ve been Irish workers constructing that ‘impossible’ project. You may learn more if you come to their reading on Sunday.

Eddie Stack and John Norton

John Norton’s writing explores the space shared by poetry and prose. A recent book of poems and prose poems Air Transmigra from Ithuriel’s Spear Press was last year. An experimental novella Re:Marriage appeared in 2000. His book The Light at the End of the Bog won an American Book Award. Small Press Distribution in Berkeley, California distributes these books.

Eddie Stack is from the West of Ireland and the author of 2 collections of short stories, two novellas and a novel. He teaches at UC Berkeley and is a recipient of an ‘American Small Press Publisher Award’ and an ‘Irish-American Top 100 Award.’

Golden Gate Bridge from Below the Palace of the Legion of Honor

When the SFMOMA Artists Gallery invited me to submit some paintings for their Golden Gate Bridge exhibition (Opening May 26), I thought “Painting this bridge is akin to painting the Eiffel Tower. It’s been ‘done’ so many times!”  However, I soon discovered that this particular marriage of high technology and landscape is archetypal. What started as a few paintings became a series.

From an outlook below the Palace of the Legion of Honor (See above) the bridge appears improbably delicate. A fine web of steel spanning two headlands. It is an expression of pure physics. As beautiful as a spider’s web and almost as minimal.

Up close – from the waterfront approaching Fort Point – the bridge overwhelms with it’s scale and with the muscular grace of it’s art deco details. The swells rounding Fort Point roll past the orange towers that rise from the ocean to conduct a steady flow of pedestrians and vehicles effortlessly across the watery chasm.

Where I stand painting this engineering marvel the waves crash up against the waterfront, splashing me and my painting and, on one occasion, drenching my truck.

The bridge embodies in its design the conviction of the nineteenth and early twentieth century that technology could overcome nature, extract great benefits from it, but exist in harmony with it. It took the horrors of modern warfare, the nuclear age, environmental degradation and climate change to tarnish this conviction. From a visual point of view the bridge expresses this antiquated aspiration perfectly.

But from the point of view of function the bridge is a conduit for an enormous amount of internal combustion traffic-hooked on fossil fuels.  The Golden Gate Bridge Commission could help break this addiction by offering owners of electric cars three, toll free years. What a great incentive to go electric.

The bridge also embodies the optimism of the Roosevelt period. Amadeo Giannini, the founder of the Bank of America, in the midst of the Great Depression purchased all the bonds for the construction of the bridge so as to provide employment for workers in San Francisco. It is impossible today to imagine a banker with such a sense of social obligation!

Painting workshop in Tuscany rescheduled for Aug 11- 25, 2012

Because of last minute cancellations I have rescheduled the Tuscan painting workshop for August 11- 25, 2012. If you are interested please contact me immediately. I will probably need a deposit by the beginning of March.

For more information click on  ‘Classes’ in this website’s menu bar. If you cannot make the meeting call me at 510-836-1681 on Jan 29th between 1 & 6 PM to alert me to your interest.

Anarcho-Syndicalism, Camille Pissarro and the Occupy Movement

‘Three Painters Witness Occupy Oakland and Occupy San Francisco’ on youtube

I recommend that you watch this eight minute video  in its entirety before reading today’s blog.
Don’t miss the images in the credits.      Enjoy…

We all know that the rebellious young artists who gathered around Camille Pissarro in the 1870′s and 1880′s gave birth to the first modern art movement, Impressionism. But the radical political origins of this movement are not generally understood. ‘Pissarro’s People’ at the Palace of the Legion of Honor in San Francisco Legion of Honor highlights the radical ambiance within which this movement was born and the central role of Camille Pissarro, a life-long anarcho-syndicalist, in nurturing and shepherding the movement. Artists as diverse as Gauguin and Cezanne acknowledged their artistic debt to the man Cezanne referred to as the ‘humble and colossal Camille Pissarro’

The democratic egalitarianism of anarchism inspired these artists to work together in a rare spirit of collegiality which enabled Impressionism to advance into virgin territory. Because these artists were comfortable on the street, among the people, their work shares a universality that continues to engage the  public.

As international collectors swarmed the ‘School of Paris’, artists scrambled to create new ‘isms’ and modernism, nurtured on political radicalism, morphed into  radical experimentation which remained  vital up through Abstract Expressionism.

Pop Art marked the end of the original radical impulse and the beginning of an unhealthy union of the marketplace and art institutions.

The Triumphalism of the ‘American Century’  which led to the absurd assertion, in the 1990′s, that we had reached the ‘end of history’  was anticipated in 1970′s  by art writers who proclaimed the ‘end of painting’ .

There is no denying the achievements of artists as diverse as, say, Walter de Maria, Christo or Andy Goldsworthy who confirm this narrative.  But to characterize the activity of painting, which we have engaged in for thousands of years, as no longer relevant appeared to me, even in those days when I was studying at the San Francisco Art Institute, to be absurd. It strengthened my resolve to explore new possibilities within realistic painting.

Painting is a fundamental laboratory of the imagination. Painting from life, studying, absorbing, refining and communicating our experience in a direct, physical way opens our eyes to reality on a deep level. It refines our capacity for empathy which is the currency of art.

The unexpected emergence of the Occupy Movement is a sign that the country is finally awakening from the delusion of American triumphalism. The ‘street’ is re-entering the political dialogue. It is a good time to be out on the street channeling this populist energy.

Holiday Exhibition / Reasonably Priced Gifts / The Occupy Sextet

Holiday Exhibition Sat & Sun, Dec 3-4  &  10 – 11, Noon to 6 PM

Join me, in my studio, over hot cider, wine or cappuccinos to view my recent paintings.

351 Lewis  Street,  West Oakland, 94607 .  510.836.1681    anthonyholdsworth@yahoo.com

For directions click on Visit Studio. I am two blocks NW of the West Oakland BART station off 5th Street.

Lake Merritt Boathouse Ripening Pumpkins # 2

Reasonably Priced Gifts including Custom Prints

As well as smaller paintings, I am offering self-published books, small archival prints (for $ 25) and a new edition of  5″ x 7″ postcards.

You may choose to have one of my works reproduced as custom prints on archival paper or canvas at a 10% discount – in time for Christmas.

Raising the Tower on the Bay Bridge, 2011

Special Preview: The Occupy Sextet

This work, comprised of six paintings, documents my first-hand experience of Occupy Oakland and Occupy San Francisco. I am previewing it in my studio. An edition of a half dozen  5 ” x  7 ” postcards of the Sextet will be available for $ 20 – 25% of proceeds will benefit the Occupy Movement.

Occupy Oakland # 3 Occupy San Francisco # 3

I look forward to seeing you.

If you cannot make these dates contact me at anthonyholdsworth@yahoo.com or 510.836.1681 to schedule a studio visit.

Occupy San Francisco No Business as Usual

Occupy San Francisco has a different vibe than it’s cousin across the Bay in Oakland even though some activists are shuttling between encampments. There appear to be less of the chronically homeless here. There is an attempt to work with city authorities around issues of hygiene and dealing with troublesome, dangerous elements that gravitate to the camp. They have achieved a fairly comfortable truce with the police. In this respect the demonstrators displayed remarkable resolve and non-violent tactics in their last major defense of their occupation against a police raid. This is well documented in Nicole Landau’s short video.

While I was painting here, Occupiers abruptly began to reorganize the camp to make the Bocce Ball courts available for use. This gesture of goodwill had me scrambling to complete details of the encampment before it was entirely transformed!

No Business as Usual

Pundits and city officials who expect rain and cold weather to extinguish the Occupy movement are probably deluding themselves. To the casual eye these encampments resemble unkempt, homeless settlements – with one difference. A difference that betrays the deep intellectual resolve underlying the movement. Words are everywhere. Words march across paper, cardboard, wood, fabric and the pavement proclaiming slogans, thoughts, poems. The homeless in these encampments are not demoralized. They have joined forces with idealistic youth and veteran activists to wake the country up. Maybe, over time, to forge a new path.

Call them dreamers, but they’re not the only ones. Outside the camps are thousands of supporters who, even it they are hanging on to solvency by their fingernails, are donating time and resources. This is what is stymying city halls in Oakland and San Francisco. Support for the movement is probably greater than support for any of our elected officials.

The country has awoken to the realization that most of the time most of our government does not act in the people’s interest.

Occupy Wall Street has stepped forward in a radical vote of no confidence. They have correctly condemned the government and its institutions for overlooking the crimes of the rich ( even bailing them out – with our money.) while allowing the banks to illegally foreclose on the poor. In an act of civil disobedience,  they are reclaiming the public square for the people.

Direct Action and Agents Provocateurs

There is talk in Oakland, since the late night vandalization of businesses after the General Strike, that the encampment is providing shelter for violent anarchists. I remain dubious. Historically anarchism, which has had many varied tendencies, has been overwhelmingly non-violent. (Indeed the ‘humble and colossal’ Camille Pissaro, father of Impressionism, whose works are now on display at the Legion of Honor was a lifelong anarcho-syndicalist – more about him in a later blog.) Most people I overheard or conversed with in Oakland were adamant in their commitment to non-violence.

A troubling aspect to these incidents is growing evidence a) that police have been infiltrating the movement and b) they and/or other national security agencies may be encouraging the masked ‘black bloc’ mob as a way of discrediting the entire movement. Clearly, it was not to the advantage of anyone in the Oakland encampment to break the windows of Sully’s Cafe which has been openly supportive of the encampment.