King Sh*ts of Turd Mountain

There are many times where art should just speak for itself and the commentary it creates; this notion certainly applies to the new time lapse painting video I shot with The Wolfman...

Click HERE for my Videos page to see MORE of the Absurdity and Insanity!

2011: The Year in Review at DREGstudios!

Your Host

When January rolled around 12 months ago, I hadn't thought much about what I wanted to do with my artwork this year.  I had been blogging seriously for just a few months and had fallen in love with the open forum which it provided me to fuse both my voice and my art.  The past few years I had focused on exhibiting  anywhere and everywhere in the world I was accepted, placing my art in over 100 shows across the country and world.  For 2011, I wanted to focus on building an audience here in the digital world.  At the turn of the year, I made the decision to dump my static website which housed galleries for my art and focus solely on turning my blog INTO my site.  I found quickly that it was a learning process and looking back I can see the wonderful evolution of the DREGstudios! site over the past 12 months, which has grown from several hundred viewers a month to 15-20K viewers per month since June!  Falling in love with blogging was the best creative decision I've ever made.

2011 was the most inspiring year of my life so far for my work and passion.  I'm still on the upswing and haven't managed to find a way to make a living doing what I love quite yet but you can go back through my archive of blog posts and see the fruits of my labor.  Here's a look back at just a few of the major highlights of this incredible year...

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Top 10 Comments of 2011 on DREGstudios.com!

Inks and Typewriter on Paper / 2006

One of the main motivations for turning my entire website over to my blog this past January was the idea of an open forum where my viewing (and reading) audience could give me feedback and comment on my work.  I opted to allow Anonymous commenting whereas many sites do not.  The only comments I remove are those that are blatantly spam and off-topic.  Other than that, this site is free of censorship for my viewers just as I do not expect any entity of government or person to censor me.  If you’ve seen my political art, you understand that the First Amendment is sacred to me as a creator. 

Today we honor ten of those people who proactively voiced themselves here on DREGstudios.com in 2011.  I painstakingly relived each and every low blow and gob of spit in the face which was thrown my way this year as well as those words which made me laugh and inspired me!  From the hundreds of comments posted, I narrowed down for you my Top 10 Comments of 2011…

[10]  ” Buy a lot of toilet paper...now.” 

-Anonymous on Living in a Society of Fear: Ten Years after 9/11

[09]  “I shall remain anonymous for the simple fact that I don't want my name associated with a blog that is so filled with infantile inaccuracies, false accusations, misquotes, and animosity towards others that is inexcusable. I also find it inexcusable to use this senseless tragedy and it is senseless for your own personal gain. Shameless, egotistical and rabid hyperbole at the expense of others.” 

- Anonymous on Sarah Palin Made Me Do It

[08]  “F*ck the "inner-city". If those lazy idiots can't make it in a free society, with a free education, a free house, free food, and a free cell phone, then they're too stupid to make it, period.

Your "outreach" programs are just another tax on an overburdened society who is already paying the price for the lower classes inability to function at any perceptible level.

The better use of our funds is to imprison, (or better yet, execute) these street criminals and get them out of society altogether.

Then there would be plenty of money to help treat the truly disadvantaged and needy people, who really do need it.

Liberals are unable to grasp these simple facts and always seek to blame society as a whole for an individuals problems.

When one of YOUR children is raped and beaten nearly to death by one of the "poor disadvantaged people" as my daughter was, you will have a different perspective.

Fortunately, they have pictures of the black bastard that did it ( he was at a hospital getting some free health care when he started stalking her). Unfortunately, considering he will be tried by a jury of his peers- more drug addicted sexual predators- he will probably walk. The good news for you Liberals is that he will be free to rape again. Hooray. Next time, I hope it's one of your kids!”

-Anonymous on Happy 100^th Gipper!

[07]  “Hopefully all you dope smoking hippie morons take a hit of some bad weed and it will speed up your Alzheimer, if your not there yet maybe the vegetative state will come real soon”

-Anonymous on Vote Teapot: PASS IT!

[06]  “The Whore of Babylon always comes to mind when her name comes up. Draped in gold, leading "sheep to slaughter", proud of it... Using the names of saints and God to her own ends...

17:4 And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication:

17:5 And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.

17:6 And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration.

17:9 And here is the mind which hath wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sat.

17:15 And he said unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sat, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.”

-Anonymous on The Ecstasy of Sarah Palin

[05]  “I hate to say this... but I was really hoping her boobs would be in the drawing.. she had a nice set.. I still appreciate it as well as you! Good job!! You did get her smile.. it's like I can hear her laugh! :D” 

-Melanie McIntyre Owenby on Janis

[04]  “In conjunction with the "Teach Creationism as a Science" law and "Stop Protecting LGBTQ from Discrimination" law, this governor has really put Tennessee on the road to complete ignorance. Art can only offend a person insofar as he or she is willing to participate in the artist/observer paradigm. Isn't it a cliche by now--if you don't like the commercial, change the channel. Don't like gay marriage? Don't get one. And so on. People who come to this page for the explicit purpose of hating on Free Speech are, ironically, taking that very freedom for granted. An artistic depiction of misogyny for the purposes of political satire is, by definition, in defense of women's rights. I would suggest that certain anonymous individuals read Jonathan Swift's classic satire, "A Modest Proposal," in which he advocates eating babies to ease the Irish famine. But knowledge does tend to spoil fallacy, so fair warning! Haslam's legislation has seriously harmed innumerable good citizens and will continue to do so into the foreseeable future. If the good governor can dish it out, certainly he can take it in stride. And personally, this doesn't offend my sensibilities in the slightest, as an artist, a patriot, a feminist, an occasional peruser of dildos... So does that mean I should be legally banned from viewing it? If you have to trample on someone else's rights to gain your own, youhaven't accomplished anything... Good work as usual Brandt. Keep 'em thinking!”

-Zach on POTENTIALLY OFFENSIVE: A Portrait of Governor Bill Haslam and his Wife Crissy

[03]  “You do realize that harvest festivals are celebrations of greed and gluttony, right? The whole giving thanks thing comes from Americans patting themselves on the back for making friendly with some natives before starting the genocide. Black Friday is a better method of celebrating the harvest than is Thanksgiving.

Of course, you're just one of those people who just want to blame Big Business/commercialization/video games/rock music/foreigners/Catholics for ruining society. Yes, I'm lumping you in with the bigots. You're just as self-important, smug, judgmental, and deluded as they are. Congrats on not being as violent, though. That's a plus”

-Anonymous on Wishing You and Yours a Bountiful Harvest…

[02]  “Nice Work Here Dreg / One picture is worth a thousand words + ONE
From Cleveland, Ohio

"ICEALITY"
(Noun) Pronunciation: i·ce·al·i·tee

1 a : to describe the phenomena of arts and culture integrating with social issues.
2 : “Assist in understanding of the relationship between Humans and their Environment through the Arts ultimately promoting a sustainable global Culture of Peace”.

Source; URBAN DICTIONARY”

-Ambassador Renate on Propaganda for the Occupy Movement

[1]  “they are going to shoot you like 2 pac” 

-W.L. on POTENTIALLY OFFENSIVE: A Portrait of Governor Bill Haslam and his Wife Crissy

If my art and words move you, don't be afraid to tell me.  If my art and words scare you, don't be afraid to tell me.  If my art and words piss you the fuck off, don't be afraid to tell me.  I'm looking forward to all your wonderful input in 2012!

-B

Illustration Friday: The Tough on Crime Skeleton

"Said the Tough on Crime Skeleton - Tear Gas the Mob"

"Brigade" is an unusually macabre theme coming from Illustration Friday this week.  Coincidentally, these past few weeks have seen brigades of armed Police in riot gear swooping down the streets of our nation in response to the first ever GLOBAL Protest in the Occupy Movement.


These largely peaceful protests are scaring the Upper Class and Big Business's hand in our Government because they are reaching beyond the control of the main stream voice in Big Brother.  Despite little press coverage or acknowledgement in its first month, the movement became a world-wide phenomenon with Occupy groups springing up in over 80 countries across the planet.  Of course, the spin doctors are at work and justifying the unconstitutional removal of these protesters across the country the past few weeks as our Government shows its strong arm by beating, tear gassing, pepper spraying and arresting over 1,000 citizens here in the US, Canada, Australia and Europe. Occupy is exposing the corruption of our Government by Wall Street.  Occupy is exposing the Police State you really live in.  Occupy is here to stay and keep pulling back the curtain and lifting the veil and nudging open your third eye.

My featured illustration this week is from my Ballad of the Skeletons series inspired by Allen Ginsberg's poem of the same name.  I have shared a few of these works through Illustration Friday and you can Click HERE to see a stream of ALL of my entries from this year!

Click HERE for the Official Allen Ginsberg Website!

Click HERE for my FREE Occupy Wall Street Posters I designed for the Movement!

Click HERE for the Official Occupy Wall Street Website!

Illustration Friday: Sun Mantra

Round is the theme for this week from Illustration Friday. The illustration I chose to share today incorporates a few unique concepts and is called "Sun Mantra." This triptych is from 2008 though I've not displayed or framed it as of yet.

Sun Mantra / inks on bristol / 2008

The tiny peace sign in the middle of the sun you may recognize as my branded symbol made out of bones which you see all over my site. The element found its way into a couple of other works the past couple of years and I drew the peace sign again by itself late last year to begin using as sort of a signature for many of my designs and promotional materials. The strongest element of this composition though is the gradation of the eyes around the inside of the sun. These eyes cycle through a spectrum of grey tones and give much life, movement and visual context to the work.

Click HERE for a Stream of ALL of this Year's Illustration Friday entries!

Illustration Friday: Flies

"Stripes" is the theme for Illustration Friday today as I continue in my endeavor to submit to their site EVERY Friday of 2011!  So far, so good and today I've got an illustration from my Scraps & Motives (S&M) Exhibit at Cafe Coco in Nashville back in the summer of 2008.  This drawing is actually a very small work (about 5 inches tall) and is a crowd favorite.  The look on his face was my own response and outlet for being overrun with house flies at the time I drew the piece.  I hate flies, they make me crazy and I'm sure it's a sight to see a grown man jumping up and down in victory every time one feels the wrath of my swatter. I'm not sure why, but folks seem to like my characters the more they look like they should be wearing a helmet.  Why do you think my viewers are drawn to the deranged?

Click HERE for a stream of ALL of my Illustration Friday entries! 

Live Painting with Chad Spann

I hung out and got some painting out of my system last night at Spann Manor.  I've been having the itch with our Southern Pop Surrealism sessions lately and figured I'd get some practice in for our next one this coming Sunday.  Chad and I have painted together more and more frequently over the years.  Here's what we tuned in to create last night....

Our buddy Nathan dropped by to hang out during the process and it was his birthday so the painting immediately found a fitting home- happy birthday Nate!

Chad Spann can make a stencil out of ANYthing!

First Layer

Chad got straight to mixing in his High Life- he's gotta pour one for his homies on every painting.

Miller High Life and Yellow Spray Paint

No palette?  Use a brick.

Chad Spann

Southern Pop Surrealism: CLOSING

Southern Pop Surrealism will run through THIS Friday at Zeitgeist Multi-Disciplinary Arts Center in New Orleans, LA.  Drop in for you last chance to see a slew of artwork from myself, Charles Bennett, Jeff Bertrand and Dustin Dirt!  Back on July 16th, we had our opening reception for our four-man exhibit at which we did a couple of live paintings.  Here's the video of us slinging some paint in The Big Easy (one some genuine NOLA wood found via scavenging..).

Click HERE for the OPENING reception of Southern Pop Surrealism!

Click HERE for more Live Painting for Southern Pop Surrealism!

Click HERE for our Heaven & Hell Paintings for Southern Pop Surrealism!

2011 Tomato Art Fest

A classic local East Nashville tradition continues this Saturday with Tomato Art Fest!  All day long, the Five Points area will host parades, artist booths, art shows and all sorts of tomato-related contests and fun for the whole family!  The best part is it's absolutely free!

Art & Invention Gallery (who hosts the Tomato Art Show annually) found homes for two of my illustrations last year in their exhibit.  I was also lucky enough to win an Audience Award for my Tomato Art!  This year, I've entered three works again for inclusion.  The main entry must be about tomatoes, which I'm previewing for you here today.  The other two works are fruit and vegetable inspired and you'll have to drop by the show Friday or Saturday to see what else I've put up (hint: one is from my Topsy-Turvy series!)

"Hear No, Speak No, See No Ketchup" Inks on Bristol Triptych / 2011

Here are some process pictures from my Tomato Art this year...

Getting my line work done after my initial sketch

Finished line work

Click HERE for the Facebook Event and how to get in on a special Preview Party of the Tomato Art Show at Art and Invention Gallery Friday evening!

Click HERE for a Sneak Peek on Art & Invention Gallery's website of the artwork which will be exhibited!

Click HERE for the Official Schedule of Tomato Art Fest including the lineup of musicians as well as the times and locations of all the tomato contests!

Click HERE for a slew of photos from the 2010 Tomato Art Festival to see what you're in for THIS year!


UPDATE 08/14/2011

The Tomato Art Fest was a terrific experience yesterday.  It was a perfect Tennessee day despite our humidity and tons of folks turned out for this East Nashville tradition.  The residents of the 5 Points neighborhood really have a community spirit and give back to their arts scene and local businesses.  We had the pleasure of picking up some really neat hand made jewelry and prints from local artists.  Even better news was finding out one of my works sold from the Tomato Art Show at Art and Invention Gallery.  I'd like to give a Special Thanks to Meg and her gallery for finding good homes for my work in last year AND this year's shows!



After sweating it out in East Nasty, we headed down to Dan and Colleen's house for some much needed R&R after the roller coaster of work the past few weeks.  While the artist lie low and caught up with friends, my wife Aurora got creative and if you are a constant reader, you already know she takes some wonderful pictures for me at my shows.  Here's what she got into last night with some friends of ours...

Tarot Reading

Lou

Zach

It looks like a light bulb going off over my head! 

The Glenlivet 21 Year Archive... giggidy

In Vino Veritas

Inspired times with inspired friends.  It's the productive summers that I'll never forget.  Dan and I are figuring out how to take over the world with my website one scotch tasting session at a time on the middle road between reminiscence and aspiration.... thanks again brother!  Any spirit brewed when we were in the 4th grade is fortune in a glass.  I came home this morning and rode the energy, writing my 9/11 article.

-B

Illustration Friday: Southern Gothic

"Imperfect" is the theme for Illustration Friday today.  It's the tiny imperfections that can blow something up to and over the top of a perfect stratosphere- the crack of high note that sends your spine tingling and gives you gooseflesh all over.  A gravely breaking blues voice that makes blood-hot tears streak down the faces of grown men.  A bullet hole in a road sign.  The break of a guitar string.  The click of your tongue off your pallet at a moment of profound clarity.

"Southern Gothic" inks on bristol / 2010

Click HERE for a stream of my Illustration Friday posts!

Illustration Friday: Eye of the Beholder

"Perennial" is the theme for this week at Illustration Friday.  I chose to share with you another piece from my Topsy-Turvy series (where all works can be hung in multiple directions.)  The featured work today is one of several square four-way drawings I completed back in 2006-07.  Many of the two-way Topsy-Turvies deal with before and after, opposites, cause and effect, etc.  These square works deal with either progression, or in this case- constancy.  This particular work was exhibited in my Topsy-Turvy II exhibition in 2010.

inks on paper / 2006

Click HERE for a stream of my Illustration Friday entries!

Click HERE for more on my Topsy-Turvy series!

Countdown to Southern Pop Surrealism: The Surrealist Manifesto

This coming Saturday from 6-9PM, Zeitgeist Multi-Disciplinary Arts Center in New Orleans will host Southern Pop Surrealism, a new group exhibit featuring the works of myself, Charles Bennett, Jeff Bertrand and Dustin Dirt! Curated by Myron Blaine, this event will feature LIVE Painting, LIVE Music, LIVE Poetry and a slew of other surreal experiences including a Costume Contest where YOU can win ART!

To countdown to to next Saturday, tonight I offer you the original Surrealist Manifesto presented by Andre' Breton in 1924 as a proclamation to the arts world that Surrealism had landed...

Le Manifeste du Surréalisme

We are still living under the reign of logic, but the logical processes of our time apply only to the solution of problems of secondary interest. The absolute rationalism which remains in fashion allows for the consideration of only those facts narrowly relevant to our experience. Logical conclusions, on the other hand, escape us. Needless to say, boundaries have been assigned even to experience. It revolves in a cage from which release is becoming increasingly difficult. It too depends upon immediate utility and is guarded by common sense. In the guise of civilization, under the pretext of progress, we have succeeded in dismissing from our minds anything that, rightly or wrongly, could be regarded as superstition or myth; and we have proscribed every way of seeking the truth which does not conform to convention. It would appear that it is by sheer chance that an aspect of intellectual life - and by far the most important in my opinion — about which no one was supposed to be concerned any longer has, recently, been brought back to light. Credit for this must go to Freud. On the evidence of his discoveries a current of opinion is at last developing which will enable the explorer of the human mind to extend his investigations, since he will be empowered to deal with more than merely summary realities. Perhaps the imagination is on the verge of recovering its rights. If the depths of our minds conceal strange forces capable of augmenting or conquering those on the surface, it is in our greatest interest to capture them; first to capture them and later to submit them, should the occasion arise, to the control of reason. The analysts themselves can only gain by this. But it is important to note that there is no method fixed a priority for the execution of this enterprise, that until the new order it can be considered the province of poets as well as scholars, and that its success does not depend upon the more or less capricious routes which will be followed.
It was only fitting that Freud should appear with his critique on the dream. In fact, it is incredible that this important part of psychic activity has still attracted so little attention. (For, at least from man's birth to his death, thought presents no solution of continuity; the sum of dreaming moments - even taking into consideration pure dream alone, that of sleep is from the point of view of time no less than the sum of moments of reality, which we shall confine to waking moments.) I have always been astounded by the extreme disproportion in the importance and seriousness assigned to events of the waking moments and to those of sleep by the ordinary observer. Man, when he ceases to sleep, is above all at the mercy of his memory, and the memory normally delights in feebly retracing the circumstance of the dream for him, depriving it of all actual consequence and obliterating the only determinant from the point at which he thinks he abandoned this constant hope, this anxiety, a few hours earlier. He has the illusion of continuing something worthwhile. The dream finds itself relegated to a parenthesis, like the night. And in general it gives no more counsel than the night. This singular state of affairs seems to invite a few reflections:

1. Within the limits to which its performance is restricted (or what passes for performance), the dream, according to all outward appearances, is continuous and bears traces of organization. Only memory claims the right to edit it, to suppress transitions and present us with a series of dreams rather than the dream. Similarly, at no given instant do we have more than a distinct representation of realities whose co-ordination is a matter of will.  It is important to note that nothing leads to a greater dissipation of the constituent elements of the dream. I regret discussing this according to a formula which in principle excludes the dream. For how long, sleeping logicians, philosophers? I would like to sleep in order to enable myself to surrender to sleepers, as I surrender to those who read me with their eyes open, in order to stop the conscious rhythm of my thought from prevailing over this material. Perhaps my dream of last night was a continuation of the preceding night's, and will be continued tonight with an admirable precision. It could be, as they say. And as it is in no way proven that, in such a case, the 'reality' with which I am concerned even exists in the dream state, or that it does not sink into the immemorial, then why should I not concede to the dream what I sometimes refuse to reality - that weight of self-assurance which by its own terms is not exposed to my denial? Why should I not expect more of the dream sign than I do of a daily increasing degree of consciousness? Could not the dreams as well be applied to the solution of life's fundamental problems? Are these problems the same in one case as in the other, and do they already exist in the dream? Is the dream less oppressed by sanctions than the rest? I am growing old and, perhaps more than this reality to which I believe myself confined, it is the dream, and the detachment that I owe to it, which is aging me.

2. I return to the waking state. I am obliged to retain it as a phenomenon of interference. Not only does the mind show a strange tendency to disorientation under these conditions (this is the clue to slips of the tongue and lapses of all kinds whose secret is just beginning to be surrendered to us), but when functioning normally the mind still seems to obey none other than those suggestions which rise from that deep night I am commending. Sound as it may be, its equilibrium is relative. The mind hardly dares express itself and, when it does, is limited to stating that this idea or that woman has an effect on it. What effect it cannot say; thus it gives the measure of its subjectivity and nothing more. The idea, the woman, disturbs it, disposes it to less severity. Their role is to isolate one second of its disappearance and remove it to the sky in that glorious acceleration that it can be, that it is. Then, as a last resort, the mind invokes chance - a more obscure divinity than the others - to whom it attributes all its aberrations. Who says that the angle from which that idea is presented which affects the mind, as well as what the mind loves in that woman's eye, is not precisely the same thing that attracts the mind to its dream and reunites it with data lost through its own error? And if things were otherwise, of what might the mind not be capable? I should like to present it with the key to that passage.

3.  The mind of the dreaming man is fully satisfied with whatever happens to it. The agonizing question of possibility does not arise. Kill, plunder more quickly, love as much as you wish. And if you die, are you not sure of being roused from the dead? Let yourself be led. Events will not tolerate deferment. You have no name. Everything Is inestimably easy.
What power, I wonder, what power so much more generous than others confers this natural aspect upon the dream and makes me welcome unreservedly a throng of episodes whose strangeness would overwhelm me if they were happening as I write this? And yet I can believe it with my own eyes, my own ears. That great day has come, that beast has spoken.
If man's awakening is harsher, if he breaks the spell too well, it is because he has been led to form a poor idea of expiation.

4. When the time comes when we can submit the dream to a methodical examination, when by methods yet to be determined we succeed in realizing the dream in its entirety (and that implies a memory discipline measurable in generations, but we can still begin by recording salient facts), when the dream's curve is developed with an unequaled breadth and regularity, then we can hope that mysteries which are not really mysteries will give way to the great Mystery. I believe in the future resolution of these two states -- outwardly so contradictory -- which are dream and reality, into a sort of absolute reality, a surreality, so to speak, I am aiming for its conquest, certain that I myself shall not attain it, but too indifferent to my death not to calculate the joys of such possession.

They say that not long ago, just before he went to sleep, Saint-Pol-Roux placed a placard on the door of his manor at Camaret which read: THE POET WORKS.

There is still a great deal to say, but I did want to touch lightly, in passing, upon a subject which in itself would require a very long exposition with a different precision. I shall return to it. For the time being my intention has been to see that justice was done to that hatred of the marvellous which rages in certain men, that ridicule under which they would like to crush it. Let us resolve, therefore: the Marvellous is always beautiful, everything marvellous is beautiful. Nothing but the Marvellous is beautiful.

... One night, before falling asleep, I became aware of a most bizarre sentence, clearly articulated to the point where it was impossible to change a word of it, but still separate from the sound of any voice. It came to me bearing no trace of the events with which I was involved at that time, at least to my conscious knowledge. It seemed to me a highly insistent sentence- a sentence, I might say, which knocked at the window. I quickly took note of it and was prepared to disregard it when something about its whole character held me back. The sentence truly astounded me. Unfortunately I still cannot remember the exact words to this day, but it was something like: 'A man is cut in half by the window'; but it can only suffer from ambiguity, accompanied as it was by the feeble visual representation of a walking man cut in half by a window perpendicular to the axis of his body.  It was probably a simple matter of a man leaning on the window and then straightening up. But the window followed the movements of the man, and I realized that I was dealing with a very rare type of image. Immediately I had the idea of incorporating it into my poetic material, but no sooner had I invested it with poetic form than it went on to give way to a scarcely intermittent succession of sentences which surprised me no less than the first and gave me the impression of such a free gift that the control which I had had over myself up to that point seemed illusory and I no longer thought of anything but how to put an end to the interminable quarrel which was taking place within me.

Totally involved as I was at the time with Freud, and familiar with his methods of examination which I had had some occasion to practice on the sick during the war, I resolved to obtain from myself what one seeks to obtain from a patient- a spoken monologue uttered as rapidly as possible, over which the critical faculty of the subject has no control, unencumbered by any reticence, which is spoken thought as far as such a thing is possible. It seemed to me, and still does - the manner in which the sentence about the man cut in two came to me proves it - that the speed of thought is no greater than that of words, and that it does not necessarily defy language or the moving pen. It was with this in mind that Philippe Soupault (with whom I had shared these first conclusions) and I undertook to cover some paper with writing, with a laudable contempt for what might result in terms of literature. The ease of realization did the rest. At the end of the first day we were able to read to each other around fifty pages obtained by this method, and began to compare our results. Altogether, those of Soupault and my own presented a remarkable similarity, even including the same faults in construction: in both cases there was the illusion of an extra- ordinary verve, a great deal of emotion, a considerable assortment of images of a quality such as we would never have been capable of achieving in ordinary writing, a very vivid graphic quality, and here and there an acutely comic passage. The only difference between our texts seemed to me essentially due to our respective natures (Soupault's is less static than mine) and, if I may hazard a slight criticism, due to the fact that he had made the mistake of distributing a few words in the way of titles at the head of certain pages — no doubt in the spirit of mystification. On the other hand, I must give him credit for maintaining his steadfast opposition to the slightest alteration in the course of any passage which seemed to me rather badly put. He was completely right on this point, of course.  In fact it is very difficult to appreciate the full value of the various elements when confronted by them. It can even be said to be impossible to appreciate them at the first reading. These elements are outwardly as strange to you who have written them as to anyone else, and you are naturally distrustful of them. Poetically speaking, they are especially endowed with a very high degree of immediate absurdity. The peculiarity of this absurdity, on closer examination, comes from their capitulation to everything — both inadmissible and legitimate - In the world, to produce a revelation of a certain number of premises and facts generally no less objective than any others.

In homage to Guillaume Apollinaire - who died recently, and who appears to have consistently obeyed a similar impulse to ours without ever really sacrificing mediocre literary means - Soupault and I used the name SURREALISM to designate the new mode of pure expression which we had at our disposal and with which we were anxious to benefit our friends. Today I do not believe anything more need be said about this word. The meaning which we have given it has generally prevailed over Apollinaire's meaning. With even more justification we could have used SUPERNATURALISM, employed by Gerard de Nerval in the dedication of Filles de Feu. In fact, Nerval appears to have possessed to an admirable extent the spirit to which we refer. Apollinaire, on the other hand, possessed only the letter of surrealism (which was still imperfect) and showed himself powerless to give it the theoretical insight that engages us. Here are two passages by Nerval which appear most significant in this regard:

'I will explain to you, my dear Dumas, the phenomenon of which you spoke above. As you know, there are certain story-tellers who cannot invent without identifying themselves with the characters from their imagination. You know with what conviction our old friend Nodier told how he had had the misfortune to be guillotined at the time of the Revolution; one became so convinced that one wondered how he had managed to stick his head back on.'
'... And since you have had the imprudence to cite one of the sonnets composed in this state of SUPERNATURALIST reverie, as the Germans would say, you must hear all of them. You will find them at the end of the volume. They are hardly more obscure than Hegel's metaphysics or Swedenborg's MEMORABLES, and would lose their charm in explication, if such a thing were possible, so concede me at least the merit of their expression . . .'

It would be dishonest to dispute our right to employ the word SURREALISM in the very particular sense in which we intend it, for it is clear that before we came along this word amounted to nothing. Thus I shall define it once and for all:

SURREALISM, noun, masc., Pure psychic automatism by which it is intended to express, either verbally or in writing, the true function of thought. Thought dictated in the absence of all control exerted by reason, and outside all aesthetic or moral preoccupations.

ENCYCL. Philos. Surrealism is based on the belief in the superior reality of certain forms of association heretofore neglected, in the omnipotence of the dream, and in the disinterested play of thought. It leads to the permanent destruction of all other psychic mechanisms and to its substitution for them in the solution of the principal problems of life.

Click HERE for the Southern Pop Surrealism EVENT PAGE

Southern Pop Surrealism Live Painting

Ink, Spray Paint and Acrylics on Wood / 2011

Next Saturday night at 6PM, Southern Pop Surrealism OPENS at Zeitgeist Multi-Disciplinary Arts Center in New Orleans. I'll be on hand doing some live painting with Jeff Bertrand, Charles Bennett, and Dustin Dirt!

To countdown to the show next week, here's some shots and video from a group painting session we did a few weeks back. These panels will be exhibited in the show along with works from all four artists.

I had a beer- Dustin Dirt! drank it all up...

There is nothing more adorable than a Charles Bennett Yeti

(Left) Charles Bennett  (Right) Jeff Bertrand

Here's a time lapse video of our paintings for the group show in The Big Easy... 

Stay tuned tomorrow for the latter half of this painting session, where we collaborate on Heaven and Hell- with each artist painting their own Angel and Devil.

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Illustration Friday: Campy

I believe "Midsummer Night" is my favorite theme so far which Illustration Friday has thrown at me.   I really had fun digging around looking through old work and musing summertime memories just now.  Today's featured illustration is from my Topsy Turvy series.  One of the things about summer which turns me nostalgic is campfires- I've had some of the best times of my life around them here in the south with guitars and stories and dancing (til dawn often times.)  That's where this work and theme brought me today so I'll be on my way- it's a beautiful summer day and I gotta find my next fire...

"Topsy Turvy: Campy" inks on paper / 2007

All works from this series can be hung either side up- today's for example, will look more like the sun in space than a campfire when you flip it over!

{ Click HERE for more on my Topsy Turvy series}

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Illustration Friday: Oceanic

"Oceanic" inks on bristol / 2008

"Swept" is the theme for this week's Illustration Friday, which immediately brought an illustration to mind from 2008.  I guess it gives me the feeling of being swept away.  The water is my favorite part of this one with it's calming deco greens.  I've never displayed this gal, since the proper context to show the work in has yet to surface.  I composed a few surreal portraits that year of women with the power animals perched on their shoulders.  I did four or five and lost interest in the idea (which tends to happen to my scattered brain.)

What is your POWER Animal?

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Illustration Friday: A Gallery Scene (Collaboration with Miranda Herrick)

We'll round out this week with a collaboration for Illustration Friday's theme, "Shadows."  Ironically, this past Saturday, I exhibited some new collaborations with photographer Chad Spann at Flashed Photography (click here for the post.)  I found it fitting to share another collaboration with you this week, only this one is a bit older.  

"A Gallery Scene" inks on bristol / 2007 (Brandt Hardin and Miranda Herrick)

When I saw the theme this week, the drop-shadow off of the child figure in this work immediately came to mind.
Back in 2007, I collaborated with a fellow artist Miranda Herrick.  Miranda works with very intricate, visionary patterns to make some very psychedelic works!  Miranda had given me some pads of scrap paper from where she was cutting perfect squares out of bristol board for her work.  What was left were these long 14 inch strips.  All the works I did on these were multi-paneled and matted similar to what you see here.  When I began the work, I left the large frame which the child is looking at empty.  Miranda filled this with her own design.

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Illustration Friday: Nod Off

"Topsy-Turvy: Nod Off" inks on paper / 2006

"Asleep" is what Illustration Friday gave us artists loyal to their themed gauntlet today as a topic of artist endeavor.  Here is another illustration from my Topsy-Turvy series, in which all the works can be hung either side up.  This dude is from waaaaay back in 2006 when I was still experimenting with the series around the time of my first exhibit of such work.  This illustration never made the cut for either show so I thought I would share it with you today seeing as it struck me as fitting the theme since the figure looks as if he's falling asleep through the progression of faces.

I have bouts of insomnia myself so sleep is very precious.  Just looking at this guy makes me want to nod off since I was up painting a skate deck last night.

Click HERE for more from my Topsy-Turvy series!

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Illustration Friday: Floundering

It's Illustration Friday again this week and we have the theme of "Soaked."  This stone age painting is from waaaaay back in 2005.  At the time, I was doing some very low brow painting aside from my illustration.  The panel was exhibited at The Alter Gallery here in Clarksville.  It was always fun painting on found wood, and just laying down some colors to see what happened.  The process took an entire 30 minutes I believe...  After making the first broad brown strokes on my white background, I decided I had an angel underwater.

"Floundering" acrylic and metallic marker on found wood panel

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Illustration Friday: Break an Egg

"Break an Egg" inks on bristol / 2008

 Each week, Illustration Friday draws a theme out of the hat as a prompt for artists.  This year, I'm trying to meet their theme with an existing work of art from my catalog.  Today's prompt is "Beginner."

Every thing we tackle in our lives begins somewhere.  Whenever we start something new, we're bound to break a few eggs trying to accomplish it, which brought me to this illustration from 2008..... enjoy!

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