Look!
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| The all-seeing eye: Blade Runner, Warner Bros. 1982 |
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| What the eye sees: Los Angles, the mythical future. |
Roger A. Deakins won best cinematography for Blade Runner
2049, deservedly so, probably, though Blade Runner, the original, is simply
superior in every way. Every way. Los Angeles is big, a big target, so it’s
quite easy to hit. Hit it. What’s more sophisticated is to capture it in an
intimate way. And can we have some warmth and wit? Thank you.
There is a city by the sea
A gentle company
I don't suppose you want to
And as it tells its sorry
tale
In harrowing detail
Its hollowness will haunt
you
Fr: Los Angeles, I'm Yours (from Her Majesty) Colin Meloy
Years ago I began a search on behalf of my power
couple clients in charming Hancock Park, (a park-like Los Angeles
neighborhood). I was looking for just the right imagery for a dining room
mural. I like to make these sorts of projects contextual so I’m thinking:
park-like, lots of foliage and bucolic. Alas nothing was sticking. Out of
frustration I tried an urban view in which I had no confidence thinking it was
not only not the right imagery but also too derivative of Ed Ruscha or Peter
Alexander. Surprisingly they seemed to like that idea, still the project was
put on the back burner and I thought completely snuffed out. In fact, I learned
they’d covered their dining room in a patterned fabric. Years go by, end of story.
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| My painted sample pinned up for sizing up. |
Last Spring, I received word, game on. No, this
can’t be, I thought. Paint the urban L.A. view on top of the pattern? Ridiculous.
But I went through the motions, made a painted sample and half-way through I
could see it. This can work. And so it came to be. A “Little” fugue in G Minor.
The yellow flower forms from the patterned fabric peak through here and there
and read alternatively as a heavily body or lights from the urban fabric. And
the grisaille palette derives from the grey in the substrate. And in fact my
painting bears practically no resemblance to anything either Ed Ruscha or Peter
Alexander painted. It’s at once abstract and evocative. Los Angeles, I’m yours.
Addendum
There’s something else really special about this
project. I managed to get my very good friend Sue Garner to help me. So fun. Sue
and I went to art school together and we worked on The Ponce in Atlanta but
that’s another blogpost. Be seeing you.
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| That's Sue, that's me. |
