Tag: ART

S_V_H Martha my Dear take 2 final image

Published on by Scott Von Holzen

This is a follow up video showing an actual finished artwork. I forgot to create the incidentals for the music box. Those add-ons include a sharp, a flat, a tie, a couple of flags, and four beams. They are there to give music box more of a musical look that is common in sheet music. Although not as much with this artwork, all those little additions add interest and are decorative. The video discusses this and the sampling process used for the visual part of this portrait of a song.

For many years, whatever musical phrase I picked for the subject, that is what I would paint. When I added sound, I continued with that idea, painting the entire length of the music. As my musical skill and interest increased, it became apparent that I had to either reduce the size of the music that I was portraying or increase the size of the artwork. The ever-increasing length and composition of the cover music was growing. For the viewer this also made it increasingly difficult to follow the music and the visual together. The problem was that the music had involved to be as important as the artwork that was portraying it.

To get hold of what I was creating, I set a one minute thirty second maximum time limit on the music. Then, from that cover music, I would select a piece, or a sample, to portray as the visual. Hopefully, this will keep these artworks to a length, and a construction timeline, that I can handle.

I see it this way: full-length paintings of portraits are few in numbers compared, for example, with portraits from the waist up. It is like the portrait painter is sampling the image of a person. My music paintings and now my music boxes are, and have always been portraits of a song.

In the video I give the viewer, awkwardly, an example of how the music is represented in the visual. I have nothing else to add to that except this entire process of combing the visual art with performance art is continuing to continue to be a continuing evolution. So it goes.

Scott Von Holzen

Here is the finished Music Box music for Martha My Dear

S_V_H Martha my Dear final image

Published on by Scott Von Holzen
Maratha my Dear L115″xH32″xD6″

There were major issues with the focus of this video, that annoyed me, but published it anyway. I was happy (in my way) with the content and the enthusiasm of this video. To then try to repeat all of my spontaneous responses to my own comments, in the same way, that would not happen. This focusing issue resulted in spending precious afternoon studio hours testing different solutions. Surprised, a setting change to my Canon 5D mark IV, and to my external microphone setup, resulted in good-to-go for now focus.

I do have this comment not mentioned in the video. The smaller than my normal sized canvas, mostly white painted, and the larger size of the music, along with my black colored staffs, is the reason that the music dominates this music box. The temporary off white support for this work also it blends too easily with the canvas. What is the obvious difference with works from this last year is that those canvases are larger and filled with more colors that contrast. For this project, white and muted grays were my options if I wanted to use the cover of The Beatles White Album as my template. Because of my history with photography I live to capture contrast in my photos and my artworks. I did so a little. So it is. So it is not.

Scott Von Holzen

S_V_H Martha my Dear putting it together

Published on by Scott Von Holzen

Here is another put-together video of my latest Music Box Martha my Dear.

The canvas is six feet, but it is only twenty inches in width. That turned out to be a little tight. When I made this video, I had not attached the industrial Velcro I use along the top edge to prevent the canvas from sliding between the magnets. What happened when I attached the small upper piece to the right, the weight of the music pulled the canvas down. The magnets attached to the music were at the very top of the frame and the canvas. Making it even more difficult to hand is that the music built for this artwork is larger than previous works. This created a similar problem with the large centerpiece of the music, with it, the magnets, and canvas all seating along the bottom edge. This is a lesson learned. I wanted to see if I could attach the music to narrower pieces of canvas. What I learned is that a wider canvas would have made it easier to arrange the music, and that I should avoid trying to attach the music to either the top or the bottom of the canvas. For this work, I will figure out how to better arrange the music away from the edges of the canvas. Along with the added Velcro for support, this artwork should make for an interesting and enjoyable Music Box for the viewer to view and play. If that opportunity eventually presents itself. So it is.

Scott Von Holzen