Tag: ART

S_V_H Blood Brothers image2

Published on by Scott Von Holzen

This image two of Blood Brothers I have staged to show the music before I attach it to the background.   My original idea was to attach two photos of me and my two brothers.  The first image placed at the beginning of the artwork would have been an early childhood image with me holding Jeff the youngest.  Then at the end of the artwork I planned to place a recent image of us three brothers.  The more I thought about this artwork and the great time being spent on its creation,  I decided to eliminated the photos.  I do not produce a lot of artworks in a year.  A personalize artwork would hurt its meaning.  The theme of this artwork, the bond of brothers, is  universal.  I left the photos out of this project and instead changed the white color of the music’s disks.

Instead of photographs representing my brothers,  I picked three different colors to represent we three brothers.  For the top section of the artwork I painted all the disks blue.  That color represents my brother Jeff, and the color of Chevrolet blue, that is his business over many years.  The middle color is a violet color to represent Roger. Violet is a color band from the Rainbow flag.  Finally, I choose a red color for me.   I have always signed my artworks in red.  That comes from Frank Lloyd Wright’s signature.  I did a paint test of these three colors.  I went with the artistic norm of the day and painted them in plastic solid colors.  Solid shades of color that I call baby colors did not look to be a part of the artwork.   Changing my mind, I took a damp cloth to remove the paint.  I stopped when my random removal of paint resulted in a look that worked with the artwork.  I then took a file and scraped each note hastily.  I then lightly sanded each disk.  Last,  I applied a light-colored  glaze that matched the note color.  There is some thought behind why I damaged the paint.

This art made a breakthrough with the artwork, Will the Circle by unbroken (rejected this year, my the Trout Museum SECURA exhibition).  I gave that artwork a rough worn look that I thought better represented the story of this classic country song,  and early Country Music.  I continued that look and idea of that theme with Blood Brothers I think the lyrics of this song tells a story of struggle, personal flaws, and faith in a family no matter the shortcomings or misunderstandings.  Maybe this music speaks to life full of complicated conflicts. That is what this artwork reflects in its lack of exhibition quality prettiness.    No bright, perfect art here. There is enough of that crap out there already.  Here you find bits of the truth in canvas,  wood and paint.   This art’s meaning is in the emotions of seeing that first paint scratch on your shiny new car, the red wine spilled on white linen, that decision you should have never made,  or the perfect life, that you never had.  Each morning we pick up the pieces of ourselves, and press on.  So it is with this artwork.

 

Scott Von Holzen.

S_V_H Where have All the Flowers Gone Final Image

Published on by Scott Von Holzen

 

36″ Length x 26″ Height x 3″ Depth

I have finished the artwork for the music, Where have all the Flowers Gone.   I am going with a short title of, Flowers because the words on the artwork say it all.  I want to explain why my little circles of music are all white.  They are that way because the flowers are all missing from the artwork.  That should then be a convincing incentive for the Pablo center to have a local florist create an arrangement of flowers to display with the artwork.  The floral and art reception is March 18th through the 22nd.

 

I am thinking that I heard this 1962 version on the radio sung by Peter Paul and Mary:

Although I have finished this artwork,  the audio addition is not.   I am waiting for parts. Once done, I will post a video.

There are two things different with this artwork that most viewers will miss.  The most important change is that the stems are flat but wide.  The extra width of the stems allows me to better adhere them to the frame.  Also, the shorter stem height makes them less vulnerable to be twisted loose when being carried or shipped to an exhibition.  Of lesser importance, on the top section, the second and the fifth stems have no connection to their extensions.  I like this idea and plan to carry this forward from now on.  I also taped all the stems for each section together.  This allowed me to paint images across multiple stems, before mounting them.

 

Scott Von Holzen

S_V_H Where have all the Flowers Gone image1

Published on by Scott Von Holzen

This is my first image of the classic Folk song, Where have all the Flowers Gone.  This music is one of my Greatest Musical Hits, the Early Years.   I am guessing, but I believe it was the Kingston Trio version of this song that created that connection.   Here is a video from 1966 of The Kingston Trio on the Andy Williams show singing Where have all the Flowers gone:

This is a 1960s live video of Pete Seeger, who wrote the song, that starts at one minute forty seconds:

Finally, this is the 1986 live version of Where have all the Flowers Gone, by Peter Paul and Mary. This group’s musical diversity, through the sixties, kept alive my interest in Folk music even as my musical tastes turned to the Beatles and rock n’ roll music.

There are a lot of good reasons to paint Where have all the Flowers Gone, but in reality, it was this email that finally motivated me to set aside the time for this project:

“CALL FOR ARTISTS & FLORISTS

FABULOUS FLORALS & FINE ART

Pablo Center at the Confluence is seeking visual artists and floral designers to participate in Pablo Center’s group exhibit: Fabulous Florals & Fine Art. This popular annual exhibit will run March 18-22, 2020. Fabulous Florals & Fine Arts is a five-day exhibit paring visual art with floral interpretations of each art piece. We invite visual artists to submit images of their completed work for jury. Artists may submit up to three artworks. After artwork has been selected, images of the artwork will be sent to floral designers and will be the inspiration of their floral design. Selected works of art will be on exhibit at Pablo Center in the James Hansen Gallery.  APPLICATION DEADLINE IS JANUARY 11, 2020.”

This well-attended, and colorful exhibition,  comes at a good time in our Wisconsin winter.  I have submitted the last two years,  and both times I have received kind email rejections.  This year I am stepping it up.  I have kept this work small. The artwork will be full of colorful plant looking shapes, and for the first time, I will include playable music.  This artwork will also have an ironic title, Where Have All the Flowers Gone.  The color of the music, only white,  says where have all the flowers gone.  The florist will provide that answer.

Scott Von Holzen