Tag: The Beatles

S_V_H A day in the life first image

Published on by Scott Von Holzen
A Day in the Life ≈L33″xW21″
A Day in the Life from The Beatles 1967 studio album, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band

Now that I am committed to doing small music works, once again, I wanted to look back at how I came up with this well-worn plan version whatever. I believe I found the beginning of the idea in an email I sent to the EWA membership, paying tribute to Christy Skuban, a member who had passed away. The part of that email, in bold print, I am sure is key to that decision.
“I believe EWAs should do its own celebration of Christy and her art. …… through the….2025 Winter Art show. We could ask those who own works by Christy to display her work as the centerpiece of the exhibition. Then, alongside her art, I would suggest each member of EWA would also hang one piece of their art in the style of Christy.“

The words “in the style” gave me the opening to experiment, one more time, with going small. That is because Christy’s art was dingy, around two feet in height and smaller in width, with a depth around two inches. One other small motivation showed up in my notes that I put together for one of my short-lived therapist sessions. That note to myself read: Everything would make sense, up to this point, if this art sold. Christy’s art, especially in her hometown area she sold. Even in our EWA shows, her sales stood out. Of course, her art had a reasonable price for this area’s market. Her pricing started from just under two-hundred to three-hundred. My art has never been that cheap. That means to no sales in years. That translates either the problem is the art or the pricing. Okay, one more time. Let’s see if it is the price.

Simplifying my artworks design by abstracting my notation and keeping the width under three feet will save considerable cost and time. Reducing the cover music’s complexity, length, and moving to the cheaper 2Watt stereo system will save time and money. I still won’t price anywhere near Christy, but I am aiming for these mini works to have a retail value of around plus or minus five hundred dollars. That amount is still pricey for this local art market, but within sale possibility. If I can sell them here, along with their easy to travel size, these two ideas may open doors to bigger sales outside the area,

My colors for the project are an easy and diverse list. All I had to do was to look at the album cover.

Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album cover

The many attempts over many years to find the sweet spot for an entry level art market for this art reminds me of a quote from a television interview of a creative person: “No one fails, they just stop trying.” That lead to my search for the original, which I think is from Albert Einstein, “You never fail until you stop trying.” Interestingly, that partially sums up a new way of thinking I eked out from one of my 8 tele visit therapy sessions. To append that quote, I have my stand by motivation words: “The closer you are to success, the nearer you are to failure.” If only Vincent Van Gogh would have known.

Scott Von Holzen

S_V_H The Beatles Triptych

Published on by Scott Von Holzen
Golden Slumbers ≈L68.5″xH35″xW6.5
Golden Slumbers music box
Carry That Weight ≈L73.5″xH51″xD7″
Carry that Weight the music box
The End ≈L70.5″xH36″xW9.5″
The End the music box

I signed Golden Slumbers on December 15th and the others on the 17th. The surprise is that I started and completed all three works in a month’s time. This entire process came into focus when I had in stock three 36 x 48 inch background canvases. The close musical relationship also helped. I could then use the same overall style and color plan tweaked for each artwork. By following the same designs of the previous 2023 artworks, I saved considerable time and effort. This then allowed me to build all three artworks together through each stage of production. The last motivation to complete these three works as quickly as possible was the drop off date of early January. Even though I completed all the preparations for this triptych for the upcoming exhibition, I have a surprise.

The curator, Christy from our group EmptyWallsArt, for the upcoming exhibition has limited wall space for eleven 3D artists that will be showing. Eight of the artists, including one new member, are from our group, EmptyWallsArt. The host then required the addition of invited artists. This was a hard search in this area for me and, Christy who signed up three guests artists for the show.

Christy also informed me she wants to ensure that “all the artists have a fair amount of room since the exhibition wall space was limited.” Right away after reading that, I knew my Beatles triptych would not fit: I requested wall space of a bare minimum of twenty-four feet. I then offered alternatives directing her to my portfolio on the EmptyWalls website. I did not want to break apart the Beatles triptych. Between us we chose three other artworks.

The JS Bach work chosen I understood because of its narrow width. The other two where each about the same size as the Beatles works, but they added variety in color matching well with the Bach piece. I did update the Bach the stereo system from a 2 watt to match the systems in the other artworks. But, again to my surprise the plan changed.

Everglow 2023, L64″
JS Bach BWV 974 Adagio 2023, L30″
Zombie 2023, L69″

This happened when I emailed Christy and told her the reason I created The Beatles Triptych was to show them in the upcoming exhibition. I then suggested another option that I was good with. I would show only two works: the center piece of the Triptych, Carry that weight, and Zombie. Finally, I would display two small photos of the other two Beatles artwork, one on each side of Carry. Well, Christy responded she did not want any photographs of artworks. She then asked for the dimension of the Triptych and Zombie. Her response after receiving the information was she would find the space to display the three Beatles works together. She also added Zombie, but that work would be displayed in a different location in the gallery. At most I wanted the Triptych, but Christy went out of the way in found space for a four. I thanked her.

Scott Von Holzen

Scott Von Holzen

S_V_H For No One first images

Published on by Scott Von Holzen

This next project’s music came into the light on a morning walk with my trusted companion, Zelda. It is on my Like Songs list from Spotify, so I have heard this music before, but that day was different. What I was listening to was a cover version of The Beatle’s song, For No One, from the 1966 Beatle album Revolver. It was the soft assuring voice of Anne Sofie von Otter, and the music’s simple and flowing melodic sound that caught that morning mood. The music lasted long enough in my head so that it then became this new project.

Here are the three stages of this artwork’s design:

Once I have my cover music notation, I than grabbed the Soprano Saxophone part of my sheet music that I would like to display on the artwork

The highlighted notation will be a part of the visual artwork.

Next, I decided on the size of the notation. Since my selected saxophone part comprises a small number of notes I knew I could go large. The biggest note I can cut from a 1/4″ thick aspen wood that is 3.5″ wide is 3.25.” I then chose two 15×30-inch canvases that were long enough to display 8 notes spaced. The two smaller 10×10 inch canvases will become the speaker boxes. The last addition was a piece of loose gesso canvas. It is on this that I will paint the words from the music.

I do not know what colors I am going to use for the music. I also do not know what colors or how I am going to handle the words on the loose canvas. Last, I do know this is going to be the 2nd in a series of three artworks where I am experimenting with ChatGPT. I am curious to see how much better of a poem I can coax out of it. I may even try different methods of handling the music’s lyrics to see what different rhymes that it may come up with. We shall see.

Scott Von Holzen