I was happy to see Janet Williams studying my basketball players at last night’s opening. I remember talking to her about the first batch of paintings that I did of these guys. I love Janet’s paintings and couldn’t wait to hear what she had to say about this batch. Her husband, Ted, showed up as we were talking and pulled out a picture of his high school basketball team. He wanted me to find him in the picture. Unlike the six member Mynderse Academy team that I painted Ted’s Brighton High School team had almost twenty players on it. Without thinking I said, “Wow, I’ll bet you never played.” Ted told me they put him in once and and he ran a layup and slammed the ball against the backstop so hard it bounced all the way to the other end of the court. The sports reporter, Bob Mathews, and former County Executive, Bob King, were both on his team. I found Ted in the photo right away. He looked just like one of his sons.
Kathy Krupp brought me a little laminated photo that she found on the ground over by the UofR. About one inch by one inch, a close cropped photo of a man’s head, like something you would see on an id. Bob Martin thought I was one of the ones pictured in the basketball series. Brian Peterson wanted to know all about my source material, the Crimestopper page, now online as a pdf. Most people wanted to talk about who these people were, which one was the homeless girl, that sort of thing. Fred Lipp was there even though he had seen everyone of these pieces in class. If I didn’t do them in class I at least ran them by the master before officially considering them “done.” I would rather talk about the paintings and did so for quite a while with Steve Caswell. He was making a connection between the way I paint and way I play drums. That was a springboard for the whole minimalism as maximalism thing. The importance of each element, what to leave out.
Richard Margolis asked me if he could ask me a business question. I said “no” without missing a beat and he asked anyway. Ken Franks asked me what I thought of the band name, “Sun Rags.” Pete Monicelli, who is on the board at BOA Editions, read us a poem that he wrote in response to a recent book that BOA published, something about if god was a woman. I was thinking a better title would be “If God Was A Man.” There were quite a few artists there but a lot of current and former art teachers there last night. I mean like ten that I can think of now.
I would have been happy to keep the art buzz going all night but a little after 8 Bob started making noise with his guitar. The band did have an engagement last night so with Martha O’Conner’s help we moved the hors d’oeuvres table against the wall and band began playing. Martin Edic came up to me while I was playing and said, “I want you to know. I really love your show.”
A better title for this entry would be “Leftover Vegetables and Hummus.”
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