Tomorrow Night the Hammer Museum Presents Ai Weiwei's Film "Human Flow"

In L.A.? Tomorrow night @hammer_museum presents  @aiww 's film "Human Flow" and Q&A with Ai Weiwei https://t.co/pFlTnIuLyD pic.twitter.com/zMsYYTTUAC

— Gregg Chadwick (@greggchadwick) January 3, 2018

You Are Invited - Sept 15, 2017 : Luchador’s Dream - Inspired by Sergio Arau (New Paintings by Gregg Chadwick)

by Gregg Chadwick

Gregg Chadwick
Flor De Asfalto (for Sergio Arau)
56”x86” oil on linen 2017

With his music, words and images, Sergio Arau has inspired me to create a series of paintings that feature him as the main character in my painted movies. Rock Star, actor, director, screenwriter, and artist Sergio Arau has often performed while wearing gear honoring Mexico's most famous wrestling star El Santo (The Man In the Silver Mask). Known as lucha libre, Mexican wrestlers such as El Santo are defenders of the poor and vulnerable. By taking on the persona of the Luchador (wrestler), Josh Kun writes in Audiotopia: Music, Race, and America, Sergio Arau and his bands have mixed "the traditional with the contemporary, the rural with the urban, the American with the Mexican, the charro with the rockero." 

My paintings in Luchador's Dream carry Sergio Arau into a Los Angeles seemingly pulled from the lyrics of his songs or gathered from scenes of his films that were left on the cutting room floor. 

Gracias Sergio!

The exhibition runs from September 7 - October 7, 2017

(Luchador's Dream is, in true rock n' roll fashion, a completely unaffiliated, and unofficial satellite exhibition of 2017: Año de México en Los Ángeles / Mexico in Los Angeles 2017)

What: Luchador’s Dream - Inspired by Sergio Arau (New Paintings by Gregg Chadwick)

Where: La Galería de la Cocina - Santa Monica Art Studios, 3026 Airport Ave. SM 90405 

When:  Opening - September 15, 2017, 6:00pm - 8:00pm

Website: www.greggchadwick.com

Film Review - Generosity of Eye: Art Transformed into Education

by Gregg Chadwick


Generosity of Eye: Art Transformed into Education from brad hall (Full Film)


Generosity of Eye: Art Transformed into Education is a must watch documentary by Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Brad Hall that documents William Louis-Dreyfus, Julia's father,  as he explains why he decided to sell his bountiful art collection to benefit the Harlem Children's Zone - an educational program in New York, created by Geoffrey Canada to break the cycle of generational poverty for the thousands of children and their families in the Harlem community. 

Julia is often on screen with her father and their scenes together are rich with familial affection. As Julia interviews her father about the art that William has collected over the years and the artists who have created it, she is often overcome with emotion as she discovers the depth of her father's passion for art and for justice.

Geoffrey Canada, William Louis-Dreyfus, and Julia Louis-Dreyfus  

Julia says, "Dad doesn't just collect art, he collects the artists who create it." For her entire life, Julia's dad has collected paintings, sculptures, and works on paper. Currently, the collection has grown to over 3,000 pieces and includes artworks by Kandinsky, Dubuffet, Giacometti, George Grosz, Red Grooms, Robert Traylor, Catherine Murphy, Stone Roberts, Graham Nickson, Raymond Mason, Rackstraw Downes, Jean-Baptiste Sécheret, Nicola Hicks, Robert Birmelin, George Boorujy, Thornton Dial, and many others. 

In a telling scene in the film, William explains his thoughts on society's reaction to injustice:  "I think there are two types of people that make up our political outlook. One is a person who sees something happening and thinks that it might happen to him and therefore is worried about it. He notices it and thinks to himself,"That could happen to me." Therefore, he is against the injustice that is happening to a third party. And then there is another kind of person who looks at the injustice and says to himself,"Thank the Lord that is not happening to me." So the fact of it's happening to another person he is for. He is for it psychologically because by virtue of this happening to another person, it's not happening to him. The other guy is against it because when he sees it, he thinks it might happen to him. Therefore, he is against it." 

William's passions are inspiring: art, justice, and humanity.

Astronaut Performs David Bowie's Space Oddity While Orbiting the Earth

by Gregg Chadwick

Tonight, a stunning cover of David Bowie's Haunting song Space Oddity was released from space by Commander Chris Hadfield on board the International Space Station. The imagery is stunning, reminiscent of the film Moon directed by David Bowie's son Duncan Jones. Sometimes life really does imitate art, even while orbiting earth in a tin capsule in space.

UPDATE: Since I posted this last night, Chris Hadfield's video has gone viral with over a million views and counting!

 David Bowie's Facebook editors loves the clip stating,"It’s possibly the most poignant version of the song ever created." Their Facebook posts continues:

you may recognise the name of one of those involved in its creation.
We’re talking about Chris's fellow Canadian, the lovely Emm Gryner, who was a part of the Bowie live band in 1999/2000. Here’s what she said on her blog (http://smarturl.it/EmmBlog) regarding her involvement:
“The task was in front of me. I came up with a piano part. i then enlisted my friend, producer and fellow Canadian Joe Corcoran to take my piano idea and Chris' vocal and blow it up into a fully produced song. Drums! mellotrons! fuzz bass! We also incorporated into the track ambient space station noises which Chris had put on his Soundcloud. I was mostly blown away by how pure and earnest Chris' singing is on this track. Like weightlessness and his voice agreed to agree.And voila! And astronaut sings Space Oddity in space! I was so honoured to be asked to be a part of this. You wouldn't get too many chances to make a recording like this and not only that, to make music with someone who - through his vibrant communications with kids in schools to his breathtaking photos to his always patient and good-humoured demeanour - has done more for science and space than anyone else this generation. Planet earth IS blue, and there's nothing left for Chris Hadfield to do. Right. Safe travels home Commander! ”

And the New York Times has a nice piece on Chris, the video, and his time in space.

  

Find out more: Twitter Facebook Google+

 With thanks to Emm Gryner, Joe Corcoran, Andrew Tidby and Evan Hadfield

Incident at Hanging Rock

by Gregg Chadwick

At the Hanging Rock  by William Ford (1820–1886)

1875, oil on canvas, 79.2 x 117.5 cm

Collection of the National Gallery of Victoria

As March drew to a close, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street band played a concert that Australian music writers have lauded. I wish I could have been there to see Springsteen and the band rip it up at Hanging Rock. 

Incident on 57th Street in Australia 
Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band 

Live at Hanging Rock - Second Night - 31-03-2013

 Major international musicians often perform outdoor concerts at the Hanging Rock reserve. Leonard Cohen graced the venue in 2010 and last month Springsteen performed two shows at the conclusion of the Australian leg of his 'Wrecking Ball' tour. The musical venue at Hanging Rock is temporary and currently used about once a year for large concerts. 

Though I have spent quite a bit of time travelling through Australia over the years, I have not been to Hanging Rock in person. But, I have been there in the visions of painting and film, especially Peter Weir's remarkable Picnic at Hanging Rock. Weir's film, based on the novel by Australian author Joan Lindsay, focuses on a group of girls at a fictional Australian women's college  who vanish during a Valentine's Day picnic at Hanging Rock in 1900.


Roger Ebert described Picnic at Hanging Rock as "a film of haunting mystery and buried sexual hysteria" and remarked that it "employs two of the hallmarks of modern Australian films: beautiful cinematography and stories about the chasm between settlers from Europe and the mysteries of their ancient new home." That chasm between European culture and indigenous Australia especially revolves around the conception of time. Joan Lindsay in her autobiography, Time Without Clocks, describes how these mysteries felt to her:

"There were certain days when I sat at my typewriter in the empty green-aired room feeling like a deep-sea fish suspended in its natural element. Not only in my fish tank but outside in the sheltered valley all natural objects seemed in a state of suspension as they do immediately before an earthquake. It was a characteristic of the Marsh and perhaps had something to do with the old volcanoes seething and boiling so far below the earth’s crust that even the geologists hadn’t discovered them." 
- Joan Lindsay,  p124 (Time Without Clocks)

Art in all its guises evokes the mysteries of time and the most compelling creations leave the questions unanswered.

 

The Darkness - Leonard Cohen

Live at Hanging Rock - 21-11-2010

December 3-5, 2010 at Esalen: Gregg Chadwick and Phil Cousineau on Stoking the Creative Fires

Gregg Chadwick
Jordaan Window
25cmx25cm oil on wood 2010

Coming up on December 3-5, 2010, I am honored to lead a workshop on creativity with writer Phil Cousineau entitled Stoking the Creative Fires: Nine Ways to Rekindle Passion and Imagination

Phil Cousineau's book "Stoking the Creative Fires" is an impassioned volume on creativity that combines myth, story and personal pilgrimages in a primer on the creative life. My painting "Fire Dream" graces the cover.
We will use this book as a stepping off point for the upcoming workshop on creativity. It will be a rich journey through myth and art at Esalen. Sign up here: Reserve this workshop
We hope to see you there!




The Esalen Institute is a non-profit organization founded in 1962 by Stanford alums Michael Murphy and Richard Price as an alternative educational center devoted to the exploration of what Aldous Huxley called the "human potential." This world of unrealized human capacities that lies beyond the imagination has brought to Esalen a steady influx of philosophers, psychologists, artists, and religious thinkers.




Phil Cousineau at Esalen

Allan Hunt Badiner explains the history of Esalen:
"Esalen takes its name from the Native American tribe, the Esselen, that once lived there. Sitting on a former ceremonial ground, the Esalen property was the site of frequent cross-tribal peace gatherings. Esselen cosmology described Big Sur as a “weaving” center for human culture and drew representatives from tribes, near and far. Today, Esalen draws 10,000 people a year from around the world to participate in a wildly diverse menu of workshops. It brought former Russian President Boris Yeltsin to the West, popularized Rolfing and Gestalt, and nurtured books like The Tao of Physics and The Dancing Wu Li Masters. Esalen created a context for understanding psychedelics, established the healing power of massage, and championed wisdom of the body. Visitors often mention that the land itself and spectacular coastline setting feels almost sacred." Allan's words are not surprising, given the retreat’s lineage of powerful teachers such as Abraham Maslow, Joseph Campbell, Alan Watts, Fritz Perls, Allen Ginsberg, Ida Rolf, Joan Baez, Boris Yeltsin, Philip Glass, Gregory Bateson, Buckminster Fuller and countless others who have visited and taught at Esalen in an effort to discuss, debate and develop revolutionary ideas, transformative practices, and innovative art forms.


Sunset at the Esalen Institute

More at:
Phil Cousineau
Gregg Chadwick
Stoking the Creative Fires
"Esalen: America and the Religion of No Religion" by Jeffrey J. Kripal
Esalen at the Edge. From Zen and hot tubs to glasnost, the famed Big Sur retreat has changed our minds, bodies, and ways of looking at the world.
- by past workshop participant Allan Hunt Badiner