I was riding my mountain bike on a certain series of trails in Northeastern Kansas this past summer, getting lost in the forest - which by the way is one of my favorite things. On one wrong turn I ended up finding quite a pleasant surprise. I had recently been studying sculpture in college, and on this wrong turn I saw a series of very old, rusted, metal automobile frames. The forest must have grown up around these hunks of metal, or just consumed them over the decades. Some of them were literally sunken into the trees and raised off of the ground, hanging in the air. The trees made them a part of themselves over the years. So being someone recently fascinated by studying sculpture, I thoroughly enjoyed this "found art". In fact it still is one of the best sculpture "installations" I have ever seen. You can't recreate decades of natural growth reclaiming and consuming man-made machines.
This is a painting I made in early 2015, it is a crow on a branch sitting over the Kaw River. The inspiration came from an early 19th century photo I found online depicting a design painted on a Haida canoe oar. In many folklore traditions the crow or raven is an animal that can pass between worlds easily, transform into other animals, or is a form that shamans often take. This symbolism is also applied to the river, which can represent a passage through time with two worlds on either side of the river.
My dad was a farmer who grew up in the depression in Kansas, with his older brothers who may or may not have participated in a small bit of bootlegging. His dad was a farmer in Kansas. My great grandparents came from Czech. I have always felt intensely connected to this Kansas landscape in which I still find myself. Even when I traveled, I still felt the intense pull to be "back home" which to me means the flowing flat landscape of endless earth matched with endless sky; the intense, wind driven landscape that is Kansas. Summer-times in my childhood I would travel often to and from Northeastern Kansas and Wichita, Kansas. To this day some of my favorite memories are looking out the window in the backseat, talking to the moon at night, and gazing at endless fields of wheat, flowing in the heavy Kansas wind; it was the closest thing I knew to an ocean.
I have lived near the Kaw River Valley in Lawrence, KS for about eight years now and will be leaving this place soon. About five years ago I got a mountain bike and began riding so I could get in shape. I lost seventy pounds and discovered a connection with nature. I discovered forest trails in the river valley, rode across beautiful land with turkey buzzards, hawks, deer, coyotes, foxes, and an endless amount of grasshoppers. Part of my rides I would ride on a flat trail enjoying the changing fields of corn and soybeans through the seasons; other parts were spent playing in the forest. During this time I photographed this spot multiple times of day and multiple seasons. Someday maybe I will make a Monet like series of paintings about it.
This is the headpiece to my latest sculpture I call "Heart of Atlantis". Carved wood and cow bone, carved circuit boards and electronic pieces, kyanite gems, antler and misc. The welded steel torso needs a little work but I am really proud of this part of it. The goal was to create something between animal, gasmask, and cyborg. Like even the animals are going to be wearing gas masks soon, and/or be part mechanical.
Wood, bone, and steel sculpture by Ed Tajchman (detail)
David Lynch is one of, if not my all time favorite artists. And one of my favorite works of his is the movie "Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me". The more surreal aspects of the movie are what attracted me - the log lady, the mystical elongated man, the one-armed man, and especially the sequences at the end inside the black lodge. Lynch defines this vision with elements like the red curtain, the black and white floor, the music, the way the figures move unnaturally, lurching and phasing in and out. This is exactly the kind of fearless, psyche driven, haunting and boundary expanding sort of work that I live to take in.
I was also blown away by Lynch's ability to weave abstract, dream-like symbolism into the film - like that the evil part of the one-armed man still resides in the black lodge in the visual form of a little person (appropriately enough), who dances slow and strangely; and talks like a backwards tape recorder. I still often think about that last aspect particularly, the strange way "the arm" talks in the dream sequences and at the end - it is creepy and strange in a way that a real nightmare would be. It's hard to capture the conscious sensation of an actual dream in an art form, but Lynch does it better than anyone - again and again.
This is the latest sculpture from myself (Ed Tajchman) It is made from Cedar and Atlantis wood, carved cow and buffalo bone, cast aluminum. It's called "Jezinka" which is from the word "Yaga", which in modern Czech translates to "wicked wood nymph, dryad". The idea behind it was my take on a Baba Yaga shack. Baba Yaga is an old Slavic myth about a witch who lives in the woods in a shack that travels around on chicken feet. The bones represent those of her victims, but if you approach with caution she might offer a boon. The piece evolved into more of a totemic embodiment of Baba Yaga.
Edward Tajchman's "Chicken Thing in a Bear Mask". As I am preparing for the fall semester this summer, (I went back to college a year or so ago), I have been contemplating what kind of concepts and forms I want to create for my second semester of sculpture. I spent a long time running away from education and focusing on my own approach to art. Well, I must say studying sculpture has made me fall in love with art all over again. So, being in heavy brainstorming mode, one of the front running sketchbook entries to possibly be made into a large sculpture this fall is this guy. A chicken type creature with a long neck and a bear mask on. The shape and texture of chicken and turkey feet (and other similar bird feet) have always fascinated me for some reason. Maybe it's because you can see the link between lizards, dinosaurs and modern birds. Scraps of ancient DNA still present in our world today.
Collapsing polarities keep reforming in the folds surrounding that event. Pounding in the brain, get the new thoughts down when they present. Perpetually caught in the moment just fading away. Staying fraught at the thought of staying slightly ahead , completely different then what was read last autumn. Still knowing that the summer is almost free, so say yes. Who will confess? No more obvious decrees revealing molded archetypes with thoughts ripe, already before the person out of the inside understands. Eyelid twitches, remembering all the stitches sewn into the skin.
Explode onto the grass, spiders in-between the toes no one knows those peripheral notions waiting like potions inside your brain. Do not refrain there is no stain deep enough that it is not a layer of a prayer in a new way. Day to day through every night reveals no more moons as we drifted without a planet beneath us. But not us only me I realized after much too long. Maybe still some day a heart song. No more wrongs take me back to any place I could know. Only forward is every thing there is that I must go to. So many arms still waiting to receive my chest against them, my words exchanged between our brains, disdain waiting to be resolved inside each others hearts. Deliver unto us a rhythm of raucous laughter how many faces caught in a schism blend their tension like daggers barely piercing the heart. Every last minute of the new day falling away.
I recently painted live at a bar and the experience was great. I painted this painting below of a gorilla. I also just had a show at a cafe that serves healthy organic food. My whole house now smells like that food, it is awesome. The energy of my paintings was enjoyed by staff and customers and my paintings absorbed the smells and energy of them. An exchange if you will. My point is that art should be where people are, where people live. Not stuffed away in a gallery with awkward silences or stare downs with guards in museums. I have never enjoyed myself more then this summer, sharing my art with people at festivals, bars, and cafe's. Art and life and people. I say yes!
“The more you learn about the dignity of the gorilla, the more you want to avoid people.”
-Diane Fossey
"Holy Purple Gorilla" acrylic on canvas, 30 x 40" Ed Tajchman.
The self portrait below is me at age 17. Three aspects of self, with the shadow self grabbing from behind. This was a frustrating time for me, like many people. The poem is written and edited July 2014.
"Between The black ink shining as it dries, and the pink morning light fading from your eyes, between the dried root finally cracked and broken, and the hoots from the owl awoken. Between the dried paint on my fingers, and the feint whispers echoing in my soul that linger A memory stirs of when a few strands of her auburn hair hung over her eyebrow. I hope she remembers to use all ideas from all moments. Seeking the shiners in her every where now. Whole world optional alone rolls forward, from the breath of a clenched brow when the pharaoh hound returns the favor. The world and everything inside of it seen on the shelf yesterday. Every small moment glued to the walls carefully" -Ed Tajchman
Here I have two things to share, a painting and a poem of the same name. Speaking of poetry, I feel like I need to mention Van Morrison's 1968 album Astral Weeks, which I listened to prolifically during the work on the painting. I agree with the critical reviews of the album, it is not entirely unlike Van Morrison's other albums, but definitely had an unusual, unique, and otherworldly feel to it. I am guessing that he was very experimental in the days before the album. It is hard to put ephemeral, universal, real, and raw feelings into words and music, but Van Morrison does it in this album. My favorite part of the song (or any song ever for that matter) is:
The dynamo of your smile caressed the barefoot virgin child to wander
Past your window with a lantern lit
You held it in the doorway and you cast against the pointed island breeze
Said your time was open, go well on your merry way
Past the brazen footsteps of the silence easy
The concept of a mere collection of words arranged in a certain manner making me feel better about life, or mystified, or excited, or reflective is not an easy thing for me to digest to be honest. So when it happens on rare occasions I really try to let the moment sink in and let it expand. I really truly love this stanza of writing. It touches on so many moments of my own life, and any life I think. This is why I make art, to try to create things that reach out across time and through spaces to reach other souls. So here is my painting called Awakened Lifetimes:
Also I have some prose that accompanies the painting, (many of my poems are works in progress this is one of them). You can read that at the end of the post. I will say a little bit about it here: Life is much more then we see with our physical eyes. There are currents that run deeper and wider then any of us can imagine. The chance to experience these currents in our everyday lives is a great thing. I am always looking for opportunities of transformation. Ideas that challenge my thinking, amazing artists of all kinds, people, groups, projects, ways to learn and grow etc.
Accepting who you really are and all that you are and are not, and sharing and learning from others is one of the first steps on the road to knowing these kinds of experiences. The evolution of the soul is one of my primary goals in this life. Getting past personal ego and learning what you can in any situation is a tough concept sometimes but it is a great way to grow. There will be assholes and greedy people in your life. Rather then engage them, learn how to pacify their interest in you and take what you need to from them. You can learn how you do not want to act, by watching assholes, for example. Accept your limitations. Know them. Use them to your advantage by working around them appropriately, think about how they make you unique. Those were just some of the thoughts behind this painting, but I always want to hear what other people see in my art, that is more interesting for me to think about. So please leave your comments about what you see in the work on this post! Awakened Lifetimes
How can a tree like me pray for remembering what the rain tasted like dripping from my branches onto my cheek and into my lips.
Tip toe-ing across the earth so tensely recoiled it can't remember to always stop moving so fast.
I love you so much and I am finally telling you now.
The sky said as I finally felt the joy of my thunder speaking.
How long had I spent searching I can't remember.
It was raining moments of our souls, fragments of awakened lifetimes pouring outwards everywhere at the same moment, in all places at all moments.
But what if I forget how to run frantically in the night's thunder? How long will it be until I remember again?
This is a recent painting of mine called Full Moon at Pomona. There is a lake a couple hours away from where I live called Pomona Lake. Pomona is an ancient Goddess of fruit trees. The figure in the painting is using his mind to see (the hand coming out of his mind), as full moon rays shine down around him. His eyes are like mirrors with no pupils (adding to the idea of him using his mind to see). The beauty of the full moonlight puts a spell on him. The staff in his right hand is a recurring symbol in my paintings. It is a fancy version of a Neptune style staff (Poseidon). The man is a guardian of knowledge, the staff is a symbol of power and responsibility. The man is in black and white because he is a work in progress, he is trying to transcend his dualistic nature and become something more then that.
This is my painting tentatively called "Bird-Man smelling a Flower". I say tentatively because I have discovered that although many of my compositions are planned beforehand there are aspects to my works that I can be completely unaware of. That is, sometimes other people also see things in my work I would of never voiced, but which are entirely valid and which helps me to understand the work.
"Bird-Man Smelling a Flower" by Ed Tajchman, all rights reserved.
Also many of my paintings belong in a larger narrative. Some of my approaches to painting include, trying to understand the self, the external world and all things in it; through symbols, dreaming, and the creative process. Lately especially I have discovered layers of mythic meaning between, and in many of my works of the last two years. In fact, I am writing a fictional story based on the works as a whole. So when I say a work is "tentatively titled" it is because I have not had the time or feedback to understand the work, or how it fits into the larger puzzle of what it is I am trying to say.
I have been writing in this space for about the last 7 years of my life, and this is the 300th post of Modern Art Quotes; my art journal. It started as me, sharing my casual observations about the creative process using art history and quotes from artists as inspiration. It then evolved into an examination of my own thoughts about my approaches to my creative process. It became a place where I could stop and think about what I was trying to say with my art, and why. It is now a place where I share my prose and recent artwork.
In the last 7 years it is clear to me, especially when seen through the lens of this blog, how far I have come in how I express myself in my art and in my writings. For example the artwork shared here of mine in the last 30 posts or so is by far some of if not the best artwork I have done in my life. The me who started this blog 7 years ago would not have known how to do some of the paintings that I am doing now, he would of been inspired at seeing the work.
There have been a few key triggers involved in the growth of my style and themes. Traveling abroad to 2 different continents, meeting and working with many artists from around the world, challenging myself to do things that seem daunting. And more recently a decision to go back to school, starting with studying mythology, which has already helped shape how I want to tell stories. Hopefully in another 7 years I can look back at the current me and think the same thing, that I have gotten so much better. The more important thing for me especially is how much work I am doing now. It is a lot, at least compared to the earlier me. My goal is to continue to increase my rate of production.
I like the fact that I have this written record to accompany my work. Part of the reason one of my favorite painters is famous today, Vincent Van Gogh, is because he had about 700 letters he had written (many to his brother Theo) that talked about his life, his work, and his thoughts. Paired with the paintings it is quite a magnificent body of work, especially given the fact that he did it all in about the span of 10 years.
So, . . . in the tradition of the earliest posts of this blog I will share part of one of my favorite letters of his. Words I have heard over and over again in my head since first reading it about 20 years ago when I was 16 years old.
"What a pity painting costs so much! This week I had fewer
worries than other weeks, so I let myself go. I shall have
spent the 100-fr. note in a single week, but at the end of this
week I'll have my four pictures, and even if I add the cost of
all the paint I have used, the week will not have been sheer
waste. But there, we live in days
when there is no demand for what we are making, not only does
it not sell, but as you see in Gauguin's case, when you want to
borrow on the pictures, you can't get anything, even if it is a
trifling sum and the work, important. And that is why we are
the prey of every happening. And I am afraid that it will
hardly change in our lifetime. But if we are preparing richer
lives for the painters who will follow in our footsteps, it
will be something.
But life is short, and shorter still, the number of years
you feel bold enough to face everything.
And in the end it is to be feared that as soon as the new
painting is appreciated, the painters will go soft."
-letter from Vincent Van Gogh to his brother Theo, August 1888
The 2nd to last stanza has always been my favorite, (But life is short, . . .) It sometimes runs often through my head, especially when I force myself to go into my workspace and paint when I do not want to. I have to remind myself how precious the time to paint is. I have to remember how short life is, and how much there is that I still want to say. I constantly feel like I have just begun to make art. I wrote earlier of how continual growth is part of the goal of my art, or well in my life in general. The more time every day I can spend making my art the better, and the more I can fill in the puzzle of this mosaic I am building. My entry into the grand scheme of life in this crazy universe.
Speaking of entries in my mosaic, here is my most recently completed acrylic painting: Octopus Man in a Sea of Sound. It is on canvas and is in the size of 26 x 38 inches (66 x 96cm). As stated in my last blog entry a lot of my paintings from the past couple years are slowly telling a larger story. This guy is one of the characters in that story. You can see a keyhole on his throat, which may indicate he needs a certain condition to be met before he can reveal the information he has been receiving. There are sound waves with symbols all around him. His lungs are like the branches of a tree and his legs are the roots or octopus legs. There is either a sound-wave running through his middle or he is in the ocean.
I will end this epic 300th post with one of my own recent works of prose. I have been writing prolifically recently, which has been very cathartic for me.
Between This Head and Yours
Imagined expectations only reveal facets of the conceiver. Work hard to put on others a direct observation. Grabbing pens unconsciously wherever you go because magic is possible to emerge from them. Becoming a guardian of magic's emergence, he didn't sign up anywhere, just showed up every day alone.
Between The black ink shining as it dries, and the pink morning light fading from your eyes, between the dried root finally cracked and broken, and the hoots from the owl awoken. Between the dried paint on my fingers, and the feint whispers echoing in my soul that linger.
Jumping through hoops, not getting caught in loops, walking and eying others watching you a bit too long. Hide your eyes and hum a song, want to get where you are going no one else can come along. Twist and dodge the blows that life that throws. Just keep going and push it through, who cares if you forget how to be true. How to trust who when the chips fall, cookies crumbling. Cannot feel the thirst when the cold overwhelms.
This is one of my recently completed watercolor paintings. You can see a being-like energy from the plant communicating telepathically with a human, showing him a chart of symbols. If you notice carefully you will see some of the symbols in this painting reappearing in other works of mine. Just recently I have had a vision of the story that ties all of the paintings together, keep reading future posts for more on that later. Also in this painting, each of the walls have taken on a different rhythmic pattern.
This is a painting of mine from 2013. I call it Man Falling Deliberately in a Dream. It is based on a lucid dream I had once where I jumped off a cliff in full confidence that I could stop halfway down if I wanted to, and did. A very powerful feeling is evoked in lucid dreams, I like it. Following it is a poem of mine.
Man Falling Deliberately in a Dream by Ed Tajchman. Acrylic on canvas 2013.
Soul is Another Word for Dreaming Lost in the never ending valleys and hills is where It found me when my heart was still.
The light singing inside those Eyes, shining amidst the shadows.
They silently and subtly released the binding that held my wings tied.
If I said I knew what it felt like to fly before now, I lied.
This is an ink drawing of mine that I just completed (Feb. 2014). The winged figure is someone who has appeared in many of my sketchbooks. You can see his brain connecting to a star-like shape with rays extending from the brain and from the star. This suggests he is creating reality in cooperation with the external symbol (star). The figure on the right is holding his hand over his chest. The empty circle on the far right has waves of cascading symbols that extend onto the figure holding his chest.
"Cure For Pain" by Ed Tajchman, oil pastel, pencils, ink.
Tentatively
called "Cure For Pain". I am in a mode where I am finishing
things I started years ago. The medium is oil pastels, pencils and ink. On
the right written in pencil if you were wondering it says, "to know that
nothing matters after all, to know it young and be a poet". One of my
favorite quotes from Jack Kerouac. Also the painting is partly based on
a song by the Rolling stones. I will see if anyone out there can guess
which song, it should be pretty easy to guess based one huge clue.
This painting is a work I completed late 2013. It is ink and watercolor on a 22 x 28" piece of watercolor paper. It is called "Heart for Brain, Soul for Body". It is a sequel to a work I did when I was 18 years old. Keep reading here at my art journal for a future update discussing both works.
It is a person with 2 faces, which could indicate past lives for example, with a more energy like being opening up a space between the faces like he is going to occupy the body. You see the energy of the being at the bottom flowing through the mouth of one of the faces, indicating possession of the body by the energy. The blood is flowing upward towards the heart, which is where the brain should be. Also you can see the heart is connected to the moon on the left. This could symbolize an attachment to, or way of understanding based on the cycles of the natural world.
I call this painting, "Goddess Explaining The Area Of Visual Communication". I had a dream once in which a message similar to this was conveyed through what I perceived to be a higher being of some sort, or special visitor at least. So this is a painting to honor that amazing vision I had in that dream. It is a Goddess like figure who is transforming at her will, a synthesis of plant and human and spirit. There are small human figures inside her feet, and many symbols throughout the piece.
Edward Tajchman is a modern artist who uses oil and acrylic paint, sculpture, watercolor and whatever medium the world offers to create artworks that are gateways between this world and other places. He attempts to bridge the spaces between dreams, between worlds, between people, between time and space, between all natures of reality.
Contributions to Modern Art Quotes are Gratefully Accepted
Email Ed
You can e-mail me here (no spaces): e d t a j c h m a n @ g m a i l . c o m Feel free to contact me with questions of any kind or if you would like to submit an article related to modern art and/or the creative process.
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All artwork by Ed T. is clearly marked as copyright. All rights reserved, derivative works, posting, copying, everything. Violators will be prosecuted. All writing is copyright by Ed T., all rights reserved. Contact: edtajchman @ gmail .com
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