Salon 83 // Influences

Hello, Internet. My name is Colin Goldberg, and welcome to the 83rd text question, is salon Today is Thursday, June 6, th 2024, and we have a wide variety of artists from all over the world here on Zoom. Today's topic is influences. So we have a couple of people lined up to get us started talking about their artistic influences. And I would encourage anyone else who's in the zoom to, you know, share on pretty much anything that you want regarding current work or anything else. So influences is really just a jumping off point and doesn't need to focus necessarily on influences, and certainly does not need to be anything that has been prepared in advance. You know, we started out with just a handful of people number of years ago, and everything was pretty much off the cuff and you know, I think that keeps it fresh. So we can start off with and when you share maybe just introduce yourself and let the audience know, and everyone else in the zoom know where you're zooming in from because I think it, it helps to establish context. So with that being, said, the 1st artist that's gonna share is Susan Detroy.

Good morning. I come to you from Eugene Oregon. Where it's sunny. You can see the sun's coming through the window. We're having lovely weather here, and so I jumped in because I love to share my work. And I'm going to share I'm gonna share. Video that I've been producing. And I would say that my influences are multiple. Particularly, I'm influenced by The natural world. I do a lot of a lot of my work. That's video is rooted in the natural world Roses and plants and forest.

Susan Detroy

And also I bite A lot. I bicycle a lot, and I've made a couple well, maybe 3 movies a new newest one that's actually gonna show tonight at a bike shop and I've I would say. Also. Since the Co working group has started. And I'm gonna say this, my work has been influenced and supported by the Co working group on Tuesday mornings. I feel like that has been. And I was saying this last night to somebody I was trying to get to come to the Co. Working group has been very influential and supportive. And I say, join us.

Susan Detroy

Join us when okay. So now I'm going to share my screen. And as I said, I don't have a lot of I didn't do a lot of prep, because I just said, Okay, I'll do this. Alright optimize for video. Alright. So I use capcut primarily, almost probably that's the right now. And I learned, Cap, that during the pandemic, so an influence for me was the fact that it was a pandemic. And I, took classes online on Zoom From the organization. That's not really doing that anymore. And this was. This, okay. See if it'll come up. This is the film that's like gonna show tonight at the bike shop that I completed in April.

Susan Detroy

Oh.

Susan Detroy

O A.

Susan Detroy

There.

Susan Detroy

Home. Go!

Susan Detroy

Who?

Susan Detroy

O.

Susan Detroy

O.

Susan Detroy

Ha! Ha! O, hmm!

Susan Detroy

Okay. So also. Colin let you know. I don't know if we're doing a timing thing today, but I also wanted to share a couple of other short films that I've been working on. Let's see which one do. I want to do? Oh, I another big influence for me is The. Natural world. And this is an in process film that I just submitted for a possible show in my city. Or to be shown in Eugene in the fall. And it's so. Anyway.

Susan Detroy

I'm not gonna show the whole thing because it's there. It's about 4 min. But.

Susan Detroy

Okay, I'm gonna stop that there. And I'm go back to and this is. And. Another influence that was pretty big for me was when I took the group class about I can't remember what it was called last couple of years ago, and I based a lot of my work on roses. They did a lot of visiting the rose garden. And this is another film that is in process. That again. A lot of influence from the salon. I many suggestions. And that, I integrated into my. Work. So this is The film.

Susan Detroy

And it's about 2 min. Shoo.

Susan Detroy

A.

Susan Detroy

A. Okay.

Susan Detroy

Way.

Susan Detroy

Okay.

Susan Detroy

There you go. Oops. It doesn't. Things are happening. So those are my latest projects. And you know, I'm influenced by my whole lifetime of making art. But I'm primarily influenced by photography, because that was my. That's how I entered in a really strong way. That's how I entered into the world of art and identified as an artist, as an identified myself as an artist when I was a photographer first, st and I have all that history of going to school and photography, and also just the black and white work. I mean that. And so my history informs what I make now, and I was heavily influenced by being in a pandemic and trying to figure out how to make how to make art At the same time, and what was available to me at that time. So that's still influencing me because I started biking and going to the rose garden as ways to cope with being in a pandemic and isolated. And then I reached out, and I found this salon started coming to the salon so that I would say all of that is influencing me when I'm when I'm working.

Susan Detroy

Thanks.

Alright. Thank you, Susan.

Sure.

And be before we move on. I just wanted to say that. You know, my colleague from graduate school. Patrick Lichty was signed on to moderate this salon, and he's actually not here because a friend passed away. Who's A pretty important artist, I would say, quite an important artist in the context of this group, particularly by the name of Roman Verostko. And I just wanted to share my screen really quickly. And just pull up something a little bit about him. So if any you guys are interested in looking him up, I would encourage you to do so.

Colin Goldberg

I had the pleasure of corresponding with him a little bit since this group started, and you know he's somebody that I would certainly count among my influences. I was a little bit Starstruck to be honest, that you know, we had been communicating, and did a couple of Zoom calls, and he, you know, he's part. He's now actually included in the Techspressionist, visual artist index. At 1st he was a little bit hesitant to you know, to be added to it. Because, he said, you know, he identifies as an algorithmist, which is I would say, probably you know, one of the if not the 1st actual Computer art movements? And he's been involved. You know, he's been involved in algorithmic art for or he had. You know he's a pioneer, basically him Ver vera molnar Chuck Csuri. I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing that right. But these are some of Roman's pieces, and he actually to me, has a direct lineage to Techspressionism, even though he himself didn't identify that way. He lived in New York City, during the time of the abstract expressionists in the 1950s live, and, you know, spent time with a lot of them. Downtown. Actually, he just looking at some of the emails that he had sent me.

Colin Goldberg

But he said that he had met quite a few of the American abstract expressionist while he lived down there. At a later time I'd like to assist. Expressionism awakens memories of abstract expressionism a title that many critics question the 1960s, and I forget the alternative suggestions at a later time. I'd like to share something about my experience with the abstract expressionists. I knew New York in the late 1950s and 60s. I did attend meetings of the club in the village that was organized by Philip Pavia, who is editor of the it is Journal, which is quite a famous journal. That led me to understand. The Brush Stroke Club consisted of active artists. Many lived in or near the village, and I met quite a few at Reinhardt, Motherwell, Philip Guston, and George, you know, come to mind, etc, etc. So you know, I feel like Roman in particular, is relevant to what this group is doing in terms of his direct involvement with American abstract expressionism and his interest in technology. Which you could see these plotter drugs of his on the screen. That you know, he actually inspired me. He was one of the artists. Probably I would say the artist that inspired me to get a plotter. And I think it's extremely interesting. What he was doing with the plotter is that you know he didn't just use standard pen plotting Pens. He actually mounted calligraphic brushes in the plotter arm, and you know, use that to create a lot of his work. He also wrote the code that generates that generated all of these images, and you can see definitely an Asian influence in the work. So I just wanted to share a little bit about this guy, you should definitely look him up if you have not come familiar with his work, because I think he's certainly you know one of the most I would say.

Colin Goldberg

Important computer artists that, you know, has come our way so far. So yeah, that's it. I just wanted to give him, you know, sort of some props, because if it wasn't for people like Roman, I don't know that, you know, many people would be would have moved in that direction. I know a bunch of the people in the zoom or at least a couple I know, Cynthia, I believe, and Nina might have known him personally to some degree. So Yeah, at any rate. I guess I will. I said I wasn't gonna share. But these, you know, I would say I you know I hadn't really thought about him being an influence until actually his passing, and he was 94, and the last time I spoke with him he was extremely lucid, you know, and still continuing to make work. This is, you know, a couple of months ago.

Colin Goldberg

And. Very inspiring, you know, individual and quite an interesting story. Personally, he was Benedict Monk for a good while, I believe, and Multitude of different lives. So I'd encourage you to look them up. Very interesting individual. So Alright. So the next artist that is up is Stephen Paré. Emma.

Calling.

Kristen. I have a quick question. We answer questions at the end that people have asked.

Yeah, I think that maybe we'll round it up at the end, because I think a lot of times, you know. There's some crossover or synergy between what people share. And it just makes for a more interesting conversation. So, yeah, so. And you know what? Like 1225. So we usually go, or we basically go from 12 to 1 30. So maybe like around 1, 1, 15, or something if it starts to. You know, the pool of people that want to present individually starts to dwindle, and we can kind of open it up. General conversation that seems like good way to go. So.

Colin Goldberg

Steven, you have the mic.

Thank you. Colin.

Stephen Paré

Yeah. It always seems like such a miracle. Anyway. I've what I wanna share about today is.

Stephen Paré

It's actually work that I did in 2020, and the significance of that date won't be lost on Americans who have been paying attention to our.

Stephen Paré

Current social situation and our political season. In a way, it comes as a surprise to me. I've always responded to things that were going on in my life, but I've always felt that the art part of art. Is not social commentary or advocacy, or anything like that. I was doing Revisions for my website, and I have a folder for our gallery for 2020 and. So in sort of looking at that I was in a way surprised by how much sort of social and political material there is, and not much sort of Passion I've got about it. Okay? So I'm going to show 5 pictures. This one is entitled.

Stephen Paré

A protest in a forest. And. The.

Stephen Paré

For me. There's a sort of a. Delicious irony, but it's also sort of an occasion for me for sort of a. Oh, God! It's revenge! The word I mean the idea of holding a. You know, a vigorous, dynamic, vivid Protest in the middle of nowhere, where it can be completely ineffective. Was a sort of a revenge. I suppose you know about the.

Stephen Paré

Events of 2020 turned into 2021 as well. I guess I could say something about.

Stephen Paré

Depicting something that I object to in a beautiful way. But I'm not sure what I have to say about that. It's just my inclination, and I'm not sure what beauty is, anyway. So the second picture. I think I'm not quite getting the edges here. It so it's you know, a 16 by 9 kind of cinematic sort of presentation, and it's entitled A Man with no name sings a national anthem. And. I'm was again sort of in reviewing this, you know, surprised by my. By my Anger! Frankly.

Stephen Paré

And can you see the whole picture here? I'm seeing all sorts of. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. It's important to see the top, because that's where the eyes are. So and this has had several titles. But it's something like an angry Karen or a Karen shouting, or something like that. So. That whole phenomenon. I've got a close friend from Kenya, and he referred to Karen's as people who call the cops when they see black people walking around. Which I think is a pretty good Definition. So Captured from some video very low res, and I didn't. Up resid very much.

Stephen Paré

You know. That was that's part of the idea. It's entitled Colabo. As, in short, for collaboration, there's kind of a French World War 2 reference or something like that. But anyway. The idea that there's a guy in an office somewhere on the right side, and his contact, who's going out and creating some kind of mischief. And finally, I did a great many pictures of Maga crowds and sort of.

Stephen Paré

Trying to get to the heart of it, trying to figure out about that, and taking a good look at who those people are. And I mean, if you look closely, you can see some Karen's in there, and there's some. I'm afraid I sort of made some of them a little more horrible. And that sort of thing again. I'm surprised by my. Reaction. I'm surprised by how vehement you know my reaction has been. And you know I do think of myself as somebody who's creating beautiful things for people's delight.

Stephen Paré

And so I guess, just lastly, to say that I.

Stephen Paré

As an artist it's a sort of.

Stephen Paré

Strange sort of delight to be. Allow myself to be influenced by what's going on around me. So I suppose that somehow the connection between a picture like this and let's call it art for art's sake. Anyway.

Stephen Paré

If I can figure out how to. Stop share. That's it.

Stephen Paré

Thank you.

Okay. Thank you, Steven. I did. Wanna note that. We have at least one Ca, actual Karen, a an artist named Karen in the lineup. So I just wanted to say that. You know, that is actually the name of individuals also. Not necessarily a you know, an Internet meme. Actually, my prom name is named Karen, and she's about as far from a Karen as you could possibly imagine. The stereotypical term. So I just wanted to put that out there.

Thanks for clarifying that. I'll just if I could just add really quickly, I'm to grab the mic for just a moment more. I remember. So I you know I was named Steven. I was always called Steve when I was growing up, and that was a name in my generation, for like an average guy. And there were a lot of people named that. And I remember seeing a Betty Boop cartoon where she's talking about her, Steve. In other words, or you know, probably a you know. A soldier or something like that.

Stephen Paré

So there was. I'm. If Karen denotes something. Steve, I think, denotes A very average person.

Right on. Well, you know, every every name or word has its own individual personal connotation. So I just wanted to add a little footnote there, so you know no feathers are ruffled out there in the ether, or you know. What have you so? Alright! Let me. Just see. To Istan Vernada.

Yes, good afternoon, everyone. I'm broadcasting to you from Port Royal, South Carolina. Which is the heart of the Golgi nation. I am going to share with you today a collection that I created on behalf of my graduating class from Bryn Mar College. We graduated in 1974. So that's you know, 50 years ago. So we have in our 50th reunion. Which was this past weekend, and I was a member of the fundraising committee for my class and we set the goal, the lofty goal of raising a $278,000. And I said, about have Crafting a marketing program that would help us succeed in obtaining that goal. And indeed, we did reach the goal.

Verneda Lights

And so I'm gonna share the images that I created. That I called the Sunflower Symphony, which became the portfolio From which I launched the social media Campaigns. For the college also did A covers for our class booklet and whatnot. And it has since branched off into an online store where class members and other members of Brynmar can buy memorabilia which allows them to Express how they feel about Bryn Marr. So I'm going to share that with you now, on parts of the Sunflower Symphony.

Verneda Lights

You.

Verneda Lights

Okay, can everybody see it?

Yep.

Okay. All right, I'm sharing from my dropbox folder. Because. You know, that's the most convenient way for me to pull up the images. And here we have a cat on a windowsill is the title of this. And all of these images were created in collaboration with. AI software Mid journey. So. Have to give credit, you know, for that. And my point here was to create a stained glass. Rendering of a cat, a steeple on the windowsillant. I never saw any cats on campus.

Verneda Lights

But in meditating about what to create. I came up with this Cat image and decided to convey it to the AI. And then, later on, in our discussions, I found out one of our committee members had not only had a cat. But had a but was aware of a community of cat lovers that secretly kept their beloved pet in their dorm rooms, and they often slept on the windowsills there. Okay, and this is a different cat on the windowsill, I think a more cuddly version of it.

Verneda Lights

And here we see also the sunflowers are figured prominently in the sunflower was the flower that I chose as a central symbol for the campaign, and I chose the sunflower because it turns towards the sun. And I saw that as a metaphor representing how women. Who lead nations and cultures forward, seek enlightenment and knowledge and justice in the culture so the sunflower, I thought was an apt image, and it also at times was used to symbolize this, the suffrage movement.

Verneda Lights

And also, you know, Bryn Mawr being an All girls college. I felt like, you know, it was appropriate. It's 1 of the 7 Sisters. And this is the energy owl which is, you know. The Fierce activist sort of component Of my class, because there are many members of my class who went on to craft careers in pertaining to social justice. And. I was surprised, you know, to find out how many pathways pathways had delved into that area. And I think it was because well, maybe we were influenced by The area in which we grew up during the 60 s. When there was lots of protests going on, and the Civil rights movement, and also the launch of the women's movement. And this is another rendering of the colorful owl.

Verneda Lights

And this image will be used to adorn a notebook. That will be sold in the store in our online store. And this is a version of it that is specifically branded for the reunion. This is an image that I'm very fond of. At Bryn Mawr we had this area Of one of the original libraries. That is, a cloisters. And the cloist is very quiet sort of a peaceful environment. And we often had special events there and here. I depict a diverse group of women. In peace, enjoying tea in the cloisters, and the move towards diversity. For Bryn Mar, as other colleges has been very fraught.

Verneda Lights

And when I was there I lived in the black cultural center called Perry House, which no longer exists. It was torn down and is now garden. So this Watercolor painting is A way of Conveying Bryn Mar's Journey and History of the Diversity. This also shows Somewhat of the diverse elements, and also the images of older women. You know I was tempted to make all of the female representations within the campaign sort of quasi youthful. And also in dealing with the A. I.

Verneda Lights

It was very challenging. 2 get the image that I wanted for our ages, I mean, we're in our seventies now, but we still are ourselves, you know. We look like how we did. We're recognizable as the souls that we knew 50 years ago. But I wanted to exhibit the camaraderie of the women at in our class, and I think this achieved it, although it took me a long time working with the AI in order to be able to get the gray hair and the level of wrinkles that I wanted.

Verneda Lights

They're split School. Okay, this one is called Golden Owl. And it's a riff on the Golden Girls. You know the TV show. To signify and do a not to where we are now in life, being in the last quarter century of our existence here on the planet. And so you see, the sunflowers also present there. The owl is a major symbol for Bryn Maris, almost like a mascot, and it's much beloved. So I wove the owl into many of the pieces along with the sunflower. Okay, same thing here.

Verneda Lights

And this is the Night Owl. I was pre-med at Bryn Mar. I majored in history, but I was also premed, and afterwards attended Medical School at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, now known as the Pearlman School of Medicine, and the science classes at Brynmar were very demanding, and I concentrated them all my 1st 2 years, so I would complete my Med school requirements. By the time I be finished my sophomore year. And then, in my junior and senior years, I focused on my history major that specialized in folk historical analysis. So I spent many nights studying.

Verneda Lights

And, you know, drinking coffee, and became a coffee lover as a consequence. And here, you see, the owl looks. Like they just had a shot of caffeine, you know. They look like they. Their eyes are like woo, you know, and the sunflowers even look like they're hyped so that would be me after night of hard studying, ready to head up to the science lab and take organic chemistry or other science Finals or midterms. And I varied the branding at the bottom, for you know, for social media, so that more than one person could use the image here. And this is it, you know, without anything attached to it, you know just the image itself, and it is actually being auctioned to the class. The class. Once they saw the artwork, they were so excited they asked me to hold a silent auction.

Verneda Lights

Which we did do. On the 28th of May and I was so exhausted by the time we held the auction, you know, and it's still online, and we'll continue until June 11th. Is more the same more the same. Here we also have another variation of the Golden Owl. And this one's entitled Sisters, because there are many fond memories. That the women have with their friends that were made during our college years. My best friend, unfortunately, did not survive to this reunion. She died in 2,016. So this is more of the sunflowers. More sunflowers.

Verneda Lights

And more sunflowers with a class of 1974. So that's me.

Verneda Lights

Thank you so much.

Thank you. Bernadette. Really interesting.

Yeah, by the way, we. Ways. And I mentioned that we met our goal. We raise over our goals. So we're approaching close to $300,000 that was raised in that pain. Isn't that cool? Yay.

Facing.

Yeah. Yeah. And I use an AI infused campaign to accomplish it. I did so because my point was this. We were born smack in the middle of the 20th century. Okay? And came up during turbulent times here in the United States. But here we are in the 21st century. And I wanted to leave a solid stamp that my class. We are Lifelong learners. And although we were born in 20th century, which I think is fabulous. It was a great time for me to be alive. But we very much Determined to be within, live within an influence.

Verneda Lights

What's going on here and now in the 21st century, and I want to do it. I wanted to do it in a way in which historians of the future could look back at our class and see if they saw nothing but our 50th reunion. They would be able to tell or discern core Truth about who we are as women in America at this point in time. So, thanks for listening, everybody.

Thank you. Grenada. Really beautiful work and an interesting application of AI. I also appreciate context in which you know the works being used in a way that is. You know, Commerce related. Supporting your Alma Mater. You know. It just it puts another perspective on how we, as far as can, you know, utilize our craft. So thank you for that. So it looks like we have 2 artists left, and I think, after Karen and Roz, we're gonna close out the individual presentation. So we'll have some time for just open conversation.

Colin Goldberg

So, Karen, you are up next.

Let me get my sound on here.

Karen LaFleur

And I think I've shown you this before, but. I've shown so many I can't remember. Oh, great. Seriously. Zoom, get out of the way. I need that button. There. Can you see the book with a solid gray background? Yes.

Yes.

Great. Okay? So this is a project that I've been doing for since the beginning of the pandemic, and in all honesty I'm still sheltering in place for all us people who have medical conditions. This still make us very vulnerable to viruses that are out there. So here I am in my little spot. I'm actually from Cape Cod, Massachusetts, on the island, and I have a little 2 or 3 room, Condo, and 4 years is a long time to stay to a 3 room condo. So you have to find ways to engage with the world. And so I started this project at the beginning of the pandemic sort of started from the influence that I have from the ocean, because if I had to pick one core thing it would be the ocean.

Karen LaFleur

Because when I was a child from 8 to 13 years old, I was just given a boat shown the ocean and said, Go at it, kid just be back by 6. So pretty much the ocean was my teacher, and I learned that inside of a tidal pool there was life underneath a rock inside of a tidal pool there was a different universe of life. If you've flicked over the sand underneath that layer of sand there was another, and it just kept going. So I have this sense of observation that I bring to my artwork.

Karen LaFleur

So during the pandemic, I said, Okay, how do I do this. So I started taking 4 photos a day. And that's it. It's just a it's like a meditation of just observation for observation sake. It doesn't matter where you are, and I was amazed at the beautiful art forms that I could find, you know, in a crumpled up piece of paper, or standing in a parking lot. So there's a little bit more detail. So you can see some of the individual photos that I'm taking.

Karen LaFleur

And then what I did is, and I've done this now for almost 4 years is I create these books annually. And this is the 1st one that I did. And I create these artworks out of the photographs that I take. My son showed me when I got my new apple phone that, you know. Forget the zoom. Just take the phone and bring it right down to an inch from the wall, or whatever you're trying to photograph, and it will jump into crystal clear focus. So he started taking these super detailed shots.

Karen LaFleur

And they can be. There's a wire bucket, a pathway lamp, some leaves, you know, a doily, an air conditioner. Whatever I run into, and I find doing this once a day is sort of like a moment to stop. And just look at the world for a moment, just for the sake of looking at it. Otherwise we pass so much, so much by. So it's like a drink, coaster. I don't know if you can read any of these moss on a stone or water bubble, toothbrush holder, house shingles.

Karen LaFleur

It goes on and on. So I end up doing, you know, maybe about 20 of these in a year from all the thousands of photos that I take.

Karen LaFleur

This is actually my stove top inspired this one.

Karen LaFleur

This is standing in a hospital parking lot. And I had this great crosswalk that was just a mess, and I was standing there trying to cross the street, and I said, Wait a minute. Get out the iPhone. Beach walks.

Karen LaFleur

This is just a study in glass.

Karen LaFleur

Feathers. And other asunder's fact. I think some of those are computer vents and stuff like that. The holes.

Karen LaFleur

And then my Galileo series. Cardboard box, a ceramic neuro frame. Now. Vinchets netting is a vegetable steamer.

Karen LaFleur

And I'll end with this the fact that now, if you've seen this before, I know I've shown bits and pieces of it, but I'm not sure I've shown the whole book, but it's now up online on Kunst matrix as an exhibit. So I'll put in the URL in the chat. So you can go there and have fun. Anyways, that's what I am sharing today. So I will stop.

Karen LaFleur

Thank you. Everybody.

Awesome thanks. So much for sharing Karen. Okay? And actually, I had one more artist message me asking if he could present briefly. So after Roz we have one more, Michael Woodruff, and make a hard cut off after Michael. So lots of time so Roz, take it away.

Sorry I was muted. Can everybody see my screen of John Berger Berger? I think it is well, I'm gonna go back in time a little bit here, but and just I'll try to make this sort of quick. But you may remember, John Berger, he wrote ways of seeing. And it's a book I certainly appreciate, as it's all about how we see women through the lens of male painters over the years, and he talks about all that and something is covering my screen. I don't want to leave meeting.

Roz Dimon

I don't know. I have something on my screen that is preventing me from oh, here we go. Okay. So I'm going back in time a little bit. He asked us to look at works like you know the Venus of Urbino? The woman lounging the classic overly sort of version of you know the male view of the beautiful woman going fast just put this together quickly. Eugene Delicaze reclining on a divan. Beautiful paintings. But this was this continually turned around, and Art and I'm bringing it one step further. Here we have men's Olympia, where we really have a different point of view of the woman, and she's looking right out and saying, Hey, you know she's not sitting back passively with the regard just being the male. She's looking right back out with her own sort of stature and. I'm gonna just go forward to a piece that I did in 95. As a lot of you know, I've been in this field a long time when since my paintings filled with pixels in New York in the eighties this is this is my version of the oval east.

Roz Dimon

And it stars. My husband, James Dawson. I have the toolbox around me. This was actually done in 1990 and I fabricated it out to a huge chrome that's about 60 inches wide and 48 inches high. And it's a it's got a kind of funny story with it. I put all the toolbox around it, because that was my new language I was so excited about. I don't remember if we had 88 colors on an amiga, or quite what computer I had at this point. But I did take a video camera out and took a picture of James, James and I both were working in like kind of the heart of capitalism in digital media. I was either heading out new media for Deloitte at the World Trade Center or at the Wall Street Journal, doing creative storytelling around. No, wasn't this time it was earlier. But yeah, this, I think I was making animations for Sd. Water, and doing my own work on the side and in the nineties showing fine art and doing how running my own company. But we were doing well, and he's in that. We're in our Soho apartment. My husband undresses. I photograph him and place the cat. Just so putting the toolbox around this and working in Photoshop to make this piece. And I always loved pixels so they're pretty evident down here.

Roz Dimon

This is one of my still images. I'm not even nearly at the place where you know, after 9, 11, where I started making paintings that you actually go inside the layers. My diamond states. But it's still always in has been for me about the final image, and this image actually hung in our Soho apartment at 6, and Prince Street and the tour buses, and it was it was backlit. It was fabricated out to a chrome backlit by a light, by light and a light box, and the tour buses in New York actually started stopping at this point as they came back up 6th Avenue. So James really had his time in the sun, you know.

Roz Dimon

But it's sort of like the woman is the guy is home kinda hanging out, and the woman's bringing home the bacon idea. So we've taken the whole woman to a whole. Another place. And as a feminist, and someone is always argued strongly for women's rights, and feeling so strongly about what's going on now, I thought, telling the influence of John Berger appreciating men to see these things and regarding the past with respect, but bringing us up into the future, and a quick, quick, just anecdote at the end I had. It was an early digital show in Soho all digital paintings, and my dealer called me and said, Ross, you want the good news and the bad news, and I was showing the Oda lease among other things.

Roz Dimon

And it'd been quite a kind of glitzy kind of exciting show. And he said, well, I said, well, just give me the good news, he said. Well, we know that James is the modern Oda lease, which is the name of the piece, and I said, yes, he said, but the bad news is you've been sued by a New York model. Who says he's the obelis. Now this gets to a lot of things because this guy I good thing. I kept all my recordings and everything. I reported James taking getting out of his business clothes, and getting nude and on, and placing it right on our kind of sofa couch, and putting the cap just so, and arranging him. And we went up to this kind of like shyster lawyer's office with our video and showed this to this person who was suing us for, like, I don't know thousands of dollars. And I think James's head was kind of swollen because he liked being confused for a New York model. But the whole thing kind of had a funny after effect, and of course we won the case. I mean, it was. It was just kind of an embarrassing situation all around where we came back down the elevator, and the guy who was the model was in the elevator with us after this whole embarrassing thing. And James he looks at James. Looks at James, is always like this. He goes he says. Hi! How are you doing? And how's it going? And the guy looks and says, I've been told by my lawyer not to speak with you, so we're like, well, I bet, anyway. So that's the end of this one. Thank you for listening. It was. It's it was a kind of a fun.

Roz Dimon

Influential thing about. Well. All of it. Thanks.

Thank you, Ross. I was. Not familiar with that particular piece. But have met James a number of times. So now it puts him in a little bit of a different light. There.

Yeah.

I.

Yeah.

Alright. So we have one more artist presenting and that would be Michael Woodruff. So take it away, Michael.

Hi, Colin. Thanks. Yeah. I hadn't planned to present, but you'd I know you'd mentioned the abstract expressionists. And that was like one of my first, st when I sort of think I can do what I do and be an artist that was like one of.

Do you mind just letting everyone know where you're zooming in from? If you don't mind.

Yeah, I'm in London. In the Uk, so I'm just gonna share my screen.

Michael Woodruff

So who you can see my screen. But anyone you know, being doing the Tuesday salons, which have been great and obviously can see my work. And I work in these animated kind of things, taking a lot of the abstract expressionists and lots of different influences from lots of different things I've done in my career. So I just wanted to show through. And I've taken a lot of archive and A lot of the ideas from a lot of the early art thing are movements. So if I just go through. And you know, as you mentioned the abstract expressionists, I always thought it'd be great to bring. You know a kind of motion. There's so much energy in those paintings, and so many layers and understanding and stories behind it.

Michael Woodruff

You know, being static, I always thought it would be great to try and bring. You know those gestural marks, the animation, the colors, you know, and play with it, you know, have fun. So I think one of my 1st one was The irascible 18 who wrote the let open letter to the met because they weren't allowed to show. So a lot of their movement was based on this idea. They weren't really happy with what they saw in the art world, and they weren't getting the recognition. And they just wanted to show their work.

Michael Woodruff

And I sort of identified with that because I've been seeing a lot of generative artwork and digital artwork. And it's not nothing new. It leaves me very cold. People aren't really exploring for me in the kind of artistic sense they're just doing things just to fill screens and various devices and chasing economies and cryptocurrencies. So you know, I always look back and just think, you know the action paintings of Jackson Pollock. Just all the energy with that. And obviously the rock code, the colors, the kind of you know what these images sort of the immersiveness of these images. And you know I played with them and adding them altogether and trying to create animated collages. But I'm always going back to exploring some of these artists, some I know a lot some like Hans Hofmann I don't really know much about, but having a look at the.

Michael Woodruff

You know the gestural marks, and going in really close and having a look at the paint, and how the colors and the splotches, you know, indeed. Decomposing, decompressing them, and then trying to bring them to life. You know. So that's an ongoing series that I've been sort of going back and forth on. But when we talks about inspiration I started with a mentor instead. I'll put, you know, some artists you like together. And you know I there's lots of artists since I sort of followed and kind of thing, but it's lots of very similar professional career that I've done. So I just wanted to roughly, quickly go through so many things here. But a lot of my influences are things like graffiti artist to share a lot of.

Michael Woodruff

I think, similarities with the abstract expressionists. So these kind of mark making flows. You know the ink, the process, you know. You can see how they The time taken to make a lot of these images they create. It's just a few here. But for me these were like one of the art school. Seeing these graffiti artists, you know, they could use any canvas and throw their ideas up. It wasn't just limited to the art studio. So they were really inspiring.

Michael Woodruff

And obviously because I work a lot in video. You know, seeing when I 1st moved to London. Bill Viola had a great retrospective. So obviously his work's been very influential, and people like Richard Moss and Marco Branbilla, who, I've seen his work. And Carla Gannis, you know the pain with the video format and using lots of techniques which is very influential. And also the 1st thing I started on was really photography, and obviously people like Ansel Adams.

Michael Woodruff

Dean Belcher, who works quite a lot in club culture. Obviously Gregory Crutzen and Jeff Wall, who, I saw retrospectives of as well in London, and you know they're massive, cinematic kind of images, and open my eyes up to really what art really was also as well that feeds into what I should do because of being graphic design as well. If, like design studios, there's 2 really influential ones from London tomato. And the design is republic. Who would then they were inspired by like Cubism and Soviet graphics, like the designers Republic in tomato, with more the abstract expressionists.

Michael Woodruff

And you can see a lot, you know, just looking through some of these images here. You can probably tell some of the you know the influences, but they were very now. They weren't political, but they're all very political, and. You know, working in the public sphere. So they were a massive influence on me when I was learning. But, like modern artists as well, like people like Daniel Richer. Who? Victor, who creates these? I can't really describe them in words. They're very visually over the top kind of very in your face pictures, but the heart back to those abtax expressionists and graffiti mark making. And you know I find these very.

Michael Woodruff

Very influential in the work I do. It's just a few more. There. Let's map this alright, and so I'm near the end here. Finally, I think something is like the collage artists. This is a great book I got recently. And you know, it's just a you know. It's very abstract, very graphic. And you know it's playing with all these textures and images, all found and archive. You know I find all that very, very interesting and so, and I can't forget all the old school artists who have influenced me. People like David Hockney, William Kentridge, who used animation, and he's probably one of the only.

Michael Woodruff

You know I always think animation for me is such an overlooked, and you know yeah, I hardly see it in any gallery. And Edward Pullott, so John Cecil Stevenson and abstract expressionists in the Hampstead in London. Jerry Bywaters, and some of my American trips I found, and finally someone who shares my namesake, Hail Woodruff, who I wasn't really aware of. I came across in a gallery his woodcuts. And then I had such an extraordinary career. And obviously in activism and working in fresco's. And he worked with had got things. Garcia in Mexico as well when he taught in the schools, and he created these abstract expressionist photo paintings and landscapes. And you know, a very diverse career.

Michael Woodruff

So yeah, that's my inspirations. Stop sharing.

Alright. Thank you, Michael. Very diverse and interesting set of influences. You know what you shared actually made me think about just one other quick person that I want to give a shout out to. That's related to expressionism, I would say somewhat directly, and that is a painter by the name of Angelo Ippolito, who's actually my undergraduate painting professor at Binghamton University. And he was a second generation abstract expressionist lived and worked in downtown New York after coming to America from Italy, and he was the 1st abstract painter that I'd ever met before I met him. I was working in sort of the fashion that was inspired by surrealist painters like Mcreeco people like that.

Colin Goldberg

And he kind of opened my eyes to abstraction. And you know the students that would ask him what his work is about. There were a couple of things I remember about him vividly, and you know him. Being an abstract expressionist himself, I think, definitely led me towards this idea of expressionism as a term because I identified with what he was doing specifically that he you know. When people asked him what is his work about, he had a really interesting response. He said. It's about paint.

Colin Goldberg

And he didn't have anything further to say about it. The idea that the viewer completes the painting is something that a lot of people have difficulty with even now. I remember trying to use that as a defense of my own work in graduate school, and many of my Mfa colleagues didn't like that. But I think that you know, realistically, a lot of times, working abstractly, at least for myself, I don't have a preconceived notion of what the ideas about you know it's where I'm at in terms of my mood, my mental state. What's going on in my life, and it just manifests in the work. So Angelo was definitely a big influence on me. His son.

Colin Goldberg

John and Bolito actually was also an influence on me, and in that he was a curator at the Guggenheim. I believe he's now at University of Maine. He works in digital media, you know, and within the art field. And he curated show called mediascape. That I saw in the mid, I believe, mid to late 1990s. It was at the Guganine, and so they had a small satellite gallery, and so and it had Manzune Pake. It had all these, you know now very well known people working in new media. And it just made a huge impact on me. So it's very interesting to think that both father and son, at least for me, had a very large influence. So I just wanted to mention Angelo, and he was one of the people that actually encouraged me as an artist. He said, you know there were. I had 2 painting professors, Hippolito and Shapiro and Shapiro said to us.

Colin Goldberg

You know, being an artist, is great, but if you have the brains to be a dentist you should go. Be a dentist and Shapiro said. If you want to be an artist, you know, I suggest that you move to New York and give it a shot. So I followed his lead. And you know, I appreciate that. So we don't have a whole lot of time to chat, but I'm gonna open it up. Now, if anyone has any questions for any of the other artists you know, or just general conversation threading things together, the floor is open. I don't.

Absentee.

So go ahead.

I loved your videos. They're beautiful. I was wondering about the music in the second video. It seems so perfect that wall, so what is that piece?

Mind me what I showed. Second, what was the second? The forest? So I'll have to get the. I'll look at the video to tell you the name of it, but one to reinforce once again that The Co. Working is influential. Since Cynthia Bath, Rubin suggested that I use Adobe stock for music. And I did a free trial, and I got licensed to a number of Muse up music, clips, or songs. And so it's 1 of those. And I'd have to look on the film to remember which exactly one it is. But that's how I changed from that experience. Was I changed from using the music that was in the editor.

Susan Detroy

Which is pretty deep. Actually, Capcot has a pretty deep sound and audio library, and I was also extracting and making some of my own. But then Adobe stock really gave me a lot of choices that were very well suited to my work. And I just jumped into that and I downloaded several previews, and then I license a few that I have in a library. And I found it very helpful. So I'll look up the name of the music, and I'll put it in the chat. Once I look it up.

Is.

Helpful!

Yeah, I just wanted to add to that and say, it's that adobe stock actually has freelance composers who are like real composers trying to make a living at it. So it's not music. It's, you know. As you can tell from the music.

It's very deep. The library they have is very deep and it was fun. It was fun Browsing the library and finding things that felt like they were gonna fit with the work that I do. So.

I just wanted to add on to that something that I think about a lot with my pieces, the diamond scapes, and also with the advent of AI and that is sourcing. I often talk about the Gutenberg press of imagery that we're in right now, and honestly, words really came into their own. So much after Democrat, the democratization of words through the printing press. When people started kind of sourcing each other in that bibliography that became part of novels and or when people would write about things. And I just I feel that it's so important for us to be aware of and talk about in this group. And I did love Susan. I thought your words beautiful, but I was going. Where's that music from? And I feel it's important to even source.

Roz Dimon

I often all of the imagery in my dining escapes. I source, if I'm gonna use something from a museum, I call them, or and say, Look, I will source you, and you know, always get permission. Cause I'm really we're. I'm painting with information. And as that goes on, I think the bouquet goes larger when we source even if it's to say like I congratulated on her Renata on her beautiful her pieces that she did for Renoir. It's amazing how much money she raised as well, but that, I said, thanks to you and mid journey. So even in my things, when I buy something like for pale mail, I'll source the fact that I purchased this picture of the World Trade Center. It wasn't. Or if it's things like that, I even say where I got it from, because I agree with Cynthia, that you know those composers and those people who are making these pictures.

Roz Dimon

I want them to come. Large part of this larger revolution bouquet that we're talking about here in this group. I have to say, this is just this meeting today, a lot among many. It's just so much more exciting, I have to say than some of the stuff that I'm that's in my local purview, which we have lots of talent. But I just, I really believe in what we're talking about here. This was a really great day. Thank you, Colin.

Yeah, up I always At the end of my films. I all any sound I used is always listed at the end. So that's right. So. Sandra, I. Give me a way to email you and I'll send you the information. It's really hard for me to get to find it when I'm on the zoom. So if you put it put your email in the chat, I'll email you the information.

Thank you. Susan.

Sure! Thanks.

Anyone else. Scojo, you're taking off very nice to see you, and a lot of the other kind of regulars I haven't seen in a while. It's awesome. I think, moving to once a month. Format actually works out really? Well, it gives people sort of you know, a chance to Gather their thoughts. Materials come back and reconvene so, and it also makes the whole production schedule a little bit more. Easy one thing that I did wanna mention is that. And I didn't realize this until looking at the calendar just now. But the 1st Thursday of July happens to be Independence Day, July 4, th so I mean we'll still have a salon. I'll be here, I don't know. Like you know, I'll be. I'll I'm willing to take an hour and a half away from a barbecue, or whatever might be happening on that day to be here.

Colin Goldberg

You know I feel like. Maybe there is some sort of metaphorical value to that. In that, you know, we are declaring our independence from the traditional art system by deciding to meet on our own and our own thing. And with that I also did want to announce an upcoming event that the text community is organizing, which is an our 1st museum exhibition. Which is gonna be happening in August. It's curated by Tommy Mince, who's been involved with the Techspressionist community for some time now. As well as a couple of other artists in the group.

Colin Goldberg

And it's gonna be happening in Brooklyn. It's actually our 1st museum exhibition. The South Hampton show was actually at an art center that used to be the home of a very amazing museum called the Parish Art Museum, which is now moved to a different location. In Watermill, New York, to town over. But kingsborough Museum is an actual accredited art Museum. It will be the 1st text in this show at the Museum, and the 1st expression is show at a museum in New York City. So it's very exciting.

Colin Goldberg

It's gonna be opening up August 7.th I believe the reception is gonna be on a Friday, August 9.th And all the information for this show is at Techspressionismcom slash Brooklyn. If you're interested in getting more information, I would encourage you to reach out to Tommy. As he is the lead curator, there's also a press release that he just supplied. And basically, it's in Brooklyn kind of towards the south side of Brooklyn, near Coney Island area.

Colin Goldberg

So yeah, I just wanted to mention that to you and to YouTube in case anyways watching this post facto.

I wonder, Colin, if maybe on independent on July, when we have a meeting, if ever, if we should have the theme either Independence or America, or something like that. It doesn't have to be like patriotic. Of course it could be like per Stephen. Steven's great thing today. I don't know how people can stay blind to what's going on. I really appreciated it. So I don't know. I just thought it's just an idea to throw out there as a, as a topic.

Well, you know our tradition, Roz, you come up with the topic. You are inherently volunteering to moderate this a lot.

So what do you think? Okay.

Alright. Well, you don't even have to.

All go.

You don't even have to wait till the after party. Then that's awesome. Alright, so well, actually, no, we have to. We have to follow the guidelines, which is like. I like to say that one of the very few things that I learned that was of practical use by being in a fraternity, which is Robert's rules and would anyone like to make a motion that we have the next salon topic be independence? Anyone? Okay, Nina. Nina makes a motion. Do we have a second.

Second.

Okay, all those in favor.

Aye.

Hi.

Oppose Alright Motion carries. We have a salon topic, independence for July 4, th to be moderated by Roz Dimon. So there we go. As for the last number of salons, I don't know how many the Promotional Graphic will be created by mid journey in collaboration with myself. So that's how I use. AI is creating the a little album cover. Art for these saloons.

They're great. They're wonderful!

Thank you. Yeah. I like to, you know, incorporate my design. Background a little bit what we do here. So we still have a little bit of time. Anyone have anything they'd like to share. Yet.

I just wanted to say that I just participated in the last cohort of the Loop Art Critique and Residency, and it was super fun, and so interesting, and just really enjoyed every moment of it. 6 weeks getting together in the metaverse, the on the loop in the loop metaverse and sharing art and critiquing each other's each other's work and our final. Our final exhibition is this, Saturday at noon Eastern time and. It's hosted on the on the loop metaverse, which is the same, the same technology as Mozilla hubs, and which we all know from Siberiana. So I especially wanted you guys to know about this because you're familiar with J, jumping into that particular style metaphors and moving around. So that's this, this last day for this current exhibition. And there's ongoing cohorts happening every 6 weeks or so.

Awesome, Lucy, would you mind posting a link to the chat so people will know how to get there? And it will it. Will it be on the main loop? Is it loop? I/O on the main loop website as well like, will people be able to get find their way there. So if people on YouTube who can't see the chat Google Loop Art Critique, you should be able to get the information there. And I'm glad you brought that up because, the artist actually that created the main image for the Brooklyn Exhibition, Renati and a chefska who also happens to be The in Instagram curator for the Techspressionist community she was recently interviewed on loop, and I believe she was involved in this West set of artists involved to some degree. Was that the case, Lucy? I'm not 100% sure. But.

Yes, she was a Jura for the I think it's the previous Residency.

Okay. Gotcha gotcha. Yeah. She had a very interesting interview. That's, I think, accessible through her Instagram account. She has a link tree link there. And the whole interview process happens within the corner of the metaverse. I don't know exactly how people talk about different areas on the metaverse. But the loop zone so awesome very cool. Done. Does anyone else have anything.

I have. I have a quick announcement, which is Sigraph. Asia is going to be in Tokyo in November, December early December, and the submission deadlines are June 20.th So I'm going to put the put this here in the. I realize not everybody can hop over to Tokyo so easily. But, on the other hand, I'm hearing from all these people. Oh, I really want to go to Japan. So if you really want to go to Japan and make it a work trip. And last time we were in Tokyo, the city organized city of Tokyo this had some really nice tourist, you know, a day trip on a bus up of mountain with great and great food up there and stuff. So anyway.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

I just put that in the chat.

Awesome. Thank you for sharing that Cynthia. And I just did get a question. Regarding the show in Brooklyn. The curator is Tommy Mints, MINT z. So if you look him up you should be able to find all the relevant ways to get in touch with him. I'm not sure if he's still accepting submissions at this time. But he certainly, you know, has a website and social media, so you could always drop the line and see if he's still accepting submissions. And he is actually a tenured professor at Kingsborough of digital art and photography. So and he creates very interesting algorithmic art.

Colin Goldberg

Involving photography. And I believe, python code that he wrote so up. Alright. Well, we're coming into the home stretch here. Does anyone else have anything they'd like to share? Simply, I'd be interested. You had some interactions with Roman right?

Yeah, I was chair of the lifetime achievement and digital art committee Sig graph. And we gave him the award. And I have one of his pieces. I don't not sure where it is now. I gotta find it and Yes, and we corresponded just 2 weeks ago. I mean, we corresponded regularly through Facebook Messenger. And just 2 weeks ago we were in touch, or 3 weeks ago. Maybe.

Did you have any thoughts or things you would want to share about him, since this is sort of is commemorating his, you know his passing and life.

Well, one of the things I wanted to say about Roman that I actually have been thinking about everyone when we were talking about influences is that Roman was very much influenced by philosophy. He and I, and when we were talking about like I'm not ready to volunteer to chair a session just yet. But one of the things that I was thinking of would be. It would be great to have a session where people deliberately talked about their non visual influences. Because for Roman the non visual influences were really important in his work.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

So. And the fact that he had been very involved in the church. Roman, are still being recorded. Yeah. Well, it's public knowledge, anyway. He managed to break 2 rules at once. He his wife Alice was also his therapist and he, you know, it became a very important relationship in his life, I mean, obviously eventually got married, and she was very involved in ideas of psychotherapy that came into his, his work very deep thinker.

Cynthia Beth Rubin

Okay, so let's.

Yeah, and thank you very much. For that. You know, I think it's really interesting how he Crossed over and Patrick. You know, is kind of a connection to Roman as well. Through Minneapolis or Roman was based, and I didn't realize this. I was just looking at another email that I had received from him that before. He said, Minneapolis proceeded Silicon Valley, and it was my good fortune to get a job teaching our history. The Minneapolis College bar and design in 1,968 Minneapolis was the home of control data. Honeywell Sperry ran super computer and univac at a research center in St. Paul. So I didn't realize that actually, it's really interesting historically, in terms of just the history of technology and computing in this country.

Colin Goldberg

And he did. Wanna go on to say, and this is very gracious. Him that this is meant to let you know that I appreciate, respect the work of the Techspressionist and wish you well. So that's amazing, you know. And I feel like you know, in some way we can kind of carry on his tradition of just doing. You know he was somebody. I think that just did his own thing and you know that's something that I think is very admirable. So

And I'd like to point out that Roman was actually Dean of Liberal arts. So this idea of bringing in from I concepts, from other fields From philosophy and psychology. Was what he did. His academic life.

And you know, and he actually there is a an art center that was established in his name the Roscoe center for the arts. Which is it's not located.

Latrobe, Pennsylvania.

Right, Metro, and that art center has a fairly large collection of his work, and also you know, I believe other artists relate to what he did. He had a pretty large volume volume, volume of you know, pre digital work as well. Traditional paintings, you know, very interesting. Kind of work that preceded was interested computing. So again, I'm encouraging here and on the web to look them up and check them out so alright. So I think we will wrap up the recording.

Colin Goldberg

And you know, do we have this kind of tradition of an after party, which is basically just an extended bit of time after the recording stops where people can hang out and kind of you know. Shoot the shit, so to speak. And also, you know, in lieu of having an advisory board. The after party is the Advisory Board, that is, people wanna stick it out through the end of the salon and hang out afterwards. That's generally where the ideas and planning for the community sort of happen in the collective way. So you're all welcome to stay. I'm gonna have to close out my participation at some point to go pick my daughter up from elementary school. But you know, I think it's a good way to get to know some of the members of the group also, and kind of an informal way. So yeah, I'd like to thank you. All this is gonna be posted to YouTube, and some Relatively reasonable amount of time. And yeah, that's about it. So we look forward to seeing you guys again on the 4th of July.

Colin Goldberg

And we will stop recording in 3, 2, one, and cut.