d’Arte Board

Darumas

jdhastings — Tue, 17 Sep 2013 18:24:33 +0000

I am very interested in Japanese art, particularly Zen art and poetry, and have occasionally incorporated some imagery from that tradition into my own work. Thematically however, my work is often the opposite to the spirit of most Zen art. Whereas meditative spontaneity, improvisation and simplicity are central to actual Zen art, my work is often busy, labored and chaotic. Personally, this somehow makes sense to me, though I’d understand if it flummoxed a fan of the original tradition (I’m pretty sure most followers of traditions I dabble in would be annoyed by me).

In these pieces I am working with an image of Daruma (or Bodhidarma), the founder of Zen Buddhism, who is central to Zen art’s imagery. These pieces represent him crossing the Yangtze River while balanced on a single reed, a feat he was required to perform while fleeing the Chinese Emperor, whom he had just insulted.

In the short term, these pieces are an experiment with a sort of collaged drawing style that I’ve used before, but never with a sewing machine. Each collage is comprised of pieces of 7 individual drawings of Daruma (based on an original source drawing I made), or collage of painted canvases. I will post these originals at the end. Each piece is 9″ x 6″, multimedia.

What I like about these, and where I see some connection back to the source material, is that while traditional western drawing techniques that I used in most of the original pieces are very deterministic, where you can achieve virtually any intended effect given patience, the collages add a large element of chance. Even knowing what the processes will be before hand, the end result can’t be predicted until the actual work is finished and viewed. While still not meditative or improvisational this element of chance that may result in unexpected results or outright failure make the pieces “live” to me in a manner that drawing static, predictable works don’t.

That’s a lot to say about these, though I really consider these sketches. Tests of methods I may pursue more fully later. Caffeine!

(This piece has already been mounted into a book that I’ll post at some other time)

Source Drawings:

Drafting Pencil

Acrylic

Marker

Ink with brush

6B Pencil

Collage of acrylic on canvas

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZbUaxsB3WQ

-JD

Art Exchange

jdhastings — Tue, 27 Aug 2013 23:55:29 +0000

My Friends’ Scott and Amanda’s daughter, Chloe, recently sent me an artwork that she drew for me.

In return, I painted these 2 unicorns rearing at each other to put in a short art book.

-JD

Conceptual Requiem for a Ninja Yogi Dream

Tom Bennett — Thu, 22 Aug 2013 19:01:06 +0000

I’ve returned to a collaboration with Toni Tiller, making conceptual images illustrating her dream narratives. She posts her dreams at www.http://lastnightsdreams.wordpress.com/page/2/.

This is a conceptual mixed media sketch on paper, one of a few I’ll make for her dream, posted on 3/17/13, “Doing yoga with a ninja”.

Tom Bennett

ink, alcohol-based ink, graphite, gouache on paper

Is This The Greatest Artwork Ever Created?

jdhastings — Tue, 20 Aug 2013 06:54:58 +0000

Probably not, but MAYBE.

-JD

Power Outage Redux

Tom Bennett — Fri, 16 Aug 2013 05:02:07 +0000

It’s been so long since I’ve posted here I can’t even be sure I can identify myself. It’s like returning to my bedroom after sleeping in the woods for a few months.; it’s dark in here. A Power Outage happened in my brain, a cognitive outage. This is a return to a medium I’ve been fooling around with the last few years; a mix of alcohol-based ink, graphite, india ink and gouache.

Tom Bennett

Power Outage Redux, 2013, ink, graphite & gouache, 8 x 11.5

New Tape

jdhastings — Tue, 13 Aug 2013 18:27:33 +0000

Gearing up for a new project I needed to make some new materials in a specific color scheme. Hence, new tape.

-JD

Finished Version Of the WIP

jdhastings — Tue, 06 Aug 2013 19:42:38 +0000

This is tiny and ultimately insignificant thing that I made, but nothing else is ready to post yet.

-JD

QuickWIP

jdhastings — Tue, 16 Jul 2013 21:53:39 +0000

This didn’t take me a week to do. The other thing I did needs to be photographed though and that’s a production, and it’s not finished either.

-JD

New Doodles

jdhastings — Tue, 09 Jul 2013 17:30:19 +0000

Drew these this weekend, as some sort of 3D asteroids (as in the video game).

-JD

Our First Official JRP Book

Rich Kiska — Wed, 03 Jul 2013 18:06:16 +0000

JD and i have been working on projects together for years in a sort of loose messy fashion but we have decided to make it official. when we work together we are now Jade Rabbit Productions, and we even have a little green bunny logo. this is our first handmade book based on my dream from 10/08/12.

comments/crits/feedback are always welcome.

JD handled the cover, quilted paintings and collage.

these are ones i worked on, the piece on the left is a graphite rubbing with a layer of tracing paper and the right is applique and embroidery.

we split these, i’m on the left and he’s on the right, applique and hand lettering.

reverse split, painted stenciling, and on the right it is cut paper and applique.

JD’s back cover with our new logo