Hmmmm

12.31.5 - Again, I keep forgetting to post anything here. Thanks to Tie-Rack for enjoying my duct tape painting gallery.

10.31.5 - Nice mention of my attempts at artistry on Bay Art News.

10.30.5 - I went to Nellie King Solomon's opening at Brian Gross Fine Arts during the week. I think that Nellie's style and what she's trying to do is slightly similar to some of my duct tape work - except her medium of choice is a superball.

10.24.5 - Open Studios went great. But what is really great is San Francisco made out of jello by Elizabeth Hickok. Amazing.

10.8.5 - I'm disappointed. I don't add anything here for almost a year and no one calls me on it? Hmph. Why do I even bother. Well, Open Studios 2005, for god's sake, is almost upon us. But you know what? Besides that, so many things have happened in the past year that I don't even know where to start. This section needs a lot of help. Should I turn it into a blog and join the other 100,000 people that start blogs every day?

11.15.4 - My first solo show at Place Pigalle in Hayes Valley in San Francisco.

11.8.4 - Open Studios 2004, in slideshow form!

10.26.4 - Yao! Man, it's been over a month since I added something here. I suck again! Open Studios was very very successful for me. Thanks to everyone who came in and bought something.

And I've been invited to do my first solo show. Aw yeah!! The opening reception is going to be Wednesday, November 3 from 7pm-10pm:

Place Pigalle
520 Hayes (between Laguna and Octavia)

My work will be there for six weeks. I'm going to have all new Black and White pieces, done specifically for the red walls of the bar. I'm also going to have Distraction up in the bar - the first time that it has been outside of my studio.

9.20.4- Yes yes. Put it on your calendar! Open Studios and the last show out of my basement studio before I have to leave. You can get an idea of what Distraction - Project 100 is but in person really is the only way.

9.7.4 - I'm really slacking on putting things up in good time. Well, here's what I've been up to lately: Duct Tape Paintings.

8.26.4 - Turns out, I don't have to leave my studio and I'll actually be opening half the space up as a gallery. It will be open during hours of the furniture store Zonal Furniture in Hayes Valley in San Francisco. If you're in the neighborhood, drop in and head downstairs. Say hi if I'm working in the studio part.

8.3.4 - I realized I never put this painting online. 10 Selves was an experiment I did in 2003. You can see the connection between the painting and the Half-Self Portrait needlepoint. And the needlepoint I'm working on now also kind of feeds off of the portrait/silhouette form.

7.12.4 - I've finished a new needlepoint: Rooftops.

6.11.4 - I've posted my newsletters on the site. Yay, fun. Fun fun fun.

7.1.4 - I've opened my No-CARB Diet store at CafePress. Postcards, shirts, hats, baby and dog gear, etc. Get political, wear your colors, or buy them for Republican people you know. They'll laugh. I promise.

I'm still doing pinback buttons I still do but not through the store. If you want to buy some, send me an email and we can talk about it. I handed a number out at the Farenheit 9/11 opening and then this little wonderful snippet got sent to me from my buddy Sandra who gave a button to Bill Clinton at his book signing in San Francisco. The rest can be found at www.mistersf.com:

"Sandra reports, "I found the book signing fairly well organized’Mr. Clinton shakes your hand and you have about 2 seconds to say something. I handed him a pin that said, 'No C.A.R.B Diet Plan. No Cheney. No Ashcroft. No Rumsfeld. No Bush.' He needed help reading the small type so Paola read it aloud. Mr. Clinton looked at me and said, "I like that!" He thanked us both for wearing our Kerry buttons. I just grinned a lot and nodded." Thanks, Sandra. Sounds like fun!"

6.16.4 - The SF Bay Guardian is holding their annual online voting for Best of San Francisco. One category is Best Local Artist. Now, I'm not telling you how to vote. I'm just mentioning.....

5.23.4--Few notables: You can see my latest needlepoint--Half-Self Portrait. I've also organized a lot of the site, finally moving all sold pieces into their rightful space.

Lastly, I have a needlepoint in an auction at Canvas Gallery in the benefit for Artspan. Go bid on it.

5.7.4--I promised. And I delivered. My new series, Organic Black and White, is ready for your perusal. Only $25 each! What a bargain.

And in more exciting news, go down to Artist Xchange in the Mission to see my work represented in gallery form.
Here are the details:
Artist-Xchange
3169 16th St.
San Francisco, CA 94103

Store Hours
Monday - Closed
Tuesday thru Friday - 12PM - 9PM
Saturday - 10AM - 9PM
Sunday - 10AM - 8PM

5.3.4--I've been a little busy and a little sick, but I'm going to be adding quite a bit in the next week or so, including a new needlepoint, a series of new black and white works, and possibly a better way of looking at Project 29.

And on Tuesday May 25, I'll have a needlepoint up for auction at Canvas Gallery in San Francisco, part of Artspan's Annual Auction Benefit.

4.17.4--The wonderful and glorious Karen Pak and Charlie Oppenheimer, temporarily of Reno, Nevada, are the proud owners of a brand new bouncing baby Pagoda.

4.11.4--The illustrious, immensely talented Bohdan Cap is now the proud owner of this four-part piece.

4.10.4--Kind of a different direction for me in painting lately. Black and white, organically looking stuff -- at the bottom of the Photo Archive. I like it so far. This is on two separate canvases, 30"x40" each. I think I'm going to try this style on some boxes I have, all 5"x7".

3.28.4--Exciting things happening. I sold another painting! Yay for me and for Ms. Emily Schubert, the new owner of My Koi Got Joy.

Break It!, the needlepoint on the gallery main page, is going to be included in the Potrero Hill Library Local Artist Show from April 3-April 24. There is an opening party Saturday April 3, 7-9pm. The library is on 20th at Connecticut in my neighborhood. Come on out.

3.17.4--Ok, this time I have no excuse. So, I'll just give you some updates:
Here's the wedding present I gave to my friends Justin and Therese for their wedding.
I also updated by show listings.
And Distraction is almost complete. At least, the large piece is done and the smaller panels are almost complete. Here's the latest installment.

2.24.4--Oh man do I suck! I haven't updated anything in a month, almost. But I have good reasons, I swear. And I've been doing good things, don't you fret. Distraction is continuing along -- check it out. Three new days! And it looks very very different now. Oh, and Peacockian Phoenix has been sold so stop asking me about it. (kidding--no it has been sold, really. Just you can keep asking me if you want.)

1.26.4--I've been invited to be in a six-week event by Urban Color, with opening night February 2, 2004. It's at Fulton Street Social Club (1751 Fulton at Masonic, formerly Storyville). I won't be in town but go have some fun. I'll have 5 pieces in the show, ranging through my "career." My first painting that I did while living in Prague, one that was on my second business card, one that graced the pages of the Open Studios 2002 booklet, and finally one that looks so much better in person.

1.4.4--New Year! New stuff. I've added two more days to Distraction--Painting in progress. If you want to skip the old and just see the spanking new, start here. But if you want my opinion: it's more fun to go through the whole thing from the start. But do what you wish.

12.28.3 -- Here are a few artists who have blown me away recently: environmental artistAndy Goldsworthy, aerial photographer Yann Arthus-Bertand, chocolate portraitist Vik Muniz, and Gerhard Richter, who a few people have told me they think of when they look at my newest paintings. His abstract work, that is. I can't touch him in that photo painting deal.

12.6.3--Busy weekend this past was. I switched my paintings at Cafe Arrivederci in San Rafael. Get on up there for dinner some night if you so choose. Also, I got to live out a dream of mine and go on stage at a Flaming Lips show as a costumed animal! Yes yes yes! So, there I am, above, half-goldfish, half-bear being tickled by a psychedelic zebra-pig.

12.1.3--Did you miss me? It's been a few weeks. I'm sorry. Here is my latest project: Distraction--Painting in progress. Based upon a new friend's encouragement, I've decided to document the progress of my latest painting. I tried this once before but never followed through with the progress detailment. I'll be adding to this section as the painting continues to evolve.

11.14.3--I just finished this needlepoint (above). It's my latest and greatest and you're seeing it one day after completion. Not sure if it did what I was planning on but not bad. I do have an idea for the next set of needlepoints. Oooooooh, anticipation can kill you.

11.4.3--Starting on 11.7.3 and going through 1.3.4, I'm going to have paintings and needlepoint pieces in Cafe Arrividerci in San Rafael. Nice Italian place. Go get something to eat surrounded by my colors, if you so choose. If you really feel adventurous or supportive, I'll be giving a 20-minute talk (Yikes!) on Monday, 11.10 at the restaurant around 7:30pm. About what? I have no idea yet. I think I'll just wing it. But come by and introduce yourself.

11.3.3--This is my latest painting. It's in a very, very early stage. As I get time, I'm going to set up a page to track the progress of it. To give you an idea, the large piece from 29 also started like this. And the final result doesn't look anything at all like where it began.

11.20.3--With everything going on in the world, from the bombings in Turkey to the Michael Jackson deal to reality television, I wonder sometimes if animals are the more intelligent lifeform. Of course, I haven't seen skunks throw a human show yet.

11.14.3--I went and saw the Rapture tonight at Great American Music Hall. My friend gave me the CD last week and I couldn't stop listening to it. And while they put on a good show, I kept thinking: I am the least white person in this place. I've never really thought that before at a show. But watching people dance there -- and I respect anyone for letting it all flow -- I just couldn't help but think that the robot and the moves that make you say "Oh please don't do that. It hurts me just to watch you move like that" -- who knows. Maybe I can't dance. But if you can do The Pause, well you just feel it.

11.12.3--Everyone may want to be a DJ but many people really can't beatbox even though they think they can.

11.11.3--Last night, I drove over the GG bridge to San Rafael, home to a great sushi place, Sushi to Dai For. In fact, I didn´t actually eat anything but did have a welcome drink with my friend from Sapporo. That´s the third sushi place I´ve been to in the last five days, including one where they play Led Zeppelin on the stereo and the butoh waitresses and sushi chefs dance like crazy.

11.10.3--I keep meeting new amazing people who landmark great domain names and fill them with wonderful fun-ness to help me distract myself during the day. Of course, after looking at her site, you'll obviously have a craving for the real deal

11.3.3--To alleviate my occasional boredom, I love usurping companies' sites, which have the fun feature of being able to send notes to your friends through their site. How about writing a message in a candy bar or a voodoo curse never gets old. Sometimes, the standard card works well too. It's just hard to tell a friend how you're feeling sometimes so let a pop song do it for you. Or, let that blind date from friendster know what to expect tonight.

10.28.3--I'm deliriously delighted to report that bluestninja is spreading a little color throughout the world. So, time for a global shoutout to a few of the recent countries who have visited:
Portugal: Some day I'll come visit and drink it up to your beautiful, sad sounds.
Dominican Republic: I was supposed to be there over my birthday in 2002 but I went to Panama in October instead.
Greece: Amazingly, you survived the visit of my swarthy Ukrainian friend and his wife.
Hong Kong: If you'd like to send me a copy of Battle Royale 2, I'd appreciate it.

10.24.3--I love my city. It entertains me to no end, with great local music like Thee More Shallows and Citizens Here and Abroad, writers who write a hell of a lot, and artists who like monkeys and cats. Not bad. Not bad at all.

10.22.3--Pure genius. Hours of fun. Oh, and more fun. This time with lines.

10.21.3--I have certain food hang-ups. Over the past two years, I've gotten past these ones: grapefruits, mushrooms, and bananas. If you, like me, enjoy eating, check out Fud Court. And not just because I've been a guest judge.

10.20.3--If you live in New York or are going to be visiting there any time soon, you should try to get over to the Whitney Museum of American Art to see Jay Defeo's The Rose. If you don't know the incredibly long and engrossing story of this painting, try this article about the San Francisco based artist. And thanks to Barry Zevin for introducing me to this artist.

10.16.3--I have a huge admiration and love for perpetrators of great hoaxes, especially when they are art related.

Han van Meegeren duped most of post-WWII Europe. Good work, Han.

10.15.3--I started work on another large painting tonight. My second 6' x 6' canvas. I forgot that I had walked all over the canvas so when I unrolled it, there were tons of footprints on it. I circled them with charcoal, then drew outlines of hands all over the place. Since I work in heavy layers of paint, I drained all of the turpentine I had and painted faded squares of color all over the place. When you paint in lots of layers, it's freeing to know that whatever I do now will eventually be covered over

down the road so I can do anything I want. Once done tonight, I frantically called friends looking for someone to go grab a drink. After finding a friend, it then dawned on me that I was smiling manically because I was high on turpentine fumes. Being a painter has unforeseen benefits.

10.12.3--While driving on the highway is normally enjoyable, driving 800 miles to visit for less than 36 hours makes me rethink the whole not flying thing. But, I did get to see garlic spewing on the side of the 5 for about 10 miles because a truck had a leak in the side. Let's see a plane match that kind of entertainment.

10.9.3--I think it's time to start writing randomly and spitting out thoughts and things. I have my own Web site so why not. Today I saw a street sign on a pole that had ripped itself out of the cement down on 17th and Carolina. It had to be because of one of three reasons:
1) Someone drove by and knocked the sign over. Boring reason.
2) A giant wandering the city streets got bored and pulled a Cool Hand Luke on the sign. I bet he didn't get caught cuz he's too big.
3) The sign was so distraught with our new governor that it decided to escape. However, sadly, after ripping itself out of the ground, realized that signs and poles don't have any feet and it was left to lie down on the sidewalk, sad and disappointed.