21 January - Anne Truitt, TURN

LAUNCHPROJECTS - I am in the process of reading Anne Truitt's book Turn. Captivated with her work since I encountered First years ago (pictured above, left), I have since wanted to know more about the woman who made these pared down, elegant, powerful sculptures. Turn is a graceful journal of her thoughts and views on life, art, family, aging, and humility. I will blog more about specific sections of her writing - as with Weschler's stunning biography of Robert Irwin this is a book that I am reading slowly to take each word and insight as deliberately as it is written.

Her 5th of January, 1984 entry discusses meeting two curators from the National Gallery to discuss the cleaning of her sculpture Spume which had become dirty since it was acquired in 1972. She describes revisiting Spume after so many years, "one hundred twenty inches tall by 25 1/2 inches wide by 13 1/2 inches deep, luminescent blues and violets, it loomed over me. I straightened up to face it. In the first second of looking, I did not recognize it as my own work and only felt its presence, with an involuntary shudder. I was so taken aback that I rocked on the feet. 'What on earth - ?' were the first words that came into my mind, along with the very particular sharp tension I sometimes feel when I am making my work: as if I were being forced face to face with a mystery equally threatening and alluring."

She describes telling these "practical men with an object to deal with" that the best way to clean her sculpture is with soap and water, which took both curators aback - they were accustomed to complex problems with elaborate and expensive solutions. These important and otherwise occupied men stirred in Truitt a keen awareness that "once again my sculpture is a bother because it is large and has a delicate surface. Despite years of self-discipline, I can never entirely avoid identification with my work and when it is thought bothersome I feel as if I were myself criticized. I have thought a lot about this aspect of my work and wonder sometimes if the vulnerability of my sculptures does not combine with their size to awaken the subtle hostilities evoked when women retain innate delicacy even while asserting their existence."

So utterly in touch with her work and its deep resonance, Truitt throughout her journal epitomizes the force that exists at the intersection of confidence and vulnerability. Searingly truthful about both her wisdom and her limitations, Truitt once stated that life experiences are "the ground out of which art grows." Truitt lived a simple yet fertile and joyful existence. Her life and sculpture bring to mind a quote that Truitt's peer Louise Nevelson stated in a lecture in 1980. "True strength is delicate."

18 January - DJ Ruscha

LAUNCHPROJECTS - Ed Ruscha played guest DJ last for Southern California National Public Radio station KCRW. Part of their Guest DJ Project, he played Jessie Belvin "Good Night My Love," Mason Williams "Them Sand Pickers / Them Sticker Gitters," Hank Ballard "Annie Had a Baby," Sleepy La Beef "Little Bit More, and Eddie Ruscha (yes, son of Ed) "The Rose."

From the radio station's website:

Ruscha’s work exposes him as an outstanding thinker with revolutionary contributions to our visual language. This list of musical favorites offers a peek for onlookers to connect intimately with his inspirations. It’s a benevolent paparazzi. Which makes the small tale of his last pick even sweeter.

A person like Ed Ruscha is a significant icon creating significant icons. He’s a major contributor to the birth of the Pop Art movement. He’s an artist. Ed Ruscha doing KCRW’s Guest DJ Project… this is exciting news.

Ruscha works with minimal and simple images that leave a surprising and glorious heft in the afterglow of their impressions. Constructed with the same minimal principles, hearing Ruscha’s picks of Doo Wop, blues and folk make sense. Of course it’s the music he grew up with, but it’s also the music he chose to grow up with. These genres are composed with simple arrangements that produce organic, sincere and real music. Without pomp and artifice, people exist in the lyrics. Stories and a human element. I see this in Ruscha’s work — stories, people and so much beautiful commentary in his artwork’s seeming simplicity – all ideas spoken with just a few visual notes from artist-songwriter Ruscha.

Ruscha’s final song selection was one of his son’s, also an artist and a fairly active DJ, Eddie Ruscha. He discusses the innocent song naming process that involved his grandson’s participation. Listening to the story, it’s hard not to acknowledge that Ruscha’s proud of his family and loves the sanctity and intimacy that art creates, the tale closing with, “…and that’s how these things get done.”

Here is a link to hear Ed's selections in his 10 minutes of DJ fame: KCRW - ED RUSCHA

images: Ed Ruscha in front of an iconic painting, Ed and Eddie for GQ Magazine.