Aaron Nagel

I got into Montreal late last Tuesday night and met my good friend Chris Sherriff at a hotel downtown. I met Chris 12 years ago in Toronto on tour with my old band. We stayed with him and his parents every time we were in Ontario and a few years later he was on tour with us as our roady/merch guy/mechanic/driver. I have been to Montreal a few times with the band, but hadn’t ever got a chance to really wander around the city without a bunch of band dudes and a show to play. [I actually got a bit delayed at the airport coming in because I was sent through immigration -- seems that time the band got turned away at the Canadian border in Vancouver for not declaring our merchandise properly is still in their computer, heyo]. It’s a great city and not as stubbornly French as I remember it…plus, pretty girls!

On Wednesday, we made it over to a Mexican restaurant [not so much Montreal -- says the California resident] and had lunch with a bunch of people involved in the show at Yves Laroche Gallery. Justin had been in town for almost a week setting it up and artists Daniel Martin Diaz and Michael Page also made the trip. there had been a private preview of the show the night before and everybody looked a little worse for wear. chris and I though, were well-rested tourists and walked all the way across town to the Musée des beaux-arts de Montréal.

turns out, Montreal has an amazing art museum. not only was there a brand new exhibition on Miles Davis, but their permanent collection is great and included work from some of my all-time favorite artists. I highly recommend doing no research at all on what is on exhibit at a foreign museum…it’s exciting.

miles davis' trumpet & john coltrane's sax...no big deal

and the permeneant collection

Gabriel Max - "The Raising of Jairus' Daughter" - 1878

and this painting (below) by Benjamin Constant had some of the most amazing detail work i’ve ever seen.
[the full shot came out a little blurry, but the details are what make it anyway]

Benjamin-Constant, "the Dawn After a Victory at the Alhambra" - 1882 (detail)

Benjamin-Constant, "the Dawn After a Victory at the Alhambra" - 1882 (detail)

I’ve recently been looking at a lot of work from William-Adolphe Bouguereau, a pre-impressionist/realist painter from France in the 1800′s. I even modeled a current painting of mine from one of his [I'll post more on this once the painting is done], which is something I’ve never done. while I’m not terribly inspired by his frequently cutesy subject matter (pretty cherubs and pretty scenery), but his skill is unreal, and his more figurative stuff is among the best i’ve seen. thankfully, the postcard quality of the cutesy ones is pretty much lost in person, especially given the scale of the originals. I was especially excited to see his self-portrait, which is cracked and looks even older than it is. it’s simple, but also has so much to it that it made me want to walk right out, fly home, and paint myself over and over again for years until I got it right…his right. it’s a good feeling actually — I imagine it feels similar to a good lecture or painting demo, when you can feel you’ve absorbed some knowledge, and now you have to figure out how to put it to use. paintings like that are my favorite professors.

William-Adolphe Bouguereau, "Self Portrait" - 1879

(Continued)

I got some fun mail today: a couple copies of the June issue of Ego Magazine i’m featured in. I have no idea how I got on the radar of a Ukrainian print magazine, but it’s quite an honor. A huge thank you to Aleksandra at Ego for the opportunity. I did an interview for the feature, and was asked some really interesting questions. The magazine looks pretty awesome, and they did a great job with the title page to my interview (check the halo and type treatment!). I can’t read anything in the magazine of course, but now I think I want to paint some Cyrillic [anybody speak fluent Ukrainian or Russian?]. I didn’t bother to scan the pages since the interview was translated into Ukrainian (also super cool), but I’ll include the interview as I sent it to them at the bottom of this post if anybody is interested.

I highlighted what i'm pretty sure is my name in Cyrillic

title page, I presume that's a fresh intro?

(Continued)

As I mentioned a while back, I’ll have a small painting in “the Next Generation” group show at London Miles Gallery in London, England. the opening is June 4th. there will be something like 45 artists in this show and should be fantastic.  I really wish I could make it out for the opening — next time. here is my piece:

"viridian II", 12" x 12", oil on wood

I did a pair of these small ones — the other will be in a group show the same weekend down in Culver City. I’ll post that one shortly.
here’s the flyer for London if anybody is in the area…and if anybody makes it and reads this blog, send me pictures!

Since I don’t have any new work to post yet, I thought I’d do a quick entry on paints, and one of my favorite painting supplies: the Tube Wringer –a very simple device with gears that will squeeze every last drop of anything from a tube. [it's that blue thing in photo below.] Oil paint is expensive — and some colors are really expensive, so it’s important to get your money’s worth (because if you are an artist, you likely have very little of it). plus, wringing the paint out of tubes with one of these things is super gratifying and even therapeutic…for me anyway. I almost feel like i’m getting away with something when I use mine. simple pleasures I guess.

I also use it for toothpaste.

pretty much all the paint I have right now*, and my tube wringer

Once a paint tube was all rolled up, I used to use a razor blade to slice the top of the tube off to get that last bit of paint. there’s actually quite a bit that gets left in there. a while ago, I found out that with a little effort, you can use the tube wringer to break the top off paint tubes — just keep wringing until it breaks, then go to town. It can get a little messy if you wring too much though, so gloves might be a good idea.**

I realize this all may sound a tad obsessive,  but I promise I don’t act similarly with anything else…no licking the inside of food containers for this guy. but buy a small tube of cadmium or cobalt anything, and you’ll understand.

*speaking of paint, see that tube of Windsor Newton Cad. Red in there? I’ve had it for almost 3 years, and have used it on every single painting i’ve done in that time. amazing! no wonder that stuff costs so much.  (conversely, I’ve probably been through about 20 tubes of Naples Yellow Italian in the same amount of time).

**I’ve actually been wearing gloves whenever I paint for the last 6 months or so, in an attempt to minimize direct skin contact with the more carcinogenic pigments and mediums I can’t do without. It took some getting used to, but now it doesn’t bother me at all.

I’m now done with the two 12″ x 12″ pieces I started two weeks ago. one, or both of them, will be part of “the Next Generation”art show (flyer below) at London’s London Miles Gallery. It’s curated by ThinkSpace (now down in Culver City), and features a ton of excellent artists from all over. It opens June 3rd for anybody in the area.

as I mentioned a couple posts back, these tiny paintings went pretty quick. this (at right) is a shot after one sitting on painting #2. I’ve been using Walnut Alkyd as my main painting medium and I’ve been really liking it. it’s non-toxic and smells pretty good, so I’m less freaked out by the carcinogens that come with the job. it doesn’t really work for glazing, especially on a panel (it starts to slide down the wood — not good), so i’m still relying on Liquin for that. I’m going to keep experimenting with some alternatives though, as Liquin is pretty gnarly. I tried a little mix of Stand Oil and Gamsol I read about on the interweb somewhere; didn’t work at all… will keep trying.

I was also finally able to do another photoshoot last weekend, which will be reference for the next few paintings (hopefully). I got to work with two new models, which is always fun and inspiring (a special thank you to Aeschleah and Brenda for the help).  more soon.