Street Proverb

I worked all day with Irv doing lawns.

Here is my proverbial wisdom for the day:

God bless America and the American automobile
Because if he doesn't, who will?

and...

Every father is a motherfucker.

Discussion with Lisa Over God/Goddess

Lisa and I went out for lunch today and had a very pleasant morning, lots of interesting discussions about music. It naturally evolved from talking about a mutual friend's spirituality, or lack thereof, to somehow talking about the spirituality that Van Goh may have projected onto his paintings. That was me hijacking the conversation into my own tangent, something I'm pretty good at. She called me out on it and I apologized and let her finish her thought. It started raining as we pulled into the driveway, not raining, but drizzling periodically, with gray clouds around the horizon. I guess it put me in a contemplative mood and I invited her to do a reading about our mutual friend outside on the porch while I assembled the stretcher bars for The Rose while we chatted. After I loosely assembled them to get a visual frame of the painting-to-be, we got into a discussion about her Sacred Rose deck, which she was using at that moment.

Her comment was that she was so overwhelmed by me constantly referring to God and not Goddess that the deck felt comforting to her for emphasizing more of the Goddess aspect. I explained that when I refer to God I mean Goddess also and that I wish there was a word that included both, she responded Goddess, to which I rolled my eyes. She asked me what Goddess qualities are, and I said I thought of it as more nurturing, growth, empathy among other qualities, she shook her head and asked why could it be war, or hunt also? Why did I think that those are mainly male characteristics? She was trying to open my mind to the fact that God/Goddess can be everything, and that to try and classify what one is and not the other is maddening, since across various cultures, things such as agriculture or death were associated with male on some and female on others. The black dot on the white and the white dot on the black shape of the yin and the yang stands for the truth that both male and female aspects can stand for all of the above.

I then told her how I admire the Goddess in the form of Athena, who aided Odysseus in his journey home, adding to his cunning and strategy where his own human cunning and strategic planning was not enough. I said that I felt as though their relationship was more as one of older sister and younger brother, to which she immediately took offense. 'Why isn't her a Goddess and him a man? By calling them siblings you are elevating a human and desecrating her.' I answered her that its because that was the precise philosophy of the Greeks, to rival the gods with their own intellect, artistic pursuit and acts of heroism. Essentially the gods were more human and the humans were more godlike. 'There is a reason why their philosophy is outdated' was her response, to which I answered, yes, but it keeps returning and fueling Humanism as it did in the Renaissance. It strengthens our (mine, I told her) belief in humanity, that we are more than just dirt as we thought in the dark ages, that we can aspire to accomplish great works, works which even the Greek gods may envy. (I had Orpheus in mind though I did not mention it, for his music impressed the gods so much, that he was given a release of his beloved from the clutches of Hades.) The head cops were showing up at that point, and she knew it. I had to calm down and articulate why I felt that way.

Having been brought up in a strict patriarchal religious upbringing, I look at my past as a Renaissance artist would look back at the dark ages, God was all powerful and humans were worthless unless they attained salvation through the Him, a power far above and beyond from their lives. “For every ten scriptures I would hear,” I told her, “nine would be along the lines of 'for He remembers that we are dust' while one may be 'and God made man in his image.' I ended the rant with “ Man is dust if dust is all he wishes to be”. She told me not to rely so much on this ancient, still patriarchal, philosophy of the Greeks to counter my oppressive upbringing, or else I would be just like Crowley, becoming a Satanist only to escape his past doctrine into its polar opposite, a way of psychologically and philosophically overcompensating. “Who wrote the Odyssey?” she asked “Homer, a man” I answered. She nodded, then I told her how its not sexist because Odysseus sided with the Goddess, in the form of Athena, while he opposed God in the form of Poseidon. “In fact” I told her “he teaches us that all the troubles brought about in his odyssey back home were because of his hubris defiance of the male god Poseidon, who then angered, was determined to keep Odysseus from sailing home”

I believe I paraphrased Odysseus saying ' it was my human cunning that won the war, not you, god' then he proceeded to outwit Poseidon every step of the way on his journey home. “Why does Odysseus need to defy this mighty God and prove his human superiority, while you say that the Goddess he sided with is anything less than a Goddess as powerful as Poseidon?” was the question she asked me, maybe not exactly in those words, but close. That gave me a long pause, a very emotional epiphany for me. “I have a problem what authority, don't I?” I thought of Athena as a “big sister” instead of a Goddess because of her intimate friendship with Odysseus, really looking out for him as a true friend, not acting as an authority figure, yet still revered by him as such. This was my epiphany, that intimacy with the Divine need not undermine its real Godhood. Years of imagining the God as a authority figure in a hierarchy, a King, sealed me off from thinking of the Divine as anything close to me, like a friend. My spiritual progress depends on my realization that He/She is both, all powerful, yet close and intimate to me, and Lisa agreed.


We then did a reading about my spirituality in the previous three lives, starting with the most recent, and we came to the conclusion that the quick learning that I've been going through, may be a reacquainting myself with that which I've already learned in my last walk in this earth (Supposedly a Japanese soldier who fought in WW2 and lived, coming back disillusioned and betrayed by his country/leaders) It was a very interesting reading, and as far as the cards I asked her to pull out for my life so far, starting my my spirituality as the 9 of swords, its effect on my life as the Knight of Pentacles and the way I express it as The World card. We both agree that in place of the Knight of Pentacles, by the end of my life, it should become the Ace of Swords, as both, the Ace of Cups and Ace of Wands, came up in the two previous lives.

Photography and Painting

Looking at artworks online, I'm afraid to dismiss an image when it may be a painting, but being so small and easily consumed by the Internet-browsing-eye can be passed for a photo. Not that there is anything especially wrong with photography if its one's medium of choice. But I have to ask this, how much does it take to set up one's vision to then capture it on film or digital camera? Sure it may take a lot of orchestration of lighting and equipment, sorting out from maybe hundreds to pictures taken digitally, maybe tweaking it in photoshop, but at the end of the day how much more faith in your vision does it take if you execute it manually in a painting? The time and devotion it takes to paint something in a way that challenges your notion of machine made image vs man made image is something that can't be done with absolute conviction in your vision.

As far as I conclude, it goes God - Man - Machine. Man is closer to the source of divinity than machine, being that machine is man's creation. I use photography, the Internet and photshop when I must, but I much rather have the subjects in my presence for a direct translation from nature (Divine creation) to man's (also Divine creation) expression of it on canvas. We all know and hate it when technology fails us, when your hardrive goes corrupt, all your data lost, or your ISP is down, so I'd rather use technology as a tool, not as a crutch.

Rethinking Kings Concept

Scratch that about the King of Swords, I'm in way over my head trying to adpt the symbolism from the card to the cahracter of Vader, I was stretching it a little, as Lisa helpped me understand. The King of Swords holds his sword in a upright position, meaning he has mastery over it. Also he does not need to use the sword, because he is king, the act of engaging one in battle with the sword represents the knight who fights for the king, not the king himself.

Maybe this isn't the time for this painting yet, but being father's day weekend, I got a little nostalgic. This is not a bad idea, and someday I'll do this painting, the right way, knowing full well that its a way to revisit my past and come to terms with it.

Wherever you are in life now, flawed as you are, I love you dad.

Originality and the Iconic

Interesting, A lot of the ideas I'm playing with for my next paintings have come from elsewhere, music, film, mythology. Someone might accuse me of never having an 'original' idea in my work. I'm readying myself for such argument because what can you expect when you're painting Darth Vader or the Man in Black, characters from other people's world. The truth is I use the characters as a departure point for my own devices, you see and recognize them, understand what they mean, and if you don't, you read about them. I don't need to fill you with back story of obscure original characters of my own making, though I do have them and use them as needed, such as Irv's character and other survivors.



I'll let Delacroix speak in my defense in this case.


"What moves men of genius, or rather what inspires their work, is not new ideas, but their obsession with the idea that what has already been said is still not enough."



Darth Vader, The King of Swords. He is an icon. I've had dreams about this painting, and it'll be the key that opens up symbolic reading of figurative art to the masses. The average man is at least as familiar with Star Wars today, as the Italian peasant of the Renaissance was familiar with the Church. This will form the link with my audience that may interest them on my more esoteric works, such as the Hades saga.



Father's day is coming and I can't help but to think of my own father, and our differences. He had the potential for so much happiness and success in his life, but without any care or respect for genuine spirituality to guide his path, he made so many bad choices that let the ultimately unhappy state he is in today. We used to watch Star Wars together and I wonder if he ever thought about the true Force that surrounds and shapes us, or regarded all of it, in his practical mind, as fairy tales with no ground on the reality of human spirituality. He's never been one for calling or writing to my brothers and I, making it difficult for me to keep any relationship with him. It feels like hard work, and I'm working hard enough trying to make something of myself. Lisa senses that he needs me though he himself may not know it, or even distrust me. But I'll write to him soon, and share images and thoughts on this painting as I work on it.



An analytical critic can even make a case for Vader being the weighty History of the Art that has taken a nihilistic turn "to the dark side" since the 20th centruy. The naive young artist fights bravely using instinct where he lacks in skill, but he lacks the experience and mastery needed to overthrow his creator. The artist is wounded, having his projecting hand with which he creates art, severed, unable to raise the brush or creative force against his modern/postmodern father. The sith lord then calls out to the young artist declaring his fatherhood and extending the seductive invitation to join him, and rule the establishment together, 'conform to unconformity' as Kuspit would call it. Ultimately in the Return of the Jedi, the son seeks to redeem his father, not destroy him. We will have to see how that plays out in the future.

I have no doubt that this painting will be a balance of intellectual ideas as well as emotion, as many will identify Darth Vader with their own dysfunctional fathers. I will discuss the nature of the King of Swords from the tarot deck as well as its identity in my mind as Anakin Skywlker another time. Its an important connection that gives greater insight into the psychology of Anakin, and maybe our fathers too.

End and Rebirth of Art

In reading Kuspit's End of Art so far (I'm three quarters through it) I really see the validity of most of his points. Particularly the way Post-modern artist (postartist as he calls them) seek to desecrate the sacred, to trivializethe extraordinary and the bring low High Art from its pedestal into the trivial everyday life they and the general masses exist in. This is done for many reasons, among them its a fear of psychological depth, the madness of our unconscious thoughts that society and science suppress through devices such as shallow entertainment, or undermine by presenting them as freak sideshows.

"They have forgotten that they were once children and think they were never mad - certainly never become mad. It would be absurd to believe that there is anything mad or infantile about their normal adult lives. For them child and madman are amusing anomalies that belong on the outside. A little bit of anomaly is the spice of life, but for them, happily, not of everyday life."

I wholeheartedly agree with what he is saying here, but at times he seems to delve too deep into the negative aspects of our society. At least in this book, he seems to be bitter about technology and the entertainment industry in general, perhaps because postartists have brought the sacred art of our forefathers down to the world of the mundane, where commercial entertainment also resides. He believes that even when the post modern artists attempts to rival modern entertainment in a David vs Goliath act, the postartist is simply consumed by the very force he is trying to rise against. He then effectively joins the quagmire of banal worthless mediocrity, the commercial entertainment where he seems to be approving, promoting it, rather than elevating the viewer as the art of the past once did. Kuspit concludes:"However much God is on their side, the postart Davids are no match for the philistine forces of entertainment, seasoned and sophisticated enough to beat back any threat to their dominance. especially by co-opting it."

I was raised on Saturday morning cartoons, comic book super-heroes, Star Wars among others, and for that I may have a fresher outlook on the new and unique lore that post-modern era has bestowed upon those of my generation. I feel that there are a handful of individuals today who could tackle this Goliath. I ,for one, believe neither that High Art should be desecrated into banality by toppling it down from its pedestal to the level of the masses, nor that it should be kept high in its mountain peak, away from the reach of the average human being.

I've been talking about this in length with Lisa, and one day she brought to mind the example of Bruce Springsteen. He sings about the every-day individuals of this country, the "working class heroes" as John Lennon would have called them, yet he romanticises the subjects of his songs, effectively elevating the average person to a higher plane, much closer to that Olympian mountain peak where High Art resides. Lisa said as if to paraphrase the meaning of all his music "I'll meet you at your level then take my hand and come with me on a trip, just for a little while."

I had thought of another example then, from the realm of entrainment. Society has a very short attention span, and a bad case of Alzheimer's disease. The hot summer movies coming out of Hollywood are packaged as the ultimate entertainment for you and your family. It comes out in the movie theater near you, everyone talks about it, and even if the movie is exceptional good by entertainment standards, how much of it do we collectively remember next summer? How much of it do we retain two, three, ten, twenty years down the road? Time then becomes the best movie critic, doesn't it? Only the best that entertainment film-making as to offer becomes what we call "household names" We see this when we use lines from films in our everyday lives, such as "Run, Forest, run!" and isn't Forest Gump deserving of such admission into our collective cultural memory? After all, its a retelling of our human story in the mid to late 20th century America from the perspective of one extraordinary individual? An individual who would be considered an "anomaly" in society. So here is what I would call a film that meets us in the disguise of entertainment, meeting us at eye level, and elevates us a little closer to High Art's pedestal.

I believe that it is my responsibly in life to connect with humanity around me through recognizable iconography of my work, then elevate them to the higher path above the mundane, even if only temporarily. I want my viewers to join me in my journey to the top of the "Dark Tower" and experience the visions of 'other worlds than this' along with me, and hopefully see the visions, may be glimpses into a reality far more concrete than our mundane, 9 to 5 existence. I paint these worlds in the most archival material I can afford, so that posterity may also 'see the turtle and follow the path of the beam'

It may be that I'm not disagreeing with Kuspit at all, since what I'm doing is not Postart at all, its a return to narrative painting as practiced since the early Renaissance, using shared myths and symbolism of our time. As in my current Dead series, I'm using the unique modern phenomenon of zombie apocalypse to tell a heroic survival story from the perspective of average citizens, thus elevating them from the banality of their lives prior to a crisis. I took the opportunity to unleash my own personal anger against the commercial and political establishment that allowed for an immoral war for private profiteering and the collapse of our economy.

So what am I? A figurative narrative painter, I could belong to any time period from the Renaissance to Post-Modernity. I paint eternity through the human story, independent of time, though using my time period to connect with my audience and place my perspective in the context of History. Am I the David who will conquer the philistines? Not so much conquer as convert, perhaps, but I have confidence in my role in this life, and when I reach the Tower, I'll stand true.

Dream: Exorcism of a Painting

This ones one among many other, less remarkable, dreams from last night. I was having problems in my life whenever I had this painting around, I painting that I had been working on, similar to Paint it Black, but not exactly that particular painting. I acquired the canvas through some old acquaintance and it used to be part of another piece of art. Later in the dream I would spontaneously have the realisation that the original painting it was part of was in a house where a lot of suffering and eventually murders took place. I've been recycling a lot of old canvasses into new work lately, so maybe its why it even came up in my subconscious. To proceed with the story, Lisa felt very uneasy around the painting, and not because of my painting itself. The series of wrong events culminated with a car accident while I had it in my car, nothing fatal because of my own maneuvering of it.

Now that I'm think about it, the whole setting was in the neighborhood I used to live in Rio de Janeiro, near my grandparent's house. In the corner there used to be a comic book shop that was closed during the dream sequence, and where there used to be a hair salon, was now a small gallery. Lisa and I had had it with the series of badness around the piece and we brought my painting to the gallery where it was empty of all people, but the building was open and the paintings were still there and there. The building was only partially lit, like the electric when out and an auxiliary power supply kicked in at a quarter of the usual lighting capacity. It was dusk outside, like a perpetual half light in an overcast day, and there was no one in the streets, like a ghost town almost. In the gallery, next to the easel we propped my painting on, there was a particular painting of a baby, with he world card naively painted as a background to this infant boy/girl, though I felt it was a boy. from looking at it I could tell there was a film of dust on it and it seemed very old, though not necessarily worth a lot of money. Could have even been a copy of an original, yet Lisa liked it.

We turned our attention to my painting once again and she focused her empathic perceptive powers, when she touched it she froze with terror. the oil paint layers that I had laid upon the bottom left part of the canvas started to recede forming a ghost image of a square, it became clearer within seconds as all of the black paint I had around it receded revealing also a face contained within it, it grinned at us as a tear ran down the canvas dividing it in two from top to bottom, slightly angled from left to right, separating my likeness of my self portrait on one side and the demonic presence on the bottom left piece. Lisa felt thought it was a lost, angry and confused human spirit, but I knew better. It tried to pass itself for a human residual haunting, but it was clearly a demonic being, taking pleasure in the misfortune of the living around him/them, cackling at the horror shown in Lisa's face. Yet, I wasn't afraid, instead I felt an anger building from deep in my heart, thinking "how dare this malignant creature defiles my holy work?" I had to fight this feeling from becoming outright unbridled wrath, less I become like it, feasting only in the negative and be consumed by the darkness. Uncontrolled anger was not the higher path, but righteous indignation with God on your side is the proper frame of mind to stare at demonic forces unafraid. So I channeled this righteous fury allowing my faith to guide what I did next. Remembering what I felt was a very valid teaching from studying the Bible, I called upon the divine name, for I knew they fear it, loath it. I used not the Anglicized version, but the language of the name of the ancient Father as the Hebrews knew him, Yahweh. I spoke in Portuguese, not by choice, but because the words flowed out of me in a chanting manner, I was performing an exorcism. Never in all my dreams have I felt such union with Divine Might, a felt holy power coursing through me, and an aura as though I could have been glowing as moses glowed when he had seen the shadow the Father aspect of the Creator. "Criatura maligna da escuridao, sai de re em nome de Yahweh" I repeated the holy name many times, it screeched as though in pain, and it fled from the canvas, just then we were interrupted by some friends approaching in the distance outside the gallery, I think Irv was among them and they were looking for Lisa and I. It broke my concentration just enough that I could not banish the demon very far. We looked at the baby painting near my, now unified, purified painting, and it was all gone, faded. We quickly left the place, joined the others and told them what happened. We were all staying at what used to be my and my grandparent's house down the street from that corner. The final memory I have of that dream was Lisa and I walking just outside of my front yard, and looking at the gallery down at the corner facing us. There was a slight silhouette of a grayish face at the window, staring from the pitch black interior. "You didn't kill it?" she asked. "No, its not its time to die yet, nor is it my job to finish it" I told her.

I've been having many lucid dreams lately, this one was worth writing down because I feel it represents my restored faith in God independent of organised religion. That evil can be banished when calling upon the Creator with unshakable faith and conviction, as Father Callahan did in the last moments of his life. Someday this will be a painting.

From Graduation in 05 Untill Now

Lets do a run down, from the safe playground of college till now. I graduated from the Lyme Academy of Fine Arts in 05, moved back to my mother's house in NY, living in the basement room. That already sounds depressing enough. Stayed there for an year in an state of just going through the motions, going to church (meetings), but that really felt foreign to me. I felt like a stranger, not able to relate to the people around me. I love my brothers, my family, and my friends from NY. But more and more I felt like I could not live the life of one of Jehovah's Witnesses. Irv and Lisa provided me with a safe refuge from time to time when I'd visit them. They would never judge me. Lisa knew that I was living a lie and that the religion wasn't for me, but was kind enough to let me come to that conclusion on my own.

One night I was playing WoW at night and my step-father barged in the room yelling at me to shut it off. I yelled back and it degenerated into a punching match. I didn't hit him, but let him try and hit me while I kept taunting saying things like "That's very Christian of you, Henry! Why don't you hit me some more?" I was a prick about it, but I was right. He did apologize the next day, but the damage was done, and I knew I had to move out. Irv and Lisa welcomed me into their home, and even though that's we've had our share of fights and bickering, I learned to be a more responsible and tactful individual, more aware of my surroundings, and the feelings of those around me. I now love Irv, Lisa and Alden like they're my family too, a bond not of blood, but of friendship. They're my "Ka-tet" as King would call it.

Since moving here, for the first year or two I continued to live a partial lie. I would tell my mother that I was going to the meetings when in reality I only went twice, ever. I think the witnesses here are wonderful people, Yahweh bless them all, but I still felt like a stranger. I just couldn't be part of it. Once I had the taste of cultural freedom going back was not an option. I would later discover that God doesn't operate in the rigid way religion will have you think, my "fall" from organized religion was meant to happen, so that I could create Art and serve God's true will for an artist. If I paint about life, the human experience, how could I ever tell it from the very limited perspective of one who has not truly lived. The world is not all pretty and flowery things, I was always attracted to the darker aspects of life. Great Art is, after all, a play of light and shadow, whether it be literally in realism, or figuratively. But I think they all live in fear of the darkness. They always quoted from the Bible "to strip away the old personality and put on the new one according to the Lord" So there is no place for anger, sadness, rage, despair? Those are emotions that make us human, part of the human experience of living, emotions that have historically made for great Art in the hands of the Old Masters.

Little over an year ago I had this spiritual epiphany along with others and used a simple analogy when talking to Irv about it. What character is most interesting to watch in the Simpsons, Homer Simpson or Ned Flanders? The answer is obviously Homer, because even though he makes so many poor choices, he feels much more like the real human being we are. The fact that he is way funnier by himself, while Ned's humor comes from the absurdity of a repressed life, just seals the deal.

Only last summer did I actually tell my mother that I'm not going to meetings nor do I plan to. Since then I let my hair grow long, so that its a visible sign to all, when I visit, that I'm not one of them. I got a lot of heat and not so funny jokes from my mother and Claudio (Leandro pretty much lets me be) and some of my friends from there, but it doesn't bother me. My hair is a symbol of my freedom of thought. I am not, as I was once told I should be, 'a JW first, Luiz Teles second', I am Luiz Teles the Artist first and foremost. How could I stand true before the Creator if I'm not true to my own self?

It was around that time that I earnestly began painting again. My faith in Art was renewed by my faith in an impartial, just God. My spirituality is still very fluid not stabilized into a solid dogma, yet I feel much closer to the universal truth. This path towards a spiritual resolution cleared the fog I had for years and gave me the drive to paint again. Having read King's Dark Tower series I saw how modern mythology, spirituality, fantasy could be weaved together in the journey of a White Knight and tell the most powerful story I've read to date. It inspired me to take all those same elements which I love and depict them through narrative figurative painting. It has set me on the path I am today, the "path of the Beam" on my way to the Dark Tower. I may not have guns forged from Excalibur, but I have my brushes and my faith in the White. My faith in the Father and the Mother aspect of the Divine. Last but not least I have faith in my will to succeed and my Ka-tet's support in my journey.

So I guess that brings me to where I am today.

Let's give it a shot

So Lisa tells me I should start blogging. We have real great conversations about my work, and talking about it helps me sort out what I'm really trying to do. Sitting down and typing this helps me focus even more. I can use this as a good starting point for future artist's statements as I'll surely be presenting my work to various galleries. I hate the idea of marketing myself, selling my personality, since so much of the art scene is about hacks selling their personality to those who'll pay for worthless shit because it has a Koons or Hirst name signed on it. Anyway, its too early to begin ranting. I know my conceptual ideas are far more sophisticated than anything Jeff Koons could come up for his fucking monkeys, I however can express these ideas in the act of painting, through narrative and symbolic elements within the paintings. I shouldn't compare my work with what Donald Kuspit calls "postart." But the fact that I'm here counting pennies while these fuckers are out there playing the art game with a budget that makes my $405 spent on oil primed linen look like $4 spent on toilette paper makes me a little upset. Just a little bit annoyed. Here I am ranting again, but it feels good I guess.

The good side of the decadent state of Art today is that anyone can do it. With the threshold for what the establishment calls an artist is so lowered, if lil' ol' me has a truly original vision with the *skill* to follow through without needing all the bullshit, I should stand that much higher than the riff raff. The "marketing" of my vision is done by my work alone and all I need is confidence in what I'm doing. Marketing is a bad word, but its the only word a businessman that runs a gallery would understand. Ultimately a lot of the imagery I'm working on undermines compulsive commercialism and consumerism.

I ought to write a summary of my story from graduation till now, maybe I should call it something catchy like the "Stoner Years" or "Debauchery Years" but all kidding aside, I really shed my old baggage these years with the help of Irv and Lisa. Its important that I write about it.

I also need to finish reading Kuspit's End of Art and form my thoughts on it. So far I learned much, but I feel like I'm in the position to harness technology or even entertainment sources to make them work for High Art, not High Art lowering itself to it. By "working for" I mean referencing or using it as a departure point in order to connect with the masses, only to then elevate them higher than anything outside of High Art could ever attempt. I had to get this thought down for the time being, because I think its important, I'll revisit and elaborate more on it later.

Well this felt good for a first blog entry.