After Bolivia: First Series 1973-1977

Upon graduation from college in 1973, my room mate and I boarded a bus in Tijuana, Mexico and traveled by land to Cochabamba, Bolivia. Works before this journey have negative numbers. After, positive numbers. Numbers in brackets are from 2010 UCB/ECAI catalog count.

Paintings 1-77, [NF 5a-m.] are the first group paintings, drawings and prints cohesive in style and theme after a group of student works in which the elements of 6 years college study of English Literature and Studio Arts, several drawings, paintings, prints, and sculptures coalesced in such a way as to indicate I was ready to continue on my own artistically. ‘Due to training under Abstract Expressionist masters, and because of Abstract Expressionist interface of religious and aesthetic methodology to develop one’s intuition and reach the unconscious, some Abstract Expressionist tenets remain viable and a pertinent vehicle for the research and intentions of the NEPSIS FOUNDATION project.’ Also compare to the poems by the artist from this period.

The main formal elements here are the amorphic color and space in counterpoint relationship with hardedge, linear and geometric embellishments. It is about the relationship between the general context of being and specific experience as open and luminous.  At a certain point, latter day works in this series replace ‘hardedge, linear and geometric embellishments’ with the human figure.  The basic counterpoint remains for a time.