Narcisuss

A Narcisuss Bulb is a genus of endogenous bulbous plants with handsome flowers, having a cup-shaped crown within the six-lobed perianth, and comprising the daffodils and jonquils of several kinds. It's a beautiful white flower. There is a form of narcsissism in almost all types of creation that is impossible to ignore. By creating something I am telling you that it is worth your while to see or read. I made a painting in college called Narcisuss that focused on this dilema. I signed the work three times in large script and toward the bottom of the painting I included a group of men holding a bouquet of flowers. To research the project fully I bought a Narcisuss plant and put it on my window sill for about a week. It's difficult for me to translate the goings-on of the next week but I'll do my best.

My apartment began to smell. It was a kind of sharp putrid smell that you could relate to bad breath but you really can't trace it to any sort of food. It took me at least a full week of brushing my teeth vigorously, showering, wearing cologne, taking out the garbage and vacuuming the floors to realize that it wasn't me. I wasn't the source of the smell, but I was the root of the problem. The Narcisuss flower gives off an odor that suggests taking time to smell the roses is not in your best interest. I was elated for a number of reasons. One, the faces people were making at me were not due to my breath. Two, this solved my problem. The allure of the flowers beauty was it's downfall. The translations to painting in general were perfect. The beauty of this painting, or any other painting that I create now had a criteria. The reaction this flower made on my apartment was something I could strive for in my paintings.

If I can create paintings that stir around peoples minds, or even their senses, for days full of questioning, days of wondering what was it that was bothering them, what is it that is sticking around in your head, than I will have reached the criteria I have set. This would satisfy me.

I think it's important to penetrate this boundary in an audience. If you can permeate the conscience of an audience you have succeeded in one aspect of successful creation. The next, and perhaps most important aspect is now to make it worth while.

One of the students in my class was making large paintings of the backs of semi's. The paintings looked exactly like what you would see in your car if you were following a Mack truck. I found myself driving to school or to work and upon following a truck, I would think of her paintings. She had accomplished the first and often most difficult loop of Art. The problem was they didn't go anywhere. There was no substance. She had not made it worth my effort. There was no conceptual base to begin that type of fractal geometrical, non-linear thought pattern I wrote about in Lectura Locura.

I think that this is an important part of many of the things today we deem worthy. They hold our attention but thats it. Many of the pop songs today that are enduring record sales success are void of substance. The do not take us anywhere. I can't explain to anyone why I'm humming "My Milkshake brings all the boys to the yard." However, the artwork found at The UBiquitous Professor Johnson's website accomplishes both criteria. The artwork, as he says "Turns on you" as well as "Turns you on." There is a substance that has been painstakingly added to the artwork that makes it worth your time, as well as worth your effort.