| fenpxsli |
| Pfeifenkopp |
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| 205 Posts |
| registered: 26.10.2013 |
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it's all regulated area of the art of Matthew Rodriguez
This is the thing about strippeddown, barebones cartoon illustration: It can communicate important safety information or juvenile fantasy protopolitical stencils. The outlined character art is apparent, transcending linguistic barriers and uniting those who were raised by TV, the kind of individuals who keep a TV schedule in their minds that's more accurate than their r or their diaries. Matthew Rodriguez is really a TV kid, however in a good way. Though raised by TV, he's a selfmade man and available to city life because it really is. Applying typing paper, painting rainbows on purses, drinking Sparks, and making puppet shows. His comical paintings evoke smiles via familiar song lyrics and cheerful imagery. Things i call recycling found objects, he calls Dumpster diving. His resourcefulness is impressive.
Rodriguez has enough sense to listen to the folks, to listen to his audience. Bums simply tell him about his painting, and he asks questions. He leaves a box in the gallery for secret notes, decorated with "I'll write back." People leave him notes, they stuff stickers and drawings inside, plus they invite him to parties. For the cartoon heritage, for the shy guy, the artwork speaks, so he does not have to. His puppet Coupon dances and throws things, so we can laugh and never throw things.
Rodriguez is really a rising star on the national art scene. He's had successful exhibits in Bay area, La, and New York, to name some outside of Texas, and this week he's opening his first solo exhibit, "duck, duck, GOOSE," at Volitant Gallery here in his hometown. He's motivated and ambitious, with boundless energy. I know something: When I'm at home sleeping my regular nine hours, he isn't. As director of Gallery Lombardi, I've got a lessthanobjective view of him. Since 2003, I've caused him on "Language from the Railroader," "Beans Rice," "Mulligan Stew," and today "Austin Graffiti Art From Birth to provide," opening Aug. 26. There, is this guy really that funny? Go see his artwork and choose on your own.
Austin Chronicle: You've developed some recurring characters in different works. You produce a character and then develop a narrative for him, building traits along with a story as in a serial publication. How important is repetition in your work? Do you think of the act as being much like a comic?
Matthew Rodriguez: I think of each and every painting as a single frame within an episode of the cartoon series. In cartoons, you do not "repeat" characters; you create a cast of characters that communicate with each other. All of my characters have voices, personalities, background histories, criminal records, and love interests. Especially Tony Bologna and also the Processed Product Gang they have been having an ongoing feud using the Red Meat Mafia since '99.
AC: Everyone discusses Trenton Doyle Hancock in terms of an artist who creates superheroes, their own personal mythology, in his work. Perhaps you have seen his artwork in the Blanton?
MR: I don't know who Trenton Doyle Hancock is, and also the only time I have been towards the Blanton was opening night, when there was a line wrapped around the whole building. We cut in line by supporting Coupon and yelling that people were late for our puppet show, and they let's along with suspicious eyes.
MR: Coupon is really a mattedfur puppet I made that I use to use renegade puppet shows. He's a delinquent, he's a rockthrower,www.bobbiejeanwall.com/2013/10/19/canada-goose-xl, and he's a heckler. My car has a moon roof that serves as a puppet window for Coupon to heckle people at red lights. Once I got stopped through the police to have puppet shows out of my moon roof. They provided me have a drunkdriving test, and then they inquired about a lot of serious questions about what I was doing having a puppet out my window.
AC: What are a few of the materials you've tried through the years? What's your favorite art supply now?
MR: I started with crayons all over my childhood home, and I still have probably the most fun when using them to make my art. I love doodling something quickly a lot more than taking forever to dip a paintbrush. You are able to draw with almost anything, but I would rather stick with crayons and ketchup bottles.
My new favorite medium is food. I can't consume a meal without having arranged it into a food face. You know, fake bacon eyebrows, kiwislice eyeballs, a fake sausage nose, redgrape teeth lined up in a smile, with a nice big beard of burnt toast. That is my breakfast every day.
AC: How has scavenging for supplies, by means of recycling found materials, influenced your art? How do you obtain the materials you use to make art on? What exactly are several things you've made art out of?
MR: The majority of the panels I use to paint on are made from recycled materials, but many of the time it's more trouble finding the materials than painting in it. It's my job to have to scavenge abandoned buildings at night with a crowbar,canada goose sale jackets, hammer,parajumpers jacka pris, and flashlight. Also, there is a secret Goodwill,canada goose outlet review, unlike any other Goodwill. It is a huge unairconditioned warehouse that utilizes pig troughs instead of shelves and racks to highlight their wonderful selection of miscellaneous junk. Once a week, I poke with the piles of trash for sale having a long stick, and sometimes I've found things like artificial Christmas trees will be able to make monsters out of.
AC: Like a selftaught artist, you utilize some interesting phrases to describe your work. Will you define the way you paint a "nicotine wash" and what you mean by "oldtimey"?
MR: I love my paintings to look like these were painted 50 years ago and also have been faded, scratched, bitten by a dog, kicked with a raccoon, and waterdamaged. One way I actually do this is by giving my paintings a "nicotine wash" top coat after the paint has dried. A nicotine wash is something I learned from the Blue Genie it's when your painting looks like your grandma has been smoking cigarettes in her own recliner chair indoors, with all the windows shut, as you're watching her favorite television programs during the last Two decades. It's the brownishyellowish transparent check her teeth as well as on her ceiling. One time, I sent some paintings to an art show in Canada, and also the gallery owner called me all scared, saying they thought my paintings got all wet and damaged on their trip as much as Montreal. But indeed, they were wrong. I said excitedly they were supposed to look oldtimey and nicotinestained.
AC: What shows happen to be the most fun for you personally lately?
MR: Last year, I made the 16footlong cardboard subway train for Deitch Projects in New York. Walking within it, carrying it Chinese dragonstyle down SoHo with celebrity puppets such as Patrick Swayze and Arnold Schwarzenegger would be a cheekhurting smile for me personally.
AC: Now that you are showing nationally, what have you learned about art?
MR: Wonderful my travels, I have learned airport security doesn't like it when you attempt to bring cap guns on planes. Also, you cannot buy cap guns within the state of New York, for the artistic reason for puppet shows. You have to learn how to smuggle them in.
AC: What exactly are you working on now?
MR: Right now I'm attempting to make enough art to fill my first solo show at this new gallery at Fourth and Congress called Volitant. It's a superfancy space with a lot of hidden rooms and marble floors. There are likely to be a lot of bigger pieces inside it which i seldom show. Next, I'm carrying out a group show the next weekend at Gallery Lombardi.
MR: I've got a bunch of shows coming up in New York within the next few months. I will curate a show at Factory People after ACL along with a type of limitededition Tshirts I designed done by then. I'm also developing a TV show starring my puppet Coupon called Double Coupon Day that involves attempted interviews with stray animals and valuable lessons on the finer things in life, like Boone's Farm and Black and Milds.
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