11/20/2006

Jason Sleurs

31 comments:

Painter said...

Jason Sleurs @
V & A Gallery
98 Mott Street
directly above Canal
Second Floor # 206

chris faust said...

dana schutz called- she wants her painting back

poppy said...

this may or may not be better painted than her. I almost think it is only because of the dog head but from the stuff i've seen schutz images seem more interesting to me than this. when i first seen this painting i thought why does this do absolutley nothing for me. Maybe you get used to seeing things that could be called "well painted" and its like - all you want to show me is a dumb dog? what exactly are you afraid of?... but he's afraid of something or he wouldn't be painting these weak little creatures.

dubz said...

you should see these in person, they're beautifully weird. it's a strong show.

zipthwung said...

Culture Vulture.
Carrion Call.

Talking about craft is pointless. If you paint with focus for a while (from life) you will get "good" (at life panting). There are literally thousands of top notch craftspersons ALL OVER THE WORLD who can paint lifelike portraits.
They have tricks like leaving your body and the background lose, while rendering your moles with perfect verisimulatitude.

Most people take about three years of solid painting, at home or abroad, to get their game on, over a foundation of drawing. You do the math.
Some peope have heroes like Velasquez or HR Giger or Mike Grell. SOme people tie their brushes to sticks an put patches over their eyes and study the poetry of Basho or Rumi or Alan Jay Lerner.

Daniel Johnson and the like just dont care about craft - no patience for it - as I think most people define it. So in effect, there are two camps - the craft will make you stronger, and the craft is a means to an end, but not the only end.
Not really a camp at all, just an impatient state of mind.

What makes some one great, as opposed to good, has to do partly with hitting the paint when it reaches the right tack, but not before, or painting something out and re-painting it where it fits, or until it fits. Or mixing up a big batch of color instead or because of neuroticly mixing and matching a little at a time.

Paint to the edge? Or paint OVER the edge and ontot he wall? Why do people see the edge? Why not anihilate the border?

Thats craft-thats why commerce hates artists - they take too long, think about the wrong things, and get upset when you take the brush out of their hand when its time for bed or whatever you trained them to do.

The other part is taste - you got it or you dont.

Does subject matter matter?

I see people with their little pekinese or whatever and I wonder what massive void they must have to keep THAT on a leash.

But is it the work true? In a Lacanian sense, where truth is located in the big Other, and the dog is actually a pawn in the cosmic game of care.

WOuld I take care of your shitzu if it showed up unanounced? WOuld you take that bet?

This painting looks like a toned down rolling stone celebrity portrait. I dont like the brushwork. I dont like the composition. I dont like the palette. Its like a John Currin, in that way.

no-where-man said...

i respond to this and i don't to schutz, for me the understanding of space a denotes similar environment but i am involved with this creature in a way that just dissolved post Frank

zipthwung said...

This is like shutz in the sense of paint handling. You can almost feel the 1 and a quarter inch ferrule, the sabeline or the synthetic hogs hair, (these are oils I'm assuming) then: the decisice (and climactic!) switch to the smaller brush and scale (fractals brah! Ever freakin color in the spectrum! Zen sumi-e! My god!).

In schutz it feels, if not looks like one brush, not that i've looked at them too closely - they are too big and bombastic for that.

Ideally I think you should have four to five brushes, including the Bob Ross fan brush for blending clouds.
Forget the magic white - its mostly some kind of medium with extender in it.
Unless you like a weeklong glaze....as I do.

Subject matter - is a developed alter ego that interesting? I know there is a tendency to create one - that is, everybody does, as architecture or as abstraction - but not everybody is given credit for the creation-as-fictive (a good story) or fiction-as-truth (truth)(i.e. underestimates the artist, or doubts the construct)

In otther words, denies the artist their place in the symbolic order (as an Artist)

poppy said...

i feel like i try to stay open in mind with this stuff....
but the dog creature still isn't doing anything... I would however respond to this dog in the real world ..sympathy empathy etc.... but not in this particular representation..
since looking at more stuff earlier, i found some of the creatures and environments rather engaging but not everytime. I don't know that i wouldn't get very bored of the repatitive paint handling quickly but i was initially impressed by alot of iton other sites and would like to see in person. this one doesn't work for me although i see the forms are there where he wants them to be..... maybe the sickly green head is letting me down.. i cant put finger on

no-where-man said...

well my love is like a truck; this brings up an interesting line of thought about empathy, what and how it is triggered and how/if it plays any role in Art.

hlowe said...

For some reason this person's paintings of anthropormorphic poses remind me of Goya's
Caprichos

(I mean in content)

Tatiana said...

Looks like an editoria illustration. This I generally do not applaud.

Martin said...

i like the spindly front legs and and attached fork-feet.. not so much the rest.

Sven said...

i agree with tumbleweed + the other ones in the show fare far worse :(

hlowe said...

Well, Tumbleweed, don't you think there is more of the psychodrama in it? I think editorial illus. remarks on events of the day, political shenanigans,etc.

zipthwung said...

"Is there any point to which you wish to draw my attention?"
"To the curious incident of the dog in the night"
"The dog did nothing in the night."
"That was the curious incident," remarked Holmes.

Lacan says you are what you eat, like the three laws of entropy are: you cant win, you cant break even, and you can do a little better if you freeze your butt off.

Can you commodify a place holder?

Sure you can.

zipthwung said...

Is the unconcious structured like a language?
I think its like klingon. Sort of harsh and gutteral - prelinguistic and ferile. Not at all like Esperanto, and yet universal.

This dog has guarded eyes, like a sheep dog. K-9.

zipthwung said...

In fact, the way this is painted doesnt add anything to the effect. It could be painted differently or even written.

WHether,as I so astutely mentioned first, its like an rolling stone illustration or an editorial illustration in general, or not, is immaterial, as we all know its context that matters.

I DO think this would go well in Rolling Stone. Its a competitive market though. You have to know people, develop relationships, perhaps get a gallery and press.

Anonymous said...

yeah, and alot of these painters came from the same undergraduate program in ohio, its kina freaky. I've met a bunch since I have lived in nyc a lot of them are at schutz's opening. Most of them are really great painters and they all have similar qualities in their work, seems like schutz just happened to be the one out the gate first. Her timing is what gave her success because of you see work of her peers, like jason, she is actually not as original as everyone thinks.

poppy said...

no one is as original as anyone thinks
i think of the painter as being near death when i see this.... Look at Goyas little dog drowning in quick sand.. theres not a soul in site to see the desperate situation unfolding....the simple cartoon metaphor of life and art is hard to get a serious gut response...

flesheater99 said...

so it seems I missed this in 'the moment' but for what it's worth...

yeah, and alot of these painters came from the same undergraduate program in ohio,--it's true. I am one as well. In fact I learned about this site via the NYTimes article about Dana a while back.

I've met a bunch since I have lived in nyc a lot of them are at schutz's opening. Most of them are really great painters and they all have similar qualities in their work--also true. In fact, there was real air of community there. Pardon my nostalgic wax. but ALL involved were SERIOUSLY LOOKING at what each other was doing. noticing patterns/mimicking languages/sharing secrets.

seems like schutz just happened to be the one out the gate first--also also true. In fact Dana was no where near 'The Man' at the Cleveland Institute of Art in those days. Things may have changed after I graduated. Nothing but props over here for Dana. For reals. It's just that she was part of a pool of folks who ALL seemed primed to be 'that' person to make 'that' big of a difference that she has been chosen to make. The best of those who weren't Dana in that CIA pool have either fizzled, gone into hiding, taken up other concerns, died, or all of the above. Seriously.

In my infrequent and un-thorough drive-by's to this board it;s been made blaringly obvious that at least 75% of you are hypnotized by the career success of Dana Schutz and feel the need to lapse into tourettic-style diatribes at the mere coincidence of stylistic/thematic elbow-rubbing to anything remotely related to Mrs. Schutz. Jason Sleurs was also a classmate of mine, and while I'm sure he's getting on well(I don't really keep up with folks like I should)I'm sure he deserves better than to be yet another public whipping boy for a bunch of people who are obviously crippled by their own career frustrations/creative bankruptcy.

Now, my apologies to Jason for taking up space reserved for talking about his work to talk about Dana. I don't know if he even reads this board but I certainly hope/expect he has more creative things to do with his free-time/energy than mess around a computer playing comparative esthetic tiddleywinks.

That said, is it similar to Schutz? Yes. But then again, so's Your Mom.

Anonymous said...

cleveland.... who knew? truth about cleveland was that somehow it managed to have an incredible program with very talented and agressive teachers. better than most graduate programs im guessing. Dana was good then (very good in most poeples opinion). jason too. most importantly it was a close knit highly devoted community. it was competetive but not negative. something about a midwest work ethic maybe. but i saw more talented artists come out of that program than most of the MFA candidates out here in san francisco. usually i think the comments on here are garbage. US magazine sort of bullshit. its dissapointing. and was sent along to me by another clevelander---as an example of how sniveling and back stabbing the art community in NYC can be. but this is just for those who cant be heard anywhere else.

go and make a painting today.

pinkandlacepony said...

Buymyfreedom
Cleveland seems like a good school. I almost went there.
I think it is fair to say that some frustration comes out on these comments and the artist posted fall victim to it but there is also alot of good things said too. It seems it is harder to say somthing nice and really easy not to. I think people feel smarter when they are trashing something. Maybe not. But as far as the NYC art scene is reflected here, I don't think most of the people that comment on here live in NY or even see the shows that often. That is my feeling. I saw this show and I think he has a very mature hand in painting, I am interested in what he paints next.

zipthwung said...

for the record nothing on painters is terrible. hows that? Now shut your pie hole and take it. Or move.

zipthwung said...

over.

Anonymous said...

wow. do you often find yourself over come with the spirit of an eleven year old meathead?

well rock on and maybe next time you can channel ray charles. he's a lot cooler. plus he's got more vision than your mole eyed comment could ever hope to find.

zipthwung said...

"wow. do you often find yourself over come with the spirit of an eleven year old meathead?"

Adahominem hominahominum homina homumina hummer hominem homina. Homina homina hominem homina ad .
Yeah!

heidi said...

In response to Buymyfreedom-who said:
usually i think the comments on here are garbage. US magazine sort of bullshit. its dissapointing. and was sent along to me by another clevelander---as an example of how sniveling and back stabbing the art community in NYC can be. but this is just for those who cant be heard anywhere else.

I respond:
Funny how you are judging all the comments here for all the negative qualities you yourself have displayed in one searing, unproductive paragraph.

I don't understand why people in general can't disagree without making derogatory comments to boot.

Perhaps it is better to lead by example.

Oh wait, or maybe it is so much easier to anonymously speak sweeping negative opinions. I liked your input, and clarification is always a good thing. But the hypocrisy of your negative statements struck me because you could not seem to rise above the very traits which you are accusing everyone else here of.

For every finger you point, 3 are pointing back at yourself. The thumb does not count I guess. Good day.

zipthwung said...

You know, I often wonder about cleveland. What do the peoples of cleveland eat? What sorts of native crafts do they make?

What sorts of preconceptions might they have from a ethnocentric standpoint?

I see TV reports and I wonder if they find them true; Are they afraid of New York with its astronomical rents, its formidable criticality? Its Humababba?

Well fear no longer. Paintersnyc tells all! The sniveling backstabers who represent NY are only the tip of the iceberg.

Underneath that tip is a bunch orf warm, caring, supportive individuals who love you and your warm fuzzy art.

Im not one of them, but I can assure you as an objective outsider, that they do indeed exist in droves. Might I say, whole huge packs of them. SOme of them may even be headed your way, to breed and seed.

If I only had their brains.

Anonymous said...

im not one to hide behind anonymity. clicking on buymyfreedom is the same as clicking here. its my name. not a moniker. sorry for the confusion. it was remedied as soon as possible. ill stand behind most things i say and recant when i am wrong. comments like... "shut your pie hole" get me down. i wasnt saying all coments are bad, and i wasnt making a blanket stament about new york. I was making a comment about how sniveling it "can" be. Not is. If my comments were searing it's just because i care. And i dont find much help in fingers that point to who is "stealing" from who. like who wore the same dress at the mtv music awards. or who got a boob job or what size brush they didnt use (daniel buren). US magazine garbage. candy aisle. low caloric low nutritional value. Grocery store check out art talk. what if i point four fingers to make my point? or make a four fingered point and just leave myself out of it. death of the author nonsense.

how about a two handed outstretched arms 8 fingered wizard-time metapoint rock stance to the future. thats what im talking about.

can we really convince ourselves that the majority of comments posted are positive? and not that they should be,.. but constructive? No. Do i think bringing to topic the topic of destructive comments with a comment slightly sharp in tongue is constructive? yes.

you dig?

heidi said...

Oh your comment made me all emotional, that was very nice what you wrote. Okay, I get it...

Yes indeed how about a two handed outstretched arms 8 fingered wizard-time metapoint rock stance to the future.

Sounds good to me DT, sounds good to me.

arebours said...

I like this "thing",not-dog,but it seems to need something to play of f of-