Bill de Kooning in his thirties and forties

Bill’s Unsalable Years

De Kooning went through a long period early on where he hardly sold anything, and then only to friends.  He made his living painting houses, and for a little while he worked for the WPA.  He was pretty far along before he bothered to show in a gallery.  He was the most famous underground artist of his time, and his reputation was truly underground and well deserved, grounded in experience and respect.  I don’t have all the dates on these paintings, but they all look like they’re from the thirties and forties, the war years, and before and after.

 Even when he was imitating Joan Miró i Ferrà (as he and Arshile Gorky were wont to do in their early years together) de Kooning couldn’t help but display all the fruits of his good schooling.  The painting above is called: the Cow jumped over the Moon.  It’s not one of those that you get to see all that often (which is why it’s here.)  The Still Life with Eggs and Masher comes from around the same time and seems to me more entirely his own.  The Dutch Landscape looks almost like a Miguel Covarrubias Caricature of Willem’s native Land.  All the rest of these drawings and paintings were likewise made in the thirties and forties, which were Bill's thirties and forties as well as the century's.  De Kooning turned fifty in 1954, the same year my older brother was born.

Last Year's Christmas

Though I was raised as a Christian, I have no belief in the Teachings of that Faith

(Ironically, my Mother, whom I'm presently visiting, has Faith for a Christian Name)

and yet, I take some Pride in celebrating the Present Holiday and for very Good Reasons.

Far from what the Christians have tried to make of it, this so called Christmas remains Pagan,

In Spirit and in Origins, as Winter Solstice, Saturnalia and Yule, and older Names long lost;

So that the Puritanical Followers of the Fictional Jesus often tried to ban its Celebration.

Now that they find they can't get rid of it, they try to turn it into something it never was.

 

 

Still, some of the old Christian Christmas Hymns have lovely Melodies, are prettily worded,

and remind of my Childhood of Choir Rehearsals, Caroling, Wassailing, and Church Pagaents:

Social Memories that I continue to  hold as valid Models for present and future Interactions.

Winter Solstice Pictures by Bob Mizer

He produced so many photographs that one could likely mine his great horde of them to illustrate a wide variety of themes.  It just happens that many of those that I’ve saved for my use fit today’s point of seasonal transition.

Obviously that wasn’t Mizer’s primary purpose when shooting them.  Above all else he wanted to give Queer guys a sexual thrill or, if he was particularly adept in his alchemy, a hard-on; but he also liked having a bit of fun when setting some of these up, and he may even have had some subterranean aesthetic purpose.

 

Mostly, in selecting these, I’ve tried to present a group of pictures that reflect Bob Mizer’s particular skills at their best and that can stand together and interact.