Ascent and Descent

This is one of my earliest oil paintings. It derives (naturally enough - I suppose) from a quick pen and ink sketchbook drawing made around 1988 while watching Czech Animator, Jan Svankmajer's, "Alice", in a movie theater in Berkeley. A young couple sitting directly in front of me was making out with such passionate ardor that it was difficult to watch the film or make the drawing.

The theme of "Ascent and Descent" is an exploration of what I imagined as "Solar Perversity". I sought to symbolize elemental forces as devouring and defecating deities. I think this was partly inspired by reading French Surrealist authors such as George Batailles and Antonin Artaud. These thinkers indulge in such strangely decadent notions as "Solar Perversity" as though nothing could be more logical and natural to the mind. The face of the sun was derived from a patent medicine advertisement for a rodenticide whose name and/or slogan was "Rough on Rats". It was the cover of a little book given to me by the underground "Cinema of Transgression" star, Lung Leg (covergirl for the Sonic Youth album, "Evol"), and I think the first woman to ever befriend me.

I believe I began this painting while staying at the late publisher, Adam Parfrey's house in LA. After Adam kicked me out, I set up a studio on the 13th floor of a beautiful art deco building off Beverly Blvd. in LA that had been turned into storage units. I could paint there from 7AM until 7PM - storage business hours. A Mexican lady with several children came by one day and admired the painting immensely, conversing with her children in Spanish about the painting. She pointed out the veins on the woman's legs and said to me, "Muy Realistico". Great compliment!