January 2011

The Junkyard

Posted on January 27, 2011January 29, 2011 by Varg

View Larger Map Update: More from Candice here. I just bought a ’90s era truck and it needs a few things so I ventured out to “Pull-a-Part” out by Boomtown Casino and the Harvey Canal a little while back to get a tailgate assembly, a door cable and whatever else I could find on the…

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Bath Salts = Bloody Coat Hangers

Posted on January 21, 2011January 21, 2011 by Varg

Jindal bans ingredients in fake bath salts Sold openly, snorted or injected, they often send users to ERs Whoa. Okay that’s a difficult metaphor but let me explain. Jello Biafra wrote, “For every prohibition you create you also create an underground.” And the bloody coat hangers are what the more ardent Pro-Choice activists use as…

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Kenny G at Congo Square…

Posted on January 20, 2011 by Varg

New Orleans Jazz Fest 2011 to feature Arcade Fire, Bon Jovi, Kid Rock, Wilco and many more Smooth jazz saxophonist Kenny G will likely appear on Jazz Fest’s Congo Square stage. He is extremely popular with African-American audiences, as evidenced by his headlining set at an early Essence Music Festival in the Superdome. …

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What Are The Saints Up To?

Posted on January 17, 2011 by Varg

According to their tweets… Shockey is pimping an energy drink … Just wanted to let yall know that I have teamed up with Cult All Natural Energy Activator and we are having a… Tracy Porter (Doubles Deuces) is still taking shit about that stiffarm… RT @S_dot_baby42 tha year of marshawn lynch stiff arm

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Ashmopedia

Posted on January 14, 2011January 14, 2011 by Varg

I was looking through the Treme Wikipedia page and saw they had one up for Ashley… Ashley Morris But wait, whaaaat? They said he died in Chicago? Have to fix that. I have to think of a way to put in there he showed up at Rising Tide 2 in spite of the pain from…

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A Man on the Morning Street Revisited

Posted on January 10, 2011 by Varg

About four years ago, a man who I took at the time to be off his rocker encountered me on the street in front of my house… A Man on the Morning Street I just stepped out onto my porch in a bathrobe and said hi to a man walking down the street. He asked…

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Rejoice!

I say that a lot. I sign many pieces with it. I do this because I believe our lives are a true happenstance. A brilliant occurence from nothingness. We are so rare. We are so unlikely. And simply being born isn’t enough. From there we must survive, endure. So each morning, after our Sun departs and is reborn again. Please, for the sake of your ancestors and the Universe in general, hoist that cup of joe up and say, “Rejoice.”

Ours is a soulful existence. No matter how many McMansions, polyester fabrics, auto-tunes, modified foods and social networks we surround ourselves with, we are all still native, passionate beings made of ancient matter. We are organic and we have soul.

Wood also has a warm, soulful quality. Wood has a memory. It retains smells, traumas, events. It even has a calendar. This is why I have chosen it as my medium, for its old soul. I like to think the wood in my work is in its third incarnation. First a tree, then a home and now art. If you have a room that needs a little soul, get a piece. A room can never have enough soul.

My inspiration and subject matter comes from many sources, among them: Humanism, old ballads, trickster tales, flora and fauna, science, myths and folklore, stringed instruments, brass bands, amber spirits, lady vocalists, general relativity and quantum mechanics. Some of my pieces are there just to make a short, simple statement about what’s important in life. Some are more diffuse and abstract in meaning. A personal drama, an enduring line from a poem or novel, a poignant song lyric, the legacy of an important person, a fleeting thought … these are the subjects of my art.

I use hearts often because they are a very abstract way of depicting the human soul without also employing the very subjective human form. The symbolic heart is an apt representation for a person’s experience and essence. A body can immediatly conjure happiness, sorrow, youth, age, anger, bliss. These emotions can get in the way. Sometimes it’s simply about the experience.

I am the son of a sailor and a social worker, the grandson of a gypsy, a dancer and a nurse. I spent my youth moving from port city to port city, watching a lot of road go by and reading World Book Encyclopedia. After my parents settled down on the Gulf Coast, I was a miscreant youth, destroying cars and taking the wrongs things too seriously and the right things not serious enough. Eventually I began replacing my imagination with experience.

I will use any salvaged wood but prefer swamp cypress and longleaf heartwood pine.

I despise waste. Particularly the waste of organic matter. Trees are magnificent. They were here before we arrived and they’ll be around after we are gone. I’m making an effort to save as much wood as possible. Creating art is fun too. But beyond communicating with folks, but beyond making money ad providing for myself, beyond rescuing flooded parts, beyond reveling in the ethereal aroma of heartpine that hasn’t seen the light of day in 400 years, beyond all that, I am trying to make a simple comment on waste.