Author Archives: JMN

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About JMN

I live in Texas and devote much of my time to easel painting on an amateur basis. I stream a lot of music, mostly jazz, throughout the day. I like to read and memorize poetry.

Alphabeticalism

Posted on May 5, 2020 by JMN

I once had to choose Arabic or Greek, the sole elective, in a course of study. It made a lot of difference in what I did next. I enthuse time and again over instances of letters lateraled into graven imagery … Continue reading →

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But Here We Are: Me and…

Posted on May 4, 2020 by JMN

I feel foolish at bobbing and weaving through the tall grass of music theory, unled and untaught, not glimpsing even sky, much less horizon. All I would have to have done — note the pluperfect infinitive — is to have … Continue reading →

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Color in Shadow

Posted on May 3, 2020 by JMN

Jordan Casteel’s paintings come at you. There’s no subordination. They are like a roomful of stories told all at once. One figure hides in his colorful skin; two others iridesce, starkly defined. Sofas riot; a hot mirrored lamp commandeers its … Continue reading →

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A Words’ Worth of Picture

Posted on May 2, 2020 by JMN

I like this illustration to Roger Cohen’s column enough to leave it alone. (Roger Cohen, “Who Knows Where the Time Goes,” NYTimes, 5-1-20) (c) 2020 JMN

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Holes for the Pigeons

Posted on April 30, 2020 by JMN

This article is summative and conclusivist in broad spectrum, but its immediate service is the convenient running to ground of generation labels. A national poll conducted in mid-March by the data intelligence company Morning Consult, which has been tracking public … Continue reading →

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Acting SECNAV Wants More Fulsome Report

Posted on April 30, 2020 by JMN

Acting SECNAV Thomas B. Modly fired Capt. Bret E. Crozier, commander of the Theodore Roosevelt, when his plea on behalf of his crew after a coronavirus outbreak on the carrier went public. Adm. Michael M. Gilday, chief of naval operations, … Continue reading →

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Homemade Hope

Posted on April 28, 2020 by JMN

George Condo alludes to the pandemic as a species of “microbiological warfare” created to get someone re-elected. Then he gets down to art: As to what I’m doing as an artist, I’m just exploring the psychological impact of… how fear, … Continue reading →

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The Naked and the Fungible

Posted on April 27, 2020 by JMN

In 2008, an IBM study that sought to identify “workers who are “virtually indistinguishable from others’ in terms of the value of their contributions to the workplace” was reported. (www.workitdaily.com). It’s pointed to when you Google “fungible.” In 2020, Kara … Continue reading →

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Only a Little Too Much

Posted on April 26, 2020 by JMN

Holland Cotter reviewed in February “Vida Americana: Mexican Muralists Remake American Art, 1925-1945” at the Whitney Museum of American Art through May 17, 2020. Cotter traces a thread of Mexican art history leading from the “big three” — Diego Rivera, … Continue reading →

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Hunker Work

Posted on April 24, 2020 by JMN

I’m at my dining room table sketching now. And they’re raw sketches. Just a Pilot pen on tracing paper. (Frank O. Gehry) I’ve actually been busy doing drawings similar to one from 2018 called “Anxiety Drawing.” They were black, and … Continue reading →

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