Anzac Bay ...and Billy Apple!

I've been playing around with my photo's again! I am becoming more and more interested video and slideshows and no doubt you will be seeing more of these...and no doubt some with audio effects too!

I didn't take these images with the intention of putting them together in a slide show although I did compose the first 3 and last 2 with the view of pieceing them togther at a later date. It just wasn't much later as it turns out and not quite how I first thought!

Yesterday I saw a documentry on Billy Apple and I was really interested in how the documentry was recorded, the photos, the angles and the silent observations made by the photographer...how that photographer saw things..they way in which it was shared with us. I saw things from the photographers point of view and I thought to myself...I want a piece of that!

The slideshow is here on this blog not because of what it records but because of the greater work my artistic mind is working on! I'm keen to do so time lapse experiments so please watch this space!

Billy Apple- A tribute

This is my completed collage, inspired by Billy Apple.
I havn't tried to copy him but I have allowed myself to be influenced by his ideas. Below is a brief history on the long history of Billy Apple (seperate post.) Don't forget to Google to see more of his art!

About this collage:
Media- Leaves, seed pods, pattern paper, paint, mesh, cotton buds, playing card, needles and thread.

The leaves have been deconstructed by either myself or by nature as a reflection of Billy Apples fascination of the process of deconstruction.

The cotton buds are a reference to one of his most controversial exhibitions- that of his own bodily wiping's.

The playing cards are a reference to Billy Apple's consistant use of text and numbers either visually or mathmaticaly.

The pattern paper, needles and thread are really just embellishements relating to the construct/deconstruct concept but play a role in balancing and calming the overall collage. (In my opinion!)

The printed apples in acrylic are obviously a reference to Billy Apple.

I have really enjoyed exploring this style of collage which I have written a bit more about below (with a close up photo) and it was an interesting challenge putting synthetic items and natural items together on the same page this way. I've really enjoyed the relative lack of rules and the freedom of working instinctively.

Let me know what you think!

Daring to be different. A tribute to Billy Apple.

Last night I watched a documentary on Billy Apple, a NZ artists who made his name in NY and came home again. I had heared of Billy Apple before but I knew very little about him. At the conclusion of the doco I knew that with out a doubt that the man is an absolute GENIUS. Bizarre? yes. Obsessive? yes. Fascinating? yes. Genius? with out a doubt.
In brief Billy Apple was born Barrie Bates. He was accepted into art school did fascinating things in the realms of pop art and neon lights. He was instinctively drawn to marketing and has worked on and off in the field of advertising creating now iconic advertisements for things like tea and clothes powder! Eventually Barrie decided to become a BRAND himself and Billy Apple was born. That is where the man is genius. HE became the art work. He became the brand. Everything Billy did was an extension of the art work that was him. He exhibited with greats like Andy Warhol and his name came up in the same circles as Robert Rauschenberg's.
His artwork broke rules and he sold concepts and ideas as opposed to actual 'take it home and hang it on a wall' art. Sometimes he took it to far. While you can get people too look at an exhibition of glass piles and floor sweepings (literally) and exhibition of his own bodily wiping's (yes really!) tested people beyond their level of acceptance. It was the concept of it the wiping's though that drove him. If he was the brand, the artwork -then these things where the deconstruction of the art work. The end result was the process and not the physical evidence ie: the wiping's or glass piles that drove him.
Now day's his art is 'take it home' art. On the 45th anniversary of the brand "Billy Apple" he signed 45 canvas's that had his trade marked 'Billy Apple" logo on them. He sold them for $4500 each. He doesn't even create the art himself. Like an architect designs a house and some-one else builds it Billy Apple designs the idea and a sign writer makes it. He is the brand just like Nike or Billabong. GENIUS!
Billy Apple changed the way people thought and what was perceived as being art and for that I am greatful.