Evian Roller Babies dance to Ghanaian artist Ofori Amponsah’s music….

Fabulous………….

All I've ever wanted is a painting by Margaret Bowland......................

Flower Girl #2 (2009)

Flower Girl (2009)

Another Thorny Crown 2010

Party, Chelsea Gallery

Murakami Wedding 2008

Olympia Series #4 2006

I know its naughty but I've been at loathes to share the beautiful and provocative art of Margaret Bowland with anyone [until I could afford them all -myself hehehee]. Anyway, its my birthday's soon -and hopefully one of the above gems -might just come my way..........x


"Art was until very recently a search for visual harmony – Picasso’s “lie that makes us realize the truth.” That lie was compositional, spatial harmony. But what was that truth? We no longer have any faith in Truth capitalized. Plato says in The Sophist that “by the art of painting we make another house, a sort of man-made dream product for those who are awake.” I believe in those houses, that in this illusory space our stories unfold. This space holds as much power now as it ever has. The human psyche still dreams, those dreams are still our stories, and within these stories our consciousness is revealed. I need art to be the story, in visual terms, of what happens to people.


We inhabit a purely relative world, in terms of belief structures, yet each of us knows and in a sense, believes in, the need to be beautiful. My work is about beauty—what it means to be beautiful and what significance the idea has in the twenty-first century in the world of art. We all know that being beautiful is as important as being rich, that being beautiful is itself a form of wealth. One must be tall, thin and white. One’s features must be diminutive and regular. We recognize deviations from this norm, but recognize that these deviations, even if appealing, are far from ideal. The need to be beautiful fuels one of the largest and most ruthless industries in our world.


Beauty makes sense to me, has weight for me, only when it falls from grace. It starts to matter when it carries damage. Sorrow allows it to cast a shadow. It becomes three-dimensional. It enters our world.

Looking at Manet’s Olympia, I wondered about the two women depicted—the young, naked prostitute and the black maid servant—about the relationship between them and to the man observing them. His implied presence began to unite them to me, not as lovers, but as the prey sharing a foxhole. In my imagination, the women of my paintings entered that room. What my century brings to the ideas of race and beauty and sexual allure began to overlay Manet’s.


I began painting Anna, the dwarf in my pictures, two years ago. I was fascinated by the tragedy of her body. In Velasquez' paintings, dwarves possess the greatest sense of consciousness of any of his characters. Even in Les Meninas, after we take in the brightly lit perfection of the blond doll at the center, our eye is drawn to Velasquez’s own face, connects with him, and then moves laterally to the dwarf. The two—Velasquez and the dwarf—bracket with their awareness the hollow beauty of the golden child. That connection between the artist and the dwarf rings true to me. I believe in that space—outside the golden circle inhabited by the princess.


I see, in Anna, a perfect visual equivalence for what it feels like to live in this outside, other world. Being observed, as the young Olympia is in Manet’s painting, creates in every one of us the squirming need to appear desirable, beautiful. But even if we are lovely, in our need to be desired each of us subsumes who we are in order to present the blank screen of beauty necessary for admiration or affection—and in so doing, dies. Anna, however, like Velasquez and his dwarves, lives a life outside the harmonious, golden circle of “art.” That space outside feels absolutely honest to me.


After watching Anna leave my studio, I have knelt on the floor, stooped even lower, crawled, to see the room as she sees it. I have placed her in “Olympia” in a struggle with the young black girl . Today, this black girl is no maid, but another candidate for desire. Yet this young woman carries all the history of what it has meant to be a black woman—used by men, by artists, by us.


We are supposed to look away politely from the maimed. But I want to stare, inhabit their flesh. Such flesh feels like an honest revelation, what it feels to be stalked by the need to be beautiful. Hence, my paintings are never allegorical; nothing stands for anything else. They are the closest I can get to what my mind’s eye sees when it depicts the struggle of living to me.


As the painter, the observer of these young women, I am a predator, but it is the desire humans have had since the beginning of time—to hunt and consume their prey and dissolve within their spirits…scarily close to what we mean when we say we love."

Margaret Bowland [Brooklyn, NY, February, 2008]

R.I.P Michael Jackson (1958 -2009)

It must be very difficult to 'BE' -when the whole world thinks you are one thing -but you are really another. It must be difficult to truly express yourself -when your image is, -constructed, owned by others [and worth Billions] -and you are not happy. It must have been difficult -to have the whole world loving you -when you can not love or connect with yourself. Thus, the excess and the loathing. The hate of your own black skin -and then , the adoration. What a crazy, crazy world you inhabited. A world where your every wish/whim is acted upon and obeyed and -thus you became a sort of God -and no man should be or can be -God [and you knew this, -because deep down you are a simple 'child of God']. And thus, the self hate and the fear. Then the plastic surgery, and more plastic surgery and more adoration, -and things got [sort of] twisted -and you started to believe the hype [and it would seem -the paler you got, -the more success you had, -removing the fear -that you may one day become like -your father]. And the more success you had -the less real your life became -causing you to become a sort of 'Peter Pan' [one of the many childhood hero's you escaped through -when you was made to work harder and give more of yourself at an age when many children are still playing], -a sort of sexless, boy/man. But instead of people telling you the truth like, 'Michael you cannot be best friends with a monkey, Michael your feet are way off the ground or Michael you have had enough surgery' -they left you to spiral out of control -turning you into some sort of 'freak show'. And we all know -'your people' enjoyed watching you become a 'freak show'; -eating all the money -but Michael,what did you care? You just wanted a childhood [because even though you were and still are loved by billions -this was never enough. Because, no matter your success Michael, -your childhood was never too far from you). I can not believe it, but like Lady Diana -I didn't know I loved you -until now, -and now, I am sort of stunned but not surprised that you have gone. Too much ***, too much fantasy, too much***, the denial, the pain, a life lived at a pace that would have killed many -sooner. A life lived on stage, -in the full unrelenting glare of the world. Did all those ugly words touch you? Did all those negative eyes, and tongues [talking rubbish about you] penetrate your soul -or were you surrounded by people who were praying and loving you? Did you have 'conscious' people cancelling, all those arrows of hate coming your way [daily]-or did the love of your fans, their goodwill and all your charity work and goodness -block the negative? What a crazy life you have lived Michael -or maybe it was normal for you. But is it possible for any one to have lived your life and not -been touched/effected or damaged by it's crazy, craziness? How can a life of excess, of having-it-all [materially] -and the pills you had to take at the end -to make you function -like your old self, -not effect the sanest of people? No, I now believe that you lived it the best way you could Michael, -God rest your soul. Michael I am sad you have 'passed over' but thankful that -your MUSIC will live on forever. I pray for your children and your family -may they live in peace and in the TRUTH -and may you, Michael -finally, be at peace -Amen. Thank you for the music...............x

Art: Dawn Okoro -An artist with a heart..

I love Dawn Okoro's work -there is a lovely fashioned vibe about them. The two (oil on acrylic) paintings above (top, 'frame' 2009 -24x36 and bottom, 'animadversion' 2008 -24x24) -are a fabulous celebration of the black female. Currently a Law student at University of Texas, -Dawn juggles her studies with her painting (many are commissioned portraits of celebrities like, Shaun Robinson of "Access Hollywood", Victoria's Secret model Nichole and Erykah Badu) and collaborations with various Charities. She also teamed up with Erykah Badu -to raise awareness for the singer's non-profit organization.
www.myspace.com/dawnokoroart