Boston Premiere of Movie and some of the painting

i'll be giving an artist presentation and Q&A on my work, the film and painting being shown at massart weds the 10th of september at 345pm, kennedy building 4th floor.

refreshments may be provided.

RIFF Joke

Dear Sh ****************:

It has been a long and arduous process in making the selections for this year's 12th Rhode Island International Film Festival (RIIFF). Approximately 3,000 entries were submitted to our competition, making for an exciting and, at times, daunting adjudication process. This year we received truly amazing film work that made the competition a very lively and difficult process. Our judges indicated that over 500 films scored high enough to be included in this year's festival; yet, unfortunately, this is something we cannot do with our seven-day schedule

We regret to inform you that "Hearts of Darkness: A Painter's Apocalypse" was not officially selected for the 2008 Festival. However, due to the high caliber of your film, we would like to offer you the opportunity to remain in consideration for our sidebar programming. Throughout the year, RIIFF sponsors events and screenings to promote the festival and provide a second chance for filmmakers, like yourself, to have their work shown to the public.

The films were judged and scored based on a potential of 8-10 applicable questions regarding the quality of the cinematography, dialogue, acting, editing, and other technical considerations. Additionally, the judges could note their personal responses. If there were questions, a final selection committee reviewed the film and a vote was taken. Quite often, a high scoring film might not be selected due to exhibition limitations. When our available slots were filled in a given category, we had to stop and many titles that were worthy of screening could not be added. There was simply not enough space for many great films, including some of our personal favorites.

At RIIFF, we respect your work. We know the time and effort you've put into creating your film. Our judging process, no matter how carefully and objectively devised, is still subjective, ultimately boiling down to personal opinion and contextual limitations. But, with our year-round programming, we have found a way to expand those limitations and further support the aspirations of independent filmmakers.

We truly appreciate that you entered our competition and we wish you the best of luck with "Hearts of Darkness: A Painter's Apocalypse" - and with your future projects. We also invite you to visit our festival and use it as an opportunity to network, meet other filmmakers, enjoy movies, attend workshops, and just have fun.

Again, our sincere appreciation for submitting your work to this year's festival!



Cordially,



Chase Huneke

Programming Manager



George Marshall

Executive Director

*************




how could they judge something i never sent or paid to submit?
riddle me that beeyatch?
by the way my movies hott and my wife is really good to watch.

these days.

the weather feels like im waiting in the jungle for something to happen, something. i havent painted since my last days in brittonie, i havent had much relation to it since i got back from france, im not at all accounting it to general malaise, for not having a job, digesting my time in europe, my last dinner in italy... its not even that i am afraid of the painting, i am afraid of it, i have been since i started it, i weakly muscled through the hotel scene, painted fantastic shrimp to "save time. If you eat these I'll never question your courage again."
its almost like a botched limb transplant, i dont want it on me but its in me, i dont know where my "love" of war and humanity's inability to be civil and work for a common, notice not greataer cause, but something that benefits anyway, look switzerland's a bunch of beautiful looking pansies and they seem pretty calm, why cant that exist? give me the new swiss order and ill stop ranting.
im tired, the painting not even being worked on is killing me, the fact that i dont know when i can see it again, paint it again.

spell fear. and shes sad too.

theses days

job searching:
lists:

*entered project for MTA subway station
Dondi's yard...

*entered Hearts in "Cinema Vérité"-
Iran International Film Festival 15-19 October

*compiled the never ending CV

*getting really good at driving people away,
maybe because i'm not painting.

*making press kits and wedding invitations.

*trying to get rehydrated

*wishing c. wasnt at a funeral
that i was supposed to go with her to.

*i really dont like fighting,
i think in the intro to mein kampf i wrote
something to the effect of "even the word
WAR makes me want people dead, what kind
of complex is that one?"

it scratches out the martyr, and jesus complexes, but leads me to think....

dictator/director. (thanks francis)

the movie.

Hearts of Darkness: A Painter's Apocalypse. from sh on Vimeo.

also can be seen in the what cannes got link.

the short and long of it.

finally i have the video up on the web, for the nerds: vimeo allowed my perfect picture and sound res.
but now its here... the amount of time i spent on this video; the ARGUMENTS that took place, and if argument is any allowance for disgust then i hope argument made you happy beacause it gets ill, dead babies, dead chillums ain't cool. so:


stop it with the cluster bombs and shallow hull landmines. be careful amongst camoflage im wrenching here...

heres the video complete (nerds hook it up...)
(<3sh)

if that dont work go here:

http://vimeo.com/913356/

thanks. love. famiglia.

rippenest town.

so im back, b******* or b***** didnt happen. im back home 150 ft are done and im only 15 minutes into the film.
been to cannes, red cahpet, expensive suits, amazing wife, eye makeup, nrml people oclock, paparazzi.

dennis hopper supposedly has one copy of "hearts of darkness:a painter's apocalypse."
which will be posted here as soon as the world premiere status is listed.

i guess the painting and my life has taken routes unseen, and i am rafting that river as it unfolds, i think next semester will be finshing, i painted a few times since, but i need to finish FINISH this project, video, installation, dance, music and all. and i know i can, ive gotten through the hardest scenes, except brando stagediving into kipling, but nonetheless, i can do this painting, i have the personal wearwithall to compete, whoever thought theyd see me with a superawesomemodel wife and a 5000 dollar handmade parisian suit... well cannes did, now shut up and finish the painting.

check: australian newspaper
italian magazine
dennis hopper's subconscious
selfdenial/reprisal
bank account.

GIVE ME MONEY OR PRAY!!!!!

shit has hit the fan!!!!!!!!!!
i wont get into particulars but the project now needs a miracle (read as $$$ which dont exist in my mind or back left pocket nomore so read as euros!), like a real real miracle, like immaculate conception or cheese pizza.

and ryan i fell into a boat how that happens is beyond me.

jesus christ bananas.
oh yeah and i got twins on the way!

way to put it all out there shaun....
"would there be any honesty to my trade, would i want it any other way"

is it okay to quote yourself? (breton does so....)

ps ill never pay you back.

oh yeah and if you are ever in nantes and see a man with a 6 inch scar on his throat.....
that was my noble fault as well.

love you pay me bitches, pretty please with sugar on top!

18left

burning the last of the promo copies for cannes, almost there i swear, i swear.
i almost broke my foot, my head hurts and i need a fucking 6 tab bump of coolatpin right fucking now!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

been awhile.

this has been the strangest adventure of my life.
escapism led to blurry eyed video production,
escapism led to running out of money in the very small production account,
escapism led back to the start.
escapism led me out.

and i apologize for s(l)ick poetics but things have changed,
i have 100ft done of three hundred ***** hasnt gotten back to me
so new cities new plans new life.

and altho i have placed this painting as a tree in my life,
consistently branching and growing,
the strange or overtly natural thing about a tree is that it has roots,
deep covered roots, and when painting or visualizing a tree,
sometimes these roots get dug up or validated or any other word you can place.

and then how a painter does video better than painting, i
assuage to branches, to new leaves, to dare i say fruitfulness,

i found out tonite in my first real step away from this painting,
something that scares,
something that i dont like,

when i first started painting, i painted directly from my heart to hand,
i would black out i was painting her and her and her and her
and i would wake up to my mothers care,
my mothers unintelligable support (spelling might be wrong im fucked)
and so i stopped
i started researching leonardo, jacopo, giovanni so i could cope with
having strizucture so the things that happen dont happen.

dear mommy,
how come when sh. tries to paint pretty pictures,
things always end up dead or dying.
your father asked why i have to be so fucking morbid,
i dont know,
its bad genes i guess.
i dont know,
i think if this letter, this writing ends in aduoisbfgkjhdsbgkvljhfbdkjvbndsfjkv
its because i blacked out face down on the keyboard,
but i wont im stronger now, i think,
and im damn sick of thinking,
thanks mom, you were right.
sh.

trailer.

so heres the trailer, after cannes ill release the whole damn thing, but for now this is what youll get unless you are very very special, and i am completely convinced you wont exploit the exploiter.
love you.

the whirlwinds of absolution with gusts of confused air.

back from a short studious vacation, paris, berlin, the dam,
paris= kiefer (louvre) kiefer (d'orsay) corinth (d'orsay) bourgeoisie (pompidou et tulieres).
(and maybe one caravaggio that held its own- louvre)
berlin= kiefer kiefer kiefer (hbg bahnhof) baselitz, grosz, beckmann, kokoschka (neuenatgal)
kathë kollwitz!!! (she has a better pieta than michelangelo)
dam= vermeer!!! (but ive already talked about that one.)

so now its back to video world, maybe its good since the flood gates of time have reopened in the best ways i've ever known, dunkin donuts in berlin is a strange idea.

kiefer gave me alot to think about, he had a statement about his german background and how it affects his working process, and its readily apparent that he has embraced the horrors of history and understands something i have yet to attempt, after all the ashes and death life does come a new, be it bombers and books fertile with poppies, or constellations of sunflowers or an old man finding understanding in heavy metal. (that wasnt meant to be a double-entendre, they are just inescapable.)
his new installation at the louvre, titled "athanol" was stunning not only in its symbolism of redemption, cycles etc but he has opened up the world of painting in ways that only merlin could have imagined, he always has used the dirt and detritus of his consciousness to inform and lecture the viewer, but now he has become transcendent, there is no lecture, just hope and amazement.

and then to look at the past, his german past, his lilith was to be taken into a world that knows only slight hope and some sort of baroque amazement,
i came up with the crackpot idea of watching him work, working for him, producing a movie on him, because this movie/project has opened my eyes to the constant lineage of journalists, artists, filmmakers, musicians who are willing to actually open their eyes to the horrors of the human condition, including their own as some sort of wierd in/evolutional telescope, to map, to describe, and to warn others of dante, of merlin, of talmud.

"abandon hope, all ye who enter here" just not yet.

the videos almost done, i should have a preview up on withoutabox soon, and send it into sfc this week, and then its back to painting, its the river for a week or so, and possibly to the kurtz compound prior to cannes, i just dont know where any of it all fits in to the life altering alterior solutions i try to understand.

render me this.

so the video for the sfc at cannes is two rendering steps, and one compressor step away, im waiting on 7 minutes of video from new york to plug in,
ivan finished the song, "black and white" last nite, holy shit, the boy kills it, it sounds scripted, of course hes seen the movie probably as many times as me, but hes never seen apocalypse now, or HOD, and he gave me fourteen minutes of pure fucking amazingness,
the backstory is is the guitar he plays it on, HE BUILT!!! (in the time we've know each other!!!) hand tools, river water, my challenge, its the most beautiful guitar ive ever seen, and the fourteen minutes, i plugged in beginning to end of film and it just sits perfect, yes slight level adjustments, but i move and he moves, its synced, maybe its living in a submarine.
well the credits are done, and im just waiting on the video from NYC (or Boston depending where it is)
and its done done done, well the short version is, off to cannes by the time i arrive in Paris, or while im there.

im going to paris, berlin, and the netherlands for a short break,
the louvre (the new kiefer permanent piece), pompidou (a show on iraq war), kathe KOLLWITZ museum is two feet from my hotel in berlin, checkpoint charlie (peter your bars might go there?)
but ill be out of touch for about 2 weeks, painting 180ft (60m) is about all i have left to sketch out....
its getting somewhere?

wait.

Your accreditation request for the 61st Festival de Cannes has been duly registered.

theres that, and 100 ft are ready to ship, waiting, has become what my head is filled with when not painting, waiting for rendering, funding, answers, and yes this has become the game, and so after 4 days of hard hours breathing pigments fumes and everything else, struggling with overseers for my route my path, i wait, i wait to use fumes and pigments, i wait through copying line upon line of dialogue to create layers and depth, i dont like the overt narrative of text, its not voice it never will be when i write insane or shrimp or kurtz its contrived, yet it has to be, it focuses me into the composition of the work to come, the montenegran brigade of color that has 200 ft to colorize in 3 weeks, the me that has to write the words so long ago spoken, in grandure, in disrespect, in theory to respect.

i wait.

legitimacy... of sorts.

Monsieur S*** M***
Nous avons bien reçu votre film HEARTS OF DARKNESS: A PAINTER'S APOCALYPSE
La conférence de presse annonçant les films sélectionnés pour le Festival de Cannes se déroule durant la seconde quinzaine d’avril.
Si votre film est sélectionné pour le Festival de Cannes, vous serez prévenu avant cette date.
Nous essayerons dans la mesure du possible de donner des réponses à tous les candidats avant la conférence de presse.

Cordialement,

Festival de Cannes
Département Films

______________________________________________________________________________________



Dear S*** M***

We have received your film HEARTS OF DARKNESS: A PAINTER'S APOCALYPSE
The press conference will be held in the last two weeks of April.
If your film is selected for the Festival de Cannes, you will be notified before the press conference we will do our best to notify all candidates before the press conference.

Yours sincerely,

Festival de Cannes
Film Department

there it is now its time to fucking paint, until my hands bleed, not much more video work to do, fuck the web right now, the knock, the paperwork, the identity is sealed.

balance.

something good happens, then something bad happens,
and im too angry to get into it right now, i just have to paint,
tomorrow i will paint, but this fucking thing has become a self fulfilling prophecy;
i should be used to that right now in my life, 13 years of calling myself a suffering bastard from the old testament on the streets, and now when things are getting all too shiny, i find my marlon brando, and in a strange sense in the same person, coppola's ex-wife. i did ask for this in assuming the role of francis ford coppola as the director of a project like this, and for three weeks i thought i was willard. reality just hit.

the butoh portion of my piece and a large financial portion crumbled today, im not going to blame, its just fucking people's relationships to commitments and promises and the value i hold them at; without the budget, without hollywood connections, without... i am faced with the same fucking shit he was, and now not only am i director, but i am actor(s)(i thought i could just pick one), filmmaker, editor, fucking everything.

my title for the short was that perfect self fulfilling, dooming, prophecy... or maybe the whole piece is based in that, im a fucking painter living beyond his britches right now, and i dont know if i like it.

i think i just did a really good job about not really venting and blaming, i just dont know what to do right now. im so angry, i could spit, im so disappointed, i could cry, im so frustrated, i could give up. could can be replaced with should in every single one of those prior sentences.
theres no alcohol or drugs of power here like i desperately need to fall asleep, after 3 weeks of 3-4 hours a nite.

i wont say im done but im on the fucking edge. and im sick of fucking lies. (which i guess is where this whole piece started).

accepted.

ive been editing a video for 18 hours straight, i got it into cannes, somehow, and it will be screened in the short film corner at the festival. the deadlines the 21 for the overall judging, and april 1st for the screening. the project has morphed, and im sure will continue to do so as time goes on, mathew knows i like lists so:

-release of "Hearts of Darkness: A Painter's Apocalypse" short
[heres what cannes got: synopsis:
'Hearts of Darkness: A Painter's Apocalypse' is the short documentary chronicling the development of the art installation, 'Apocalypse Still,' a 100 meter painting using Coppola's 'Apocalypse Now,' as subject, installation as evidence, and movement as dialogue. The installation will be screened at a major international art festival in July, this short contains interviews and actions showing the intensity and intent of the project.]

-followed up by full documentary release of the same film.
*yes its backwards from how francis did it, but i have my reasons*

-premiere of installation

-release of full length dvd, "Apocalypse Still" shot in the same running time as the movie itself, showcasing in real time the project in its finished state.

-wish i could paint more and had a team of video techs to handle this part, but this is the route i chose to take, i have less then a week to finish the short, and three months to finish the painting, so on the deadline tip, one is more pressing. but i have started painting furiously and on a whim tried the cannes submission, and so one way or the other something lined up right.

-shoot last six minutes of dialogue, now, because its dark out, my eyes hurt, my headaches, and i have a fucking absurd desire for deadlines.

the walls are closing in.

not to be hyper-dramatic, tho that is kind of my nature, the nature of a film, a painting, but the walls are closing in, the weather in pontaven has been less than cooperative, i painted in a hailstorm the other day after brief lulls and periods of clarity and sunlight,the next day was fraught with hurricane winds and rain like.... well never mind the simile, all the priors day painting beat away, and so the weather has forced me to move a majority of my working time inside, on the ground with canvas that is beat to shit, gesso that has become nonbinded plaster, and until i really started grinding and bottling my own paints and colors it was hell, the first day not a person walked in who didnt complain about the smell of over terped medium (how else to make dammar) but i dont mind the smell it smells like painting is supposed to. and the second day, the cheap grocery store oil ive been using has too much absorbtive power and dries so matte i dont know how to read the layers. but aside from that i've been pressing forward, still havent moved past the hotel, and am working too slow for my time restraints.
i have thought about a pre-screening at cannes in may and i think its a good idea, tho i dont know how ill play it, i have to do some research, if anyone has any clues to cannes i think it might be the best move this whole project has seen, besides the bad weather in brittonie.
my computer is lagging like crazy so, im going to stop babbling, and tho this project is a political nitemare of a piece and has affected so severely my outlook on governments and war machines, i leave you with a picture bunny sent me for the archives.

getting softer.

so, the paintings begun, and you can view the individual photos of the work by clicking on the slideshow, i think?
its been a rough week, the weather was shit, ive been getting sick, cold, wet.
i became extremely disassociative before starting the hotel scene, and im surprised i made it this far, without francis giving me dope, but it was scary for the first time in years i was losing time, losing faith, acting out, but i gave myself 36 hours, and i think i pulled through, and however psychosomatic a painters logic can be, it was fucking frightening, i had thoughts of running to amsterdam, or nooses, and yes those jokes arent funny but they are what i was dealing with, im sitting in a hotel, a trained killer, questioning the shallow nature of a woman who doesnt understand me, while the real person who can kill me, "charlie, is squatting in the bush, getting stronger..." yeah thats a good place to be.
but heres the update, ive sketched the first fifty or so feet, the hardest scene in the movie, and i have 240 or so more feet (80m) to go... and im going.
im working outside, still wet, peeling gesso, grinding pigments on rocks, sealing cracks with cheap linseed oil, smashing found pastels to get brights and then, inside because of the fucking french spring, but "c'est la guerre, n'est ce pas?"
today tho was victorious, i think im the only painter ever to see frost on his painting, and try to save it... it was beautiful to see the frost when it was shining before it melted and i saved the craquelure with damar and oil.
the next scene is the mission, and han solo's in that shit, so thats easy, i can play games with harrison, its about time i get a break, and the shrimp, the honor of those fucking p(r)awns, let the absurdist logic take away my fears, i beg you.

first and 15

my canvas was puddled, gesso was like glue to my feet, and so i started acrylic underpainting, large brushes, the first three and a half minutes, the choppers flying through flare smoke, forest of the war, napalm strike, without much contrast in dark yet, it was too wet to get oils in there, but my release was blowing pigment as smoke at the end of my day. im exhausted. but it felt good to paint, or it felt horrible to paint as well. my body is killing me, my head hurts and i need to eat something, vikram will give me reiki soon, and people say ive used more color than theyve ever seen, so overall i think it was a good start, a good place to begin, the birds and river behind me, my feet red and yellow, my heart pounding at times, but friends coming to save me for smoke breaks, tho i had a cigarette in my mouth for the whole time. stuart advised me to put a tarp over it due to the shit weather we've been having, even tho i think i am detached and want the world to take this thing from me, its probably a good idea, ill post some snapshots later, after i recuperate.

changes and news.

after long talks with relja, i have decided to paint the piece outside, on the ground, in the elements, as another element, more evidence, i think. it could ruin things, or it could melt the oil off the canvas, but i guess its war, no?
so without further wait heres the video journal part one.

back from spain.

alot has solidified with this trip to spain, especially with the exposure to war soil, and goya (like we all knew that wouldnt happen.) barry and i filmed the first video interview in our hotel window, fitting place due to the barrio surrounds with policia in the middle. ill edit it and it will be up by this weekEND. its reiterating alot of the points ive already made here on blogworld, and sort of clarifies some of the struggles i am dealing with being an american by birth painting something that we are famous for but have no actual resonance with, even when our family and friends are shipped off, they are just that, shipped off, prepackaged to be returned prepackaged or way to fucked to have a word for.
ivan and i had coffee at the castel de montjuic, a place where one can feel the beauty and horror, a place where vomit and chills are a sideeffect. hes seen blood, hes seen war's deadly ring and we sat drinking nescafé between spanish fascist howitzers. then the sun cut through the fog like the moon looks, on the nite of a lunar eclipse. it was a wierd ride. faces in the rocks, tags on antiaircraft guns.
sorry i gotta use jim morrison to end this one,
take me, spanish caravan, take me away.
the painting starts monday.

framerate.

if you havent voted for me on ideablob please do, the link is to the right of this post,

i had a rough whiskey nite, last nite, wondering if my objectification of war as social comment and autobiography is the worst form of lying possible. (ivan, bunnie and barry had to clean up after me, and ivan had to walk me home, well not walk me basically carry me... but i made it.)
the montenegrans who have seen "real" war, have seen the blood in the streets i think i can paint, have been so helpful, too deep even with the language barrier.

i cannot understand how they can respect my work, which they do, because i cant handle they fact that i might be onto something. moreso, that it feels like lies, but relja told me that it is the same war, whether ive been there or not, the things, the selfimposed struggles i have been through are the same as there, and because they only speak from their heart i must take it into mine.
i dont like it at all. but they dont know lies like i do, and maybe there is truth in my work that i refuse to see.

i leave for barcelone and madrid on friday morning, to disrupt ARCO 08 with an action piece, and flyer the hell out of every single dicksucker there. but aside from the shameful selfpromotion that i am so good at, GOYA!!! RIBERA!!! VELAZQUEZ!!!

so again not to belabor the point, please vote for me at ideablob, and tell everyone about it, and as many rolodexes that need to be opened, please break em open.

i start the actual painting the day we get back from espagne. i have been looking for a map of the nung river, or even a vietnam river map, it can be jpg format, i dont mean a real map, i really just need the line of the river.

elements. new ideas.

painting as film.
installation as evidence.
movement as dialogue.
(see movie clip)




*this needs some time to sit with me and others in the project as a conceptual theme for the work.
the 100meters is here, size and gesso are my work for the week. that and hashing it out with the internet.

shoulder pain, head spins.

no i wasnt breakdancing today, ive been sitting in front of this godamn machine when i should be sketching, notetaking and watching. but its been network and update city today. in a place as quiet as pont aven, its real loud.
so here comes the begging, help! web designers, people with land in *******, disenchanted soldiers of moral fortune, funds or eggandcheese sandwiches (which apparently they dont make here, theres eggs and cheese and bread in abundance but they dont combine them like im used to) please send via email, paypal, or par avion.
ill have a lot more stuff up here tomorrow, i have some simplistic design for the main domain, apocalypsestill.com
some emails to comrades and potential resources, be patient.
i also get my 100m tomorrow, and pigment when i get back from barcelone.
its getting there i promise.

the beginnings.

its getting started.