What I liked about Walter Robinson was that he was good at being dark. He would say things like, “We live in a world filled with resentment, racism, stupidity and hate. The consumerist utopia sells us on the idea that a better world is possible. All you need is a little dishonesty,” with a casual matter-of-factness that dared you to argue with him. For someone whose head was almost certainly a great aquarium swimming with art and the strategies of artifice, he also had that quality of obdurate journalistic loyalty to facts, reality, and truth.
He counterbalanced his grim outlook with a breezily playful and relentlessly deadpan sense of humor, so it was sometimes hard to tell when he was kidding or not—as when he “claimed as a figurative painter to have debuted in 1984 the first-ever painting of a nude flossing her teeth.” (Seriously, is this true? Where is it?)
His commitment to seeing things as he saw them and then saying out loud what he saw was inspirational, driven by sensitivity to the world rather than callousness. He seemed to recognize the necessity of seeing and thinking about the things that are hard to think about and see – and not just the things that are fun, sexy, and delicious (though much of all that made it into his repertoire too).
At zing, we join the art world in remembering Walter for his sense of humor, his insight, art, and words:
The Wallyburger
two-page spread from “Big & Beautiful”
In zing #23, curator Charlie Finch explained Walter’s paintings of fast food hamburgers, which he dubbed the Wallyburger, as so:
The Wallyburger becomes more excessive the more you examine its contents: drip equivalence achieves statis in the paint Robinson meticulously applies, the tomatoes rolling into cheese in the imagery and the automatic Pavlovian drool which ensues. Never underestimate the power of a burger, even a painted one. . .
The Fertility Painting
from Pharmaceuticals
Naturally, when Walter wrote his own curator’s note for a project of paintings he contributed to zing #25, it was a work of art unto itself, ending on this note:
The other works from that [Pharmaceuticals] show have found homes in important collections, thanks to Jeffrey Deitch, who included them in the survey of my work that he hosted at his gallery in October 2016. All save for the four-foot-square painting of a box of Tampax, that is. My ‘fertility painting’ I’m keeping for myself.
The Male Paintings
Oxford Dress Shirt Lands End, 2016, acrylic on paper, 12 x 9 in
When, in an interview for zingchat, Devon Dikeou asked Walter why he was painting so many shirts, he gave this as an explanation:
I paint a lot of sexy girls, in the studio I’m surrounded by images of women—you know, no one is really interested in men as a subject, not men OR women. But I felt bad, I don’t want to seem a complete dog, so I needed a masculine line, for balance.
So the thing about the shirt paintings, is that they’re MEN’S shirts, so they’re male paintings. What’s more, the images come right from the catalogues, or more typically from advertising emails, and the shirts are all flattened, folded and squared off. They’re pinned down, baby, can’t move at all. They’re just torsos, figurally castrated!
Not some kind of visionary
When I interviewed Walter in 2013, I foolishly prodded him, trying to get him to take a stance on real art vs commercialism or something silly along those lines, and instead he gave me this:
Early on I was interested in the idea of being straightforward and not pretending you’re some kind of visionary or something. It’s stupid. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
Lessons of New York is a collection of oral histories from the LES art scene of the 70s and 80s. This never before published interview was conducted November 2014 in NY, NY.
Diagram: “tag”, “throw-up”, and “piece” by Al Diaz
Amidst the dirty-glamour of the downtown art scene of the 70s and 80s, artist Al Diaz (b. 1959) formed the pen name SAMO with his classmate Jean-Michel Basquiat. Then a couple of unknown kids at City-As-School High School, the duo tagged the dilapidated streets with smart-ass poetry such as, “SAMO© 4 THE SO-CALLED AVANT-GARDE” and “SAMO© AS AN END TO BOOSH-WAH.” Their friendship would prove, like so many of Basquiat’s relationships, to be fiery and generative, driven by both fraternity and competition.
Interview and editing by Rachel Dalamangas
We were real cynical and rebellious kind of kids. Fuck everything kind of thing. Jean [-Michel Basquiat] felt that way. I felt that way. We were dissatisfied.
The 60s didn’t seem to accomplish anything. The sexual revolution. We were jaded. It was pre-AIDS so everyone was screwing around. We were just kind of a bored bunch. We rolled our eyes a lot. We didn’t have faith in much. The city was dilapidated. It was a time of mild hopelessness. And you’re at the age where you think grownups are a bunch of liars and everything is a lie.
We didn’t really believe in anything. Our lack of belief in anything was an alternative to belief in anything else.
We didn’t make “street art”. It was graffiti. The “street art” thing is a little more academic. You go out there with the intention of making art. Graffiti, in my generation, we weren’t trying to make art. I was trying to get my name around. I wanted to be famous.
Some people will do anything to get themselves noticed. Jean was like that. One time, when we were in high school, maybe the summer after, he painted his face silver and stood on the Brooklyn Bridge so people would look at him. He would take his overalls and cut a piece off so that you could see his crotch, exposing himself. Anything he could do to get someone to look at him.
When we started doing SAMO, it was almost competitive but a collaborative kind of thing. We wanted to keep the same handwriting. We had rules about it. We would practice it. We would look at stuff and write stuff together and try to keep the best stuff. We were editing ourselves. Both of us were lovers of language so we’d try to out-clever each other.
Yeah, we wanted SAMO to look slick and cool if that was so much high art but it was all about style and ego. Driven by that. The bottom line. Then it developed into making it look prettier and this and that. That was a gradual process. It didn’t start out as, “Hey, we’re making art here.” Nobody ever said that. Nobody ever said it was going to be a global phenomenon.
We also didn’t say it like, “We’re going out tagging.” We were paintin’. We were bombin’. And we’d tag something. The i-n-g of it didn’t come until later, if that make sense.
SAMO was only me and Jean though. People would try to copy it, but it was only us. We were a little bit Nazi about it. We were possessive.
It was crazy. It was a fun time. It was a hedonistic lifestyle.
I remember one time, I was at Tier 3 and they had just changed the policy. They had just started hiring some bouncer type door people because before everyone would just walk right in. And Klaus Nomi was standing in front of me waiting to get in.
When he gets up there, the guy says, “Alright, $10.” Like a big gnarly dude. Probably a Hell’s Angel.
And Klaus goes, “You don’t know who I am?”
The bouncer goes, “I couldn’t give a fuck who you are. Give me $10.”
It was so fucking hilarious because he was so incensed and the guy couldn’t give a fuck.
I didn’t really know Klaus at all though. He was just around with all those other people.
I was very salt of the earth. I didn’t have crazy hair. I wasn’t trying to be fabulous. People like that kind of intimidated me. Jean was very good at that, looking like completely insane. But I was from the Lower East Side, working class kid. I really wasn’t trying to do any kind of like expression with my clothing.
I screwed around with some of the girls that were all costumed out and stuff like that, but I was kind of very street. That kind of set me a little bit apart.
I knew Keith [Haring]. I thought he was a very smart guy. Very ambitious and very focused on what he was doing, but he could be a little catty. I remember one time he said, “Al Diaz is a dabbler” and he didn’t even know my history.
He just said some bullshit. Because I was no longer doing SAMO? Because Jean was saying something about me to him? Jean was saying some nasty stuff about me for a while until somehow we became friends again.
After ’78 until at least 1980 we went our separate ways.
When he took the SAMO, because it got some media attention, he was using it as a springboard for his career. It was no longer SAMO. It was Jean.
We had gotten that article in the Voice recognizing us so he just rode that but I had nothing to with that. I had been as much a creator of it as him so I had some resentment about it.
After the SAMO article in Voice we dropped off. It was over some stupid shit. We had this place where we worked for this guy. A white metal casting shop on Spring Street. He would work there anytime he ever needed a few dollars.
So one day we were in the shop and we found this figure of a Buck Rogers. Remember those little green plastic soldiers? It was kind of like that, but it was Buck Rogers holding a ray gun with a helmet.
He said, “Wouldn’t this make a cool pin.” Kind of a brooch.
So I was like, “Yeah, yeah, that’d be cool.”
Then he vanished for a while and I ended up making the pin because I was making pins and selling them. I had my little industry going.
When he found out I was making the Buck Rogers pin he flipped out. He was so incensed and that was it. It was over some stupid shit like that.
It broke my heart. He had like zero skills for dealing with conflict.
He was an amazing human being because his head was in all these places. You’d never see him reading so it’d be like, “Where’s he getting all this information?”
Nobody really thought we were gonna be famous. Well, Jean did. Jean knew he was going to be famous. I’m sure Keith did too.
The night we hooked up again, he told me that. I hadn’t seen him in like two years and he told me he was working on that film Downtown 81 and then we tripped that night.
We tripped that night and walked around the West Village and we kept finding joints, like four joints, like someone had dropped them like one by one. We were spouting, babbling, and one point, we were sitting in Sheridan Square, and he turns to me and he says, “Al, I know I’m going to be real famous and I’m going to die young.”
What do you say to that, right?
One of the first things I judge about sexually explicit art is whether it is at all gross. Maybe only a little. But maybe a lot! Good art about sex requires bodily fluids, subverted gender roles, kink, something weird and/or icky.
The second thing that goes a long way with me in love and art is a good joke. A sense of humor is highly rated by both men and women as a seductive quality, and moreover, making someone laugh is arguably more difficult to do than making someone cry – and is just as revealing as what turns someone on.
Finally, what I like about the aesthetic of these projects in particular is their distinctly Gen X flavor of grungy, too-cool, low-key ragey femininity – both in gaze and object – that is celebrated as sexy.
One time when I was giving a tour at the Dikeou Collection to a college class, a young woman burst out laughing when we got to the Tracy Nakayama exhibit and pointed at the flaccid penis of a naked man on foot leading an enormous horse. Nakayama’s paintings sourced from vintage porn often provoked this kind of delighted, giggly reaction from young women who visited the Dikeou Collection, and that is one of the best things there is about the work of Tracy Nakayama.
No stranger to the subject of erotica, gallerist Mark Sink curated this series of close-cropped detail images from a Victoria’s Secret ad by artist David Brady. Instead of an entire woman in her underwear, there’s an eyebrow, the divot of a throat, silky blonde hair, fruit-like cleavage in a bright pink bra. The hyper-close framing makes the images feel more intimate and even erotic though less explicitly sexual than the source material.
Why is that rabbit performing oral sex on that woman?
Why is the other rabbit watching?
Why are they smoking?
I don’t know! I don’t care!
Because it’s so effortlessly cool – bizarrely sexy, even – and would look great on a t-shirt or a tote.
In this project, the female form appears in strip clubs and abandoned places as a broken doll or partially completed graffiti, proving that even the creepiest alley can instantly become creepier – but also sexier – with the addition of the naked female form. In her curator’s note, Kereszi writes, “I noticed all the abused, tortured and mutilated, sexy female mannequins in the various haunts I visited. I’m not sure what I’m trying to say here about sex and violence and horror and voyeurism.”
In Cronin’s art historical resurrection of the sculptor Harriet Hosmer, I learned many things. For example, one dead guy whose name doesn’t matter that much criticized Hosmer for “casts of the entire female model made and exhibited in a shockingly indecent manner” – which sounds pretty hot. And he wasn’t wrong of Hosmer, given the undeniable sensuality of the subject at hand, her masterpiece of female-on-female gaze, Zenobia in Chains.
When I think about defining the difference between pornography and art, two quotes come to mind:
When the Honorable Supreme Court Justice Stewart Potter famously said of pornography, “I know it when I see it.”
And when 2010s YouTube personality Hennessy Youngman said that the litmus test of any work of contemporary art is if it, “doesn’t serve an actual function in society.”
Obscene for the sake of considering the obscene, Gomez’s paintings are lyrical and crude, somehow satisfying the conditions of both.
Leo Tanguma (b. 1941) is a Chicano muralist known for his works that integrate Mexican American heritage, spirituality, social justice and autobiographical elements. Born in Beeville, Texas, he began his career in Houston with ambitious murals that advocated for social change. In the 1980s, he moved to Denver, where his public works made waves in the Denver International Airport, and he continues to create murals throughout the Denver community, most recently at Ricardo Flores Magon Academy. This is the second interview with Leo Tanguma to appear on zingmagazine.com, the first was conducted by Rachel Dalamangas and can be read here. Leo will be featured on the ARTiculated: Dispatches from the Archives of American Art podcast, produced by Archives of American Art | Smithsonian Institute oral historian Ben Gillespie.
Interview by Ben Gillespie and Josh T. Franco
You’re coming up on nearly 40 years in Denver—how has your understanding of the Denver community changed in that time? What excites you now in Colorado?
When I moved to Denver in late 1983, the Denver community, especially the Chicano community, was experiencing a severe problem of gang violence. After attending meetings which sought to address the problem, I observed the actions already taking place in dealing with the gangs I was deeply impressed with what I saw. I immediately added my contribution to those efforts by constructing a movable, sculptural mural on gang violence. I designed this mural to be shown in one area, dismantled, and then taken to be shown at another site in order to reach as many viewers as possible. My understanding of the issue developed into an admiration for the city and for the Chicano community in particular.
During the past 40 years, Denver has only increased its kindness towards me. This situation has remained constant as I have seen my work welcomed despite its frequent political or radical content. For example, the following are some of my most political murals:
Beyond This Cross (1986): This was a sculptural mural in the shape of a cross, 33 feet in height by 45 feet at the base, and was exhibited for an extended period at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts in downtown Denver. The painted imagery on the cross was a condemnation of the United States Government’s support for Central American dictators who oppressed and murdered many people using the military as well as death squads.
The Torch of Quetzalcoatl (1989-1990): A sculptural mural 72 feet along a curved base by 12 feet in height tapering down on its ends to 2 feet. This mural was commissioned by the Denver Art Museum in 1989-1990. Its subject was the Chicano Movement and Movement for Civil Rights in the United States.
In Peace and Harmony with Nature and The Children of the World Dream of Peace at Denver International Airport (1993–1995). I painted two sets of large murals with a total square footage of 692 square feet: I was assisted by my daughter Leticia Tanguma as well as a few other Denver artists.
Given Denver’s openness to progressive artwork, I wonder why more Denver artists, especially mural painters, in the Denver area have not seen fit to examine social and cultural issues in paintings and offer them up for the public to enjoy or scrutinize? I call Denver’s stature one of down-to-earth sophistication with tough demands but with high rewards for those who try.
Leo Tanguma, The Torch of Quetzalcoatl, 1989-1990
You’ve described human dignity as a foundational impulse for your work, how would you define it? How have collaborators defined it or changed your definition of it?
My sense of human dignity comes from religious Christian ideals instilled in me by my farmworker parents during my youth. The murder by the Sheriff of my mother’s two cousins at their ranchito in my hometown south of San Antonio, Texas inspired my rebellion against authority. I realized that the social order and its authority over us demeaned, and it often destroyed, our human dignity. What the Sheriff did that day was to attack our self-respect, that is our human dignity, especially since we could do nothing about it. The Sheriff was exonerated in this case as he was in other cases that involved his killing of other Mexican-Americans.
Following the murder of my mother’s cousins, our local community resumed its life, and we were soon back “normal” again: Happy in our homes and our barrio. Later I saw this return to normalcy as our reclaiming our human dignity.
As I matured, I painted mural depicting the struggles of all oppressed people fighting for a better life and thereby for their human dignity. I became aware of the Christian philosophy of Liberation Theology that stressed that Christians must have a preference for the poor and the oppressed. In essence I have been doing this all my life as a mural painter. I am not sure that my example has inspired other artists. Although I have spoken and advocated for an art reflecting not only our community’s culture but also its political struggle.
Leo Tanguma, Beyond The Cross (Detail), 1986
How do nature and the natural world factor into your murals?
I have shown nature in some of my murals. I equate beauty and fragility of nature as something spiritual, something that touches our senses with awe at the spectacular beauty of this mystical creation all around us.
Leo Tanguma, Leticia Tanguma, Cheryl Detwiler, In Peace and Harmony with Nature, 1993-1995, Denver International Airport
David Alfaro Siqueiros and Dr. John Biggers were major influences for your approach to mural making and meaning—how do you hope to influence artists today and tomorrow?
Dr. John Biggers, Professor of Art at Texas Southern University, stated that the greatest experience we can conceive of is the human struggle through the ages. He said, “Our struggle for Civil Rights is part of that monumental struggle for human dignity of which we are a part of.”
David Alfaro Siqueiros told me in an interview with him in his Cuernavaca studio that we Chicanos should not only paint the folkloric and cultural identity of our community, but also the political and social struggle. Siqueiros also referred to leaders and revolutionaries of whom we were aware. He also pointed out unknown and forgotten martyrs and heroes in the human struggles of the past.
At my age I can only say that hopefully my example alone could be of some value.
Looking back on your long career in art and activism, what does “Chicano Art” mean to you today?
Chicano Art means to me the representation of my community’s aspirations for liberation through the mediums of artistic creation. However, the artform which most lends itself to that expression is mural painting.
I have often said that mural painting is our Mexican heritage going back two thousand years B.C. in ancient Mesoamerica. I am not sure about the following being applicable to our Chicano Art, but I suggest that the cave paintings of Altamira, Spain, should be incorporated into our Chicano sense of history.
Leo Tanguma, Leticia Tanguma, Cheryl Detwiler, The Children of the World Dream of Peace (Detail), 1993-1995, Denver International Airport
You often collaborate with young people. What do you hope they take from the experience of creating murals with you?
In most, if not all, of my painting with youth, I use the symbolism or figures which we may be painting in a mural as messages about their intrinsic worth. Often in developing a mural topic to be painted with youth, I point out the importance of what we are about to do. Instilling this mindset at the beginning, our planning inspires those youths to more meaningful ideas for a mural. I suggest that while painting a mural is a fun experience, it can also tell a story or message with their pictures in a mural.
On more than one occasion, I have been approached by middle-aged persons who have said to me “Do you remember me? I painted with you in Arvada Middle School?” Or many other locations where I painted with youth. A particularly memorable experience was when someone said, “Remember me? I painted with you at Platte Valley!” (Platte Valley Youth Services Center, a youth correctional facility). He added “And you talked to me!”
Everyday heroes from many cultures come together in your murals—who or what is a symbol of heroism for you today?
I am inspired by many revolutionaries of the past. But my heroes are my parents, a friend in our barrios of many years ago, and the following very special people:
My sister Enedina who was raped and had a child but continued to work in the fields to help support our family.
My Uncle, Pedro Jarro, who fought in battle in France in World War I.
Dr. John Biggers, my African-American professor at Texas Southern University, who advised me and encouraged me to continue painting murals on the street.
But most of all my wife Jean, who endured more than ten years of domestic abuse from her partner before she met me. She, nonetheless, fought for social justice for others starting in college and has continued in the struggle to the present day. Since I met her over 40 years ago, she guides and inspires my work. Her progressive ideas have greatly influenced me. Beyond that is the person who she is: her ability to love deeply and never expect anything in return. Her love for the oppressed, especially those in our American society who struggle daily for a better life. Her patience and smile always move me, and I thank God for such a love in my life.
E.V. Day in front of her installation Golden Rays/In Vitro at Getty Museum
E.V. Day’s work considers feminism and sexuality, often within the context of popular culture and in the form of suspension-based installations, ranging from deconstructed couture to skeletal big cats. Based in New York, she has been artist-in-residence at Versailles Foundation Munn Artists program at Claude Monet’s Garden in Giverny France, Artpace San Antonio, and the American Academy in Rome. Her work has been shown at The Whitney Museum of American Art, Herbert F Johnson Museum of Art at Cornell University, Lever House, and Lincoln Center, among other institutions. Her most recent solo exhibition “Velocity Drawing and My Crazy Sunshine” featuring mixed media two-dimensional work was on view at Baldwin Gallery in Aspen, CO from July 26 – September 2, 2024, and her installation Golden Rays/In Vitro is currently on view at Getty Museum as part of “Lumen: The Art and Science of Light” through December 8, 2024.
Interview by Devon Dikeou
E.V. Day, Bombshell, 2000, white crepe dress, tulle, hardware. 16’ h x 16’ w x 16’ d
Your career bio cites your work in some interesting collections, among them the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum . . . And in your work there is a question of velocity vs stillness that is very much what the National Air and Space Museum is about, a museum that brings things that garner such otherworldly force to a standstill . . . That impulse very much embodies your work, I’m thinking saber-tooth tigers suspended in animation while in the midst of a fight, familiar opera costumes dancing in air without their divas. Rockets in wait, sans flight . . . Iconic dress in exploding deconstruction without the icon . . . Talk about what attracts you to this juxtaposition . . . Of velocity and stillness . . .
I feel the relationship I am after or the juxtaposition I am attracted to is more “velocity” and “capture.” Capture by freezing time. I’m looking for that juicy moment before the subject dissolves into something unrecognizable. And I am not just freezing the moment but animating it. Like Harold Edgerton’s famous flash photograph of a bullet’s penetration through an apple. I’m especially drawn to the fragments that result from the forward thrust of the projectile and the bits of debris from the part the bullet passed through. The magic of this experiment is that the core of the apple is still intact at that moment. I like the image of rupture coming as well as going. This is the kind of energy I want in my sculpture.
Rupture and capture are an essential relationship in many of my sculptures. Bombshell, from the “Exploding Couture” series, is a perfect example. But it’s different from the action of Edgerton’s photo, because I’m not portraying forces of penetration. I’m animating the garment by pulling it from all directions as if the explosive force of raw energy comes from within the dress. The power is generated inside. The “suspended sculpture,” as I call it, is trussed up in a gesture that suggests the familiarity of the iconic image of Marilyn Monroe’s billowing dress from the iconic scene in The Seven Year Itch (1955). Frayed fabric and debris of the partially deconstructed dress are suspended with tension of the fishing lines, and they appear as projectiles directed away from the center. I use tension as a material. Without the tension on the lines, there would be no sculpture. It’s a tensile sculpture.
I also think of what I do as drawing lines in space. Visually, the translucent lines glint when lit, like contrails of the tattered fabric. The monofilament suggests movement by the way the light interacts with the translucency of the material and at the same time it’s literally capturing the material. It’s all a paradox: stillness and motion, tension and release, all captured at the same moment. The tension on the lines themselves is somewhat ethereal but it is also the scaffold holding everything together.
Another aspect of capture is suggested or emphasized by the oversized tensioning hardware I use to anchor the lines into the floor and ceiling. I want to emphasize these terminal points to suggest the strength and force, the power and velocity it takes to dismantle such a stubborn societal cliche fixed in place by “the male gaze.” And by attaching the lines to the floor, ceiling, and walls, it suggests this problem of sexism, living through the male’s perspective, is part of the very architecture we inhabit—the social fabric. If these images of my Bombshell sculpture were as familiar or became as iconic as the Marilyn Monroe picture, it would be a great victory. I want the explosion to be ecstatic, orgasmic. The work is a rebellion and celebration of female empowerment. A visual explosion, a moment of transformation frozen in time.
E.V. Day, Golden Rays/In-Vitro, 2024, aircraft cable, gold leaf, monofilament and hardware, outdoor/indoor installation 40 ft and variable, (installed at the Getty Museum, 2024)
The Annunciation (Detail), Master of the Retable of the Reyes Cathólicos, Spain, 15th century
Which brings us to the illusion of movement in your work . . . A spiritedness both in subject and realization that teases movement but only in an illusory manner . . . I’m thinking of your Rome Prize installation Golden Rays/In Vitro a glass bending illusion of ethereal light from god or sun made sculptural and literal . . . Please elucidate . . .
My first stop in Rome was to see Bernini’s Ecstasy of St. Teresa. This marble masterpiece captures the saint writhing in ecstasy on a cloud that seems to float. But it wasn’t the depiction of a saint experiencing an orgasm that fascinated me, it was the golden rays in the background that activate her and set the entire ecstasy scene in motion—complete with an angel about to launch a golden arrow at her heart.
The rays are made of streamlined, gilded strips of wood, which contrast sharply with the otherwise heavy materiality of the baroque stone carving. Their sleek, modern look reminded me of modernist art of the 1950s and ’60s often seen in bank foyers. They also resembled renderings from science fiction films—images of transport beams like “Beam me up, Scotty” or the exaggerated rays from a cartoon ray gun.
From there, I began collecting hundreds of images of golden rays from paintings, most of them depictions of the Annunciation from the medieval and Renaissance periods. I also gathered images of light beams from science fiction illustrations and films. I connected the two and started calling them “Shazams.” The rays in Annunciation scenes became rich material for me to explore themes of overt sexism in the Catholic Church, especially around Mary’s “non-consensual” impregnation and the concept of the Immaculate Conception. If pregnancy occurs without the intersection of male and female sex organs, then where does it happen? In a petri dish? It felt like an early suggestion of in vitro fertilization, and the golden rays themselves seemed to resonate with contemporary communications, satellites, laser beams, fiber optics, and Wi-Fi.
I wasn’t sure what to do with this obsession at first, but I eventually decided to create some golden rays of my own. I suspended gilded aircraft cables through my studio skylight, 32 feet above the floor, extending them out a pane of glass to a gravel terrace 45 feet away. The installation worked best at night when it could be illuminated, but during the day it almost disappeared, becoming lines that captured light.
Rays of light are ethereal, much like the concept of God. Light is intangible, and in creating my rays I was trying to materialize that intangible quality for myself. This is where my sculpture, Golden Rays/In Vitro, originated. It feels like a miracle, perhaps even from God, that my rays—which I recently installed in The Getty’s show “LUMEN: The Art and Science of Light”—landed in this exhibition about light in art from the medieval and Renaissance periods, surrounded by artworks that inspired my sculpture. The Getty commissioned me to re-make Golden Rays/In Vitro as an indoor piece, and it’s suspended in the gallery right next to an Annunciation painting that I had used as a source image. The context is perfect!
Light and rays are not physically tangible, but they carry a mystical power, an invisible force, announcing divine presence. You can’t capture a ray of light with your hand but you can feel its warmth and energy. I often find myself trying to make the ethereal tangible.
E.V. Day, My Crazy Sunshine I, 2024, paint and pencil on paper, mounted on board, 36” h x 60” w
But moving onto the series of two-dimensional works at Baldwin Gallery in Aspen . . . The twenty pieces titled “Velocity Drawings and My Crazy Sunshine” still capture the essence energy and motion while resting firmly within specific two-dimensional confines, even frames . . .
The drawings at Baldwin Gallery, which was my first show of two-dimensions, are soaked in the aesthetic of Italian Futurism—I emphasize the aesthetics, not the Fascist politics of that era. It was a time of industrial acceleration, much like the technological speed we experience today with computers and AI. I’m drawn to the aerodynamic style and the promise of velocity it represents. In college, when I discovered Italian Futurists like Balla and Boccioni, I had an “a-ha” moment—I suddenly felt connected to their vision of a world shaped by cars, trains, and airplanes, all designed for speed. This phenomenon feels similar to the acceleration of today’s tech evolution, like Apple’s sleek “retro space-age” designs in white plastic. What I love about Futurist paintings is their attempt to render transcendence—pushing beyond the still-life to capture motion.
Other influences of mine include Moholy-Nagy’s plexiglass drawings, photograms, and Brancusi’s sculptures, which are full of velocity. Growing up, I attended vintage car races with my dad, who used to race a 1949 roadster. I loved the feeling of speed, the centrifugal force of turns, the sound and smell of it all. Coincidentally or not, these drawings have an automotive origin story. I was commissioned by Jimmie Johnson, the NASCAR Cup Series Champion, to make an artwork from the fire-suit he wore in 2006 when he won his first Daytona 500. He and his wife, Chandra, collect contemporary art, and had seen my work. For my proposal, I made a 3-D wireframe model of the suit in a state of suspended deconstruction. Once complete, I experimented with distortions of the wireframe model and all kinds of dramatic compositions evolved. It was so much fun, I wanted to live in the drawings! The lines felt like they cut the space with velocity just the way I like it. I started putting them on paper and canvas, using only the colors in the suit, with pen, pencil, and paint. So, the “Velocity Drawings” were born, and the next composition series became “My Crazy Sunshine.” I have never made something so bright and sunny, it seemed crazy. So that’s the title.
E.V. Day, Daytona Vortex, 2020, Commissioned sculpture for Jimmie Johnson, NASCAR fire suit worn by Jimmie Johnson at his first Daytona 500 win, monofilament, hardware, and mirrored stainless steel base, 149” h x 96” w x 96” d
Some pieces even cite Zaha in the title . . . Is that a reference to Zaha Hadid, who in my mind certainly embraces ideas of futurism in her architecture . . . Can you address Zaha, and titles in general.
For me, Zaha Hadid captures the narrative of speed better than anyone. I first discovered her work when in college while browsing architecture magazines in the library—a habit I miss for the serendipity of finding new things. Her drawings felt so familiar, almost as if I already knew them. It took me a while to realize that Zaha Hadid was a person, not a movement or collective, and even more surprisingly, a woman! Back in the ’80s, technology hadn’t quite caught up with her vision, but she was already speaking to me through her work.
These two drawings are in the “Velocity Drawing” category. They’re identical but face away from each other—one in a bluish palette, the other in yellow. I felt like I was plagiarizing her work, though I couldn’t find the exact drawing I was thinking of. It’s an ode to her. When asked who I’d want to share a two-person show with, I said, “A Zaha Hadid building.”
E.V. Day, Flyby Zaha (Blue), 2024, Paint, ink, tape, acrylic medium, pencil on canvas, 32” h x 48” w
A couple of spacemen and ghosts of the commercial Lowe’s logo crop up in these drawings that bring a more contemporary pop touch (Rosler/Warhol) while also making reference to the grandfather of movement Cubism and collage . . . Speak about elements of collage and or pop in your work . . .
I’m a fan of pop art; my work often originates from themes addressing popular culture, but it is definitely not pop art. In some of the drawings, I collaged images of astronauts that I screen grabbed from 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968). The figures’ spacesuits show a cut cord as HAL has ejected them from the mothership. They are floating toward an energy field or a black hole. I imagine the drawings as immersive and infinite, so I included those untethered little spacemen for scale.
E.V. Day, Spacewalk, 2024, paint and pencil on watercolor paper, 11” h x 8.5” w
Lastly, Edison or Tesla . . .
Tesla, of course, but I’m not eager to own the automobile version. They are prematurely “automatic,” driverless, etc. Tesla was a creative genius; Edison was an all-out marketer who exploited him for his ideas. I read that had Edison not marketed electronics, we might have free electricity. Tesla is my man; I even made an artwork called Tesla’s Mistress. It’s a bit melancholy, but I wanted to honor him in some way regarding the visualization of electricity. This idea came about as I was interested in trying to visualize the flow of electricity. In his biography, it is said that he never had any romantic relationships, but at the end of the book, he has the companionship of a pigeon/dove that visits him regularly at his window in the New Yorker Hotel building, where he died alone and impoverished. Very operatic. It could be a good story for an opera, with the rivalry between Edison and Tesla, where the main character who dies in the end is male, as opposed to the usual woman . . .
E.V. Day, Tesla’s Mistress, 2020, Wooden mechanical hands, fishnet glove, metal, gold leaf, rhinestones, resin, and feather, 36” h x 22” w x 9” d
To return to your question about NASA: I was commissioned by NASA to create an artwork for the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. I was invited to visit the Jet Propulsion Lab north of Pasadena, where I met rocket scientists, engineers, geologists, and astronauts. At first, I felt like a fish out of water, but quickly realized about these experts that we had more in common as we are all explorers, dreamers and problem solvers. Most artists I think are curious people, trying to satisfy something that’s never existed before, by exploring, experimenting, and optimism about potential discovery. Problem solving. If there is any overriding theme to my process as an artist, it is problem solving. Experimenting with combinations of materials that are new to me, logistics, learning about the infrastructure of various museums and buildings to figure out how to securely hang my artwork. Like with Golden Rays/In Vitro piece I mentioned that I recently installed at The Getty, which is a Richard Meier building, you’re not allowed to paint or touch the exposed, brawny I-beams in the ceiling, as mandated by Meier. And the floor similarly cannot be marred in anyway. So, it’s been a real creative workaround with the installation team and exhibition designer, and we figured out how to make it work.
Mars Rover “Opportunity”
E.V. Day, Wheel of Optimism, 2006, Milled aluminum tire from NASA Mars Rover, hematite rocks, artificial plants and photo, 9” h x 9” w x 8” d
But back to NASA . . . initially, I envisioned a project that would explore the concepts of stealth technology, velocity, and space travel. But most of the people I met were exclusively searching for evidence of water on Mars. I met engineers who were building a machine, named by the acronym RAT, to carve out Martian soil samples. I caught the “search for water” bug from a geologist, who showed me images of the surface of Mars, mostly iron ore with concentrations of sphere-shaped nodules of hematite, referred to as blueberries. I imagined miles of polished reflective hematite rocks like the ones you see at the gift shop at a nature museum, covering the land. To me this image seemed really outer space-y, otherworldly, a little like a backdrop for Barbarella’s habitat, and a new approach to my project was sparked—especially when one of the engineers handed me a spare tire from the Mars rover, and asked, “Could you do anything with this?” He handed it to me, looking straight into my eyes like he was entrusting me with a holy relic, which it kind of is. The idea was that I would return the tire to the space program but as a work of art. It was a magnificent specimen of engineering, a sleek, silver cylinder milled from solid aluminum and measuring 8 inches by 8 inches by 9 inches. As I ran my fingers over its smooth, cool surface, I could feel the weight and precision of its construction. It is the prosthetic toe of humankind on Mars. The tire became the centerpiece of my project, symbolizing the potential for life and growth on Mars. I imagined the interior hollow space as a lush oasis, filled with diverse flora, mineral-rich rocks, and an image of a Martian vista in the background from their archives. The diorama was a tangible representation of my vision for a hydrated Martian world. I ended up making something not just about space but more about hope and the endless quest for discovery.