I’ve stolen my title “Joyous Cosmology?” from The Alan Watts’ book Joyous Cosmology – Adventures in the Chemistry of Consciousness which was published in 1962. Watts, best known as an interpreter and popularizer of Eastern philosophy for a Western audience, discusses various philosophical questions about Western vs. Eastern thought, scientific vs. spiritual theories, and imposed vs. organic ways of perceiving the world and universe.
I use the term Cosmology (defined as the philosophy of the nature of the origin and structure of the universe – the cosmos being a complete, orderly, harmonious system) to refer to the cosmos of my paintings, to the order and harmony of art – specifically painting, and to the greater cosmos.
Influenced by Japanese artists’ concepts of spatial flatness and composition, figures and flowers of American artists share my paintings with figures and flowers of Japanese artists to create new, sometimes cryptic, often symbolic, sometimes humorous narratives that comment on their place in the flatness where they find themselves.
East meets West as translations of images from Tawaraya Sotatsu, Katsushika Hokusai, Tsukioka Yoshitoshi, Suzuki Harunobu (and more!) join forces and oppose forces with translations of images from artists Alex Katz, Andy Warhol, Georgia O’Keefe, and Henry Darger.
Coloring books were one of the main sources from which Henry Darger co-opted his images for his paintings and drawings. Here, in “Joyous Cosmology? – A Cosmic Coloring Book,” art and ideas from the east and the west interplay with your crayon rainbow to create a pop, mainstream, and off-hand consciousness.
Large Coloring Book Pages
These large scale (40" X 30") prints were displayed in the gallery during the opening and course of the show and participants were encouraged to fill them in with supplied paints and markers.
I created and printed a coloring book entitled Joyous Cosmology? A Cosmic Coloring Coloring Book which has 30 images that are black outlines on white paper (similar to these large print outs) to be colored in.
