I Dream Of Boj

I had a dream a couple of nights ago. Someone rang my mobile in my old living room and said 'Hello there you young old speccy four eyes. I was just looking at your blog and I just wanted to tell you it seems you have a lot of interestingness in your life right now.' I said who's this? and got the reply 'Boj'.

I Dream Of Matisse

Cold blue canvas
In a warm room
Somewhere.
Mocking words,
Insufficient
In these combinations.

Mascleta!

Today I went to my first mascleta which is a series of explosions for five minutes. The Plaza d'Ayuntamiento was packed out. Its addictive, I'm looking forward to seeing it again - they have it everyday til the end of fallas - 19th March. My girlfriend told me to keep my mouth open because its so loud it can burst your eardrums. A woman in front of us fainted and had to be carried out. If I can compare it to anything it would be the strange compulsion of popping bubblewrap but on a much larger, louder scale.

OCD

Have a headache from downloading image files from the Adam Baumgold gallery http://www.adambaumgoldgallery.com/inventory.htm. Lots of interesting artists I've never heard of here.
Sigh. My art teacher discouraged me from painting because I couldn't draw in 3D and create realistic pictures of ropes and apples. Seeing some of this makes me want to get back in the saddle though, along with my novel writing (going slowly, avid Wooodenelephant fans). I used to do lots of cartoons. Maybe one day I'll scan them up here. Watch this space! For probably quite a long time! So art, literature... What about music? Can't get my head round the technology. Maybe I should give it another try...

Art brut

I went to an exhibition here in Valencia called 'El fuego bajo las cenizas' featuring pieces by Picasso and Basquiat. I wasn't much of a gallery visitor in London but I returned to this exhibition at the IVAM three times in August before it ended at the end of the month.
The IVAM also had a terrific photography exhibition (many styles represented) - including a 1960 collage by Antonio Saura, Richard Hamilton's My Marilyn and Wim Wenders' widescreen shot of the Road To Damascus (so good seeing this dawn(?) shot in a huge print.
But the 'El fuego' exhibition was the big draw and from it I discovered Jean Dubuffet, seen as the godfather of art brut / naive art / tribal art. I'm having trouble finding reproductions on the 'net of the Dubuffets exhibited in Valencia last year (such as 'Comments') but my liking for him has lead me to discover other exponents of art brut such as Darger, Wolfifi, Walla, Carlo, Guillame Pujolle (all institutionalised with the exception of recluse Darger - an innovative bio-film is out which I'd love to see). There's also Sanfourche whose jolly simplistic colourful smiling men recall what attracted me to the Dubuffets - and whose work I'd like to see a lot more of.
A link on all the mad art brutists is http://rawvision.com/abcd/abcdframes_def.html