Lady McCrady artist statement

private journal

Since 1980, I have made paintings of street construction, the arena of transformation and theater in the streets in NYC - and Paris, London, Tokyo. Nice, Milan. I realize now that my fascination for these sites is as a parallel world to the ritual and transformation in the artists studio. Street constructuin means danger cones, yellow tents full of light and wind, a mysterious toolbox on wheels, backlit red flags blowing, workers dancing with brooms, and steam pouring out of manholes and smokestacks. When Olivier first arrived in my studio from Paris in 1982 to buy one of these paintings, he said "what eez eet about thees town. . . Everything eez always burning !"

In 1981 I started making etchings and paintings in pieces, connected or disconnected, seemingly about to fall off balance or in perfect balance. It isn't the classical picture frame of a selected vision. It's an area in two unequal sections. Maybe the smaller section is more vivid, or not. The idea of falling is a theme in the Sublime, my thesis and subject.

I habitulally make gestural drawings onsite when I see a landscape incident. Something surprises me, like a traffic light being repaired by a guy in a motorized bucket or a giant rock on a flatbed truck rolling through a rural intersection. Dan Rice called them Impulse drawings when I showed them in an installation at the Smoothie factory, New Haven.

2004. I've started enlarging them onto canvas.

In 1996 I became disinterested in permanent archival materials. Art had to be so precious, so guaranteed to outlast us. Too much pressure. Life is fleeting.

So I began painting halo sections on the interleaving paper that is kept between the prints of an edition. The paper is buffered but it will turn yellow exposed to air.

I didn't want a vitrine - frame.
I wanted something living that would wither.

Series of drawing installations in soot on metal with the same purpose.

The Sublime became phenomena - fFunomena - documents of the oddness of the tiiming of uncontrollable events. Martin, a photographer, started out in the print studios of St Martins School of Art in London woring and exhibiting with artists. He likes my drawings. We recently went to the Warhol openings of the Jon Gould collection at the Brattleboro museum VT. Bettina's husband Mark Sanderson was a corporate sponser. A few members of Andy's entourage - Wonderful Peter Wise (originally from West Hartford and with his handsome new amour), and Chris Makos (in his trademark bleachie blond beachboy goatie and flash duds) were at Jon's cousin Robert duGrenier's country house pre-party. (Taft , as in President, farm is also home to a rarified group of animals under the care of an Egyptian prince.) We followed Chris in his glam vintage Jag to a movie palace downtown where his large photos of everyone from Dali to Andy were installed. Next was the former train station now Brattleboro Art Museum party. Andy's gift to Jon was a slice of Warholia unknown even to museums in NYC. (Then on to the Studio 54 storefront, complete with fabulous black diva in blond wig and hot pink satin tight fitting gown. He looked so familiar. It felt like NYC home.) Peter talked about how Andy enlarged the drawings with an Artograph.
Martin kept talking about Andy's litho drawings.So I pulled out some of mine. I've always wanted to blow them way up to see the disconnected relation of the lines in space, so I've been playing with them since September.

2007. Willoughby's Coffee Bar. NOT Nature Morte -
three Still LIVE paintings for spring. 30x36". Flasche paint on Arches cotton, France. completed 2002 - 2007

The engagement of art works in art theoretical strategies makes some work contemporary in its time, and other work not.

In these pieces, Dada is the oddness of an abandoned espresso and a lettuce. The Sublime is the shock at seeing an intentionally "crooked painting".
Appropriation is the idea of proving verticality by using drips. Feminine Practice is the idea of drips attributed to Jackson Pollack in the hands of a female artist. Too, it's about taking up big space, noisily, like the guys do. My paintings are rectangles and require less square inches of work for the amount of real estate they inhabit. Instead of more work and lower pay, they require Less Work for More Pay.

So art strategies are employed - for what purpose? 1 to catch you off guard. 2 to send you into a confused vertigo. 3 + 4 to manipulate you to question the
status quo. Artists through history have posed questions and agitated for a different reference starting point.

We’re reeling from the shock of Disappearing Honey Bees and violent Killer Storms ‘Coming Soon’. We still think someone else will fix global warming AND simultaneously cause our stock portfolios to gain value. In the EU, individuals are actually riding bikes and taking public transport instead of buying smaller cars and driving around the same amount.

Liberace playing shortened versions of the classical repetoire by leaving out the boring parts.

Miami, Madison, Nice, Berlin, NYC, London - the job of contemporary art and its capitals is to ask the questions. Time is fleeting.

Statements from previous bodies of work

Since 1980 I've made paintings of street construction work zones. Workers' transient studios = arenas of performance, transformation, personal theater –– in NYC - Paris - London - Tokyo. Nice - Milan streets.

I worked in The Sublime 1980 - 2000, then in Phenomenology ("fFunomena") making documents of the timing of uncontrollable events.

1981. Etchings and paintings in connected or disconnected pieces, in or out of balance, an area of two unequal sections, NOT the classical picture frame of a selected vision. Maybe the smaller section is more vivid, or not. The idea of falling. The Sublime.

NYC street construction = reminders = comfort home.
Danger cones. Tents of yellow light. Toolbox on wheels. Backlit red flags flipping in wind. Worker dancing with broom. Steam from manhole. Moveable smokestack of caution stripes.

Andy Warhol comes to happenings in my studio under the water tower, holds private parties there, calls me during studio time working, takes me out to numerous events, puts me in several shows and Interview Magazine, stays at my opening at East Village gallery called –– & –– documented by a feature and photos in the Daily News and by Baird Jones in the East Village Eye and later books on the East Village. Keeps a photograph-painting for time capsule box.

Olivier Renaud-Clement arrives in my studio from Paris in 1982 to buy a painting.
"What eez eet about thees town. . . Everything eez always burning !"

I make notes of incidents in the landscape.
There's a traffic light being repaired and a motorized bucket with a guy.
A giant rock on a super long flatbed truck rolling through an intersection.
Dan Rice (studio assistant of Franz Kline, Mark Rothko, authenticator because now there are many fakes) calls them Impulse Drawings when I install them inside an interior square hut with windows on the bra factory floor, Smoothie building, New Haven CityWideOpenStudios.

1990 I'm working only in reds, asymmetric double canvas, a seed shape and a clinging-member symbol.
They are hypnotically beautiful and I get an important grant for them, notice from a good dealer.

1997. My parents are fading. I lose interest in permanent archival materials.
Artmaking is precious, too guaranteed to outlast us, too much pressure on me to say something of value.
My children are little and adorable.
Life is fleeting and I want to feel it, not observe it from a detach.
The protection I felt from parents vanishes.
But simultaneously, I learn to sail, snowboard, use knives and the stove in the kitchen.

I start painting halo sections on the interleaving paper between the prints of an edition.
I'm making movable protection areas. Inside the halo area = safety.
The buffered paper will yellow when exposed to air.
Frame = vitrine = death.
By definition, something living will wither.

1999. Parents die. Red paintings are all i can make for several years now. so large imposing controlling intimidating scary they have to be sliced up, thrown down a shute, eliminated.

2003. drawing installation at Connecticut Commission on the Arts, Hartford, in black soot on silver aluminum.
Asymmetric units floating off the surface, 13 feet long - magnetic hug of ground, vertical trying to leap. Unsprayed they would blur and turn to dust.
I learn to weld and use a plasma cutter.

2004. I enlarge impulse drawings onto the assymetric canvases.
Warhol opening of Jon Gould collection, Brattleboro museum VT. Friends (Andy's close friends) Peter Wise and Chris Makos are at Robert duGrenier's pre-party. Andy's gift to Jon was a slice of Warholia unknown even to museums, including some great drawings. Peter tells me how Andy enlarged the drawings with an Artograph. Unwittingly, Mark Sanderson, Springfield Printing, my brother in-law is corporate sponser.

I like to blow up small painted sections into large. it's like resting your ear on the body of the guitar while you play - big sound disconnected, like the lines in space are detached on an enlarged section of drawing.

2006. I'm offered several shows I can't possibly prepare enough new work for. Travel, work in steel - sharp flame shard barriers for installation - flamenco guitar and french language studies, rhythm tap, take precedence but i will do the shows.

statement for three 5' drawings to hang at the New Haven coffee importers Willoughby's, December 2006 - March 2007:
Three Red Holiday Balls ! When I made these drawings I had a bouncing, feisty, happy baby who wanted to cling to me all the time. I wanted to protect and provide a safe haven for him. These are about the icon of Mother and Child. They are portraits of son and mother. The form I make them in is a sort of game or amusement. The Art History topics I work in are The Sublime (huge scary forces we can’t quite wrap ourselves around, like weather and love), and Phenomenology (I prefer pFun o’ men ology) the essence of things (or the oddness of the timing of curious incidents). So the outer form is trying to balance - could topple - could roll. The two sections (or 4) are unequal and connected and/or they vie for dominance and/or they collaborate. The titles are left to right - Red Haven Icon 76 (goodnight moon); Red Vigor Icon 77; Red Protector Icon 78. They’re made on French Arches paper with cadmium pigment, blending stomps, conté and vacuum cleaner erasures. The dust is lethal. When I look at them now, they have a dangerous velocity. And what about red? Love, passion, red on right channel marker, English “bloody hell”. If red is the drone in the background, it’s a pretty intense place. But red is also those cute traffic danger cones. Critics blamed Liberace for the rhinestone studded capes and the burning candelabras on the giant grand piano. But what really got them was his flashy, shortened renditions of classical music. His answer was “I just left out the boring parts”.
Red Haven Icon was reproduced in The New York Times in 1991 from an exhibition at Connecticut College, New London.
L I F E . C O M E S . A T . Y O U . F A S T . L a d y M a c C r a d y . 245.7935