When Advertising Gets It Right

Most of the time, I daydream about moving to a place like Bhutan where I won't have to spend mental energy dodging the push and pull of companies trying to sell me happiness. Then today, I came across this ad:

This is why I love painting portraits. This is why I spent a year on my AS IS project.

There truly is a flame of life at the core of every person. It is so much more intensely beautiful than we let ourselves see. 

So try to look at yourself kindly today. You are alive and you are beautiful.

Thank you to everyone who came out to the National Museum of Women in the Arts on Sunday to hear me speak about my Urban Portrait Project and Anna Ancher's work!

It was an absolute honor.

Boring Headshot or Painted Profile Pic?

 Colette Marvin has the most fascinating job. She is an art forgery expert, meaning that she researches art crime and cultural heritage protection for the government and for private clients (including consulting on this case)! She also teaches a course at DC's Duke Ellington School of the Arts on Art and Social Media.

I met Colette when she invited me to come speak to her class about my Urban Portrait Project, AS IS. As part of a revamp for her art forgery website, she commissioned me to paint a loose portrait sketch (like one of these.)

In an online world awash in corporate head shots, I love the idea of opening an "About" page and finding a bright, loose painting sketch instead! There are so many creative companies out there who have the most stale staff photos on their websites. Having a piece of art in place of all that blandness is a fresh way to shake things up.

Colette's work requires her to do quite a bit of analyzing and discussing particular artworks, so she will also be including this colorful little painting somewhere on her site. We took this one in more abstract direction--focusing on a dynamic composition of color blocks and lines versus a descriptive representation of facial features. 

This was such a fun project! Thank you, Colette!

:)

I hope that 2013 is off to a shining start for you, Friends!
I am up to my ears in exciting projects, and have been daydreaming about starting my own studio team like Takashi Murakami's to help me finish everything on time!

While rushing through a slew of business e-mails yesterday though, I opened this one and smiled:

Dear Nicole,
     I am *** and I am in Girl Scout Troop ***. In that troop, each kid leads a meeting.This year, our project is to interview someone who does a job we would like to do when we grow up. I would like to be an artist. I heard your interview on the radio and I thought you would be willing to do it. Please do.

                                                Sincerely,  ***

Isn't that the sweetest? I feel really blessed to have been able to work on my Urban Portrait Project for a lot of reasons, but receiving e-mails like this one takes the cake...or the thin mint :)

The World Just Got a Little Smaller

One of my favorite things about the Christmas season is opening holiday cards from friends near and far. Today there was an envelope in the middle of the pile whose return address I didn't recognize. It was a Christmas card from the sister of a lady whose portrait I painted for AS IS! 
I have been struggling like everyone else to wrap my mind around the horribleness of so many little lives lost recently. During a time of such awful sadness, it gives me some comfort to think that this project might be touching a few lives and helping our world to feel just the tiniest bit smaller.

Wishing you all much peace and love this Christmas.

Found

Friends, thank you for all of the lovely notes that you have been sending me about AS IS! Please feel free to post them directly into the comment section of any of the blog posts. I really appreciate your thoughts on the project and think that other people would love to read them as well!

Also, a friend sent me this picture that she snapped

while grabbing coffee at this place in Georgetown:

Seems someone has hung one of the AS IS portraits up at the Bean Counter. Does anyone know the back story? I'm curious. Will you share?

AS IS: A Recap

With the AS IS install behind us, and all of the urban portraits claimed, many of you have been asking: What was the result? What was the response? So I thought I'd share a few statistic with you:

* I knew exactly 0 of the people that I painted before I began work on this project.

*Since painting and installing these 10 portraits, I have gotten to know 7 of the subjects, 2 very well.

* All 10 urban portraits were claimed by the 2nd day after they were installed. 

* 8 out of 10 of those portraits were claimed by the subjects themselves, or were removed from the installation sites and delivered by their friends and acquaintances. 

* 7 portraits were taken in broad daylight.  

* 3 were removed during the night.

* Only 1 painting was left exposed to the rain. This portrait was installed in front of an art gallery.

* 2 portraits were tethered to nearby objects to prevent them from being blown over. Both of those were among the 3 paintings taken at night.

* 1 portrait is confirmed stolen.

* 2 of the  portraits' whereabouts are unknown.

Here are the portraits listed in the order that they were claimed or taken:

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

 

7.

8.

9.

10.

It has been very humbling to hear your responses to this project. I wish that I could share every word that every one of you have written. Short of that though, I hope that you won't mind me copying a few favorite notes that I have received here. (I have abbreviated any signatures to protect the privacy of those who have written.)

"I just came across an article about you leaving Portraits  of Strangers on the Streets Where you Saw Them with a note: "IF THIS IS YOU, TAKE IT"!

Such a beautiful and simple thing... This is cool! Its like a memory of a moment on canvas. I got a chance to check out the art and it's stunning!

Congrats! I love your spirit!
C-A"

***

"Dear Nicole,
I hope that you are flooded with emails praising you for your AS IS project!

I've been doing portraits since I was 12 years old and it's always been a dilemma to me that to be successful (monetarily), I would need to paint people who are rich enough to buy portraits. I'd like to make money (so I could paint for a living rather than write grants!), but I'd much rather have people see themselves as valuable enough to have a portrait.

I carry paper and pencil and draw people all the time, and if the person wants it, I just give them the drawing. I've had people who were so happy and grateful for this little gift. But your wonderful and inspired idea is so much grander! I LOVE seeing the story of Keith Cook.

I also really like your response to the biker who took the portrait, hoping that he is appreciating the life and dignity of the man behind it.

So, I hope that not only you are lavished with blessings in your life, but that the blessings that your portraits bring to people's lives are multiplied as they see themselves through your eyes.

Hurray for you!!!

Truly best regards,
L. C." 

***

"Dear Nicole,

"I was pleasantly surprised to see the beautiful portrait of Feno at Ben's Chili Bowl this morning.

Your work is magnificent, and the WHAT touched me deeply.

(...)

Best,

V.A."

***

email subject line: "Thank you for Restoring My Faith in Humanity"

Text with picture of one of the installed portraits:

"I came across this painting on my morning walk. You made my day! :-))

L.M."

***

Thank you again, Friends! I treasure every one of your responses. In fact, I think that the success of this project can be measured in no small part by the community of notice that has sprung up around it!

 I would love to continue sharing your thoughts here. Have found your portrait,  or bumped into a portrait of someone else somewhere around the city? Care to share? You can posts thoughts here or send an email to nicolebourgea@gmail.com.

Do You Know What Was Really Fun?

Sneaking around the city at the crack of dawn installing art on the streets! Thank you to my old friend, Marcie Revens, for not only coming along for the ride, but documenting the whole thing!! More of her awesome pictures soon...

Day 4 Update

For any of you who watched this news story about AS IS on Fox5 last night, you know that one of the two remaining unclaimed portraits was taken off of the street (on camera!) by someone other than the subject himself. 

Here is the painting:

Here's how the portrait looked installed on the street:

OK, go back and click the orange link at the top of this post to watch the news story if you haven't already. 

Now tell me friends, does the man on the bike look like the subject of this portrait? I was not there when the portrait was taken, but the flustered reporter called me to say that the man promised to send an e-mail explaining....I'll let you know when that comes through.

 So how do I feel about this? Well, I did expect the unexpected with this project. I knew that it was a possibility that the portraits could be stolen. I had come to peace with that fact. I wanted these portraits to be gifts freely given. 

I did. 

I still do.

 I also worked on the painting above for over a month and spent a lot of my own money creating it. I really, really hoped that this man would find it, and that he would know that someone noticed him...that someone thought that he was important enough to be the subject of his own portrait. And so, I am holding out hope that the person who took this painting actually knows the man it depicts...that he is holding onto it for him and looking out for him. At the very least, I hope that he is appreciating the portrait, and in so doing, appreciating the life and dignity of the man behind it.

A friend was watching the Fox5 segment and texted me as soon as it finished:

 "Can I please take the suryevor home while I try to locate him? Broke my heart to see the bike guy take the painting!" 

She was talking about this portrait:

It was installed here:

I pictured her running down the street in the dark. 

A few minutes later, I got this text:

"He's gone. I'm sorry."

Day 2 Update

Well friends, yesterday I installed the AS IS portraits under the clearest of blue skies, but today the rain just keeps coming! 

Ready for the good news? All but two of the portraits have been removed! I can't tell you how happy it makes me to see the "If this is you, this painting is yours to take" signs taped to otherwise blank brick walls!  I swung by each installation site on my way into the studio this morning. The only painting still on the streets is the one installed in front of the Corcoran! I hope that this means that there are some happy folks out there.

It has been so touching to witness the thoughtfulness of DC residents! One shop owner writes me to say that he and his staff are working hard to find the employee whose portrait I had have painted. Another says that he has moved an unclaimed portrait inside his store to spare it from the elements.

A portrait of a street surveyor was originally installed against a dumpster, but someone has thoughtfully moved it under an overhang of the American City Diner to keep it dry. I rounded the corner this morning to check on it at the same time as the garbage truck. As I jumped out of my car to grab the little box of project explanation cards off of the dumpster, the driver rolled down his window. "Hey!" he shouted "Are you the one who has been painting all those pretty pictures of people? I saw one on Connecticut yesterday. It's GONE now!!" Then he flashed me a thumbs up as the truck hoisted the dumpster into the air.

One hope for this project was to ignite conversation about the power and the gift of notice. Residents caring for portraits of other community members. People searching for the subjects of unclaimed paintings. Average people taking notice. I couldn't have hoped for more from this project!

 I was up with the moon this morning installing the AS IS portraits...yaWN...so please don't make fun of my crude napkin drawing of the DC map... 

 but here are the addresses of the installation sites if you care to take a treasure hunt:

1.) Magruder's (loading dock),5626 Connecticut Avenue, DC

2. ) Plaza, 7825 Old Georgetown Road, Bethesda

3.) Pauls, 5205 Wisconsin Avenue, DC 

4.) The Broad Branch Market, 5608 Broad Branch Road, DC 

5.) THEARC, 1901 Mississippi Avenue, DC

6.) The Corcoran Gallery of Art, 500 17th Street, DC

7.) Maine Avenue Fish Market, 1100 Maine Ave, DC

8.) American City Diner (dumpsters), 5532 Connecticut Avenue, DC

9.) Bens Chili Bowl, 1213 U Street, DC

10.) A Mano (upper Georgetown), 1677 Wisconsin Avenue, DC

(While I wish in some ways that the project had reached into more corners of the city, AS IS developed out of the natural course of my movement through the city. This portrait project is about giving the gift of notice throughout the course of a normal day, week, month, year...wherever that time took me.)

*** 

All ten of the portraits were out on the streets by about 9:00 AM and by the time we had grabbed some breakfast, at least five were gone! 

 Can I ask you a favor? Will you keep keeps your fingers crossed and spread the word so that the other five folks find their portraits before tomorrow's rain storms? Thanks, Friends!

Are You Awake?

The sun is set to rise at 7:05 this morning and if all goes according to plan all of the AS IS portraits should be installed on the streets of DC by 9 A.M. Want to know where? Check back in a few hours. Map to follow later this morning...

Thank You!

photograph credit Chris Lyford

Thank you to Chris Lyford of The Washington Post for the article on AS IS. It was so fun having you visit the studio and the story is beautifully written! You can read it by clicking here if you like.

Under the Weather

John Singer Sargent, Atlantic Storm

Keep your fingers crossed! If the ten day weather forecast is to be trusted, there is a forty percent chance of a storm on October 1st--a.k.a, AS IS install day. I'm choosing to look on the bright side though (pun intended). After all, wasn't today supposed to be grey and miserable too? Well hello there, gorgeous sunny morning! Now, I'm off to the hardware store to pick up something to anchor the portraits against that 6 mile per hour wind :-/

P.S.--Thank you to Emily Friedman of WMAU for the lovely story about AS IS on NPR's Metro Connection! You can read it or listen to a podcast of the program by following this link.

Technical Difficulties

a detail of portrait #9

Keep your fingers crossed, Friends! The ninth AS IS portrait turned out even better than I had planned, but I am experiencing a few technical difficulties with the tenth. I never use a medium to clean my brushes in between mixing colors. Instead, I dip my brushes in linseed oil in between colors and brush any remaining pigment onto a cloth next to my palette. Painting directly with a bit of the old color mixed into the new helps keep the painting process full of surprises, and it gives the final portrait an underlying coherence too. I usually tone the entire canvas in one bold shade before beginning a portrait to further the effect. Whatever color I choose will bleed into the top layers of paint a bit, lending the whole portrait some of the mood of the underlying color. 

 Good. Great.

Thing is, I also usually have the luxury of time on my side. I can tone one canvas, and then work on an other project while I wait a few days for the first canvas to almost fully dry. Sadly, I didn't meet the tenth AS IS subject until I was almost finished with the ninth. AND! The very bright red that I chose to tone his canvas is doing a little too much bleeding into the top layers. OK, a lot of bleeding. Like the man looks like he could be bleeding. Oy vey! 

Wish me luck in the studio today? I think I'm going to need it!

image from greatergreaterwashington.org

Happy Friday, Friends! Did you catch the radio program yesterday on the graffiti along the Red Line of the Metro? Saaret Yoseph’s documentary, The Red Line D.C. Project, is based on her belief that “in Washington, D.C., the most accessible art form isn’t in the museums. It’s on the Metro.” It was an interesting program with strong opinions on both sides of the tagging issue.

 While the destruction/improvement (depending on your perspective) of private property is obviously a sensitive subject, I have to agree that successful public art is uniquely compelling today because of its accessibility. Context definitely alters the way that we view works of art. While museums have an unquestionably important role, I am attracted to the idea of art that meets you in the midst of your day. In fact, one of the sub-objectives of AS IS is to question the distinction between fine art and street art. By installing traditional, formal paintings on the streets and inviting people to take what might otherwise be considered precious art objects right off the walls and corners of the city, I hope to blur the line a bit and ask whether fine art is really fine if it propped against a dumpster or loading dock. As always, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Also, if you live in the greater Washington, DC area, you can listen to NPR's story on AS IS today at 1:00 PM on Metro Connection (channel 88.5 for DC folks), and if you are out of town, a podcast of the show will be available online after the program airs.

Enjoy your weekend everyone!

Friends, I have begun work on the tenth AS IS portrait! Can you guess where in the city I found my subject?

Why Make a Painting When You Can Snap a Picture Instead?

A reporter recently asked me about my choice of medium for the AS IS portraits. In this age constant documentation, where everyone is snapping pictures of everything, and digital photography makes it all so easy, why would I spend forty to eighty hours paintings someone, she wondered. Wouldn't a photograph do the trick?

I have to admit that I was unprepared for the question. In fact, I am still struggling with the answer. This is in part because I truly admire the work of many artists who work in the field of photography. As far as my choice of medium for portraiture goes though, here are my (1) scientific and (2) philosophical answers: 

1. The emotional centers of our brains prefer blurry.

When I paint a portrait I want it to hit on the essence of who someone is. I am not particularly concerned with recording every freckle and eyelash. 

Have you read this CNN article? (Thank you to Laura Walton Crouch for bringing it to my attention!) This point in particular jumped out at me:

Patrik Vuilleumier at the University of Geneva and colleagues figured out that the amygdala, a part of the brain involved in emotions and the "flight or fight response," responds more to blurry photos of faces depicting fear than unaltered or sharply detailed images. At the same time, the part of our brain that recognizes faces is less engaged when the face is blurry. Cavanagh explains that this may mean we are more emotionally engaged when the detail-oriented part of our visual system is distracted, such as in Impressionist works where faces are unrealistically colorful or patchy.

So, emotionally, we respond more strongly to things which are depicted with less photographic accuracy. My portraits for this project are realistic but they are not photo-realistic. Their palettes and paint applications do not correspond to reality in a literal sense. 

2. The process is as important as the product. 

Touch matters. For a project dedicated to giving the gift of notice, I want the trace of a human hand (mine!) to be evident in the final artwork. Giving connotates a reaching out from one person to another and I want a small trace of that one person (me!) to be uncover able in the gift.

Time spent matters. These paints are large...and they take weeks or even months to make. AS IS has challenged me to offer the gift of notice to everyone that I meet in the course of my day. Sometimes I acknowledge a person with a smile or nod, other times I may paint a five-foot tall portrait of someone and leave it on the street corner for them to find and keep. When the later happens, I think that it is important to spend time reflecting on that person. This doesn't necessarily mean cataloguing the details of someone's life. It means simple concentrating on the fact of someone's existence apart from my own. It is always refreshing and I hope that that attention translates into the finished portraits!

Remember This Guy?

Mr. Keith is one of the maintenance guys that works at THEARC in Anacostia, DC. At one point in his life he was homeless and addicted to crack cocaine. Wanting to do better by his three little kids, he followed a friend to an Narcotics Anonymous meeting to get some help. 

Months later he was no longer picking the stuff up, but was becoming tiered of introducing himself as an addict. He remembered that when he was growing up in the projects, a man used to bring him and his buddy, Junior, along to church. That way, they wouldn't be left hanging around with the older boys in the neighborhood to drink and smoke. The memory inspired Keith to turn to God to help him with his life.

He has been clean for twenty-six years now and has been married for seventeen. He has ten children, some biological and some adopted. When the kids were young, Keith used to take them and any other kids that needed a little love and minding to the zoo, park or basketball court. They would get from one end of the city to the other by bus. Sometimes, his children would complain about having to bring along stragglers. He would explain though that we all need to look out for each other.

Today I had the honor to give Keith this:

 I installed his portrait in the community garden that he helps to maintain at THEARC. When he saw the painting he gave a series of strong hugs and high-fives, and he told me his story. "We all need to look out for each other" he said gesturing to the painting "and that is what your doing here!"

Unlike the other nine subjects for this project (most of whom I will probably never meet), I am so happy to have had the privilege to get to know Keith Cook just a little bit, and to hear his reaction to having his portrait painted. He radiates a sincere goodness that just makes you want to be around him and soak up what he has to say. It would be difficult to find a person who deserves more to be recognized and honored for his bottomless love and his drive to live every day to its fullest. 

I hope that when the rest of the portraits hit the streets on October 1st, they will brighten a few days. I hope that they will let people know that they are seen and that they matter.  I am also pretty sure that there will be portraits that no one will find. There will be paintings that will be rained on, stolen or thrown away...and I've made my peace with that. A gift is only a gift if it is freely given, and I want these portraits to be true gifts of notice. Whatever happens to the other nine paintings though, I am very very happy that Mr. Keith has his.

photo credit, Leah Moss

 NPR's Metro Connection came to the studio this morning to record a story about AS IS. The interview was so much fun, and I hope that the feature will help all ten people that I have painted for the project be on the look out for their portraits around the city!

Have you ever been interviewed for anything? The reporter asked such good questions, some of which (I confess) left me more than a little tongue-tied! You know how sometimes the perfect answer comes to you long after you have been asked a question? Yeah, me too. As the reporter assured me, sometimes the simplest stories are the hardest to tell. I have confidence though that the team of talented people at WAMU will cobble my painstaking attempts at an explanation for this project into a story worth hearing! You can tune in to channel 88.5 on Friday, September 28th to listen for yourself and be the judge.