Studio View: Enigromatic Avocado Tree
I can’t imagine not having plants sitting around the studio. An artist friend of mine named Moses Hoskins gave me a tip on growing avocados a few years ago, and I started this one in a coffee can. I’m going to have to transplant it again soon. It’s sitting on my rolling palette-table, which is just a ready-made tabouret fashioned from an old crate I’d found on the street in Manhattan some 15 years ago. I screwed some caster-wheels onto the bottom and store my oil mediums in it. It’s dimensions are identical to the size of my 12″ x 15″ Enigromatic Paintings, one of which is mounted to the side in this photo.
A few years ago I saw an exhibit of Picasso paintings at a gallery on 57th street that included an old palette that the artist had sitting in his studio when he died. I was surprised to see how similar it was to this little crate that I’d found, with an old ceramic plate on top with black paint dried onto it, a brush still stuck to the paint. It was one of the most moving things I’d seen from Picasso: it reminded me of some of his guitar constructions somehow.
Tags: avocado, Harold Graves, Moses Hoskins, Painting, Picasso, plants, ready-made, Studio, tabouret
