©2008 Ed Muscle and Ed Muscle Interweb Deathbed. Please direct questions or comments or provocative photographs of yourself to edmuscle@gmail.com (no nudity, please). Ed Muscle is Ed Muscle, Francis Muscle, Ed Madrid and friends. Ed Muscle Interweb Deathbed is the website, Ed Muscle studio is a work space in Portland, Oregon, USA. I am Ed Muscle, the studio’s Editor-in-Chief, Design Director and Head Writer. I did most of the work so I’m going to write in first person.
Polyfarm… Pussy Peak… Devil in the Sky is a series of 10 digital paintings paired with a series of 41 small scale images, indexed on the web and completed over the course of a year and a half, from January 2007 to July 2008. A version of this project was installed at the studio in August 2008. Here are some photos from a party.
TAGLINE
Sort of like Timbaland-eats-Justin Timberlake.
SIX WORD DESCRIPTION OF THE PROJECT’S DOMINANT UNDERLYING THEME AS SPECULATED ON BY THE ARTIST
The way sexual jealousy affects perception.
PRODUCTION NOTES
All editing took place at Ed Muscle studio in Portland, Oregon. All images drawn, scanned and edited by Ed Muscle. Vice President of Operations: Melissa Logan. Wartime Consiglieri: James King-Loo Yu and Betsy Tripi. Hitting Coach / Director of Photography: Rob Finch. Editor Emeritus: Andrew Oberriter. Managing Editor: Tamir Kriegel. Prints by Pushdot Studio. Web hosting by MediaTemple. Canvas stretching by Bryan Grimes. Installation work by Peter Qualliotine and Cailin Gibbons. The main tools we used were: sharpie and printer paper for sketches; technical pens and yupo paper for large drawings; scanner and camera; MacBook Pro and Photoshop for editing. For project management, I am a big fan of the suite of web-based applications offered by 37 Signals; e.g., Ed Muscle studio relies heavily on Backpack for day-to-day list-making and note-taking.
RECENT NAVIGATIONAL STARS
John Ashbery, Andrei Tarkovsky, Gerhard Richter, Kurt Cobain, Joan Mitchell, Allen Iverson, David Foster Wallace, Édouard Manet, Ed Ruscha, Fernando Pessoa, Paul McCarthy, William T. Vollmann, Tom Hagen.
THE ART WORLD
Like lots of artists, I get pretty excited when I see artwork that embodies themes or employs techniques which I feel I can somehow assimilate into my own work. On the flip-side, I’m also moved by artwork that operates in a way that’s totally contrary to my instincts and desires as an artist, stuff that forces me to rethink deeply-etched assumptions. The art shows that have meant the most to me over the last six years or so fall a little bit into both categories, starting with the Gerhard Richter retrospective at MoMA in 2002; Carroll Dunham at Metro Pictures in 2002; the Stuart Horodner-curated Words in Deeds show at PICA in 2002; Paul Chan’s video installation My Birds…Trash…The Future at the UCLA Hammer Museum in 2005; the Jeff Jahn-curated Fresh Trouble show in 2005; and fresh in my memory because fairly recent (and local): Storm Tharp at PDX Contemporary, Keith Boadwee at Rocksbox, Dan Attoe at the Portland Art Museum, Melissa Dyne at the Contemporary Craft Museum and Jaqueline Ehlis at New American Art Union.
SENTIMENTAL DEDICATIONS
I don’t think I could have made it through the weird years without my friend Melissa Logan; this one is for her…
The religious subtext of this project is dedicated to my Wartime Consiglieri James King-Loo Yu and Besty Tripi. Their lives are an inspiration to me and I hope I never let them down…
The fancy roses in Polyfarm #35 are for Rob Finch, whose heroic sanity makes me believe it’s possible to, in Richard Powers’ words, “see and feel the maelstrom but not be buffeted by it.”…
The trees in Polyfarm #6 are for Michael Brophy, the king of Northwest painting and a bridge to the mystics of Northwest abstraction who continue to comfort and inform us all. Thanks for rooting for the Warriors in 2007 and visiting my studio in 2008…
The physical installation of the paintings in my show are dedicated to my friend and confidant Mary Heinlein. Thank you for seeing right through me. I forgive you for being wrong about steroids…
The flash-free interface of this website is for Mary’s island-mate Leif Halvorson…
Polyfarm #32 is for Lala Rivera, who is kind to me in a way that feels suspiciously unconditional. I hope to know you for a long time…
The River and Two Human Hearts is for Amy Hsuan, whose crazy manic energy inadvertently helped get this project off the ground. I thought a lot about her generosity when I made that picture…
Now listen, some folks think there are images of dildos in my work. I don’t see it, but if they really are in there, I dedicate them to my friends Andrew Oberriter and Tamir Kriegel. I hope you two will get off your asses and make something funny happen…
The two male lovers in The Gash are for my roommates Kevin O’ Connor and Paul Lynch. Thanks for giving me a place to live and introducing me to your friends and loved ones…
The orange and black in Girl in Bedroom III is for Barry Lamar Bonds, undisputed home run king…
You know, I don’t really expect this work will be perceived as particularly funny, but it's sort of hilarious to me. As long as two people are together in the same room — even if they’re both sick and dying, or are getting swallowed up by abstract patterns, or are in fact trapped in said room, barely even conscious — as long as there is the potential for communication, there is the potential for great comedy. The funny parts in my work are dedicated to my younger sister Christina, who laughs at the same things I do, and whose favorite joke is the absurd one about how we all grow up and drift through the world and buy stupid things and disappear; it’s a classic…
Also to my younger sister, and to my older brother and older sister, to my parents and to the whole Madrid family, I have this weird hope that my work can somehow protect you all from harm. It’s sort of insane, and arrogant on some level, I know, but the thought keeps me going some nights…
Thank you everyone, including those I’ve overlooked and those I barely know, for the irrational faith you seem to have placed in me. If I am lucky enough to live and work a while longer, I hope to repay your love in many unexpected and shamelessly melodramatic ways. I begin today, by swallowing my fear of embarrassment and emptying the contents of my grateful, sloppy, hyperactive heart.
WHAT’S NEXT?
Journalism, the web, strippers.
Your friend,
Ed Muscle