12 Apr My california paintings Pt.1
In My California, De Cock, in order to find new sources of inspiration, traveled through the deserts, on the lookout for members of the Native American Culture, and stumbled upon those representing White American Counterculture instead, ending up in deserted holiday spots, a clandestine military field illegally claimed by guys building their own planes, in little towns made of trash, in scrapheaps turned into art or into a concert hall. Places that certain people would call rat holes, or worse: shitholes.
We’re talking about places such as Slab City, near Salvation Mountain, CA, where the residents make a creative re-use of the junk the military hastily dumped in the ground when they left, or Bombay Beach, in the Sonoran Desert, east of Salton Sea, a place destined to become a beach resort for the stars of high society such as Marilyn Monroe, but due to climatological changes became deserted, desolate, with dead fish all over the beach, as we can witness in the video teaser for Daoud.
The names alone of these places, or what resounds of them, are sheer poetry. Ballarat, around Panamint Springs, a supply point for miners, once harbored 500 inhabitants, now only one: Rock. This solitary man is the guardian of this little ghost town.
My California Paintings Pt. 1, My California Series:
- Regular john, acrilic on canvas, 160 x 160 cm, 2016
- Gunman, acrilic on canvas, 120 x 100 cm, 2016
- God Is On the Radio, acrilic on canvas, 220 x 160 cm, 2016
- Scumbag Blues, acrilic on canvas, 250 x 140 cm, 2016
- San Berdoo Sunburn, acrilic on canvas, 250 x 140 cm, 2016
- The Lost Art Of Keeping a Secret, acrilic on canvas, 200 x 120 cm, 2016