Mathews Angst

They have been described as “the window to the soul” and there is truly a phenomena that telegraphs information about individuals when we look in their eyes. “Her eyes sparkled and shinned like the stars” says the love struck, “He had Blood in his eye”- a phrase denoting one who wanted a fight. “You can’t hide your lyin’ eyes, and your smile is a thin disguise” the eagles.

Consider this: Mathew 6: 22-24 The lamp of the body is the eye, if it is clear the body is full of light. But if the eye is bad your whole body is full of darkness. If the light in you is darkness then how great is the darkness.

Our world of distraction can lead us to total over-load. We just have so many things to think about, worry about. Our need to take action in so many directions can lead us to a virtual catatonic state, being frazzled, at the end of our rope. We can let the light in us fade like an old flashlight battery, we can burn it on unimportant concerns. And others can see it in our eyes. What is this energy? Where does it come from? In cartoons the dead are often depicted with just ‘x’s for eyes. The frail jewel of an eyeball in it’s liquid envelope of tear can tell so much about the depth of life within. Not just the physical blood pumping and breath, but the state of the soul, the events that have shaped this life, the hope for the future, and the probable impact this individual could have on us. Consider this about the author of life:

John chapter 1: “He was with God in the beginning. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.”

Our “countenance” comes through in our posture and in our eyes. If you are on the way to darkness it shows. We have so much to distract us these days from the true light of the world, we can get so concerned about this or that that our light can get so very dim. And our ability to come to a spiritual relationship can be virtually gone. But then, when we enter into darkness we may cry out in anguish and there in that despair a living God will come to us. The light does shine in the darkness. Will you comprehend it? You must be willing to let the rest of those draining concerns go.

What’s in Your Worship?

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thanks

Tj

Tell me about your struggles with relating to God

Our Appetite

Oh yes, we have an appetite all right. After all, we must eat to live, right? But we develop an appetite for foods that will ruin our health, we develop appetites for activities that will wreck our balance and suspend any activity that could be considered spiritual. We are not only talking about our trips to the fridge, but to the internet porn site, and the shopping mall, the TV. How mockingly appropriate is the term “download” like a massive amount of stuff, pouring into an already burdened carrier. It strains and groans under the new burden of stuff, unwieldy and difficult now to climb a hill, so difficult to maneuver because of the shear mass of………..all the available things we crave.
Our American world is so chocked full of stuff for us to crave that most of us bear multiple versions of excess appetite. Then it comes time to seek a living God, to come before Him to partake of his wisdom, and who are we? What do we bring? He wants us with nothing and we show up so laden with the excess of our consumption that we do not know how to even seek his presence.
Fasting is not very fashionable. But it may be one of the only ways to even recognize what habits we have constructed for ourselves, and how severely they get in between us and a relationship to a living God who’s life is the light of men. Like Pavlov’s dog we respond to the bell on cue, we salivate on command just like Madison Avenue wants us to. Ah, so well trained, is it nicotine, alcohol, sweets, or sex? Do we know how it started and what should be considered normal? And worst of all, when we come before Him, can we be apart from our craving long enough to enter in? How often should we enter in? There are few natural curbs for appetites in our modern culture, we may have to create our own.
What is in Your worship?
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Cool Daddio- from the OverHeads series

Are we cool enough? Are we under control, suave and debonair? Do we rank with the “in” crowd far above the losers? Man, it is in our style, our dress, our talk, our crowd. This awareness comes in puberty and in many, just takes over everything. Some of us never grow out of it’s domination. We must be cool. And the act of pointing out the low status of another is like counting coo. It stimulates us and we believe we have achieved through these petty comments. The concern about cool is probably the greatest distraction from a spiritual relationship ever conceived. It is elusive, fleeting, and indefinable, making it only achievable by those who truly believe they have it, confirmed by those around them aspiring to be there themselves.

Cool can be a perfect mockery to the condition of righteousness, and a tremendous impediment to the ability to get close to a God who knows better of you and your state. The grand illusion of being cool deceives so many. Just look at the celebrity worship that the entertainment, and fashion industries receive. Yes we can be so cool, but what is in our worship? Can we be cool before God? Fat chance, and if we are focused on cool, then God is not in our consciousness. When we are cool our heart is cool, and warmth of heart is required to come to the presence of God. Ever loose your cool to get before God? But that brings another topic:

What’s in your worship? Dude

"What's in Your Worship?" a new series of sculpture

“OverHeads” speak to our modern American tribal worship rituals. These car interior components (over head consoles) have morphed into tribal mask like objects based on the spiritual conditions that the components may suggest. I use shredded tires that I collect from the highways, and upholstery fabrics from local industries. Meditation on the suggested spiritual states drove decisions for design of these pieces. Each has a message and it’s own story. “What’s in Your Worship?” is the headline for showing these ritual-like objects. Each posting will have the meditations on one of these in the series. Several have animated presentations that go with them. Here is the first:

Golden Calf-

We revert to what we are familiar with under duress, or when we don’t know what else to do. Consider the people who said: Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses, we don't know what has happened to him." (Exodus 32:2)

They had seen the plagues in Egypt, they had experienced the Passover, they had witnessed the red sea part, and passed through. Now after a short wait for the spiritual message they give up and revert to what they knew, demanding that Aaron the priest make them a golden calf to worship.

What do you revel in? What gods go before you in your daily life? Cars, homes, Sports, Movies? We revert so quickly. Our rote response kicks in and we do what is practically a reflex. So often these things are so far from our real spiritual encounters that it is a wonder that the ten commandments survived at all.

In reviews of actual police shoot-outs where officers died, they found pockets full of casings. Precious seconds had been wasted in the heat of battle to pick up the empties, not because it was a good idea but because that is what they had done in training! (This practice was changed.) So what have you conditioned yourself to do? What is on your training table?

When we come to worship, and we seek to worship in spirit and truth, we may be under pressure that we are not used to. It may take longer to get it started than we had thought or planned for. The rest of our life enters in at these points and we revert to what we know. “We don’t know what became of that guy who went up the mountain, let’s do what we always did.”

What’s in your worship?

Thanks,

Tj SculptureByTj.com

Back to The Mission – 57 Descending a switchback after Duchamp

After all the Nike studies and creating 5 new pieces I came back to the original objective “The 57 descending”, a work based on the Painting “Nude Descending a Staircase” I had a mold for the bronze pedestal sized “Boomer’s Nike” so I cast a bunch of these and constructed the model. All through an exercise like this I am thinking about the full sized version and what it will take to make one of these that is 12 feet high and could weigh several tons. I assembled the components and modeled the transitions into the finished the model. Next came a rubber mold to cast it in, the most complicated mold I have ever designed, with fins projecting in all directions. But I was determined to cast it all in one piece. Quick calculations told me this could weigh 2 to 300lbs and would need two people and a chain fall to manage the casting process. And this was just the pedestal size! The mold was designed for that purpose.

. A nice yellow beige color was created for the base mix to imitate the Duchamp painting The piece was cast in Concrete. An assistant and I managed to do the casting in about an 8 hour session and it worked out pretty well. My new area for wet grinding cement was tried out during this project and of course I had to re-design the set up for improvements. I have some ancient iron wheeled carts for factory transport that turned out to be great turn tables for this heavy, wet finishing work. The piece was ready for the Velocity show in Minneapolis. It weighs about 230lbs. and I do have to bring my engine hoist when I install this baby.

Every 15 degrees or so is a brand new composition, and when you experience descending a mountain road the energy is a lot like this. I hope I paid sufficient homage to Duchamp in this composition. And to the Harley Earl team that created those beloved Chevy fins. I look forward to the day I can build the big one.

My last few thoughts and spin outs on the Nike series were about the dreams of car collectors. Like dear in the headlights, all they can see is their favorite. The rest are of no importance, hence the headlight pieces as wall reliefs for My 57 Chevy fans,. Oh and one last note; under construction is the “Rites of Passage” installation with a 57, but this will wait for my next series of postings on the big installations in the Art park.

Next time: the Overheads-my forayer into Modern American Tribal Art using car parts

Thanks

Tj