commission a work of art

Francesca sent me a preview of the piece which is almost done… and it looks beautiful. I love it! It looks like I may be able to name the piece as well as a few places on it. Yay! I’ve requested a slightly larger image to help with this, but I’ve already got a bunch of ideas.

The inspiration for this commission (on my end) is artificial cities and communities. I thought it fit well with Francesca’s style since this is essentially a map that has been cut up and reconstructed from other cities, oceans, and bays. In my silly story, Man Versus Himself (wikipedia) there is a city named Andom Bay that is basically a city owned and run by the protagonist (Anselm Betty)... and he also creates a city within the city named Little Anhedonia (wikipedia). I love artificial cities, and when talking about this commission Francesca and I sent links back and forth on my hometown of Irvine, Celebration, Florida, New Songdo, and Dubai’s crazy World Islands. One of the best things about these crazy communities is that they also employ very deliberate and altruistic/futuristic/naturalistic naming-schemes. I grew up on Songbird then moved to Falling Star and Springbrook, for example.

So, in the spirit of radical self improvement, I may inject a few philosophies into the landscape as well. In It To Win It Lake. Accept All Offers Drive. Going For Broke Hill. They may all be rejected though. I’ll have to Sleep On It Valley.

What do you all think?

My artist of choice has a big show coming up in December, in San Francisco, so my piece won’t be started until after that. To survive, I purchased one of her smaller maps at her Viveza show.

I’m talking with Francesca Berrini about a possible commission for one of her maps.

I really liked that scene in Royal Tenenbaums where Owen and Luke are sitting in Owen’s apartment having an awkward conversation and as the camera switches between their looks of confusion there are these large, very expressive paintings in the background. After some research I found out that the paintings were by Miguel Calderon. Not sure how that relates directly to this goal, but I think it would be fun to find an artist that I like (preferably local) and commission a new painting. I would like to see how such a collaboration would pan out.