About

The Beatles, Records series of mixed media collages is my attempt to create a visual narrative of two very personal aspects of my life.  Both aspects continue to exert a powerful artistic pull on me despite their being positively ancient and of course pre-digital in terms of my life history.

As an American teenager, coming of age in the early 60’s, I was, like many baby boomers, more than casually aware of the pop group the Beatles.  In the summers of 1962 and 1964 I had spent time in London and the nearby English countryside.  Somewhat as a result of these travel experiences, I felt eminently qualified (as only a teenager can) to expound upon things British. I recall postcards written to friends in the U.S. – telling them to watch out for miniskirts and the Beatles – sort of an early warning of what would be later known as the British invasion and the Swinging London of that era.  Not surprisingly, the Beatles were the first band I heard back in the U.S., first on a jukebox and then radio who sounded authentically English…a very cool way to sound many of us then thought.  About this time in Buffalo, New York, I had become friendly with a lanky, intelligent suburban kid named Drew Andersen whose brother, Eric Andersen was a rising folk music artist and whose management contract was about to be handled by none other than Brian Epstein..  Epstein (affectionately dubbed “Eppie” by the lads) was of course also the manager of the Fab Four. Inside information on the Beatles was not something that I actively sought out. However, I did not avoid it either.  Tidbits that did not seem to be stamped “common knowledge” or “mainstream” would reach me through the Andersens from time to time, and which over the years became part of their very public identity.  It should probably be noted that I was not a huge follower or fan of the Beatles after their films were made and their recording as a group had ceased.  My interest in them was casual and sporadic through many years.  However, in looking back at those years as a visualized unit, it seems to me that their impact was colossal.  The lads were quite simply always one step ahead of it all.  It may seem a bit of a blanket statement, but virtually all good rock music is Beatles derivative. As a small example: my late friend, bassist Rick Anderson of the Tubes was constantly practicing Beatles chords when not performing. (The Beatles are of course, further beholden to Buddy Holly and the Crickets, Chuck Berry and Little Richard to name several).

Many have noted that the Beatles were somehow handing America back their own musical legacy.

With only several exceptions, my collages do not individually, or in groups of four – specifically relate to any certain Beatles song or event.  My real fascination with them as expressed in the works” Beatles, Records” is ultimately as cultural harbingers and pioneers.  Another way to express this is as my attempt to create a durable graphic of early pop iconography.  During those brief recording years, I found myself identifying mostly with Paul, who appeared to have a special place in the development of Nowhere Man, Eleanor Rigby and the conceptual masterwork: Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. It must be listened to at least once annually.  I hear many people both in and out of the music industry agree.  Among the items I heard was that when the lads were dry on song material, Paul was often the well they went to.  A tune that reinforced this was the wistful “Fixing a Hole” For years I believed Paul was singing other song parts only to be corrected by those who knew better:  It was John.  But perhaps most importantly to me, the Beatles were at once philosophically complex and refreshingly silly and childlike.  The pure blocks of color in some pieces are meant to be seen as such.  Beatles lyrics and melodies can often seem to me as a color or colors: primaries, in-between tones, washed out and water colored, high contrast black and white (or bone) and I have tried to incorporate them into many background and record sleeve colors in these works.  The historical forces that the Beatles and youth culture in general let loose have not been exaggerated.             

The second word” Records,” in my entitled” Beatles, Records “– or the other half of my theme: In the early 1950’s, one of my father’s jobs was as a news commentator on radio (WHLD 1260 FM) in Buffalo, New York.  I was only 5 or 6 years old then but can recall stacks of mostly 78rpm records appearing regularly and upon his arrival home. Black circles that could produce sound!  And all from inside sharply creased green, tan and brown construction paper!  I spent many happy hours playing those 78s and tearing the round labels off and into bits.  For what reason and to discover what? (I am not sure) “thinking” to myself that if all those records had no identifying labels, and since all the black vinyl circles were the same – no one would really know exactly what they were about to hear!  This I considered to be great fun.  It was short lived though as I soon thereafter turned my attention to the labels on canned goods in my mother’s pantry.        I was found out and made to stop.  I think of these pranks now as early collage attempts, although it would be another 5 years (at age 11 or so) before I assembled any discarded materials and glued them to a surface.

“We’re all really the same person, we’re just four (4) parts of one”.  Paul said that.         In these panels the Fab Four are given the quadrant status popular in the pre digital formats of some album covers and film ads of theirs.  The quadrants, apart from being read as: upper left John, upper right Paul, lower left George and lower right Ringo, are painted with some thought as to their 4 – in – oneness.  My choice of colors or palette is meant to be seen as a direct product of the recording years before they broke up.       Pre digital, pre photoshop (and in my view) representative of the last years when pop culture was still fundamentally innocent.  I have also tried to evoke the random and somewhat repetitive nature that is at the heart of language and song lyrics.  The numerous coats of resin that have been applied to the surfaces are meant not only as an overall protection of the layers of vintage, painted, washed and Xeroxed papers in these collages.  It is my hope that as they age, they will acquire more of a preservation surfboard – family den patina reminiscent of things 60s, both British and American.         At the very heart of all that will always be for me, my own association with vinyl recordings and the incomparable group, the Beatles.