feather2pixels

I sure am getting lots of mileage out of my Cliff House/Ocean Beach/Seal Rocks stencils, and here is a recent permutation. It is a birthday present for EB, and also an un-subtle homage to one of my favorite works by the artist Ed Ruscha that I have admired it in the DeYoung museum many times.

Ruscha is a West Coast artist who participated in the Warhol/Lichtenstein driven pop-art movement, and later went on make a series of highly awesome word art paintings in the seventies and eighties. He is one of my favorite American artists. As a mantra, “a particular sort of heaven” perfectly encapsulates my personal West Coast experience, the highlight of which has been finding EB.

(By the way, Ruscha’s “a particular sort of heaven” is incomplete without considering this companion piece)

A Particular Kind of Heaven | Screenprint on Paper | 19×19 inches | 2013

Joe and Ana are still in SF, freewheeling through the remaining days of their honeymoon. Four nights in a row of hanging out and I practically feel like a normal person again. I like the concept of friendship. I like the feeling of stopping by a friend’s house on my way back from the ocean to drink beer and to watch baseball. I like this idea that friends sometimes hang out in groups larger than two. I’d almost forgotten that once upon a time having fun with other people didn’t require planning weeks ahead.

The ride home from Cole Valley is a series of zigzags and wiggles, all downhill through a maze of SF Victorians. At night, the streets are awake and the city sweeps past me at eight miles per hour. Right. This is how I am supposed to feel. This is where I belong. This is a particular kind of heaven.