Benday and the Jets....

I do think I have figured out the Benday dot painting. If you know the close-together dots of the comic book and (particularly the early) Roy Lichtensteins, you may not recognize the influence, since the dots here are "so spaced out" (that phrase always reminds me of Elton John and Bernie Taupin's "Bennie and the Jets," I can't help it)... but the fact is that Lichtenstein, even though his art doesn't have as many (apparent) followers as Cubism, created something just as radical, a kind of departure for how we perceive space. And when you see his work in person, it gets to you. It certainly got to me. And so I have moved the dots away from each other to see if that would make that "space-between" any more visible. And then inside each dot is a piece of landscape, the skies, the grasses, the mustard flowers and a bit of vine from driving through Napa... and the mist, because it was raining, is everywhere else... and the tiled border, the three white squares, is for safety. And the painting seems joyful to me... I am delighted with it... I think it is done!

Napa, crossing York Creek

The rain seemed to bring out the patterns of the vines. The branches were all trimmed to the same height, the rows were impossibly even, wires and posts ensured that nothing would escape. The grass in some vineyards was trimmed or pulled; in others, grass and yellow mustard blossoms took our attention away from the gray skies and the bare branches. No leaves yet. Mists rose partway up the mountains, peaks still visible, nearly a Japanese print. It was really really pretty.

So, given that this world was so lush, I felt I had to take another run at my Benday dot monotype. I decided to try something I had heard that Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg had each done: re-visit a print and add layers ... not via the press, but by adding oil-stick or acrylic paint ... I have re-worked prints, but never so thoroughly ... so I sanded the interiors of each "dot" and then painted over the sanded circle, following the colors of the wet wine country and leaving the initial blue of the print alone.  The monotype has new life, I think:

The sky, the clouds, the mists, the grasses, the quiet vines, the mustard flowers are all there.