5
TIM EBNER
M. Animals ... ?
I think that the animals can kind of do what we were talking about earlier. They kind of give it a perversity that sort of sets you off from it. You go 'Well, I don't know whether that can really go off like that. That's ridiculous.' But then, it settles. You go, 'It's not. There's something going on here.' So it flip flops in between these two. And that flip flop, that going in and out, setting up that, not an ambiguity, but discrepancy, allows the experience to happen.
If it's all one thing, if it's just a caricature of dogs playing cards, then forget it. Or if it's just this angst-ridden, or whatever-looking portrait of a person, then you say, 'Well, I've seen that before, too'. So it just creates this kind of walking along the fence here, on the top of the fence, that line. And in that area I think the experience can happen.
M. Along those lines, were the fish.
Yeah, like the three fish. I remember when I did that one, too. That was where I was really struggling. I was getting some things to happen, but I saw this comic strip of these goofy fish and I said 'That's perfect'. I can make these goofy fish and I can float them around anywhere I want on the picture plane because they're fish, they're in the water. And that popped the whole thing open for me. But also when I was painting the fish I just didn't want them to have that cartoony look. Because it almost felt as though, because of the intensity that you bring to the activity of making the painting, and that because of the immediacy of the application of paint on the canvas, that something is bound to show itself. Consciously, or ...
M. Because they're so blank?
Yeah, because they're so blank, yeah, that's a great way to put it. Because something will emerge out of that vacuous image of a fish, or something, or of a bear, or something. But if you start with something that's too heavy, too laden with a specificity, then you're doomed. Then it's redundant.
M. There's one that was in the last show that just kind of did it to me ... you know that one where the face just kind of disappears ...
Oh, the ghost! I worked on that painting for a really long time and it wasn't doing anything, and I had all this shit that was on that desk and I just poured it onto the canvas, all the mediums and whatever crap I had. And then I painted in a face. I said 'Fuck, I've got to do something'. So I just quickly painted in a face and I said 'Wow, this is kind of weird'. And then I put some white around it and when I put it up on the wall, because there was so much medium on it, it just started to go wooooo. And I went 'Whooa, whooa, I like that' and so I put it back down on the ground and I kept it in the garage for about two months to let it dry. Because everytime I checked it out, it would start to ooze again. So that's basically how it came out.
M. That's freaky. Even the palette's freaky ...
Yeah. Well, I worked very hard. And it's a palette that I never would have thought ... But I like how it emerges out of that pool of something with those purple lips. Somehow all the things just kind of work together. But yet, when you put it all together, you go 'What the hell? Why would that be going on?' I like that. Maybe I can get to a certain kind of place in making a painting where things just don't all add up. You put them next to each other, but they don't necessarily all add up and make sense. But it's not just a grab bag. I worked on it for a very long time. It was a painting from last show. I didn't like the face. And then I got the face down. And then I put a hat on and I didn't like the hat. And finally I said well I'll just put an alligator on it. And I said 'Wow that works'.
There is just enough tension with that alligator on his head, that it works. And I don't know why. But ... I don't know, the alligator is kind of staring out at you with these crafty eyes but then the person underneath has this sort of angelic preoccupation and it's nice to have those two things going on.