Miki de goodaboom biography samples
I have a powerful story to tell. As an artist, I normally create paintings issued from my own fantasy, with probably the unconscious hope that they will touch somebody’s else fantasy and perhaps even lead to a sale one day.
Many years ago, as I moved from Germany to Spain, I founded an art business with a group of international artists, with, attached to it, an art school. The main goal of the business was to paint on commission. Here is how we wanted to sell the idea:
“We all have the deep desire to create a personalized work of art. This can be a portrait of a loved one, a painting of your favourite landscape, an artistic representation of a dream or an abstract idea. This can be a personalized copy of a famous painting or a photograph: your wife as a Mona Lisa or your husband as The Laughing Cavalier! It could be a personalized scene from a film or a book; your son as Harry Potter, your fiancée as Marilyn Monroe or your friends as the Famous Five, or the Beatles! Or a surrealistic montage of your preferred elements… Or any other fruits of your imagination. In other words, to visualize artistically everything that real life impedes us from seeing. This could be a painting of your house here or your house in your native land or the house where you were born, or a painting of your friend´s new house as a house-warming present. It could also be a scene of a landscape that you like particularly, or a panoramic view of a famous place, and we will paint the person you want within these scenes. It could be almond trees in blossom…Whatever… we will paint it!”
The business worked well, but I always noticed that people had problems to find their own ideas, to translate their dreams and wishes and visions in words which we could then visualize into a painting. They needed much help, too much. It cost us too much energy to try extracting the dreams from our client’s sleeping consciousnesses. Eventually we gave up and most By Miki de Goodaboom I was once a big fan of Mr Bean, one of the rare TV comic figures who did manage to make me laugh. There are not so many! These days, I did not know Teddy Bears, I had not met my Truffle McFurry yet, and had had none as a child. I certainly did not get it with the Teddy Bear love, and to my deep shame today, I even ignored them. Which is why I did not even know that Mr Bean’s best friend was his Teddy Bear “Teddy”! Here is what I found about him on the “Mr Bean Wiki”: “…Teddy (born in August 15) is Mr. Bean‘s teddy bear, generally regarded as Mr Bean’s best friend. The bear is a dark brown, knitted oddity with button eyes and sausage-shaped limbs, invariably ending up broken in half or in various other states of destruction and disfiguration. Although Teddy is inanimate, Mr Bean occasionally pretends it is alive. For example, when Mr Bean hypnotises Teddy, he snaps his fingers and the bear’s head falls backwards as if it has fallen asleep instantly (Bean used his finger to prop Teddy’s head up). Certainly, Bean behaves as if the bear is real, buying it a Christmas present or trying not to wake it in the mornings. The bear is often privy to Mr. Bean’s various schemes and doubles as a good dish cloth or paint brush in an emergency; it has been decapitated (“Mr. Bean in Room 426”) and shrunk in the wash (“Tee Off, Mr. Bean”). In the animated series, he has a girlfriend. It is actually Irma Gobb’s teddy (Lottie), which doesn’t appear in the original series. Over the years, Teddy has undergone several changes. When it debuted on The Trouble with Mr. Bean, it had a smaller head. Two episodes later, its head reached its current size, but its “eye” wasn’t present until Bean placed gold thumb tacks on its face. The “eyes” have since been replaced with two small white buttons sewn over Teddy’s fac As I was travelling through Portugal some years ago I had started sketching old people, together or lonely. And last year when I was in Italy I got the idea to make a series about old people from around the world, meaning, wherever I go, I try to capture them in their special loneliness or togetherness. A theme very dear to my heart, as I am generally very fond of our senior citizens, loving to see them still enjoying life, and hating to see them lonely. I called the series: “My Dear Old People” I have painted so far old people from Portugal, Spain, Italy, Republic Czech and Morocco. And now from Cyprus. I had hardly a chance to catch sight of old people in Ayia Napa, it being more oriented towards fun and youth I would say. It was certainly better in our next port of call, in Nicosia, the “last divided” capital in the world, apparently – and especially in the Turkish part of it. We had entered it on foot, via the “No Borders Street”, and got a three month visa at the end of it. A very weird feeling by the way. I meant to do a painting of that street full of poignant graffiti and political slogans, but somehow I felt that it would be some kind of inappropriate voyeurism and I let the motif go… It hurt though! Most of the tourists who had crossed seemed to stay close to the border, not daring to venture further, probably scared of what would befall them. Much blood had been spilled in the Turkish/Greek conflict in Cyprus, so perhaps it was better to be careful. But Kevin and me, we are two daredevils and we walked a long way away. In fact I wanted to have a better look at the mountain on which an enormous Turkish flag was painted. But after many kilometres the mountain still hadn’t appeared, as if it vanished once one was in Turkey! Instead I saw these two old men walking the street together… just wonderful! Together Old in Cyprus 02 - Watercolour and ink painting, by Miki The artist Kimsoojawas brought to my attention by one of my tutors. In particular, it was suggested that I looked at “A needle woman”, a video installation of the artist standing in the middle of busy streets in different parts of the world as people pass her byand walk in the direction of the camera. She is a feminist artist and is approaching women’s labour of sewing within this work but I believe it definitely applies to the concept of my city project even if being alone or singled out amongst others in the city was not the artists original intention. This work made me think about the hidden loneliness of city lifeand the notion of being surrounded by others in the city but alone. She is standing in the middle of many people, but no one is interacting with her, she is being overlooked and people are just passing her by. She is an insignificant figure to them and at the same time all the people around her may as well not be there at all. The feeling of lonelinessif highly evident in this work and I believe her video showing herself surrounded by others who are not interacting with her or even acknowledging her existence is not dissimilar to my project imagery of a coloured figure surrounded by white silhouettes. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1srBpUIcuKY This piece is highly inspirational and influential to my work, it confirms to me that you can be surrounded by others in the city but at the same time singled out and alone. It sort of highlights the Embrace Your Age!
Artist Research: Kimsooja: A Needle Woman