Working on "MY NEIGHBOR SERIES" - The Truth Factor and the Power of Image

One of the defining characteristics of the "My Neighbor Series" is the extensive live work with the remarkable individuals that inspire the work.

As the objective of the project is a capture of the deeply specific and personal expression within the unique character, the live interaction and study I consider a critical ingredient. "Love" is an extraordinarily difficult quality to convey and, even more so, to elicit.

Conveying the message of "Love My Neighbor" credibly requires unquestionable empathy on the part of the viewer and no one shall underestimate how hard it is to earn it in today's jaded and betrayed world.

We do not trust anyone with a slightest hint of authority and rightly so. We know empirically and for a fact that politicians of any self-professed stripe lie, selling us on themselves for a vote. Those, who don't are the vast exception to a rule. We know that corporations lie selling us something that we don't need or what will likely harm us for our own buck. Those, who don't are the vast exception to the rule. We know that anything that "sounds nice" is more often than not is a blatant, conscious and deliberate trap. Our instinct of self-preservation tells us not to take it. Society had lost faith in the institutions of society. Everything we were supposed to believe in, we now can't. Problem is that the organized society in its key components - political and economic - is a product of faith. Without faith there is no organized society. Religion used to take care of that and we know where that went. There is only one thing today outside our immediate family boundary that I see as worthy and demanding of our undisputed and unquestionable faith - it is a Love of Our Worthy Neighbor.

Love of one's neighbor today, whomever that neighbor happen to be and of whatever ethnic or cultural background, is the only hard land we can crawl on in midst of the societal deluge that is upon us.

Conveying such Love credibly and emphatically is a tall order. It is opposite to both the objective coolness and the ironic smirk that most of contemporary art is preoccupied with, it is also opposite to any trace of a sugarcoated sentimentalism that is always prevalent. That is were very specific personal and professional qualities are needed to come together in the act of eternal fusion called ART.

We can and shall envision, address and will-to-life the best in people that really is there. We can help overcome fear, anxiety and separation not by pretending it does not exist but by showing with an undeniable certainty that the alternative does exist. That is what the immense power of ART can do and that is its core Social Function.

in ART we trust!
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