Tales from the Darkside

Co-Curated by David Van Gough


So how cool is this? Tales from the Darkside-(not to be confused with the old TV series) a single showcase, bringing together-or bridging together to be more precise-the dark art community from all over the world.

Over fifty artists from as far afield as Austria to Alabama.

And what a roster of top talent we have lined up. Having been fortunate to have seen some of the previews for the show, I am overwhelmed by the grand guignol of creative artistry that’s going to be on exhibit.

But don’t just take my word for it, look at that list of names below.
Blurbage details are as follows:

La Bodega Gallery presents
TALES FROM THE DARKSIDE
A Group Exhibition Co-Curated by David Van Gough

From Hieronymus Bosch to Zdzislaw Beksinski, artists throughout history, have explored the darker side of the imagination. Drawing from the monstrous excesses of the periods they created in, or speaking to the inner turmoils of the psyche, darkness in art has been a potent, visual language, which expresses the deeper recesses of the soul.

In the month that is the festival of Samhain, Tales from the Darkside will be a showcase that is both a manifestation of the shadow side of art, and a representation of the best contemporary dark artists working today.

Saturday October 13th, 2018
6:00pm to 10:00pm / Free Admission

Participating Artists :

Alissa Renzetti
Ally Burke
Amber Michelle Russell
Amy Rodriguez
Andreas Nagel
Anthony Champ
Bill Remington
Bri Valdivia
Brooke Weston
Brynn Elizabeth
Carrie Anne Hudson
Celene Petrulak
Clint Carney
Clinton Neuhaus
Cory Benhatzel
Dan Harding
David Russell Talbot
David Van Gough
Donnie Green
Dos Diablos
Edgar Marquez
Edward Frausto
Enys Guerrero
Evgeniya Golik
Gregory P. Rodriguez
Ivonne Carley
Jay Ferguson
Jeff Christensen
Jen Lightfoot
Jeremy Cross
Jessica Perner
Jim Pavelec
Jorge Gutierrez
Karikatura
Katherine Lomax
Lana Gentry
Lee Harvey Roswell
Mark Jesinoski
Martin Woodhead
Matan Chaffee
Megan Buccere
Nannette Cherry
Nonie Cruzado
Paul Neberra
Paul Vargas
RF Pangborn
Rick Dienzo Blanco
Ron Lemen
Sandy Yagi
Scott Holloway
Shane Izykowski
Stefania
Stephanie Vega
Sunol Golden
Tatomir Pitariu
Tehani Farr
Theodore Limn
Tom Haubrick
Vanessa Lemen
Vince Packard
Vincent Castiglia
La Bodega Gallery
2196 Logan Avenue
San Diego, CA 92113

www.labodegagallery.com
www.davidgoughart.com

Tales from the dead zone

It’s been several months since I last wrote, I know, but if posts have been thin on the ground of late, it’s because I’ve been pouring myself into the work at hand.

That, plus its all too easy to feel like you are just adding to the noise right now, magnifying the human footprint marked ‘the landfill of opinion’. Better to stay in the dead zone.

Still, it’s alarmingly distressing out there-kiddies in cages. Concentration camps. An entire demographic of the populous falling over themselves with lick spittle piety to justify it. One wonders where the balance will tip, and how far over the edge.

The work by contrast has flourished, but is no less inspired by current events. It would be hard not to. What began contextually as possibly my farewell letter to the American empire, has become a surreal catalogue of the ill omens that have informed it.

This piece-as yet untitled-swirls with apocalyptic nods and winks. Personal and otherwise. Broadly, there are the American Killing fields of Vietnam. The little napalm girl-Kim Phuc in that eerie messianic pose. Hiroshima and Nagasaki respectively.

Quite a lot of unsavory raw meat to swallow, and not the kind of sandwich one feels compelled to share.

"Bosch Brain Freeze" - Oil on canvas-11" x 14"

It’s not all been dark introspection, took a breather and knocked out a fun little Bosch homage for La Bodega’s recent Spirit Animal show.

Because the old Flemish master is always a good party trick to conjure at the end times.

Anyway, more announcements to follow soon, all being well.

Fridom Kahlo-Infinito

“Feet, what do I need you for when I have wings to fly?”

Frida Kahlo

11″ x 14″ | Oil on panel

Working in the Chicano quarter as I do, its hard not to feel the incandescence cast by Frida’s influence. Her striking visage is ubiquitous, even staring out nobly from a mural to the entrance of La Bodega gallery.

My piece for the forthcoming Tribute group show has our Art heroine reborn as the feathered serpent Quetzalcoatl, whose resume boasts of being the Aztec god of wind, Venus, the dawn and Arts and Crafts.

In such days when the world seems intent on bloodshed and cavernous divide, a celebration of Frida’s legacy remains one which is thankfully universal to all.

Show opens July 9th | 4pm-10pm. Free admission and open to all ages. Children’s and adult look-alike contest. Art, food, music, merchandise, culture!

80's Hit

“All it comes down to is this: I feel like shit but look great.”
― Bret Easton Ellis, American Psycho

8O’s hit
12″ x 12″
Oil on panel

La Bodega Gallery
March 19th.

So the 80’s : era of day glo, Yuppies and mulletts, Iran-Contra and Chernobyl, a veritable bonfire of vanities for the decade that taste forgot.

Catapulting into my teens as I was, It didn’t feel like that at the time- I was randy for it all -everything that had been denied me in pre-adolescence was suddenly for the taking, accompanied by low rent video, an incredible soundtrack and an Ad execs wardrobe.

All absolute bollocks of course because in retrospect it was soulless, by the end of it I was utterly miserable, jobless and broke with a first child on the way.

So here you have a collage of  that eras excess, a marketers swirling coke addled dream; Gordon Gekko in the penthouse, full metal jacket, Keith Haring tie with Patrick Nagel sideline, an American Psychometric of the ages, with Freddie Krugers chrome talons extending from it’s slick dimension.

Except there’s grotty Liverpool on the periphary, post Toxteth maelstrom, dockers strikes and another three terms of Maggie’s despotic reign to look forward to.

Real life seldom works on MTV.
Relax, don’t do it.

If my piece Aztec Ghost Groove was a picture disk, this would be the album cover.

The piece will be on display during the I Love the 80’s group show at La Bodega gallery, Saturday 19th March. Contact labodegagallerysd@gmail.com for pricing and purchase details

The Origin of Life

“…some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new Dark Age.”

H.P.Lovecraft

Plaster,Polymer clay, straw and paint, good ingredients for life right there I think, better than a clutch of mud and ashes, certainly. A love of the craft then for Lovecraft, some Cthuloid rising from the meta ganglion of the primal subconscious, just in time for Dia de los Muertos and Samhain.

So in the spirit of spirits, La Bodega is having it’s third annual showcase this weekend-Saturday 24th, whence there will be a galleria full of dead cases and head cases.

Bring out yer dead.

Suffer the Little Children-at the Dirty, Filthy show III…NSFW

Suffer little children, that come unto me | 12″ x 24″ | Oil on wood panel

You could be forgiven for thinking that this ‘piece’ , was an almost satirical evisceration regarding the dark history of child abuse perpetuated through the Catholic church. That is there of course,  all gagging Christ phallus, stupid fish hat and gilded to the cat of nines.

Except, more specifically it deals with the bottomless depravity that has haunted Parliament vestibules and po faced seats of power of my home country. A poisoned well spring that seems daily to unravel a stomach churning proclivity,spanning decades and including a sinister spectrum embroiling the celebrities of British Broadcasting house, the insidious machinations of ministers and the possible complicity of the monarchy . For instance, it’s no accident that the Pope here, bares an uncanny resemblance to despot Maggie Thatcher-albeit in drag.

No doubt, my American counterparts, hoodwinked by the Masterpiece theatrics and the export of Britcom idealism were entirely none-plused about its subtext, when I showcased it at the recent second Annual Dirty, Filthy Show at La Bodega gallery, but to my mind there is nothing so dirty or filthy, or inherently evil, as the ritual defilement of children by those who wield power.

Dog eat God

10″ x 10″|Oil on panel

…Or God eat Dog, depending on your preferred perspective.

So what’s it about then?

Its a kind of Ouroboros- one of those rather nice little absurdest pieces,which follows Bruegel’s penchant for painted puns and proverbs. Its also that paradox of creator and destroyer-who is being consumed or biliously ejected? As Artistotle remarked “Whosoever is delighted in solitude is either a wild beast or a god.”

On display August 8th at the Perfect 10 group show at La Bodega gallery.

The Owls are not what they seem.

“I discovered that if one looks a little closer at this beautiful world, there are always red ants underneath.”

David Lynch

9″ x 12″-Oil on Canvas

There are few moments I can recall, that are as predominantly strange in the collective,cultural zeitgeist, as Twin Peaks was back when it aired in 1990. Certainly, for at least the first season-one could sense that the Lynch/Frost amalgam, had unraveled the seams of sinister architecture. Given the insidious hive mind of mainstream television, it’s unfathomable that it was allowed to air beyond the third episode, but there it is, a shining beacon that reverberates it’s influence through things like The Killing, Hannibal and True Detective.

“The Owls are not what they seem”- the ominous portent by giant Carel Struyken-is my little homage in celebration of the news that a new season is in production.

It’s also timely as Comicon is upon us again and you can view it in person from my studio, concurrently during the forthcoming Marvel/DC show at La Bodega on July 11th