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Creating on Illusion

  Creating on Illusion - collage by Douglas Brent Smith Where's the illusion? What sleight of hand do we focus on? I think that I made this collage in 1989. That was so long ago and yet, in terms of illusions, not long at all. What do you think?

Note to Self 20230423

If you keep working your craft you will be amazed at how much you've learned and how much more there is yet to learn. -- doug smith  

Deep Thinker Thinking

  Deep Thinker Thinking, drawing by douglas Brent smith, December 2001, from Journal #35, Mission Control, Volume Two, 2001 - 2002. Drawing helps me think. Thinking, sometimes, draws me to draw. It amazes me how few adults draw at all. Somewhere along the line in childhood they just stopped.  We should all draw more and more often. Pencil, pen, crayon, whatever you've got. Instead of scrolling tonight, spend that time drawing a picture. Instead of wasting your time and feeling bad about it you've have a picture you can feel good about. It doesn't have to be great, it just has to be yours.

Density

  Density by Douglas Brent Smith

frequency log

 frequency log - collage by douglas brent smith, 1979

Wild Towers

  Wild Towers -- collage by Douglas Brent Smith Notes: In the lower right corner is one of my favorite photos -- my brother Dave and me at Grandmom and Grandpop Rogers' house. If you look closely you can see Grandpop Rogers sitting in his chair. He was probably reading the newspaper, the Bridgeton Evening News. It was a great newspaper in those days and Grandpop read it front to back every night. There are more clear versions of this picture, probably even in other collages because I love it so much. Those were wonderful days and I miss my little brother so much. 

Lighter Than Air

  Lighter Than Air - acrylic painting by Douglas Brent Smith, November 1976. Notes: I don't have every painting I've ever painted. Some years ago I purged many of them. I like this one, though, and have it hanging in my apartment. It's whimsical. It's a painting in a painting. It has a top hat. It has balance, a candle, even a drop of blood.  What else could you want in a painting?

Not Obsolete

Things -- and people -- well cared for need not go obsolete. Getting tired of something is a choice. Discarding the old is a choice. While we should continually improve ourselves, our materials, our technology, there is still value in preserving what lives on with quality. That great guitar. That classic car. That recipe that still tastes good. There was an episode of "The Twilight Zone" on this week about "Obsolete." Burgess Meredith plays a librarian who in some autocratic society had been judged (under penalty of death) as obsolete. The last forbidden book he pulls from hiding, as he awaits his execution, is a Bible. He was not truly obsolete. His value as a being was unquestionable and though thru cleverness he brings his executioner to fear at being himself on the edge of facing his own imminent death, locked in a room with a bomb, the librarian does allow mercy (in God's name) to prevail, setting free his captor even though he himself will perish. Like man...

User Agreement Rider

Do you like reading and committing to User Agreements? Of course you don't. They are pure rubbish. .Designed to make you read them, but written so that you can't read them (because they are confusing and massively too long) we mostly end up pretending that we did read them just to get on with whatever we want to do. Not fair. Not designed to be fair. Designed to cover the butts of the people who wrote the User Agreement and to restrict the rest of us from being ourselves, from doing what we want and need to do, and from exercising our rights. In a perfect world, all of those user agreements are unenforceable. Maybe, even in an imperfect world. Is it really an agreement if we don't agree to it? If we don't have any influence on what goes INTO an agreement, how is THAT an agreement? Enough! We need some sanity.  I hereby propose a universal User Agreement Rider to invoke whenever you've had enough of an evil User Agreement.  No lawyers have been involved in the drafti...

Le Grande Fromage

  Le Grande Fromage -- collage by douglas brent smith