Thursday, January 26, 2012

Ray Pettibon in Ewing, NJ

Raymond Pettibon. You don't need to be some goofy patron of the arts to appreciate that guy's work. You just need to be a normal, red-blooded Black Flag & SST Records fan. You know, the type of fellow who can recite all those radio commercials at the end of Everything Went Black, appreciate all the sour notes in a Ginn solo, and who will argue 'til last call that no, Rollins did not ruin Flag and yes, those later records do kick ass. And like Ginn & a litigious trigger-finger, Flag & the art of Pettibon will always go hand in hand. The bars, the little puppet on My War, the ill-fated cop in the Police Story illustration: this is the stuff that decorates the lockers & living rooms of creeps who pace around at midnight & struggle to discover a third way to blast a concept.

But this blog entry is no history lesson. There's an exhibit titled Raymond Pettibon: Early Drawings & it's hanging on three white walls at the College of New Jersey. It's got images of surfers, self-obsessed big-league hitters, locomotives, introspective tight-rope walkers, a few sexually-charged 60s teenagers, a drawing that can be a none other than little brother Greg (or the other sky-high guitarist, Dez), a Vavoom or two & a film from 2004 titled Repeater Pencil. Much of it looks brand-new to these eyes. Weirdos & misfits from up & down the East Coast are already clogging Route 31 and creepy-crawling the campus. As the saying goes, you guys would be fools to miss it.

Here are some photos, taken without the benefit of flash photography.





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1 comment:

some dude said...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QmBjYdJILo