It's August, but I still have something to tell you...
Tim McFarlane Studio: August, 2025
The mixed bag that is August
August is always a weird month because while we’re still in the throes of summer heat, it’s also a big time for last minute getaways, transitions back to school year schedules and looking ahead to the busy fall/winter seasons. Originally, I was thinking that I wasn’t going to send out a newsletter this month since it’s a slow time for announcements at the moment but things are in the works that I can’t talk about right now. In the meantime, there’s always things going on in and out of the studio, so let’s get into it…
Above are a selection of new drawings I made in late July, before heading away recently for some much-needed rejuvenation of mind, body and spirit. I’ve been in the mood to make some small works featuring the glyphs in loose, indistinct ink-based environments. These didn’t turn out quite like what I thought I envisioned, but I like them a lot. There’s more to come because I feel like these are off on a promising start. At 5.75 x 4 inches, these are a great size to let myself get lost in for a bit as I make them. Keeping the mark making in the spaces that the glyphs are floating in loose starts to create a lively tension between the watery ink and distinct marks of the glyphs, as the latter seem to float on the surface. Another “poem” series that I’m looking forward to developing.
Rag works (cont’d)
In June’s newsletter, I talked about the origins and current state of my on-going series I’m generically calling “rag works”, for the time-being. This time, I’m sharing a few more thoughts and photos of this fairly new, on-going series. Recently, I thought it might be interesting to see a selection of them hung on the walls to start getting ideas of how I might want to exhibit them eventually. This salon-style configuration works as a first step in the thought process, but there’re a lot more iterations to consider and try out.
Everything here is evolving, even as I type this. New thoughts about how this work might morph and change over time are coming to me constantly. It all started as another way to engage ideas about the residue of living and making, but already, I can see it connecting to a wider framework beyond its origins as my used studio rags. For now, though, there’s a lot of personal history embedded in these works.
The rags I use all had previous lives as everyday items like wash cloths, bath towels, t-shirts, bed linens, old shorts, denim jeans and more. Those things then came to take on other roles as collection surfaces for paint wiped from brushes, palette knives and wiping down surfaces. Now, all of that embedded history, my history, is locked into the fabric of these rags.
I’m taking my time with this work, letting it develop slowly as I add layers of material to it but leaving the history of that mark-making and process open to scrutiny. This is similar to how many of my paintings are made, with a call and response attitude, exploring and experimenting until things come together and feel right enough to stop working on them at some point.
I can’t say much now, but one of these new pieces will be included in an upcoming winter group show at the Bridgette Mayer Gallery in Philadelphia. I’ll share more details once everything is settled.
Old work that’s new to someone…
There’s a lot of work I’m glad that I’ve kept over the years and this is on of those pieces. Even better is when someone finds value in older work that you still like. That’s what happened earlier this summer when several older works of mine were brought into an office building-to-condo conversion project in center city Philadelphia. Inverted Dislocation (2003), was made during a period where I was knee-deep in minimalist work. Most of the paintings made and exhibited during the early 2000s were based on my love and observations of architectural features, mostly grid-like structures like sidewalk grates, building facades, walls, etc… This lasted for about three or four years until I moved to a different relationship with space and mark-making in my work.
Even though I’ve moved on from most of these ideas in my painting, I still appreciate a lot of what I made from that time and kept several of those paintings, including this one. That this painting even survived the last twenty-two years of my relocating to several work spaces is no less than a miracle. I’m looking forward to sharing images of this and several other older works in their new home in an upcoming newsletter.
Fun fact: Inverted Dislocation is also the namesake of my first solo exhibition with the Bridgette Mayer Gallery back in February-March of 2004. This was the first and only time where I showed any of these stripe-based paintings. Almost immediately, I started feeling the itch to move on to new horizons. It took a few months, but a new body of paintings came into being over the following year. I returned to exploring a type of mark making where overlapping forms allowed for a more open interpretation of space within the paintings.
Mark your calendars: POST 2025!
One upcoming thing that I can tell you about now is that I’ll be participating in the Philadelphia Open Studio Tours for the first time in about twelve years this October 11th and 12th. POST is an annual, city-wide event where participating artists open our studios up to the general public for two days (Saturday and Sunday) over two weekends. This year, studios east of Broad Street are open Oct. 11 & 12 (mine is east of Broad St.), west of Broad Street Oct. 18 & 19.
If you’ve been thinking about stopping by for a studio visit and will be in the Philadelphia area in mid-October, this is a great chance to catch up with me and get to know other artists here, as well. More information (and reminders) will be forthcoming in my September and October emails.
Exit: sunsets and more…
I was fortunate to have been able to spend some much needed time away in Holbox, Mexico recently. I didn’t make any art, but did a lot of reading, spent an amazing amount of time in the beautiful waters of the Gulf of Mexico and generally decompressed a bit. Watched every sunset of every day and every one was different and magical, especially from out in the water. The colors and light of each sunset were amazing and what you see here is as it was, no filters.
The other four photos were taken on a night time beach walk and I know I’ve mentioned this before, but the light that the phone camera allows in makes these scenes look like daytime shots. It was literally pitch black out, except for the minimal lights coming from places close to the beach.
Photos aren’t the same as the experience, but I hope that seeing these brings some good feelings to you today.
Thanks so much for reading and being here, I really appreciate everyone taking time out of your day to open and read these emails.
Available works and more can be found on the Bridgette Mayer Gallery website and at TimMcFarlane.com. Questions or comments about my work for me directly: tim@timmcfarlane.com
See you soon! -Tim
Always so nice to see updates of your work, Tim. I also like your new black and white drawings.
That open studio tour in October sounds like a great time for a trip to Philadelphia (I am so ready to be done with summer haha)