One of my favorite abstract artists is Cy Twombly – especially his “scratch” or “scribble” works, like the “Blackboard Series” with the notions of automatic writing, action, movement, simplicity, emotion and passion and how these all work together as a joyous expression of life and identity.

Where I found this artwork: Last Summer I decided to visit the Cleveland Zoo.  I was hoping to get some nice pictures of animals but just like me trying to photograph people – my camera just said “no” to animals (mostly because the animals looked bored, unhappy or sickly – so JUST SAY NO to ZOOS! There has to be a better way to learn about exotic animals).  Okay so enough about my newly developed political viewpoint toward zoos.

Now, onto the main topic of this post.  I did find a couple of other cool things on the zoo grounds.   One thing was this blackboard outside the Ape Exhibit where visitors (animal or human) could take a piece of chalk and write, draw or mark up what ever they felt like.

I like both presentations of this work and even if they are the exact image the processing completely changes it and I think they are very complimentary side by side and in the spirit of Cy Twombly’s work  – which is why I titled them “ODE TO CY TWOMBLY”.  I hope you enjoy.

For the music part of this post I decided to include one of my new finds that I dearly enjoy.  The composer is Canadian born Mark Templeton.  He composes experimental/abstract/noise/glitchy/ambient music.  I hope you like this selection, “Pattern For A Pillow” which is from his 2007 recording STANDING ON A HUMMINGBIRD.

For more on Mark Templeton you can check out his website at http://www.fieldsawake.com