Deprecated: mb_convert_encoding(): Handling HTML entities via mbstring is deprecated; use htmlspecialchars, htmlentities, or mb_encode_numericentity/mb_decode_numericentity instead in /var/www/html/wp-content/plugins/super-cool-ad-inserter/inc/scaip-shortcode-inserter.php on line 37
This is the month of resolutions, and people pick all kinds — like exercising more, tidying up or quitting booze. But John Peña tried something more ambitious: He decided to document every single day with a pencil drawing and accompanying paragraph, for two full years.
Peña is no stranger to daily discipline: This is the same man who wrote and sent a letter to the Pacific Ocean each day for nearly a decade. And that commitment, combined with his intense emotional openness, helped Pittsburgh Center for the Arts dub Peña Emerging Artist of the Year.
A sampling of Peña’s drawings — dating from between April 23, 2011 and Nov. 14, 2011 — is now on display at PCA, and it is astonishing. Seeing a book-length work arranged on the plain white walls, in chronological order, gives visitors a sense of how painstaking his process is. What’s more, Peña is not a happy-go-lucky character. His black-and-white drawings often have an Edward Gorey somberness, and his autobiographical writings are as unguarded as any private diary.
“Sitting in a Chinese Restaurant [sic] on a rainy day feeling really alone,” Peña writes early in the series. “I feel like I am wasting my life with these stupid fucking drawings,” he says later, after a failed sketch is blacked out entirely. If you’re interested in the inner life of a struggling artist, Peña is a ripe fruit: He wrestles with money, relationships, children, changing houses and even the weather. He documents a panic attack at The Andy Warhol Museum. He describes depression and ennui. In one sucker-punch surprise, Peña reads about Hurricane Irene, which is threatening to destroy the East Coast. But he pauses mid-read, because he has run out of free articles on the New York Times website. “LAME,” he writes.
Peña studied at Carnegie Mellon University, and like many CMU grads, he works in a variety of media. His video “Untitled Cloud Series” shows Peña’s shadow across a green lawn. As the clouds move above, his shadow changes tint and coloration. At times, his shadow disappears. The video is very different from the drawings, but they complement each other perfectly. Life marches on, his work suggests, whether it’s sunny or overcast. Sometimes you feel distinguished and purposeful. Sometimes, it’s like you’re not even there.
JOHN PEÑA: EMERGING ARTIST OF THE YEAR continues through Jan. 22. Pittsburgh Center for the Arts, 6300 Fifth Ave., Shadyside. Free. 412-361-0873 or www.pittsburgharts.org
This article appears in Jan 11-17, 2012.
I think Mr. Pena’s work, as represented here, is sophomoric at the very best. We have all seen the same lame teen, “I’m so bored and misunderstood ” angst melodrama scrawled out and played out (with a higher degree of quality and wit in most cases) across high school notebooks by the artsy kids with torn Chuck Taylors and Misfits patches safety pinned onto their jackets (whether they’ve heard the band or not) for decades now. Pena’s commitment to being (or appearing to be) completely honest while sharing his banal inner monologue is admirable and is made of the courage to reveal oneself that great popular art demands (i.e. The disenfranchised want to know that someone else out there is as fucked up as them so they don’t feel as bad for being lame… I know I do). In this case, his humor and angst reach the level of a high school bandy trying to impress the fat girl who smells like pee, laugh’s at anything because she’s socially retarded, and twirls a flag because she didn’t make the majorette squad. That being said, I think Mr. Pena’s work is unoriginal, trite, irrelevant, uninspiring, and testament to the immaturity of those who are entertained by it (and not in a Katy Perry kind of way whose art is all of those things yet may be considered ..good) In conclusion, I seriously question the CP and Robert Isenberg’s immature taste level for making it a feature. Is Robert 16? Just wondering?