Rick Bartow
Origin of Song 4, 2009
drypoint on handmade mitsumata paper
image 5 1/4 x 4 in
paper 11 x 10 in
paper 11 x 10 in
Edition of 16 plus 2 artist's proofs
BAR2240
Copyright R.E. Bartow Trusts
$ 600.00
Published at Moon & Dog Press, Tokyo / South Beach. Former Froelick Gallery employee, Wilder Schmaltz emailed to writer/collector Edd Guarino on 4/22/21: In 'Origin of Song,' Rick is going...
Published at Moon & Dog Press, Tokyo / South Beach.
Former Froelick Gallery employee, Wilder Schmaltz emailed to writer/collector Edd Guarino on 4/22/21: In "Origin of Song," Rick is going back much further than any recognized or remembered composer, but to the true origin of musical expression, both in an anthropological, human-made sense and as it appears in various myths, as the bird suggests. (I believe there is a Hopi story, for example, that involves a First Song that brings about the beginning of all life). Rick was deeply fascinated with the emergence of art, depictive as well as imaginative, as made by early humans, and he may have been thinking along similar lines, though in musical terms, here.
In 1998, Bartow told this Crow Story
"This drawing depicts the pan-Northwest Native myth of crow and the sun box. The tale is often called Yealth, which is the Tlingit word for crow or raven. In Crow Story, a powerful chief keeps the sun in a box. Crow tries many ways to trick the chief into releasing the sun, and there are several variations explaining how the sun is freed eventually. Beside crow is a sun mask, which resembles a mask made by Lillian Pitt—a close friend and artist, member of the Warm Springs tribe."
In 2006, Bartow spoke about the crow walking:
"A pow-wow dancer-all bustle and proud-crow-hops the dusty circle dance. Falsetto voices chanting - as drum sticks unite - in a thunderous crescendo - of mother’s great heart beat! Sacred fool, keep away from our daughters and get your sticky fingers out of that pick-nick basket!"
Former Froelick Gallery employee, Wilder Schmaltz emailed to writer/collector Edd Guarino on 4/22/21: In "Origin of Song," Rick is going back much further than any recognized or remembered composer, but to the true origin of musical expression, both in an anthropological, human-made sense and as it appears in various myths, as the bird suggests. (I believe there is a Hopi story, for example, that involves a First Song that brings about the beginning of all life). Rick was deeply fascinated with the emergence of art, depictive as well as imaginative, as made by early humans, and he may have been thinking along similar lines, though in musical terms, here.
In 1998, Bartow told this Crow Story
"This drawing depicts the pan-Northwest Native myth of crow and the sun box. The tale is often called Yealth, which is the Tlingit word for crow or raven. In Crow Story, a powerful chief keeps the sun in a box. Crow tries many ways to trick the chief into releasing the sun, and there are several variations explaining how the sun is freed eventually. Beside crow is a sun mask, which resembles a mask made by Lillian Pitt—a close friend and artist, member of the Warm Springs tribe."
In 2006, Bartow spoke about the crow walking:
"A pow-wow dancer-all bustle and proud-crow-hops the dusty circle dance. Falsetto voices chanting - as drum sticks unite - in a thunderous crescendo - of mother’s great heart beat! Sacred fool, keep away from our daughters and get your sticky fingers out of that pick-nick basket!"
