Mexico-All You Need Is Max

Everyone Will Be famous for 15 Minutes

“I never know what I'm going to put on the canvas. The canvas paints itself. I'm just the middleman.”- Peter Max

 "America  is the canvas, throw up as much paint as you can. We are  just the middlemen"-Ed Reif

The Power of Myth

The myth that  REAL artists don’t make money is the wrong myth. Pop Artist Peter Max is no miraculous exception--He  is having his 70 something-ith  birthday this week onboard the Celebrity Solstice.

Optimistic, generous, and naive, that's the German-American Dreamer  in a nutshell. He isn't the industry standard- He's industrial painting; churning and burning cotton-candy, Art-Nouveau-ish  limited  editions---the inedible raised to the unspeakable, funk and Junk.

The copies are  better than the originals.... from Xerox to Infinity.The man who mass-produced the decade(s)  even has Cosmic iPhone Aps, Max  has more game than Milton Bradley.
 

I had a conference call with The Max two weeks ago, and I cannot help be reminded of what his friend Andy Warhol said--- "The most exciting attractions are between two opposites that never meet".
Holy Cow!
The coolest things I can think of about him is that  he doesn't eat his friends-Peter is a vegetarian. Noteworthy is his  cow rescue-- a $180,000 barter deal ) at a  Cincinnati slaughterhouse,  and  a 1984 Statue of Liberty extreme makeover  with with then Chrysler CEO Lee Iacocca, and Nancy and Ronald Reagan's blessing and clout.

His paint is on  a Boeing 777 Continental fuselage,  the 1999 Woodstock stage, The Beatles Yellow Submarine Album cover, a giant mural at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.  Max has been designated as the Official Artist of five Super Bowls, five Grammy Awards, World Cup USA, The World Series, and the United Nations Earth Summit.

"Sometimes you fantasize that people who are really up there and rich and living it up have something you don't have, and their things must be better than your things because they have more money than you. But they drink the same Coke and eat the same hot dogs and wear the same clothes and see the same TV and the same movies. . . You can get just as revolted as they can -- you can have the same nightmares. All this is really American -Andy Warhol

So

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Mexico-Same Ship. Different Day

Wake up kids/ We've got the dreamers disease.



You've got a reason to live / Can't forget you only get what you give New Radicals- You Get What You Give

Cruise Ships are the new Golden Gate Bridges
Putting the SIN in the sincerest form of criticism life can get- Why kill yourself? Life will do it for you
 The earth school kills all of its students, eh? Suicide is man's way of telling God, "You can't fire me - I quit..."  so is jumping off the Carnival Splendor.

One of the Assistant Waiters, 27 years old,  was seen shouting into a cell phone, throwing it overboard in disgust, then jumping to his death. Ouch. Taking your own life really kills 2 ppl's souls in this case, the chick he was arguing with too.

I just couldn’t live with myself knowing I had just killed myself. Sure, 9 out of 10 ppl are would-be suicidal maniacs.But, it's the  permanent solution to  temporary problems.

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Mexico-Sea of Cortez

I'm stuck in the 1980's with Phil Collins "Oh, think twice, 'cause it's another day / For you, you and me in paradise" resonating against , Neil Young's Cortez "He came dancing across the water/With his galleons and guns/Looking for the new world/In that palace in the sun"

Hate was just a legend
And war was never known
The people worked together
And they lifted many stones.

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Malibu-I Am Only Human... Potential

Malibu is full of magical things, patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper. Talk may be cheap but intelligent conversation is very expensive these days. Ask anyone with a kid in college.Here at Pepperdine,a  dry campus-no one is maintaining a perfect 4.0 blood alchol level, or majoring in Beer. The only thing that interferes with student's learning is their education.

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Surfing The Himalayas-Wave or Wipe Out

Das Boot

 The power of (my) intention to have a good time is the lyrics for the Beatle's song---Yellow Submarine "Embracing the life forced upon me" to stay in hotel rooms and live under pressure = Submarine. Because I have been  having a great time it is  Yellow (friends are all aboard). Sea of green = money.

Time to surface----I need a vacation from this permenent  vacation. Hell is other people, and you usually find them on the buffet line of a Carnival Fun ship.(Their favorite food is Seconds). The road to hell is paved with good intentions. The Wall-Mart of the cruise industry, pay less and have more fun,  isn't so funny anymore. Freedom is what you do to  what has been done to you- I quit.

So we sailed on to the sun / Till we found a sea of green / And we lived beneath the waves / In our yellow submarine ...

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Mexico-Colonel Gesso-"We sell art or ppl die, are we clear?"

A Few Good Pictures

Kaffey- Did you Order the Code rED?
Colonel Gesso- We Sell Art Or People Die. Are we clear?
Kaffey-Crystal

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Mexico-All Along the Watchtower

“There must be some kind of way out of here,”
Said the joker to the thief. 

Now that 10.10.10 is just a 2 days  away-looking forward to the cataclysm! and  Second Coming.

Reinventing The Wheel

"All Along the Watchtower"  is the audacity  of Dylan's hype at manipulating chronological time: "at the conclusion of the last verse, it is as if the song bizarrely begins at last, and the power of myth began again. 

My own  aging is regressive these days, not progressive. I am the Bob Dylan of the fifty-somethings. Growing old isn't optional, growing up is.

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Cruise Ship Auctioneer Ed Reif

Art Auction On Board The Carnival Splendor

The Mother Teresa of the Cruise Ship Art Auction World--turning water into wine, The Ed Reif brand, handing out the sacrement of faith--, and as M. T.  said herself" My wish is that everyone that meets me, leaves a little bit happier". Props to Gary Glitter, for "Hey Hey" song

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Tranquility Base-The Ego Has Landed-Revue-October 2009

In one year and out the other. A year ago today...
Space travel sure is fun

Greetings from the user-friendly universe---The Peoples Republic of Santa Monica; Home of The Mac Store, and Apple, the forbidden fruit.

First in January, I was in the Majik Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, a bit like Mars.

Then in February, I went to The Land of Smiles, Thailand, and walked on the moon.

Finally, in March and April, I had my head in the clouds with The Helium Report, winning and losing the American dream in Macau every night, playing high-stakes no limit- poker, on The Hong Kong Express.

Leaving Las Vegas
In May and June, I got my Baht out of Asia and went back to the United States of Unconsciousness, playing tournament poker in the black holes of Midwest bars and Las Vegas Casinos. Spent the best part of my losing streak...in an Army Jeep, from what I can recall.

There's that line from Sheryl Crow-Standing in the middle of the desert waiting for my ship to come in...

In July, I decided to take a World Tour-Cruise (creating my own luck) to get away from the game. I had a false start with a run at Amsterdam's Holland Casino.Nevertheless, mission accomplished---I love poker but I am not in love with it anymore. Poker and I have decided to see other PPL.

Last month was the Epiphany. On a visit to Monaco , I was scheduled to level up, turning my bogus Poker PH.D. from ESPN, to the real deal in Monte Carlo. I didn't have any gamble in me and didn't even walk through the doors. After all, you can only quit once.

The last three months, I have been in Russia and The Baltics, The British Isles, Scandinavia, The Greco-Italian-French Mediterranean. Now I am here in California to re-charge before the next leg--Australia, New Zealand and the South Pacific...and The Southern Cross.
Being Vincent Vega

Don't ask me what they call a whopper over there-

"I Never Went To Burger King"---Pulp-free fiction writer and Space Sheriff Ricochet Rabbit


This pretty much sums up the differences between America And Europe:Royale With Cheese-Meet Your Meat:

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Feeding Firenze-Florence and Pisa- Revue-Oct 2009

Pizza On Earth, Good Will Towards  Renaissance Man

Florence (Fierenze) is a beautiful city. I kept saying to myself "Gee it's great to be Roman Catholic, especially in Italy--and I mean anywhere-Rome Sweet Rome, Florence, and even in Pisa.".

(Visited three churches today-so I am definitely going to heaven)

I had some Chianti, the national beverage, along with a Veggie lasgna for an appetizer. The rest of the meal...well I'll get back to you on that...I had too much wine.

Money-centri Florence was the New York of the Middle Ages. The House of Medici, the Godfathers of the Renaissance, funded many of the buildings, statues and paintings that makes this place an Art History 101 class.

Seeing Michelangolo's David made me think of going to the gym--his body fat percentage--even in marble is mos def under 10%.

WWMD? What Would Machiavelli Do?

In the spirit of the law instead of the letter, I thought it would be better to ask for forgiveness rather than permission: No photos I 'thought" was only a suggestion. LOL

I think it's time I broke out my copy of The Prince, and get in touch with my inner "Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli" civil servent to the Florintine republic.

Here we go: Quotable Mac on "Mainting a Princedom"

I'm not interested in preserving the status quo; I want to overthrow it.

It is much more secure to be feared than to be loved.

One change always leaves the way open for the establishment of others.

The ends justifies the means

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