Diana… Vreeland

Diana Vreeland Bradley Theodore 2013

Diana Vreeland

Acrylic & Oil sticks

©2013  Bradley Theodore.

https://maddoxgallery.co.uk/artist/bradley-theodore/

https://www.instagram.com/bradleytheodore/?hl=en

http://www.bradleytheodore.com/

Love it.  Love him.  Let there ever be art!

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©2013-2025 Arvin da Brgha.  All Rights Reserved.

Miles Ahead!

Miles Davis 2

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Miles Davis

Davis III, Miles Dewey 26/5/26 <0> 28/9/91  Tiger 8.4.4 = 7

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I am so looking forward to the opening of Don Cheadle’s Miles Ahead this week.  i think of any other Jazz artist, Miles is the only one whose every album, on listening to it, I conclude is a favourite.  This creative genius just oozed authenticity.  Of course, a major part of his outréness and originality had to do with his having been an actual old soul.

I have always been partial to him as he was briefly married to Cicely Tyson who was a maternal first cousin of my late mother’s who in her youth did play the cornet.  Of course, Cicely Tyson, who is still going strong and currently starring on Broadway, is an entity mate of Miles Davis’.

My creatively gifted mother whose songs are published in the hymnal of the now Wesleyan Church was a remarkable woman who was pure intellect and a source of fierce pride.  She whose paternal grandparents were Sephardi from the small Brazilian community which settled in Nevis.   Indeed, she who is now reincarnated in London, England, male and first-born and about whom I have dreamt – East Indian/Caucasian heritage in this lifetime and currently aged 13 years old.

Sadly, none of my dream encounters with Miles Davis were ever audiocassette-recorded as they were never had during the decade when I did so – 1989 to 1998.  Each of those dream encounters did, though, validate his agedness of spirit and he seemed every bit an old soul during astral plane encounters.

In anticipation of this long overdue film – imagine that, the paucity of Jazz biopics when so clearly Jazz is rooted in Klezmer!  More than that, on to the matter of saluting a true original, a true creative genius and a giant of Black high art.

*Sadly, I have spent the last couple of weeks trying to track down the title of the Miles Davis painting herein featured; alas, to no avail have I managed to have discovered its title et al.

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Birth of the Cool, 1957.

Kind of Blue 1959.

– This is the music (Kind of Blue) I am mostly likely to listen to, after having audiocassette-recorded the dreams, on awaking from a flying dream.  This music is about finding centre whilst simultaneously remaining aloft in the realms of the flying dream.  As West Indians would say, it’s sweet!

Milestones, 1958.

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©2013-2025 Arvin da Brgha.  All Rights Reserved.

Two Men In the Studio.

Two Men In the Studio

Oil on Canvas

185.4 x 120.7 cm

1987-1989 Lucian Freud

Masterful.

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If only I had begun audiocassette-recording the dreams on awaking prior to February 1989.  In mid-1987, I had the most lucidly awakened dream encounter with the artist, Lucian Freud.  I had been in a flying dream and instinctively knew that I was in London.  On alighting, I moved through a woodsy artist studio and found there the artist himself.

To better absorb his process, I had rendered myself invisible and remained in a corner whilst onlooking.  Without a doubt, I had dreamquested to a session for which both men – the subjects of this canvas – sat for this painting.  Of course, at the time, I was then a muse and lover to master printmaker and painter, George Hawken.  This was an immensely fulfilling time in my life; it was also rather adventurous as I was then quite happily ensconced in my relationship with Merlin.

Suspecting that he was ill with AIDS, Merlin had long canned our physical relationship.  Since I was in my 20s and one of my three primary needs is adventure, I most unashamedly roamed and salaciously ploughed the town.  Along with Francis Bacon, Lucian Freud’s masterful work has always fascinated me.  Not surprised then was I to have recently discovered that the trigger for that 1987 dream was the fact that we are entity mates.

Here’s to you and as ever sweet dreams and thanks for your ongoing support.

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©2013-2025 Arvin da Brgha.  All Rights Reserved.

Concrete Cabin.

Concrete Cabin  Oil on Canvas 198 x 275 cm 1994 Peter Doig

Oil on Canvas

198 x 275 cm

1994 Peter Doig

One of my favourite Peter Doig paintings.  I rather love it for being so quintessentially Canadian.  I am more readily reminded of Vancouver, rather than Toronto, as the Sitka-like evergreens – which are the soul of Stanley Park – are so not Toronto.

Happy New Year to every last one of you.  Thank you so very much for being focussed herein; your support is immensely encouraging.  Here’s to life, health, happiness and, of course, sweet dreams!  Nothing but the very best in 2016!  I love you more…

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© 2013-2025 Arvin da Brgha.  All Rights Reserved.

In Remembrance: Hugh Steers.

Breathing 1987

Breathing

Oil on Paper

11 x 15 in

1987 Hugh Steers

Provenance: Estate of Hugh Steers

Signature 1991

Signature

Oil on Canvas

66 x 56 in

1991 Hugh Steers

Provenance: Estate of Hugh Steers

Sick Room Hugh Steers 1990

Sick Room

Oil on Canvas

38.12 x 40

1990 Hugh Steers

Provenance: Estate of Hugh Steers

Hugh Steers Self Portrait 1987

Self-Portrait 

Charcoal and Watercolour on Paper

30 x 22 in

1987 Hugh Steers

Provenance: Estate of Hugh Steers.

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I have always loved the works of this young American Brahmin artist who was felled by AIDS – far too soon.  He was, of course, related by marriage to two of the most iconic Americans – at least for me – of the 20th Century: Gore Vidal (whose Michael Overleaves are to be found on the Michael Overleaves Appendix page) and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis – both of whom were king souls.

I remember… this World Aids Day, 2015

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© 2013-2025 Arvin da Brgha.  All Rights Reserved.

Man Changing into Thunderbird VI of VI

20150609_123817[1]

Oil on Canvas

© 1977 Norval Morrisseau

Provenance: The Leitz Collection,

Art Gallery of Ontario.

http://www.ago.net/

Love these works especially more so as they have been recently relocated within the gallery; they are better displayed now.  A true shaman of the first order, Norval Morrisseau.

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© 2013-2025 Arvin da Brgha.  All Rights Reserved.

Sick Room.

Sick Room Hugh Steers 1990

Oil on Canvas

38.1 x 40.0 Inches

© 1990, Hugh Steers

Provenance: Estate of Hugh Steers.

One of the most poignant AIDS-related paintings of the last century.  Truly moving.

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© 2013-2025 Arvin da Brgha.  All Rights Reserved.