Music, animation and text by Dana Lyn

A Point on a Slow Curve

Available at http://www.danalynmusic.bandcamp.com

“wonderfully prismatic” – Michael Azerrad

Bay Area artist Jay DeFeo had one guideline when she began painting The Rose: to create “an idea that had a center.” Her sole focus for eight years, it bloomed into a 12.7 x 8 foot, one foot-thick mixed-media monument, weighing over a ton. It is a creation piece, the story of it in layers piled on top of each other. She fed The Rose not only $5300 worth of paint and epoxy but barrettes, cigarettes, wire, beads and apparently a can of beans. By 1965, she could no longer afford her monthly rent and was evicted, and The Rose was forklifted out of her apartment and transported to The Pasadena Museum of Art, where she continued to work on the painting for an additional three months. Due to its unwieldy proportions and structural fragility, DeFeo was unable to find The Rose a home, and the painting languished in the basement of the San Francisco Institute of Art, entombed and forgotten, for over 25 years. In 1995, six years after DeFeo’s death, The Rose was bought and restored by the Whitney Museum and is now regarded as a seminal work of contemporary art.

When I tell people this story, common responses are “she seems tortured” and “she must have been mentally ill.” When I write music, I adopt a protective, reclusive mindset; I feel that this could be the last thing I ever do in my life. Many writers and composers I know cocoon themselves similarly. Why is it crazy to be passionate about what you are creating, to never let up, until you feel you that you have finished? And then… when do you know you have finished? Would the answer be different if one had no deadlines, no pressing financial obligations, no ‘career’ to think about? If DeFeo were a man, would she instead be looked at as a genius and celebrated for her commitment to her work?

“A Point on a Slow Curve” is inspired by the creation story of The Rose. Scored for four female voices, violin, clarinet, cello, bassoon, vibraphone, upright bass and drums, it is presented in eight movements, one for each year that DeFeo worked on The Rose, plus a coda entitled “Removal”, inspired by the removal of the painting from DeFeo’s apartment. This has become one of those situations when life starts to mirror art; I started this endeavor by writing a short piece inspired by The Rose in 2013 for a string trio. Since then, I have tacked more and more onto it, all the while struggling with the instrumentation, orchestration and direction of the piece. I finally arrived at what I think this piece should be; it was recorded in the fall of 2021 and released on Feb. 18, 2022, via In a Circle Records. I am so grateful for the musicians who have worked with me as I developed this piece over the years: Mike McGinnis on clarinet, Sara Schoenbeck on bassoon, Hank Roberts on cello, Gary Wang on bass, Patricia Brennan on vibes and Noel Brennan on drums. Special thanks to Danielle Buonaiuto, Madeline Healey, Catherine Hedberg and Elizabeth Merrill for their gorgeous singing. 

This is Movement IV, titled “Daytime Atheist.”

Sirens of doubt and unease
Drowning the memory of sleep achieved
Of evenings perched
a distance away from our dreams

What I believe falls to nothing
When thoughts like these uninvited
are cited, ten thousand nights
we lurch towards a state of reprieve

Calm were the nights before these
When we accepted what we couldn’t see
Halfway believing we blend with the rainfall
We become part of the chord

What I believe in the daylight
Makes me forget how in nighttime
I resign but still cannot find
A way in and out of extremes

For more information about Jay DeFeo, please visit the Jay DeFeo Foundation website.

The composition of POSC was made possible by the American Composers Forum through funds from the Jerome Foundation; the recording of POSC was made with support from: The NYC Women’s Fund for Media, Music and Theatre by the City of New York Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment in association with The New York Foundation for the Arts’s NYC Women’s Fund for Media, Music and Theater.