A review of Mary Ann Tharaldsen’s Art Movie. Part One

There are so many “First off” things I can say about my ex-wife, Mary Ann Tharaldsen, and her apocalyptic Art. I have narrowed it down to three.

1. I love Mary Ann
2. She has a highly evolved sense of humor
3. My ex has an uncommon love for fresh two by fours

Now, let me mention my terrible character flaw. In order to bring order to my chaotic life I have foisted my need for calmness on those around me, especially those I love. The second biggest mistake of my life was being critical of the chaos I found in Mary Ann’s living room when I first enter there. Along one wall was salvaged pieces of wood, and freshly scented two by fours. I didn’t understand this was a work of art in progress. I should have taken a picture, and let it be.

“The Smithsonian will want a record of this.”

In the kitchen of the Victorian we rented, was THE ARTIST’S LOFT. I was impressed that a woman had built it. Mary Ann showed me her tools, many of them big manly electrified Black and Deckers. How could M resist this name? Words like Chanel No. 5 was not in M’s vocabulary. She owned a level.

M majored in architecture at Cornell. Her goal was not to be a WOMAN architect, or a WOMAN artist. If M has anger, it is at being typecast on a stage that automatically reduces women down to second class size. You can see in her video she is in command of The Stage. This is a resurrection, a healing, as her hands conduct the Orchestra of the Dead. Then, here come her laugh! This is the chuckle of a Mad Person who was determined to threaten normal folks the way crazy male artists threaten people. M was keenly aware how she rubbed people the wrong way.

Our ceilings were ten feet high, and if you climbed into the loft there was an attic of some kind with a cupboard door that opened into the living room. This was the Childrens’s Treehouse where Eric and Britt dwelt. I never climbed up there, I never mounted THE STAGE M built in the middle of the kitchen that rained down children while one was eating on it. There was no longer room for a normal kitchen table. This was a mobile made of two by fours, a jungle gym. The biggest mistake our family made, was we worried about being average. We were being watched. Need we ever wonder why?

In the video I found on the internet, M mentions she did a sculpture. In back of her along the wall, are fresh two by fours lined up like extras on a movie set, or, balletrinas waiting to dance on stage. These boards are Mary Ann’s props that are in a state of suspended animation. Something is going to happen with this lumber. In front of the lumber is M’s LOST ARTWORK that I have never seen! She never told me she was an APPOCOLYPTIC ARTIST. I have never beheld such chaos, such destruction, such madness and despair. Here is M’s Black Swan Song unveiled at last. But, is it too late? Did the world end as she knew it, a long time ago?

The LAST MESSAGE we exchanged on Facebook was full of hope that we might take up our relationship again, but, when she added this extension of the deal “No drama!” I just had to remind her what Judge Boutillini said just before he un-cuffed me from his desk.

“You’re just a victim of circumstances?”
“I was just an extra, Judge!”

In this photo I snipped from Youtube, we see THE LIVING WORK OF ART IN ACTION that I title;

‘The United States of Armageddon – with Old Stove’

You can’t go wrong with this All American title. What M has done in the fine example of Stage Art, is, rip-off Jasper John’s American Flag, with bulls-eye, and Grant Wood’s ‘American Gothic’. It is no mistake that M’s paintings up against the wall look like an American flag, but, instead of a hopeful field of stars (that can no longer be seen thru the pall of the nuclear winter) we have a the Wooden Stripes of Hope, being, we can rebuild after the ‘End Times’ if we have fresh two by fours – and employ clean lines. No more bullshit next time!

Did Jaspar invent minimalist art, or, just finalize it? In this photo we behold this truth. This genius has summed up what modern man is all about, the making of Absolute Nationalism with Glorified Church and the means to destroy it all so the Savior will come and save us – with a Fresh Start. Here is the God-head of Western Reconstruction. For dropping this atomic bomb on the Art World, Jaspar was given a Tiny-tot chair to sit in because he has taken away the talking-points of gallery dealers, and the critics, who needed a way to humiliate him because this is what they do – on the sly!

I will try not to do this in my review because Mary Ann may be the most humiliated artist of all time, and this may not take in the truth she is a woman, a mother, and the ex-wife of several men. Famous male artists are not required to be married, or take care of any children. M had to go to work to support herself and her children.

I have never seen these damaged works of art, never knew they existed. What they reveal to me, is, this artist tried to SAVE THE WORLD with HER art. The key word here is “her”, because, women are not allowed to try and save the world. The question here, is, does Mary Ann employ a secular philosophy to do this thing, or, has she borrowed from the church? I knew her as an atheist, but she could be a secret Christian Appologist.

Because we were Man & Wife, Mary Ann is kin to the men in this work by Heironymus Bosch who was employed by the church to render apocolyptic images. The Wedding Feast at Canna has been severely damaged and altered due to Iconagraphic Wars. Pieces of it were chopped off in order to get it to fit I a niche. The dancing dog was painted over an image of Pope Adrien, and I suspect our kindred, Gottschalk Rosemondt.

Mary Ann made some brilliant marriages, but, made a huge mistake in marrying Chuck, a right-wing upper-crust hot-shot San Francisco attorney who took my ex to the cleaners – with the help of his partner. Chuck was conducting Cultural Warfare against this brilliant artist before we met. Tharaldsen gave up her art that got put in storage where the roof leaked. I beheld this damage when I saw her large portrait of her friend, Mimi Farina.

If I am not mistaken, my ex is saying she was married to David Seidler the producer of ‘The King’s English’. This puts Tharaldsen at the epicenter of a very prestigious Cornell group. M was married to Thomas Pynchon, the good friend of Richard Farina. I can almost hear their discussion as the Soviet ships carrying nuclear missile, steams towards Cuba – the Bulls-eye of the Apocalypse.

Who can change the course of the End Times? The Kennedy brothers went to Harvard and gave America the idea that highly educated college students could change the world – and end the Cold War – by offering a better, more clean, and constructive CHOICE. These brothers, and Martin Luther King, were put in the bulls-eye of dark destructive men ‘The Anti-Artists. The End Times takes away ALL choice, but the choice to choose Jesus. Human Choice is so dirty and highly cluttered. Here is Hiroshima, and the attack on the World Trade Center. Ground ZERO! 911 is the work of a minimalist.

Target stores hired commercial artists to render a iconographic symbol, make a brand for our modern times – washed clean of our most lofty ideals. Gone is the cross and the swastika. But, there still is a rising, but, doomed sun – with Doomsday Eclipse! The days of owning free will, and being able to elude our fate, is over. Might as well go shopping.

On one of M’s paintings she wrote these words “NO PEACE”. America must rid itself of the idea there must be TOTAL WAR, before there can be peace. Appocolyptic writing came about when Judaic apologists could no longer employ a jumble of chaotic words, allegedly from God, to explain why there is such a thing as HUMAN HISTORY that was growing ever more indifferent to God. Mary Ann’s greatest sin, is, she is a very intelligent, and highly educated, Humanist. Many men want to see her fail.

The person that has helped M get her work back in the light, understands this is a historic event, but, she and M can’t quite put their finger on it. In this still-pic these two women pose like bookends and wave their hands over the dead who reach up to them.

“Save us!”

Take note the saviors make the infamous sign of the M that we find in the Grail lore Dan Brown exploited. Here is Poussin’s mysterious masterpiece that allegedly has educated folks identifying the tomb of Jesus, who for a little while, was a peace-loving hippie. Is this dude about be reborn as a Holy Jihad rages in Babylon? That M could stand for Mary Ann. But then, maybe not.

Jon Presco

Copyright 2014

Finding herself stuck between two droll and dusty bookends, two avant guard writers who expect at least one avant absurd poem from her, Lucia finds her breakout moment when she meets Antonin Artaud at the Moulin Rouge. Back at his garret they do mescaline together, in the form of Peyote buds Antonin has brought back from his trip to the States where he witnessed the Ghost Dance. Teaching her some of the moves, Lucia goes into a trance and into the future. In her vision quest she finds herself on the dance floor of the Filmore West gyrating to the Grateful Dead. The first Dead Head is born!