Art Matters: The Worlds of Toc Fetch and Tricia Cline

"The Exile and The Path Of The Mouse Arive" Tricia Cline

Toc Fetch: Book in Progress

Hold on. I do have a concept of ample. It means enough, even more than enough in certain instances. But when I walked into Tricia Cline’s studio, half mile off a main road in Woodstock, I looked for the barrels of clay, paints or glazes, boxes of tools, models, books and the likes. Instead, dog skulls are lined up along a beam, seated in a corner is a funky but proud and obedient manikin waiting for a raison d’etre, a computer, the model , a couch for sitting and sleeping, small table for tea sipping or whatever, a woodstove and work all around. I looked for drawers, secret places , the hidden accoutrements of a working artist , but no luck – elegantly spare. My heart raced to catch up to the unexpected, only to suspect that Tricia Cline’s inner life, is her artwork and that would never fit into a drawer. The animals, people, saints, imaginary “visitations, lucid dreaming, the “perfected archetypes” inside of her, come to life in beautifully crafted unglazed porcelain clay figures. I don’t know how. They just do. (Although she does teach it at the Woodstock School of Art.) Believe it or not, the fiction rests not as much on symbolisms but on a religious fidelity to form and (could it be?) ingenuousness.
Animals, people, odd and out-of-date clothing, faintly recognizable gestures, no color to confuse us. Is it a movie? Or a song? A prayer? Is it God? Is it a self- portrait or maybe, me? Oh, I know. It’s a storybook without the book and I don’t get to write it. Why does her work feel so personal to me? I never really thought about being a (female) pope or strapping an elephant to my back – which is more compelling than it is amusing. I would certainly not wear those clothes. I remember my grandma’s home, full of porcelain dolls collected from her worldly travels – staring at them for hours as a child, enchanted by the delicacy of form and detail, clothing from faraway dreams. They were real to me - dolls to look at, admire and pretend with. Tricia Cline’s art is not like that. It speaks another language, not my own, but somehow connected. It’s more like a missile, destined for deep insides, where metaphors challenge assumptions and hard core beliefs. Tricia’s work is alive. I think that her subconscious is asking my subconscious to romp – like we do with dolphins, maybe. (Hmm. What are those twitching sort of dreams that dogs seem to have. Who were their ancestors and which are their archetypes? Something about humans strapped to their backs…. )
Speaking of romping, Toc Fetch (a.k.a. Joseph Stubblefield) makes his entrance into Cline’s studio with a ‘can’t –wait- to- get- into- this’ look on his face. Having seen only one reproduction of his work on a gallery announcement, I assumed he was a picture maker. The reference to his work - Diamond Comic Distributors - as if I knew what he was talking about, set me into a bit of a head spin. A comic book artist? Well, that would be a maker of pictures - plus narrative, plus color, plus framing and pacing. Then he goes on to tell me how he is or was a “juicer” in film production and how his art evolved from shooting stories to making collages. He now works from video stills to create elaborately (remarkable actually) crafted pencil drawings. But this is the thing. That which he does is entrancing enough, but there is so much more to it than comic books or large graphite drawings: It is entry into his personal space that transports us, straight-a-way, into a playful and cleverly designed parade of characters and dialogue. And how does he accomplish this? Only an artist who takes the journey inside himself, over and over and over again, can observe that“…nothing holds the silent life of observation-in-light better than pencil……very conducive to trance work, my work.”
Why does River Scout Finnegan look like Tricia Cline? Metaphorically, depending on your birth year, it’s up for grabs. But, rule is, you have to stay with Toc and try to listen to his voice. I’m thinking that there are things happening in Toc’s lucid dream world that can help us to get away from our provincial small selves by way of familiarity with his art. Tricia as subject belongs to both of them. They share her,, (forgive me, Tricia) like the chair in Van Gogh’s famous painting of his room, (you brought it up) which is merely the subject, not the meaning of the painting. The chair is everybody’s chair, Tricia Cline (in their works) belongs to everyone and the voices of Toc Fetch’s characters are all of us speaking. We, the audience, are the ones that give it meaning…..or not.
What is the difference between Tricia and Toc? They seem to be spirit mates of a high order. Tricia is like a sentience seeker. She sees “things”. Toc Fetch, too, has imaginary visitors. He hears them. Their work is earth and sky, and we, the audience, can stand wherever we want.
Tricia Cline and Joseph Stubblefield (a.k.a.) Toc Fetch) are represented by the Roger Ricco/Maresca Gallery on West 20th Street in Manhattan, as well as the Obsolete gallery in Venice California. You can view work at the gallery website: www.riccomaresca.com, or check out www.tocfetch.com to see both, as well.