And the little yellow house we grew up in is no longer yellow,

and the apple trees are gone, but the conifers out back we dug

up elsewhere and planted seem to be still there, just bigger, like us. And

the house is on the market now for 2.5 million, just a little more than

the 2,500 dollars my mother paid for it in 1944. Oh well, things

change, people die and people are born. Slowly on...

Now... and then.

BULWINKLELAND CALIFORNIA USA

Contact Mark Bulwinkle Here

 

Mark Bulwinkle: My Life as an Artist

 

Homage to Big Dog

 

New Stuff

 

Homage to John Abdouljaami

 

"The Christmas Tree" by Wally Hedrick.

Created sometime in the mid 1950s in the

City of San Francisco, California. What does

this have to do with me? Well click on the link

and read on, friends, and you will find out.

Where do bicycles come from? Like fish, they spawn. 2001?

"Juggernaut" 1975 - 2010 With a tip of the hat

to Wally Hedrick's "Christmas Tree"

From "The Thrilla on Manila" (1981), and a bigger

tip of the hat. 15 years in the making before I tore it

down and left that life behind. And no, everybody, the

"City" did not "make" me take it down. Nobody made

me make it and nobody made me take it down. It was

just time to move on to somewhere else.

Him and Her who lived in the Thrillah on Manila - 1982

Zooks Lucretia - etching, 1968, edition 20

 

But Bulwinkle is still barking. RRRRwoof! -1980 -

Some things you just can not fix, Doctor Dog

At John Natsoulas Gallery in Davis, Ca.

Installed in and created in December 2022, 3' x20'

"FREEDUMB"

Damn! Feedumb crashed in cyclonic winds.

"Gone With the Wind"...so to paraphrase.

FreeDumb repurposed as a border fence at my

place in the Mojave Desert of California - 2023

 

Gate to Harrison House, Joshua Tree, California

at night in the winter of 2023

 

But, we have small woodcuts from 2022!

Instead of a crashed out "Freedumb,"

which has to make the city engineers in

Davis, California deleriously happy.

OK. He tried, so you can't make all of

the people happy all of the time. Paraphrasing

another paraphraser of paraphrases.

And, oh yeah, you can try to challenge nature,

but you will lose, sooner or later.

Onward and inward!

The Shoe Box

Marky B. in 1992 at Manila St. in Oakland's Rockridge.

It has seemed to me that artist's have always had a starting

point. For me, Wally Hedrick's Christmas Tree which stood

unexplained in the window of a small store front in San Francisco's

Inner Sunset district in 1971, was, at least with welded steel

sculpture, my starting point. The thing never left my mind,

and later, in 1975, when I began to weld, it was still there, like a

virus, waiting to attack me. And it did.

 

The Smoke Eaters Club of San Francisco. Picture taken back when

men and women did something for work other than key boarding.

The stoner on the far right is Jim Hardy, to whom I am deeply

indebted for getting me into being an artist on the West Coast,

but for further getting me into being a very accomplished smoke

eater myself. Happiness is where you find it. Or shall I say

that happiness is where you hid it, but forgot where you put it.

 

"The Aminals Go Golfing"

(My thanks to John Abduljaami for proper pronunciation)

!!!Yikes!!!

First be sure you are wrong, and then go ahead.

 

 

!!!YES!!!

Mountain Woman she live in a tree. "This is not my beautiful

home." Yes it is. You betcha is.

 

"The Aminals Go Golfing"

Hand cut steel with flintstone wheels at the Retreat Center

Joshua Tree in the Great Mojave Desert in Californa, USA

Enrico's Band Stand makes it to Pioneer Town in

the Mojave Desert. The new owner smiles deleriously.

Happy Birthday, Beautiful!

And thanks so much to Mal Sharpe! Too also!

Yahoo!!

 

Photo by Eva Soltes of Harrison House in Joshua Tree, California

Santa's Tam by Agnes Rettie of Alameda, California

 

Bulwinkleland in 1967 (woodcut) 24" x 30"

Printed with a wooden spoon on Sekishu rice paper.

Copies created, signed, and printed with a wooden

spoon by the artist are available by contacting

the John Natsoulas Gallery in Davis, Ca. $3500 ea.

 

Model for 12 x 27 foot relief painting completed in 2018

I love this thing. Sometimes a person can make art

without ever trying. Maybe that is our best work.

Without ever trying.

Somewhere in California Halloween seems alive forever.

 

1 Park Avenue Screens

 

Brand new work

 

Pvt Hardy's sketches/Vietnam 1969/1970

 

My front yard in the Mojave Desert

 

Photos, above and below, by Eva Soltes of Harrison House M,A,&E in Joshua Tree, California

When the temperature goes above 110 degrees in California,

kick back and let heaven flow

Marky B. in the White Water River

 

Over 6500 thrilled customers and counting

(Discontinued due to nudity portrayed on

small woodcut on the cover of the box.

Well, that took the heart from the lion.)

 

Just up the road from me in 29, a poem to desert varmints - 2021

 

1988 - Flame cut Sailor Screen - 8'x33', Oakland, Ca. This

thing created for Elsa Cameron of Comunity Arts traveled

here and there around the USA before finding a resting place

in Woodside, California. Who knows where it is now. Maybe

at some sex worker rancheria in Nevada? Hope so.

Just gimme the leftovers

Dare to be Dumb

Saint Bully

Thanks to Laurel Bellon for these two pics from the early 70s

From 5333 Manila St., Oakland, Ca. 1975

From "Fine Homebuilding" issue 10, 1982

That fine home builder himself in 1992...

Wooly Bully amputating the heart from Bulwinkleland in 1992

Burning Down the House

 

Pharoah Marky

Biker Boy Bulwinkle in 1949

Out there, weight is a factor

Please do not doubt the veractity of my re-orting here, but I did

too seen this drone way out there in the wilderness of California.

For this biker boy things really have not changed that much

 

Some stuff from Bulwinkleland in 2020

"What happens to all your stuff when you die?" - Andy Warhol

Wish I was that kid. Maybe I am. Just a kid.

 

The Sexy Star in Joshua Tree

So long, Clayton. It 's a lot lonelier without you on the planet.

You and Betty, and the rest, you were the best.

Really Ruff Stuff

 

Me and doggies at Perry's Desert Rat Club in Wonder Valley

Truly a WONDER OF WONDERS

Ornametal Iron Works

ArtsyFartsyLand

My Norumbega Park

The Rock Houses of Boron

Aluminum Cuts 2020

Serving irrational thoughts to the public since 1967

I welcome you to the website of Mark Bulwinkle,

the inventor of rust. Proceed with caution.

Contact Mark Bulwinkle

As a teacher, it is so nice to hear the excitement in a students voice when they are discovering how to work with clay. That is what art and craft is for. To lift our spirits, if only momentarily, is enough to carry us through the doldrums of daily life. It is for many what art and craft is for.

And this:

"I don't want to be a millionaire. I just want to live like one." - Pablo Picasso

 

"The trouble with you is you want to do whatever you want to do." - Former art dealer

 

"Once you have worked in a sausage factory you will never eat sausage again" - Mark Bulwinkle

 

"What is an artist? That's some fool with too much time on his hands." - Joseph Stalin

 

"You know what it takes to be an artist? Hypersensitivity and the will of the devil. To never give up." - Alice Neel

 

"I have always depended on the kindness of strangers." - Blanche DuBois

 

"BlaBlaBlaBla, Bla." - George Edward Bulwinkle Jr.

 

"You will be an artist." - George Edward Bulwinkle Sr.

 

"Instead of wasting money buying a house, you could buy a Corvette and live in it." GEB 3rd

 

Visit The Trailer

The rusty old dog himself, Mark Elliott Bulwinkle

Photo by Jon Rosen

 

11" x 16" / woodcut printed with a wooden spoon on rice paper (1967)

 

Fifty-five years ago that rusty old dog, above, created this woodcut

print and began a life of trying to be an artist. Many, many

thousands of images later the stubborn old fool is still trying

to be an artist, just because that is what we do.

Latest painting, 9' x 25' x 1'- 2018 - wood,acrylic,aluminum

For a larger image click here

My patron, John Hamilton, Me, and Libby Schaaf, the Mayor

of Oakland, California, standing in front of

"My Song of Oakland." 2019

Oh dear, my old neighborhood is gone forever. Again.

Whoops!

And so is he.

Que Serra Serra...

 

Bulwinkleland in the Mojave

Two dogs playing chew

What's in that coffee?

See Windwinkles in Joshua Tree, California

Boilermaker welding students wearing virtual reality masks

Hey. Shit happens. Then you gotta fix it.

 

 

"The Clients"

Sometimes people ask, "Who buys this stuff." Me, I says, "Just regular people."

They buy my stuff. They support this artist. Just like it should be.

Two old boilermaker-welders 2018

Picture taken at Danny Macchiarini's historical studio in North Beach, San Francisco

Old welders never die. They just shut their power off.

The last of the Mohicans, welder Mark MacDonald, in front of his shop

on Blake Street in Berkeley, California. His power is still on in 2020.

Life can be good if you let it. This be a fine car to drive after, during, and before a war.

Who's more beat up, me or the car? This car will indeed outlast dear me.

 

God's Plants

Rafflesia pricei, photographed with an i-phone by Richard Ward at the end of July,

2012, not far from Kola Kinabalu, Borneo. Not to copy, not to imitate, but to attempt to

emulate the way of nature is so often the artist's calling. This curious habit in itself

can make one's life, which can sometimes seem so hollow and meaningless, instead

sumptuous and worthwhile. For some of us, that is why we attempt to do art and craft.

 

Bulwinkleland in 2014 in Oakland, California.

"Well, bein' there is no other place around the place, I reckon, this must be the place, I reckon.

Nyuk nyuk nyuk! " - Curly Howard of The Three Stooges

The Neighbor Kids

Above - the neighbor kids back in the old days practicing their moves in front of Bulwinkleland

They be all growed up now - kids a their own! Life goes on, yes it does.

Jim Hardy

The man centered in the picture below, at the left, is Jim Hardy. Jim first got me interested

in welding as an occupation after art school. He told me you could cut steel with a torch

and paint it with enamel. That's one of Jim's old pieces pictured at right. I credit Jim with

getting me into the mess I am in now. Always give credit where credit is due, I say. Jim's bridge

is also pictured below. Life can be OK if you can take the punches and savor the rest.

 

Sadie Hazelkorn and me on top of Jim Hardy's Big Red Bridge in 2015. Never look down.

Tall Paul (Rest in peace, TP)

Tall Paul Brown, a neighbor, and his homemade tall bike. If an artist can't make

his own work, he shouldn't make it. All else is not art but propaganda for a you who is not.

You can find Mr. Brown riding his art most days and nights in and around the streets

of west Oakland hunting down some stray money, just like all the other artists in the world.

A dominant culture can do its damndest to crush another physically weaker culture,

but it can never repress the spirit of that culture. Live long, Tall Paul Brown!

Left to right - Mark Bulwinkle, Briana Kaufman, and Peter Neufeld - Telegraph Ave. 2017

 

Below, Bulwinkle Plaza, Emeryville, California. Art in a public place. 1993.

Below, some Photos of the Show in Joshua Tree, California, spring 2012

Birds over Birds at Harrison House, spring 2012

 

Music for Birds

Full moon over Joshua Tree, Ca.

 

Mark Bulwinkle and his two assistants, Bouncer and Doo Dah, in 1998

Centered at Dawn

Centered at dawn in hot water is Barbara Gregory in Shoshone, California.

Agua Caliente Woman. It seems important in life to like life,

at least once in a while. There will come plenty of

reasons to despise it.

 

Red Rock Beach. Dan Ellsberg's favorite beach. Mine too. End of summer/fall, 2014.

 

"Art is just another name for reorganized debri" - Howler Cat

"The Bureaucrats' Nightmare"

Morning fog with orange cat at Bulwinkleland, 2011(click on The Steel Nursery, below)

 

Early August is sunflower time in California. Too soon the celebration always ends.

Flowerland

The Great California Italian Pizza Plant, 2012

 

Ms Opposum and Ms Doggie dancing in Napa, California in 2013

Only in art will the lion lie down with the lamb, and the rose grow

without thorn. - Martin Amis, from Isaiah 11:6.

Thick Boy moves to the suburbs

"Blood Money," an autobiographical poem to a well squandered life,

in rust. 1975 - 2010

Late fall, above, at Bulwinkleland, in Oakland, and below,

The Land of Broken Promises.

I can fix a lot of stuff but these, and a broken heart, I cannot fix.

Ever.

Click on The Land of Broken Promises (above)

 

e-mail Mark Bulwinkle here

 

Germs and Viruses

Drink muddy water

Windwinkles at Joshua Tree 2013

Tin Can Cut Outs

An Artist's Statement

A Brief Artist's Autobiography

Bulwinkle Plaza, Emeryville/Oakland, Ca

ornametalironworks.com

Bug Art

Bulwinkle's Paw Prints

Old work already/2011

Old work also/2012

Pretty New Work 2016

Recent Small Sculpture

Burning Down the House

Sexy Seventies Postcards

People Page

The Coffee Shop Screens

The Steel Nursery

Ceramic Tiles

New Postcards (2009)

Classic Bulwinkle Postcards

Woodblock Prints

The Rootabaga Shadow Puppets

Stoneware Tiles

Children's Subway Tiles in Boston

A walk around the garden in August

Flowerland

Official PayPal Seal

All contents copyright Mark Bulwinkle, first publication, 2009

Click on each picture below and above to see what that picture is thinking!

"Everybody wants to have a goal: I gotta get to that goal, I gotta get to that goal,

I gotta get to that goal. Then you get to that goal, and then you gotta get to

another goal. But in betweeen goals is a thing called life that has to be lived

and enjoyed - and if you don't, you're a fool." - Cid Caesar, 1922-2014

The Charlie Bukowski MeToo Dancers

 

Brunhilde Bulwinkle arriving in America...

Shortly before two people in this picture(below)

got together in the State O' Maine

some 100 years ago and decided to

create more Bulwinkles

 

Dooh-Dah, best friend and most valued art critic I have ever known.

"No government or corporate sponsored person or committee will ever have any

interest in finding or establishing the truth about anything. They will only ever be

interested in inventing truth. If you want to find out the truth about anything,

you must think your truth up yourself and be satisfied with it. Woooof."

"Oh no, another random thought."

A dishonest bar tender is more useful than an honest doctor any day.

Hearts my garden grows hearts for me.

Bouncer the big boned gal . Such a fine and

beauteous face. She don't need no lipstick to

stoke my boiler, no. RRRwooof!! Rrrr.

Life Against Death in California - for Brother Bill Holst

In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king.

Trust, unlike a shattered ceramic tile, can always be repaired.

Someday.

Recent steel screens, 2014

Photo by Richard Whitaker

It ain't nothin' if it ain't free. Maybe.

I think really I am too young to be restored. Really?

As much as I have tried to out run the clock, it has still caught me.

My song of innocence. My song of experience. Life has run me down.

At every turn in the trail time awaits. Patient as a cat. Good for life.

L'chaim

MB - 1965 - 2018

 

"Your ongoing courtesies are deeply appreciated"

Try this nail in your coffin

 

Click on the above links for more of Bulwinkle. Thanks!